The Constitutional Union Party in Texas
Author(s): James Alex Baggett
Source: The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Vol. 82, No. 3 (Jan., 1979), pp. 233-264
Published by: Texas State Historical Association
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/30238588 .
Accessed: 14/11/2013 14:12
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .
http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp
.
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of
content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms
of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].
.
Texas State Historical Association is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to The
Southwestern Historical Quarterly.
http://www.jstor.org
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
The Constitutional Union Party in Texas
JAMES ALEX BAGGETT*
IN
THE MID-1850S MANY CONSERVATIVESOUTHERNWHIGS FOUND THEM-
selves adrift without a political haven. The American party with its
platform of nativism and nationalism, which many of them had supported, crashed on the same rock that had earlier destroyed the Whig
coalition: the controversyover slavery'sexpansion.Yet from the political
wreckageof the American party (commonlycalled the Know-Nothing
party), spokesmen emerged demanding another national party. These
leadersdesired to provide a political home for a group isolated from the
Democraticpartyby tradition and doubtlessby the fact that they lacked
influenceor opportunitywithin the Democraticparty.Still, the builders
of the new partydid have an ideologicalrationaleas well as a pragmatic
reason for the founding of another party.While differingon many matters, these leaders generally feared sectional political parties and they
had, for the most part, reacheda consensusregardingslaveryin the territories: the institution of slaveryhad reachedits natural geographical
limits. Therefore, its extension was a pseudo-issuebeing exploited by
self-servingpoliticians who were impeding debate on the more important matters of industry, agriculture,and commerce.1
A recent article by John V. Mering has provided some balance to
earlieraccountsof southern politics in 186o. Meringcontends that "the
Constitutional Union party'sreputationfor distinctive antisecessionism
... derives from a fallacious interpretationof the campaign of i86o as
*James Alex Baggett is associate professor of history at Union University, Jackson, Tennessee.
1John B. Stabler, "A History of the Constitutional Union Party: A Tragic Failure"
(Ph.D. dissertation, Columbia University, 1954), 29-30, 222, 728-729; Allan Nevins, The
Emergence of Lincoln (2 vols.; New York, 1950), II, 58-64; Roy Franklin Nichols, The
Disruption of American Democracy (New York, 1948), 340. Not a single book has been
published on the Constitutional Union party, and only Stabler has written a dissertation
dealing exclusively with the party and giving a description of the party's origin and development. For a detailed defense of the geographical limits of slavery position see Charles
W. Ramsdell, "The Natural Limits of Slavery Expansion," Mississippi Valley Historical
Review, XVI (Sept., 1929), 151-171. Some of the rationale for the founding of the new
party was doubtless a carry-over from its Whig and Know-Nothing antecedents. For example, the 1856 Texas Know-Nothing party platform expressed "opposition to the formation
or encouragement of sectional or geographical parties ... ." Ernest William Winkler (ed.),
Platforms of Political Parties in Texas (Austin, 1916), 69.
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
234
Southwestern Historical
Quarterly
a referendum on secession in the South." He demonstrates that the Constitutional Unionists often voiced strong proslavery sentiments regarding federal protection of slavery and he argues that because of this
extremism northern conservatives refused to ally themselves with the
party. Moreover, he concludes that all of the contending parties in the
South contained lovers of the Union and that large numbers of them
voted for the Democrat John C. Breckinridge. Finally he indicates that
the leaders of the Constitutional Union party were primarily interested
in furthering "their political fortunes." Most of Mering's statements are
doubtless valid; yet many of his deductions are debatable. For example,
when he denies that real differences existed between the Democratic
and Constitutional Union parties, he has confused temporary tactics
and campaign rhetoric with a political record of national conservatism
and of pro-Union principle. Appeals to the same voters did bring the
parties closer together in their pronouncements (and perhaps in outlook). Nevertheless, this sharing of constituencies did not cause the
parties to become absolutely alike either in the way the voters perceived
them or in the way they perceived themselves. It is true, of course, that
many unionists voted for Breckinridge; but it is equally true that almost
all well-known secessionists were in the Democratic party, and that in
the crisis of 1861 antisecessionist and moderate leadership was generally
provided by those of the Whig tradition. Finally, the fact that the Constitutional Union party received little support in the North does not
conclusively prove Mering's contention that northern conservatives
were driven from the Constitutional Union movement by southern
extremism within the party. Rather it seems just as conceivable that by
the years 1858-186o the conservative wing of the Republican party had
already won the support of most northern conservatives and Whigs.2
Many Whigs were among the numerous newcomers to Texas following independence and statehood; and despite the fact that nationally
the Whig party had not championed the annexation of Texas nor the
Mexican War, that party's candidate (Zachary Taylor) received 31 per2John V. Mering, "The Slave-State Constitutional Unionists and the Politics of Consensus," Journal of Southern History, XLIII (Aug., 1977), 395, 396 (quotations), 397-410o.
For examples of works which consider the Constitutional Union party's contribution to the
unionist movement see the following: Stabler, "Constitutional Union Party"; Ollinger
Crenshaw, The Slave States in the Presidential Election of i86o (Baltimore, 1945); Thomas
B. Alexander, "Persistent Whiggery in the Confederate South, 186o-1877," Journal of
Southern History, XXVII (Aug., 1961), 305-329; Robert Gray Gunderson, Old Gentleiien's Convention: The Washington Peace Conference of 1861 (Madison, 1961); Nevins,
The Emergence of Lincoln, II, 261-262; and Avery O. Craven, The Coming of the Civil
War (New York, 1942), 416-418.
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
Constitutional
Union Party in Texas
235
cent of the state's vote in the 1848 presidential election. After 1848,
however, the road for Texas Whigs, as for the party as a whole, appears to have been downhill. Whigs did remain active, however. In
1851 the Whig gubernatorial candidate, Benjamin H. Epperson, a
Clarksville lawyer and former state legislator, was badly beaten; and the
next year Winfield Scott, the Whig presidential nominee, received only
26 percent of the Texas vote. Although the defeated Whig candidate
for governor in 1853, William Ochiltree, a Nacogdoches lawyer, ran a
respectable second-place race, the party had by that time been destroyed
at the national level. Most Texas Whigs rallied to support the American or Know-Nothing party in the mid-185os, as did southern Whigs
generally. Unable to win state elections because of their smaller numbers, however, the Whig/ Know-Nothings combined with Sam Houston's
dissatisfied and disaffected union Democrats who after the mid-185os
generally rejected the regular state Democratic convention, possibly because of their minority status within the party.3
After the death of the national Whig party most southern Whigs
tended to vote for the national party which seemed most intimately
identified with the defunct party-that
is, for the American party in
Union
and
the
Constitutional
party in 186o. The Texas Constitu1856
tional Union party was composed primarily of Texas Whigs who continued to vote along traditional party lines. Some scholars have sought
to find a close relationship between the 186o presidential vote in Texas
and the 1861 referendum vote on secession.4 A close correlation does
not exist, however, because in 186o both Democrats and Whigs voted
along party lines rather than along lines of ideology and interest. But
in the 1861 referendum, when voters were less encumbered by party
labels and had a clear-cut decision to make regarding secession, the
factors of state sectionalism, class interest, and ethnic solidarity were
more decisive. Although party affiliation should not be discounted as a
3Walter Prescott Webb, H. Bailey Carroll, and Eldon Stephen Branda (eds.), Tile Handbook of Texas (3 vols.; Austin, 1952, 1976), II, 893; Charles William Ramsdell, "The Frontier and Secession," Studies in Southern History and Politics (New York, 1914), 67; Earl
Wesley Fornell, The Galveston Era: The Texas Crescent on the Eve of Secession (Austin,
1961), 268-269; George W. Paschal to George W. Smyth, May 9, 186o, George Washington
Smyth Papers (Archives, University of Texas Library, Austin); Anna Irene Sandbo, "Beginnings of the Secession Movement in Texas," Southwestern Historical Quarterly, XVIII
(July, 1914), 73; Randolph Campbell, "The Whig Party of Texas in the Elections of 1848
and 1852," Southwestern Historical Quarterly, LXXIII (July, 1969), 21, 25.
4Frank H. Smyrl, "Unionism in Texas, 1856-1861," Southwestern Historical Quarterly,
LXVIII (Oct., 1964), 172-195; Allan C. Ashcraft, "East Texas in the Election of 186o and
the Secession Crisis," East Texas Historical Journal, I (July, 1963), 7-16.
