rm or its
equivalent declaring that the Wilmot Proviso or the repeal of the
fugitive-slave law would lead the South to "resist even (as a last
resort) to a disruption of every tie which binds her to the Union".
Southern disunion sentiment was not sporadic or a party matter; it was
endemic.

The disunion sentiment in the North was not general; but Garrison,
publicly proclaiming "I am an abolitionist and therefore for the
dissolution of the Union", and his followers who pronounced "the
Constitution a covenant with death and an agreement with hell",
exercised a twofold effect far in excess of their numbers. In the North,
abolitionists aroused bitter antagonism to slavery; in the South
they strengthened the conviction of the lawfulness of slavery and the
desirability of secession in preference to abolition. "The abolition
question must soon divide us", a South Carolinian wrote his former
principal in Vermont. "We are beginning to look upon it [disunion] as
a relief from incessant insult. I have been myself surprised at the
unusual prevalence and depth of this feeling." [3] "The abolition
movement", as Houston has pointed out, "prevented any considerable
abatement of feeling, and added volume to the current which was to
sweep the State out of the Union in 1860." [4] South Carolina's ex-governor,
Hammond, wrote Calhoun in December, 1849, "the conduct of the
abolitionists in congress is daily giving it [disunion] powerful aid".
"The sooner we can get rid of it [the union] the better." [5] The
conclusion of both Blair of Kentucky and Winthrop [6] of Massachusetts,
that "Calhoun and his instruments are really solicitous to break up the
Union", was warranted by Calhoun's own statement.

Calhoun, desiring to save the Union if he could, but at all events to
save the South, and convinced that there was "no time to lose", hoped
"a decisive issue will be made with the North". In February, 1850, he
wrote, "Disunion is the only alternative that is left us." [7] At last
supported by some sort of action in thirteen Southern states, and in
nine states by appointment of delegates to his Southern Convention,
he declared in the Senate, March 4, "the South, is united against the
Wilmot proviso, and has committed itself, by solemn resolutions, to
resist should it be adopted". "The South will be forced to choose
between abolition and secession." "The Southern States... cannot remain,
as things now are, consistently with honor and safety, in th