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
Southwestern Historical
236
Quarterly
factor in the 1861 decision-making process, it was simply one of many
elements (and probably not the most important) which determined why
Texans voted for or against secession.
During the late 1850s several congressmen and newspapermen sought
to mold the nation's Whig and conservative elements into a potent
political force. The most active were Senator John J. Crittenden of
Kentucky and Washington journalist Nathan Sargent, the secretary of
the American Party Central Committee. Among those associated with
Sargent in this so-called "Opposition party" was Lemuel D. Evans, a
recently defeated Texas Know-Nothing congressman from Marshall,
who was a friend and supporter of Sam Houston.5
While still poorly organized, Opposition groups entered northern
and southern state elections in 1858 and 1859. The results proved to be
largely negative, particularly in the North where most Whigs and KnowNothings had become Republicans. Yet in the Upper South the Opposition party made an impressive showing, and in the Lower South party
organization developed which could be utilized in the 186o presidential
election. Particularly noteworthy was the August 1859 Texas election
in which Sam Houston's curious coalition of Union Democrats, old-line
Whigs, Know-Nothings, and Germans triumphed over the fire-eateroriented Democratic regulars. Houston's popularity as a hero-figure,
together with the failure of the regular Democratic administration to
deal with frontier defense, and the activities of many party regulars,
who still supported the reopening of foreign slave trade (opposed by
most Texans), led to a Houston victory.,
The Opposition victory in Texas, however, was not total; Houston's
enemies still controlled the state legislature; and in November the regular Democrats in the legislature elected a politician perceived by many
to be the state's chief spokesman of secessionism, Louis T. Wigfall of
Marshall, to the United States Senate. Most importantly, unionist sentiment reflected by Houston's gubernatorial victory was weakened by the
raid by John Brown on Harpers Ferry, Virginia; for Texans came to
view the Harpers Ferry attack as indicative of the northern attitude toward slavery. Furthermore, despite the 1859 triumph at the polls, the
Union Party," 20-21, 100-101, 307-308, 343; Albert D. Kirwan,
5Stabler, "Constitutional
John J. Crittenden: The Struggle for the Union (Lexington, Kentucky, 1962), 346-349.
GStabler, "Constitutional
Union
Party,"
172,
185-186,
192,
220,
349, 37,
380o; Nevins,
The
Emergence of Lincoln, II, 65-68; True Issue (La Grange), June 1, 8, 1-, 186o; Frank H.
Smyrl, "Unionism in Texas, 1856-1861," Southwestern Historical Quarterly, LXVIII (Oct.,
1964), 176; Ramsdell, "The Frontier and Secession," 66-67; Fornell, The Galveston Era,
225-229,
269-270,
273.
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
Constitutional
Union Party in Texas
237
unionist coalition was unable to persuade many additional regular
Democrats to join their movement for a new or reorganized state Democratic party. Particularly devastating to the Houston forces had been the
unwillingness of popular East Texas Congressman John H. Reagan,
who had taken a strong union stance in his recent congressional election
victory, to abandon the regulars and support the Houston faction. Reagan believed that in any reorganized party,
its ruling element would be opposed to real Democracy .... [and] that any
effort to reorganize a Union or National Democratic Party will leave the
great body of the present Democratic party with the present organization
with conservative as well as extreme men. The whole nation has become
disgusted at the formation of new political parties with which to defeat the
Democratic party. And whatever the patriotism and however fine the objects
of those who would undertake such a movement it would be regarded by
the masses as another opposition movement. And it would be joined by the
opposition men and shunned by the Democrats for the same reason.7
In the winter of 1859-1860 the Texas press reported a series of northeastern union meetings which were seeking to allay southern fears that
John Brown's raid represented prevailing northern sentiment. The Corsicana Navarro Express reported that "ever since the Harper's [sic]
Ferry insurrection, Union conservative meetings have been the rage
among the people of the Northern States." These rallies were utilized
by the Opposition faction in the North to further the cause of the
Unionist movement, whose seed had been
embryonic Constitutional
earlier.
Such
planted
meetings provided a good climate for the party's
birth and formal announcement.8
At about the same time active public support surfaced for the Houston presidential candidacy. In early December, 1859, three of his sup7Reagan to G. W. Paschal, June 26, 1859; Reagan to Albert H. Latimer, Aug. 26, 1859
(quotation [italics added]), typed transcription, John H. Reagan Papers (Archives, University of Texas Library, Austin); Sandbo, "Secession Movement in Texas," 66; Smyrl,
"Unionism in Texas," 176; State Gazette (Austin), Sept. 24, 1859; Texas Republican (Marshall), Sept. 17, 1859; Guy M. Bryan to Moses Austin Bryan, Aug. 15, 1859, Guy M. Bryan
Papers (Archives, University of Texas Library, Austin); Ben H. Procter, Not Without
Honor: The Life of John H. Reagan (Austin, 1962), 111-112; J. W. Throckmorton to
Epperson, Aug. 18, 1859, Benjamin H. Epperson Papers (Archives, University of Texas
Library, Austin). For the relationship (or rather lack of relationship) between John
Brown's raid and Wigfall's election to the United States Senate, see Billy D. Ledbetter,
"The Election of Louis T. Wigfall to the United States Senate, 1859: A Reevaluation,"
Southwestern Historical Quarterly, LXXVII (Oct., 1973), 241-254.
8True Issue (La Grange), Jan. 6, 20, 27, Feb. 17, 186o; Ranchero (Corpus Christi), Dec.
31, 1859; Standard (Clarksville), Jan. 28, 186o; Navarro Express (Corsicana), Feb. 4, 186o
(quotation); Galveston Civilian and Gazette, Feb. 14, i86o; Stabler, "Constitutional Union
Party," 300.
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
238
Southwestern Historical
Quarterly
porters answered an important Opposition party strategy circular by
visiting the party's Washington national headquarters. On December
20, the night before Houston's inauguration as governor, a previously
announced public rally took place at Buaas Hall and Garden in Austin
to recommend Houston for president. According to the anti-Houston
Austin State Gazette, only about 250 people were present. Thirty of
Houston's supporters in the legislature were listed in the proceedings
of the meeting. The inclement weather and lack of accommodations
may have prevented better attendance. Although the proceedings were
called the "Mass Meeting of the National Democracy of Texas," the
State Gazette reported that "with the exception of Maj. Bogart, all the
speakers we believe, have been whigs or know nothings." The group
met again at the Capitol on the night of the twenty-second and adopted
resolutions which among other things, recommended Houston for president. Some participants wanted to select Houston presidential electors, but they were overruled. The group heard a speech given by
Benjamin H. Epperson, recognized an important out-of-state visitor,
Leslie Combs of Kentucky (a Whig and onetime speaker of the Kentucky House of Representatives), and appointed a committee of correspondence to write to the friends of Sam Houston throughout the
Union .
Meanwhile, at a series of December and January conferences in the
nation's capital, Opposition leaders successfully solicited the blessings
of the largely inactive but still official American and Whig executive
committees to form a new political party, the Constitutional Union
party. They also called for a national nominating convention and established the mechanics for the party's organization at the state and national levels. On February 22 the national committee issued an address
"To the People of the United States," which included a justification of
the party's existence: since neither the Democratic nor the Republican
party were truly national parties, neither could be "safely entrusted
9Stabler, "Constitutional Union Party," 267, 313-914; Crenshaw, Slave States in the Election, 288; State Gazette (Austin), Dec. 24 (quotation), 31, 1859; Red Land Express (San
Augustine), May ig, 186o; Matagorda Gazette, Jan. 4, 186o; William P. De Normandie to
A. J. Hamilton, Dec. 29, 1859, Jan. 15, 186o, Andrew Jackson Hamilton Papers (Archives,
University of Texas Library, Austin); Proceedings Of The Mass Meeting Of The National
Democracy Of Texas (Austin, 186o), 3-8, 8-19; Members of the Legislature of the State of
to 1939 (Austin, 1939), 32-37; Allen Johnson and Dumas Malone, DicTexas, from
,846
tionary of American Biography (24 vols.; New York, 1928-1958), IV, 328; Llerena Friend,
Sam Houston, The Great Designer (Austin, 1954), 312-313. Friend gives the dates of these
meetings as March 20 and 22; it is clear, however, from newspaper reports and correspondence that the meetings actually occurred on December 20oand 22.
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
Constitutional
Union Party in Texas
239
with . . public affairs"; the party's principal objective, to remove the
slavery issue from politics; and its plans for victory, to unite the nation's
conservative elements.'0
By prearrangement, that same day state Constitutional Union conventions met in Virginia, Kentucky, North Carolina, and Tennessee to
endorse the national party and recommend candidates for the presidency. Actually, at the state level much Unionist activity was centered
around particular candidates who were having their candidacy pushed
by one or more newspapers. In addition to widespread newspaper support in Texas, Houston was proposed as a presidential candidate by the
New York Sun and the New York Express, the Augusta Daily Chronicle
and Sentinel, and the Little Rock Arkansas Gazette."
Although an independent Democrat, Houston had endeared himself
to many conservatives, especially Know-Nothings, by his victory over
the regular Texas Democratic party. Houston had voted with the KnowNothings in the United States Senate and had supported their candidate, Millard Fillmore, for president in 1856. His candidacy was further
enhanced by his past statements that nature had already determined
the boundaries of slavery, by his opposition to the reopening of the
slave trade, and by his strong stance as governor against a South Carolina sponsored southern conference which he regarded as a preliminary
step to secession.12
If Houston was to run for the presidency, however, it appeared unclear on whose ticket he was going to run. The New York Express proposed him for the regular Democratic nomination; yet Houston insisted
that he did not wish his name submitted to that party's convention, and
that he would accept only a call from the people. So shortly before the
disruption of the Charleston Democratic convention (when southern
delegates walked out because northern delegates refused to endorse
federal intervention on behalf of slavery in the territories), a group of
1oKirwan, John J. Crittenden, 349; Ranchero (Corpus Christi), Dec. 31, 1859; Matagorda
Gazette, Jan. 18, 186o; John Howard Parks, John Bell of Tennessee (Baton Rouge, 1950),
348-349 (quotation); Stabler, "Constitutional Union Party," 331-33711Stabler, "Constitutional Union Party," 240, 325, 383; Crenshaw, Slave States in the
Election, 291. The Corsicana Navarro Express, Apr. 21, 186o, quotes the New York Herald
as listing the following aspirants: Edward Bates of Missouri, John Bell of Tennessee, John
M. Botts of Virginia, John J. Crittenden of Kentucky, Edward Everett of Massachusetts,
William A. Graham of North Carolina, Washington Hunt of New York, Sam Houston of
Texas, John McLean of Ohio, William C. Rives of Virginia, and Winfield Scott of New
York.
12Crenshaw, Slave States in the Election, 288-289; Stabler, "Constitutional Union Party,"
428; Sandbo, "Secession Movement in Texas," 69; Message of Gov. Sam Houston, on the
South Carolina Resolutions (Austin, 186o), 5-6, 15-16.
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
240
Southwestern Historical
Quarterly
from 1,500 to 2,000 people met at the San Jacinto Battleground on
April 21 to celebrate an important anniversary and to nominate the old
general for the presidency. They chose four presidential electors and
immediately dispatched the results of the meeting to Charleston:13
Still, Houston delayed a decision to accept this draft from the people. On April 25 Houston's private secretary, W. J. Pendleton, wrote
to Virginia Congressman Alexander R. Boteler, a leading figure in the
new Constitutional Union party, extolling Houston's popularity in the
South and commercial East and recommending him as a presidential
nominee of the upcoming national Constitutional Union party convention at Baltimore. Only two days later a small group of Houston's East
Texas Know-Nothing friends who were now supporting the new party
assembled for a night session in the Smith County courthouse at Tyler.
Included in the group was his old Whig friend from Henderson, James
W. Flanagan whose son, Webster Flanagan, Houston only days before
had appointed a brigadier general of the state militia. There had been
an earlier Constitutional Union organizational meeting at Marshall
and the primary purpose of the Tyler meeting was to elect delegates to
the national convention at Baltimore. The four delegates appointed
were probably fairly representative of those who would support the
party in Texas: Benjamin H. Epperson, who had followed the path of
most Whigs into the American party, into the Opposition movement
of the late 185os, and finally into the Constitutional Union party; Anthony B. Norton, an Austin publisher who was also a former Whig and
only recently had been appointed by Houston as the state's adjutant
general; former Know-Nothing Congressman Lemuel D. Evans, who,
like Houston, was a Democrat who had supported the American party
in the mid-1850s; and the fourth delegate, state Senator Abram M.
Gentry, who as a Union Democrat had been a very active participant
at the earlier San Jacinto assembly.'4
13Crenshaw, Slave States in the Election, 289-291; Stabler, "Constitutional Union Party,"
428-430; Navarro Express (Corsicana), Apr. 14, 186o; Ranchero (Corpus Christi), May 5,
186o; Friend, Sam Houston, 313-314; Winkler (ed.), Platforms, 85-87; Harvey H. Allen to
Smyth, Apr. 22, 186o, Smyth Papers.
14Smyrl, "Unionism in Texas," 176-177; Friend, Sam Houston, 315; Webb, Carroll, and
Branda (eds.), Handbook of Texas, I, 568-569; Crenshaw, Slave States in the Election,
290o;
Stabler, "Constitutional Union Party," 335, 430; State Gazette (Austin), Apr. 21, 1860; New
York Express, May 8, 11, 186o; Appointment of A. B. Norton as adjutant general, Apr. 6,
186o, Secretary of State Record Group, Sam Houston's Executive Book, 1860-1861, p. 83
(Archives Division, Texas State Library, Austin); Ralph A. Wooster, "Ben H. Epperson:
East Texas Lawyer, Legislator, and Civil Leader," East Texas Historical Journal, V (Mar.,
1967), 30-31. For a list of Know-Nothing leaders see Ralph A. Wooster, "An Analysis of
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
Constitutional
Union Party in Texas
241
The national Constitutional Union party convention which met in
Baltimore on May 9 was composed almost entirely of Whigs and KnowNothings. Altogether twenty-two states sent delegates; all of the southern states were represented except South Carolina, Florida, and Louisiana. The arrival of the Texas delegation was delayed somewhat by a
wreck on the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, and the Pennsylvania supporters of Senator John Bell of Tennessee (a favorite with the Whig
element) sought unsuccessfully to stampede the convention into voting
early, before the Texans arrived. An eyewitness account, given by newspaperman Murat Halstead, described the delegation's arrival.
While speeches were being made, the Chair announced that the delegation
from Texas was at the door. (Tremendous applause.) The Chair directed
the doorkeeper to admit the delegation from Texas. (Tremendous applause.) The delegation from Texas was admitted. (More tremendous applause.) The delegation, headed by a man [Norton] with a beard half a
yard long, who was dressed in homespun and bore a great buckhorn-handle
cane, made its way to a front seat, amid "tremendous applause." An officious delegate said that the long haired man had agreed at one time not to
have his hair cut until Henry Clay was elected President. (Still more tremendous applause.)1'
The next day a number of speeches were delivered praising Houston.
New Yorker James W. Gerard described him as "a living man for whom
we can raise a battle cry"; H. Hopkins of Georgia compared the hero of
San Jacinto to other men of military renown, such as William Henry
Harrison and Zachary Taylor; and Leslie Combs of Kentucky praised
the old general for saving Texas from secession. Norton, chairman of
the Texas delegation, said that they had been instructed to vote for
"Old Sam" Houston, and that, if nominated, he would carry Texas by
a majority of 20,000 votes. Other partisans told reporters that the old
hero would sweep the South and carry New York, thereby achieving an
the Texas Know Nothings," Southwestern Historical Quarterly, LXX (Jan., 1967), unnumbered fold-out page between pages 42o and 421. Despite later denials, there can be
little doubt that Houston knew of the action taken on his behalf at Tyler. Webster Flanagan of Henderson, in accepting an appointment as brigadier general of the state militia,
wrote Houston that, "I shall write our mutual friend Cave [E. W. Cave, Houston's secretary of state] at length in a day or two as soon as I learn the action of the Tyler Convention. My father is there and . . . he is for you[.]" Flanagan to Houston, Apr. 28, 186o, Sam
Houston's Governor's Papers (Archives Division, Texas State Library, Austin).
15W. Dean Burnham, Presidential Ballots: 1836-z892 (Baltimore, 1955), 75; Nevins,
Emergence of Lincoln, II, 261; Reinhard H. Luthin, The First Lincoln Campaign (Cambridge, 1944), 119; Friend, Sam Houston, 315;. William B. Hesseltine (ed.), Three Against
Lincoln: Murat Halstead Reports the Caucuses of 186o (Baton Rouge, 1960), 121-122, 127
(quotation); Stabler, "Constitutional Union Party," 446, 448.
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
Southwestern Historical
242
Quarterly
electoral majority. Actually opposition to Houston at the convention
was strong, if not insurmountable. He was a lifelong Jacksonian Democrat who had had only a brief flirtation with the American party; many
of the old followers of Henry Clay believed the movement for Houston
was absurd.,'
Even so, the first ballot proved that the only two candidates having
widespread support were Houston, with 57 votes, and ex-Senator John
Bell of Tennessee, with 681/2 votes. In addition to the four Texas votes,
Houston got a majority of the New York and the Arkansas votes, and
half of the Illinois votes, and received some support from the Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Connecticut delegations. But Bell's support was
geographically broader, and he was the second choice of most delegates.
Thus, on the second ballot he defeated Houston by a vote of 125 to 68.
Edward Everett, a former governor of Massachusetts, won the vicepresidential nomination notwithstanding his attempts to avoid it. Next,
an ambiguous platform was adopted-one
that merely declared the
to
be
for
the
the
Constitution,
Union, and the law, thus leaving
party
state parties free to adopt statements suitable to their constituencies.'7
Finally, two weeks following his rejection at Baltimore, Houston accepted the presidential nomination tendered to him at San Jacinto. His
Texas newspaper support persisted: over ten journals, including the
Houston Tri-Weekly Telegraph, Galveston Standard, Austin Southern
Intelligencer, Columbus Colorado Citizen, Crockett Printer, Henderson Era, and Centerville Times, continued their editorial support of
Houston for president into July. Following Houston's acceptance of the
San Jacinto nomination, many local rallies were held to endorse him
for president. Particularly active on his behalf was Houston's cousin
Thomas Carothers, who was serving as the director of the state penitentiary at Huntsville. Carothers ordered one hundred Houston campaign broadsides for the Huntsville area, planned additional campaign
literature, and wrote to influential Alabamans and Georgians lauding
Houston's candidacy. Pro-Houston speeches were delivered in Louisi1OHesseltine (ed.), Three Against Lincoln, 128; Stabler, "Constitutional Union Party,"
440, 449-450, 454-455, 458 (second quotation), 460 (first quotation), 461-463; Parks, John
Bell, 35417True Issue (La Grange), May 18, 186o; Parks, John Bell, 355; Stabler, "Constitutional
Union
Party,"
459-460;
Nevins,
Emergence
of Lincoln,
II,
261-262,
281; Harrison
Flag
(Marshall), July 20, 186o; Hesseltine (ed.), Three Against Lincoln, 126; Dwight Lowell
Dumond, The Secession Moveinent, i86o-i86i
(New York, 1931), 93-94. Dumond feels
that the platform "was a distinctly Southern platform. It did not pledge its endorsers to
support the union of state at all hazards. It pledged them to reestablish the rights of the
people and of the states. .. ." (p. 94).
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
Constitutional
Union Party in Texas
243
ana; and in Kentucky a movement was under way "by some of the most
prominent and able leaders of the opposition to put forth an electoral
ticket pledged to Gen. Houston." His greatest out-of-Texas support,
however, came from New York. Pro-Houston rallies occurred in New
York City during May and June; some Texans visited the Empire State
on Houston's behalf; and a few New York newspapers continued their
support for him.'8
Eventually, however, as former Whigs who had not been absorbed
by the other parties began to rally to Bell, Houston lost all of his outof-state newspaper support, and practically his only followers outside of
Texas were a few diehards in New York City. Also, his credibility was
damaged when the fact became obvious, despite many denials, that he
had indeed sought the Constitutional Unionist nomination at Baltimore, and that only when he failed to receive it, did he accept the
nomination by a small group of old comrades and cronies. During July,
friend and foe alike predicted that soon he would withdraw his name
from nomination and ultimately support the Bell-Everett ticket.'9
In a statewide election on August 6 for three state executive offices,
candidates John D. McAdoo, George W. Smyth,
Houston-supported
and James Shaw campaigned for the positions of attorney general,
comptroller, and treasurer. The scope of their defeat by the regular
Democrats (by over two to one) may in part explain the stance during
the ensuing months of Houston and two other important union Democrats: Congressman Andrew J. Hamilton and ex-Governor Elisha M.
Pease.20 On August 18 Houston wrote a letter addressed "To my friends
in the United States," which began, "I withdraw my name from the list
of candidates for the Presidency." In September he endorsed a fusion
party of Bell and Douglas supporters. Shortly after Houston's August
18 announcement, Pease and Hamilton became active with the Constitutional Unionists. Pease agreed to serve as chairman of a newly
18Red Land Express (San Augustine), June 9, 16, 23 (quotation), July 7, 21, 28, Aug. 4,
186e; True Issue (La Grange), June 1, 15, 186o; Matagorda Gazette, May 3o, June 13,
186o; State Gazette (Austin), May 19, 186o; Stabler, "Constitutional Union Party," 526527; Friend, Sam Houston, 310, 316-318.
19Harrison Flag (Marshall), June 29, 186o; True Issue (La Grange), July 19, 186o; Matagorda Gazette, May 3o, 186o; Stabler, "Constitutional Union Party," 527-528.
20Ernest W. Winkler (ed.), Check List of Texas Imprints, 1846-186o (Austin, 1949), 259;
Election Returns for State Officers, Aug. 6, 186o, Record Group, Sam Houston's Executive
Book, 186o-1861, pp. 114-117 (Archives Division, Texas State Library, Austin). After 1850
the attorney general, comptroller, and treasurer were elected by popular vote in evennumbered years. See Rupert Richard, Texas: The Lone Star State (Englewood Cliffs,
N.J., 1943), 170.
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
244
Southwestern Historical Quarterly
created Union party executive committee, whose other members were
Hamilton, William C. Philips and John Hancock.21
The committee issued on September 18 an address to the people of
Texas appealing for moderation: "Let the conservatives of the South
unite with those of the North in their patriotic efforts to crush out
Sectionalism." The address condemned "the abstraction of slavery in
the territories" and called for compromise to save the Union. It spelled
out in detail Constitutional Unionist plans for winning an electoral
college majority and indicated that the party was a fusion party by
stating that its electors would be "pledged to vote for the most available
candidate to defeat Lincoln and Hamlin." The party's national committee and its presidential candidate, John Bell, had no objection to
fusion and favored a coalition with other antisecessionists if it would
help Bell's chance in the election.22 The results of the August 6 election
and Houston's August 18 withdrawal announcement signaled to his
followers that they were now free to support the Constitutional Union
ticket.
Even before Houston's withdrawal, East Texas Whig-unionists were
organizing for John Bell. They had strong support from the Marshall
Harrison Flag, which had been founded in 1856 by the Know-Nothing
party. The Harrison County party, which was organized on July 7, endorsed Bell for president and began meeting weekly at the county
courthouse. Further impetus was given the movement in September
when Lemuel D. Evans returned to Marshall from the North in the
aftermath of Houston's withdrawal, and began to campaign for the
Bell-Everett ticket. In addition to his numerous East Texas speeches,
Evans scheduled a nine-stop campaign tour from Corsicana to Weatherford to McKinney.23
21Crenshaw, Slave States in the Election, 292-293; True Issue (La Grange), Aug. 3o,
186o; Harrison Flag (Marshall), Sept. 1, 186o (quotation); Navarro Express (Corsicana),
Oct. 19, 186o; Parks, John Bell, 369-370; Stabler, "Constitutional Union Party," 528-529;
Political and Personal Friends to E. M. Pease, Aug. 30, 186o, Graham-Pease Collection;
Matagorda Gazette, Apr. 11, 186o.
22Address of the Union Executive Committee to the People of Texas (Austin, 186o), imprint in Graham-Pease Collection, 1 (third quotation), 2 (first quotation), 3, 4 (second quotation); Stabler, "Constitutional Union Party,"
551-552. A fusion party had been fore51o,
seen by a number of Texas newspapers. See Alamo
Express (San Antonio), Aug. 18, 186o;
Navarro Express (Corsicana), Oct. 5, 186o; James Alex Baggett, "Origins of Early Texas
Republican Party Leadership," Journal of Southern History, XL (Aug., 1974), 444-44523Smyrl, "Unionism in Texas," 177; Harrison Flag (Marshall), June 29, July 6, 13, Aug.
Io, Sept. 1, 8, 15, 186o; Lynnell Jackson, True Witnesses: A Check List of Newspapers, 1845i86r (Austin, 1971), 22; Red Land Express (San Augustine), July 28, 186o; State Gazette
(Austin), July 14, Oct. 27, 1860; Standard (Clarksville), Oct. 27, 1860; Southern Intelligencer
(Austin), Oct. so, 186o; Navarro Express (Corsicana), Oct. 12 [misdated on masthead, Oct.
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
Constitutional
Union Party in Texas
245
The Travis County Union Club organized in Austin on September
3, and an executive committee of correspondence was appointed. A
petition endorsing two union Democrats, George W. Paschal of Travis
County and John H. Robson of Colorado County, as Union party presidential electors for the state-at-large and for the western part of the
state, respectively, was being circulated in Austin by the organizers.
Paschal, Robson, and Hamilton began campaigning in areas within a
hundred-mile radius of Austin. Paschal also wrote campaign letters to
individuals and newspapers.24
The same week that the western district chose presidential electors, a
Constitutional Unionist meeting occurred at Honey Grove in Fannin
County, where William Stedman of Rusk County and Benjamin H.
Epperson of Red River County, two old-line Whigs, were chosen as
electors for the state-at-large and for East Texas. Immediately Epperson
undertook a four week campaign in the eastern and northeastern part
of the state. The Clarksville Standard reported that "Stedman[,] [State
Representative George W.] Whitmore, Evans, and Epperson, leave no
stone unturned."25
The Galveston Constitutional Union party, one of the earliest to
organize, assumed the appearance of a gentleman's club. Meeting weekly were a handful of highly respected long-time Island City citizens,
almost all of whom had Whig backgrounds. The group included Colonel A. C. McKeen, a local merchant; William P. Ballinger, a well-to-do
lawyer; and Levi Jones, pioneer physician and land speculator. They
delivered speeches; entertained visitors (including David G. Burnet,
one-time acting president of the Republic of Texas, whom they made
an honorary member); suggested possible electors for the Bell-Everett
ticket, if any of the men already appointed were to decline; and
5], 186o. The Marshall Harrison Flag, June 29, 186o, questioned the advisability of the
continued candidacy of Sam Houston for the presidency: "[That] the independent candidacy of Gen. Houston, as a Constitutional Union man, and that of the nomination of Mr.
Bell, by a convention composed of the great lights of the Constitutional Union move [sic]
have placed the Union men of Texas, in an awkward predicament is but too apparent."
24Southern Intelligencer (Austin), Sept. 5, Oct. o10,186o; Alamo Express (San Antonio),
Sept. o10,186o; Smyrl, "Unionism in Texas," 178-179; Harrison Flag (Marshall), Sept. 22,
186o; True Issue (La Grange), Sept. 3, 18, 186o; State Gazette (Austin), Oct. 20, 186o;
Navarro Express (Corsicana), Nov. 2, 1860; Standard (Clarksville), Oct. 27, 186o. Unionist
legislators were identified from the list of signatures on the petition supporting Paschal
and Robson. Southern Intelligencer (Austin), Sept. 5, I86o.
25Smyrl, "Unionism in Texas," 179-18o; Standard (Clarksville), Oct. 27, 186o (quotation);
Wooster, "Ben H. Epperson," 32; Alamo Express (San Antonio), Sept. io, 186o; Harrison
Flag (Marshall), Sept. 15, 186o; State Gazette (Austin), Sept. 29, 186o; Southern Intelligencer (Austin), Oct. io, 186o.
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
246
Southwestern Historical
Quarterly
of which favored fusion of the Bell supporters
adopted resolutions-one
with the Houston and Douglas forces.26
In another coastal county, Jackson County, Constitutional Unionists
met at Texana on August 1i and elected as chairman Clark L. Owen,
a Texas Revolution veteran and one of the wealthiest men in the state.
John A. Brackenridge, a friend of Owen, and his two oldest sons,
George W. and John T. Brackenridge, were included in a group of men
appointed to attend an anticipated state meeting of Houston/BellEverett supporters in early September. The elder Brackenridge, a former resident of Indiana, was a longtime Whig who had served as a
presidential elector for Henry Clay in 1844, and once had been a friend
of young Abraham Lincoln. At that first Texana Union party meeting,
those attending endorsed both the Bell-Everett ticket and General
Houston, called for enforcement of both the fugitive slave laws and
laws prohibiting the African slave trade, and recommended a statewide
meeting of "the friends of Sam Houston and Bell and Everett."27
San Antonio Union party rallies began in September and were well
attended by an ethnically mixed group of men of English, German, and
Mexican extraction. A large meeting occurred on October 3 when Sam
Houston, who was on a three-day visit to the Alamo City, spoke at a
barbecue for the fusion ticket. In those counties
Unionist-sponsored
from San Antonio and Austin to Galveston, such as Colorado and Fayette, many Anglo and German friends who had previously supported
Houston held Constitutional Union party meetings. In late September
two rallies occurred in Washington County, and the Union party was
organized in the neighboring counties of Walker and Montgomery; a
reporter referred to the crowd in Montgomery as "the American party."
And in Central Texas the party was organized in such towns as Corsicana, Waco, and Georgetown.28
Governor Houston was one of the most active among the many campaigners. Houston addressed large rallies in Austin, San Antonio, and
Georgetown, and scheduled further rallies from Austin to Huntsville.
2GFornell, The Galveston Era, 276-278; True Issue (La Grange), Aug. 30o, i86o; William
Pitt Ballinger Diary, Aug. io, 13, 18, 31, 186o, typed transcription, William Pitt Ballinger
Papers (Archives, University of Texas Library, Austin). For a list of Whigs based on newspaper sources see Campbell, "The Whig Party of Texas," 30-33; and Ronald C. Ellison,
"The Whig Party of Texas" (M.A. thesis, Lamar State University, 1971), 96-112.
27Southern Intelligencer (Austin), Sept. 5, 186o (quotation); Marilyn McAdams Sibley,
George W. Brackenridge, Maverick Philanthropist (Austin, 1973), 19-20, 26.
28True Issue (La Grange), Sept. 13, 20, 27, 186o; Southern Intelligencer (Austin), Oct. 1o,
186o; Alamo Express (San Antonio), Sept. io, 17, Oct. 1, 8, 186o; Harrison Flag (Marshall),
Aug. 18 (quotation), Sept. 15, 186o; Navarro Express (Corsicana), Sept. 14, 186o.
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
Constitutional
Union Party in Texas
247
Several newspapermen were extraordinarily active during the campaign,
especially A. B. Norton, publisher of the Austin Southern Intelligencer
and the Fort Worth Chief, and young James P. Newcomb, a supporter
of the Know-Nothing candidate in 1858 and publisher of the newly
founded San Antonio Alamo Express. At least nine Texas newspapers
supported the Bell-Everett ticket; some were well-established Whig
publications, others were independent Democratic journals which had
long supported Houston, and a few were recently founded Constitutional Union newspapers.29
From the platform and in the press Constitutional Unionists proclaimed that a vote for the fusion ticket was a vote for the Union, and
that a vote for John C. Breckinridge, the Democratic candidate on the
ballot in Texas, was a vote for secession. They accused Texas Democratic leaders of knowing that Breckinridge's defeat was imminent, and
hoping to use a Lincoln victory to provoke secession. They scoffed at
the idea that a series of fires on July 8 (in Pilot Point, Denton, and
Dallas) and other disturbances occurring in Texas during the summer
of i86o were caused by an abolitionist plot to overthrow slavery, and
countered with stories of secessionists' plots to destroy the Union and
reopen the foreign slave trade.30 They defended the Bell-Everett ticket
against the charge that they were abolitionists. Bell, they said, was a
known slaveholder (according to Newcomb, Bell was "the only slave
holder of all the candidates running for President"). And Everett, they
contended, had long denounced radicalism. Finally, they denied that
29Harrison Flag (Marshall), Oct. 27, 186o; State Gazette (Austin), Oct. 13, 27, 186o; Navarro Express (Corsicana), Oct. 19, 186o; Standard (Clarksville), Oct. 27, 186o; True Issue
(La Grange), July ig, Aug. 3o, 186o; Alamo Express (San Antonio), Sept. io, Oct. 8, 15,
186o; Southern Intelligencer (Austin), Oct. io, 186o; Ranchero (Corpus Christi), Sept. 8,
186o; Crenshaw, Slave States in the Election, 294; Smyrl, "Unionism in Texas," 182-183;
Dale A. Somers, "James P. Newcomb: The Making of a Radical," Southwestern Historical
Quarterly, LXXII (Apr., 1969), 451-457; A Memorial and Biographical History of McLennan, Falls, Bell and Coryell Counties, Texas (Chicago, 1893), 255; Graham G. Landrum,
Grayson County: An Illustrated History of Grayson County, Texas (Fort Worth, 1960), 63,
65; Oliver Knight, Fort Worth: Outpost on the Trinity (Norman, 1953), 46-48; Donald E.
Reynolds, Editors Make War: Southern Newspapers in the Secession Crisis (Nashville,
197o), 11,
113-114,
133, 172, 205-206,
229. Reynolds
lists the following
newspapers
as Bell
supporters: Southern Intelligencer (Austin), Belton Independent, Colorado Citizen (Columbus), Harrison Flag (Marshall), McKinney Messenger, Quitman Clipper, Alamo Express
(San Antonio), the Weatherford News, and the Fort Worth Chief (the Chief, however, was
sold to a secessionist in Sept., 1860). Reynolds, Editors Make War, 133.
3soCrenshaw, Slave States in the Election, 287, 296-297; Dumond, The Secession Movement, 95-96; Stabler, "Constitutional Union Party," 537, 555, 567-568; Nevins, Emergence
of Lincoln, II, 307; Southern Intelligencer (Austin), Sept. 5, 186o. Reynolds states that immediately after the fires, "newspapers attributed them [the conflagrations] to a combination of carelessness and the exceedingly dry, hot summer." Reynolds, Editors Make War,
98.
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
Southwestern Historical
248
Quarterly
Unionists were submissionists or cowards, or that they were seeking
federal offices upon the election of either Bell or Lincoln; rather, they
stated that they were loyal Americans seeking to save the country.31
Unfortunately for the Constitutional Unionists their organized effort
was too little and came too late. If, indeed, they ever had any chance of
winning the election, their hopes were dashed by the events of the summer and fall of i86o. They were damaged by Houston's unwillingness
to declare for Bell early in the campaign; the summer disturbances and
fires were widely publicized as abolitionist plots by the newspapers supporting Breckinridge. Unionist campaigners, moreover, were faced with
a spirit of militancy on the part of the opposition generated by John
Brown's raid, and other so-called abolitionist plots, and growing belief
in the need for southern solidarity. Lemuel Evans was hanged in effigy
at Fairfield; A. B. Norton's life was threatened in Weatherford; and
A. J. Hamilton was prevented from speaking at a Washington County
gathering until an opposition speaker, a Breckinridge Democrat, asked
that Hamilton be allowed to address the group.32
The loss of the August 6 state election during the period of disturbances was disastrous for the Unionists. Some of them felt that, in light
of the August results, the campaign for Bell was an exercise in futility.
Some of the antisecessionists who were Democrats and could have supported a Houston candidacy for the presidency, as they had voted for
him as governor in the past, could not bring themselves to support the
Bell. On the other hand, a few Whig purists were
Whig-Know-Nothing
with
the fusion or mongrel ticket of two Whig electors and
displeased
two Democratic electors, and they stayed away from the polls, as they
did not desire their state's electoral vote to possibly be cast for the
Democrat Douglas. Other Whigs were willing to abandon Bell for the
Democrat Breckinridge, either from a sincere belief that "old party
divisions should be forgotten in the face of these vital interests," or
simply because they were overwhelmed by community pressure for
southern solidarity.33
The Unionist strategy of getting the Germans to vote for the fusion
31Alamno Express (San Antonio), Sept. io, 186o (quotation); Crisis (Galveston), Aug. 13,
186o; Robert Pattison Felgar, "Texas in the War for Southern Independence, 1861-1865"
(Ph.D.
dissertation,
University
of Texas,
1935), 19.
32Navarro Express (Corsicana), Nov. 2, 186o; Knight, Fort Worth, 48-49.
33Webster Flanagan to Houston, Aug. 9, 186o, Sam Houston's Governor's Papers; Red
Land Express (San Augustine), Aug. 18, Oct. 6, 186o; State Gazette (Austin), Aug. 25, 186o;
Navarro Express (Corsicana), Nov. 9, 186o; Matagorda Gazette, Aug. 15, 186o; Standard
(Clarksville), Oct. 27, 186o; Texas Republican (Marshall), Nov. 3, 186o (quotation).
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
Constitutional
Union Party in Texas
249
ticket on the grounds that they were voting for Stephen A. Douglas
generally failed. Even Ferdinand Flake, the influential editor of Galveston's Die Union who had supported Houston's election in 1859,
refused to follow the governor into the Constitutional Union movement. Instead, Flake endorsed a write-in campaign for Douglas (Douglas received 65 votes in Galveston and 410 votes statewide). Many Germans rejected Bell because of his former Know-Nothing affiliation;
most, however, simply voted their traditional Democratic ticket and
failed to see the election as a referendum on secession.34
The Texas Constitutional Unionists may have also been hurt by a
number of other factors. Their open advocacy of remaining in the
Union, even if the "Black Republican" Lincoln was elected president,
possibly cost them some support. Also, the fact that a large majority of
the state's newspapers endorsed the Breckinridge ticket was not helpful.
Nor were the election results from those states which held local elections before the November presidential vote.
If the Constitutional Union party was to win nationally it had to
capture a few northern states, but in early local elections Republicans
won heavily in Maine, Indiana, Pennsylvania, and Ohio.35
Despite all these negative factors concerning Bell's candidacy in Texas, however, the main reason he received only 15,402 votes (24.4 percent) out of nearly 63,ooo votes cast was the state's weak Whig tradition.
The cause of this defeat can be seen by comparing the Constitutional
Union vote of Texas with the vote in those southern states where the
Whig party had formerly enjoyed at least some measure of success. In
other slave states, the Bell percentage was considerably higher: he carried Tennessee, Kentucky, and Virginia; received over 40 percent of the
vote in four other states; and got 30 percent in another four. Altogether,
the southern vote for Bell, the Whig-Know-Nothing
turned Constitutional Unionist, was 41 percent, only 4 percent less than the vote for
the Whig-Know-Nothing
Millard Fillmore in 1856. In Texas, as elsein
voters
continued
to vote along traditional party lines.30
where,
186o
A county-by-county survey of the 186o Texas presidential vote re34F. S. Stockdale to Guy M. Bryan, Oct. 16, 186o, Bryan Papers; Fornell, The Galveston
Era, 277-278; Felgar, "Texas in the War," 23.
35William Carey Crane, Life and Select Literary Remains of Samn Houston, of Texas
(Philadelphia, 1884), 604; George WV.Paschal, "The Last Years of Sam Houston," Harper's
New Monthly Magazine, XXXII (Apr., 1866), 633; Philip J. Avillo, Jr., "John H. Reagan:
Unionist or Secessionist?" East Texas Historical Journal, VIII (Spring, 1975), 29; Dumond,
The Secession Movement, 95--96; Red Land Express (San Augustine), Aug. 11, 186o; Stan(lard (Clarksville), Oct. 27, 186o; Navarro Express (Corsicana), Nov. 2, 186o.
3GSeymour Martin Lipset, Political Man (New York, 1959), 346. The figures on which
these percentages are based were all taken from Burnham, Presidential Ballots, 764-812.
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
250
Southwestern Historical Quarterly
veals that the Bell vote, although small, was geographically widespread.
Bell received a slightly higher percentage in the western half of the
state; even then, however, the East Texas vote (22.4) was only 2 percent
less for Bell than the statewide vote (24-4). Bell received a majority vote
only in 3 sparsely populated counties on the state's southwest frontierBandera, Gillespie, and Starr. He got 40 percent of the vote in io counties, at least three-fourths of which were located near Austin and contained a number of German voters. Still, the most heavily Germanpopulated counties gave a large majority to Breckinridge. Nearly 30
counties, many of which had large numbers of slaves, gave Bell 30 percent of their vote; and over half of the state's 135 counties voted at least
20 percent for Bell.37
An analysis of the vote in those counties which gave the Constitutional Union party at least 20 percent total (which altogether accounted
for nearly nine-tenths of the Bell vote), when compared with those
counties' presidential results in 1852 and 1856, reveals some striking
similarities. In the majority of the counties which voted in 1852, 1856,
and 186o (see Table I), there was less than a to percent vote swing in
the three elections. The relationship between the 1852 Whig vote and
the 186o Constitutional Union vote shows a closer correlation in most
counties than the relationship of the 1856 Know-Nothing vote and the
.186o Unionist vote. The usual pattern seems to have been for the 1856
Know-Nothing percentage to increase over the previous 1852 Whig
vote, and then in 186o for the Constitutional Union vote to return to
about the 1852 level. Statewide the i852 Whig party received 26 per-
cent, the 1856 American party got 33 percent, and the 186o Constitutional Union party garnered 24 percent of the votes. It is likely that
in 1856 the Whigs, most of whom had become Know-Nothings, were
joined by many union Democrats who were urged by Houston into
supporting Fillmore, but who later repudiated Know-Nothingism. This
trend does not appear to vary much from section to section (Table I).
In the East Texas counties the three totals were Whigs, 29 percent
(1852), Know-Nothings, 35 percent (1856), and Constitutional Unionists, 29 percent (186o); the North Texas counties show 22 percent
(1852), 32 percent (1856), and 29 percent (186o); and the Central and
Coastal counties' totals were 31 percent (1852), 36 percent (1856), and
32 percent (186o). Thus, in these particular counties totaled by section
there is only about a 5 percent total vote swing in the three elections.
37Burnham, Presidential Ballots, 764-812; Ashcraft, "East Texas in the Election of 186o
and the Secession
Crisis," io; Smyrl, "Unionism
in Texas,"
192-195.
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
Constitutional
Union Party in Texas
251
This indicates that the primary voting strength of the Texas Constitutional Union party was Whig. Voters in 186o, for the most part, were
simply voting along traditional party lines. This is in agreement with
what other researchers have found regarding the i 86o voting pattern in
the entire South.38
A comparison of the 186o Texas presidential vote with the 1861 vote
on secession (see Table I) shows that while the Bell vote was geographTable I-a
TEXAS
COUNTIES
WITH AT LEAST
FOR THE CONSTITUTIONAL
20 PERCENT
VOTE
PARTY
UNION
East Texas
%Whig
County
Angelina
33
37
-4
16
29
30
27
34
38
42
45
28
30
28
25
5
7
4
1
-37
-41
52
41
18
53
Harris
Harrison
Henderson
Houston
29
41
23
Montgomery
Nacogdoches
Panola
Red River
Rusk
Smith
Titus
Upshur
Walker
Wood
TOTALS
%1861Vote
186o
36
-
Jefferson
Marion
%
Anti- was above or
%
Sec. below i86o Vote Slaves
1856
40
1852
Bowie
Cass
Galveston
Grimes
Jasper
%K.-N. %C.U.
27
20
-
41
47
21
31
35
-
31
-
38
50
20
25
23
20
29
29
29
28
37
37
31
27
15
36
5
21
11
22
6
7
6
o
25
25
29
30
33
20
24
23
1
38
31
45
9
34
23
24
27
26
4
40
6
24
47
24
26
27
33
11
30
29
35
29
13
-21
+ 12
-7
-15
-24
+3
-4
-21
-26
+10o
-26
-1 4
- 24
-9
23
58
24
35
40
15
51
51
28
36
36
39
37
-27
-41
-21
36
25
- 10
50
+16
20
--18
37
38Burnham, Presidential Ballots, 764-812; Lipset, Political Man, 344-354. The totals of
each section of Texas (Table I) are computed from the complete voting figures of all the
20 percent Bell counties.
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
Southwestern Historical
252
Quarterly
ically widespread, the 1861 antisecessionist vote was centered in the
northern and central parts of the state. In East Texas almost four thousand voters who had voted in November, 186o, stayed away from the
polls in February, 186 ; yet there was only a few votes difference between the number of Democratic votes in i86o and the total prosecesTable I-b
TEXAS
COUNTIES
WITH AT LEAST
FOR THE CONSTITUTIONAL
20 PERCENT
UNION
VOTE
PARTY
North Texas
%Whig %K.-N. %C.U.
0%
% 1861Vote
-4
Anti- was above or
%
Sec. below i86o Vote Slaves
County
1852
1856
186o
Bell
14
30
26
24
10
32
-
33
28
45
29
37
40
24
25
30
70
62
16
29
24
24
30
42
32
24
33
35
33
36
44
25
--16
-6
o
+5
+10
+7
- 11
- 1
+11
--11
-40
27
-9
21
Collin
Cooke
Coryell
Dallas
Denton
Ellis
Falls
Fannin
Grayson
Hill
Hopkins
Hunt
Jack
Kaufman
Lamar
Lampasas
Llano
McLennan
Montague
Navarro
San Saba
Tarrant
Wise
TOTALS
25
23
29
-
43
31
31
25
28
58
66
15
41
30
16
14
25
35
14
31
45
84
25
55
47
35
25
63
6
35
22
51
22
32
29
41
20
14
30
22
-
o10
29
-
26
20
-
25
26
25
20
30
44
71
41
-
30
47
24
28
21
26
25
o
--11
+4
-15
- 24
+11
+17
-3
+11
--20
-34
-26
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
21
11
10
14
12
5
21
46
18
16
18
13
9
5
13
15
5
39
4
32
10
14
4
Constitutional
Union Party in Texas
253
sion vote in 1861. A large number of Constitutional Unionists (Whigs)
apparently boycotted the secession referendum because they either believed the election to be illegal, or perhaps because they thought their
Table I-c
TEXAS
COUNTIES WITH AT LEAST 20 PERCENT VOTE
FOR THE CONSTITUTIONAL
UNION PARTY
Central and Coastal Texas
%Whig
%K.-N. %C.U.
%
% 1861Vote
20
96
8
9
7
41
+47
+42
+10o
+17
+ 30
+ 11
- 38
+36
-5
+2
+ 2o0
-13
+2
-13
-5
35
1
43
60
23
-31
+ 12
+46
+ 11
Anti- was above or
%
Sec. below 186o Vote Slaves
County
1852
1856
186o
Austin
Bandera
Bastrop
Bexar
Burnet
24
28
26
5
26
43
25
57
36
30
35
30
84
32
49
51
23
46
63
47
48
24
26
42
20
20
25
33
3
14
36
31
28
35
41
8
59
41
42
50
41
37
27
5
29
36
48
24
47
49
54
36
22
2
Caldwell
Calhoun
Cameron
Colorado
Fayette
Gillespie
Goliad
Gonzales
Guadalupe
Hays
Jackson
Karnes
Kerr
Medina
Nueces
Robertson
Starr
Travis
Uvalde
Victoria
Williamson
Wilson
TOTALS
33
-
30
4
46
55
45
44
-
31
36
30
52
36
25
36
45
39
33
27
23
26
22
30
6
6
36
52
-21
39
3
31
10
9
37
16
o
35
52
2
25
39
32
37
47
15
8
6
7
+6
+20
+5
-9
+18
45
2
39
5
34
20
16
1
61
83
28
22
24
46
11
+14
- 3
20
19
32
33
+ 1
28
73
42
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
254
Southwestern Historical
Quarterly
chances of preventing secession were hopeless. The 186o Bell vote was
little affected by variations in the percentage of slaves in these East
Texas counties. The 1861 antisecession vote, however, diminished in
counties with a high percentage of slaves. Indeed, statewide the relationship between the percentage of slaves in the county and a decrease
in the Bell vote was minor; but the reverse was most often true in the
1861 state referendum: in the vote on secession there was usually a correlation between the percentage of slaves in the county and the decrease
in the antisecession vote. Many Central Texas counties, however, provide an exception to this relationship. Like East Texas, some Central
Texas counties had large slave populations, but unlike East Texas they
also had great numbers of German unionists, many of whom disliked
slavery. In 186o these Germans had given little support to Bell, either
because of their traditional Democratic loyalty or because of Bell's past
affiliation, but in 1861 they heavily supported the
Know-Nothing
Union. The North Texas antisecessionist vote was greater than the
Constitutional
Union vote, possibly for three reasons: the section's
small slave population, which caused the section to feel less threatened
by Lincoln's election; its greater number of northern-born voters who
did not desire separation from the states of their origin; and the refusal
of most union Democrats to vote for the Whig, John Bell.39
Who were the leaders of the Texas Constitutional Unionists who directed the new party in 186o? Did they fit the usual stereotype which
Union party?
typified the national leadership of the Constitutional
Were "most of them 'respectable' and advanced in years who had been
influential in their heydey[?] But that time was past"? Were they mainly
businessmen and planters and former Whigs? Whigs probably provided
the Constitutional Unionist leadership in Texas towns such as Galveston, Marshall, Henderson, Corsicana, and San Antonio. Some of the
statewide campaigners, however, were union Democrats, most of whom
39Burnham, Presidential Ballots, 764-812; Ashcraft, "East Texas in the Election of i86o,"
12-13, 15; Georgia Lee Tatum, Disloyalty in the Confederacy (Chapel Hill, 1934), 11-12;
Claude Elliott, "Union Sentiment in Texas, 1861-1865," Southwestern Historical Quarterly,
L (Apr., 1947), 462-463. The "antisecession vote" and the "% 1861 vote" in Table I are
figured from the corrected totals in Joe T. Timmons, "The Referendum in Texas on the
Ordinance of' Secession, February 23, 1861: The Vote," East Texas Historical Journal, XI
(Fall, 1973), 15-16, 18-19. The slaves in the population percentages were figured from U.S.,
Department of the Interior, Population of the United States in i86o; Compiled from the
Original Returns of the Eighth Census (Washington, D.C., 1864), 484-486. For an analysis
of unionism in North Texas see Floyd F. Ewing, Jr., "Origins of Unionist Sentiment on the
West Texas Frontier," West Texas Historical Association Year Book, XXXII (Oct., 1956),
21-29.
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
Constituftional Union Party in Texas
255
had been briefly associated with Know-Nothingism.
Doubtless, some
Unionists had been Whigs before coming to the Lone Star State but had
never played an active role in the Texas party, choosing rather to join
the union faction of the dominant Democratic party. Regarding age,
evidence indicates (see Table II) that the majority were not older than
their political opposition; neither were they over-the-hill politicians
with respectable pasts but without political futures, nor to any significant degree were they businessmen and planters. Of the 195 identified
Union party leaders 6o percent were between thirty and fifty years of
age; more than one-half of the Unionists were under forty years of age;
and only 17 percent were over fifty years old. A little over io percent of
the Unionists identified were members of the 186o legislature, and
many others served in local government. As most of these Unionist leaders were young men, many of them continued their political careers
long after the Civil War, some as Democrats, others as Republicans. At
least eight were later elected to the United States Congress, two became
postwar governors, and five served as Texas Supreme Court judges.
Others were district judges, legislators, and constitutional convention
delegates in 1866 and in 1868-1869. Altogether at least one in four of
the 195 served in government beyond the local level during the postwar
period.40
Occupationally, as might be expected of politicians, lawyers composed the largest group of identified Constitutional Unionist leaders
(see Table II). There were fifty-five lawyers (many of whom had large
agricultural interests), as well as fifty farmers, twenty-seven merchants,
The First Lincoln
Members
40Luthin,
of the Legislature,
Campaign,
119 (quotation);
32-36; Baggett, "Texas Republican
445. For the executive and judicial
Party Leadership,"
officers of the state during Reconstruction
see The Texas Almanac for 1867. With Statisand Biographical
tics, Descriptive
Sketches, etc., Relating to Texas (Austin, 1867), 241, 275276; The Texas Almanac for i868 with Federal and State Statistics; Historical, Descriptive,
to Texas (Austin, 1868), 217, 220-221; The Texas
and Biographical
Sketches, etc., Relating
Almanac for 1869 and Emigrant's
Guide to Texas (Austin, 1869), 185-187; The Texas Almanac for 187o and Emigrant's
Guide to Texas (Austin, 1870), 225, 226; The Texas Almanac for z87- and Emigrant's
Guide to Texas (Austin, 1871), 219-220, 238-239, 242; The
and Emigrants'
Texas Almanar,
Guide to Texas (Austin, 1872), 223-225. Also see Webb,
Carroll, and Branda (eds.), Handbook of Texas, for brief biographical sketches of many of
the Unionists. For Table II the Texas Constitutional Unionists were first listed from i86o
newspaper accounts of party meetings and activities and then they were located in the
Eighth Census of the United States, i86o, Schedule I, Free Inhabitants; Schedule II, Slave
Inhabitants (microfilm, Genealogy Division, Texas State Library, Austin). The timeconsuming process of checking census manuscript returns made it impracticable to search
for slave ownership or real property in counties other than those in which the party
leaders resided. Therefore, wealth and slaves owned by the individual in counties other
than those in which each party leader resided were missed. Such- would also apply for the
Secession Convention delegates.
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
3
7
1
Slaves
8,ooo
13,000
20,000
Personal
Property
14,000 22,25010,15022,000
4,000
Real 3,oo000
10,000
Property
2,250 11,000
2,014
34,00084,000
20,000
Raiser
Comm.
Student
Secretary
2
14
2,500
3,500
3,500
4,000
4,000 35,000
12,000
Agent
Occupation
Saddler
Stock
Rancher
Lawyer
Soldier
City
Lawyer
Publisher
Ditch
Law
Lawyer
Lawyer
Farmer
Lawyer
Lawyer
Land
Editor
Lawyer
Physician
Watchmaker
Lawyer
Lawyer
Publisher
Data
II
UNIONISTS
newspapers)
C.
C.
Y. Y. C.
placeKy.Ga.Texas
from BirthKy.Tenn.
England
Canada
N. Ga.Texas
Ga.N. Ark.
Nassau
N.
N. Tenn.
N. Ky. La. Ind.
Germany
Scotland
Table
Biographical
in
?
with 186o 46 4128 26 34 42 20 32 23 48 25 41 39 35 28 26 30 40 35 36 23 31
Age
CONSTITUTIONAL
(Identified
of
County
Bexar
Bexar
Residence
Bexar
Bexar
Bexar
Bexar
Bexar
Bexar
Bexar
Bexar
Bexar
Bexar
Bexar
Bexar
Bexar
Bexar
Bexar
Bexar
Bexar
Colorado
Colorado
Caldwell
Collin
Lewellen
Pyron
Jefferson
Upson
Sweet
Paschal Schleicher
Newcomb
B. Baker
Robson
Anderson
Wilcox
E.
L.
C.
Childers
P.
A.
H.
Navarro
Flores
Peterson
Henson
Holman
A. Seary M.H.
Jones
Lilly
Wade
C. A.
J. F.
O.
W. Sartor
H.
D.
Charles
SolNeph
Name
R. J. Charles
R. E. Angel
Isaiah
M.Gustave
C. Charles
James
Wilcox
J. John0. Thomas
James
Ben
John
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
5
17 2 8 7
3
1
34
8 3
3 7
11 1916 6
6 4 1
11
oo
1,94o5,00ooo
1,575
1,000 2,ooo
2,400
8,500
6,000
9,000
4,500
4,000
15,00023,00015,00053,130 45,0006,025
14,530
13,000
10,500
34,00012,oo000
25,000
23,600oo
15,000
300oo
1,oo000
3,000
6,ooo
3,000 10o,ooo
5,000
6,250
4,000
6,ooo2,000
12,000
13,000
10o,ooo
30,00022,0002,ooo
25,00036,370
25,000
35,0005,210
40,000
15,ooo
Clerk
Clerk
Merchant
Merchant
Merchant
County
Merchant
Gentleman
Farmer
Lawyer
Farmer
Lawyer
Lawyer
Farmer
Farmer
Farmer
Merchant
Federal
Lawyer
Lawyer
Farmer
Merchant
Farmer
Merchant
Farmer
Lawyer
Lawyer
Physician
Physician
Farmer
Lawyer
Farmer
C.
C.
C. Y.
C.
Ky.Dela.
Ky.N. Tenn.
Ky.Ky.Ga.N. N. Va. Germany
Ga.Ga.Va. Ky.Md.
Germany
Tenn.
Germany
Tenn.
S. Ill.Va.Tenn.
N. Ky. Tenn.
Va.Tenn.
35 26 49 32 3461 48 49 34 52 25 33 41 52 3238 42 4458 4063 38 40 34 44 47 39 68 65 45
Fayette
Fayette
Fayette
Galveston
Fayette
Fayette
Fayette
Fayette
Fayette
Galveston
Galveston
Galveston
Galveston
Galveston
Fayette
Fayette
Fayette
Fayette
Galveston
Fayette
Fayette
Fayette
Fayette
Fayette
Fayette
Fayette
Fayette
Fayette
Fayette
Fannin
Davidson
Ledbetter
Ballinger
Russell
Taylor
Ledbetter
Holman
Haynie
Dancy
H.
M.Gaither
P.
J.
Stramler
McFarland Robinson Surmann
Howard
Zapp
H.
D.
A.
C.
Ligor
Price
Farish Love
B. Perlits
W.
Price
Crawford
Bond
Smith
Jones Lynch
Powell W.
Gregory Jackson B. A. S. F. B.
O.
B.
L.
U. James
Robert
Oscar
William
W.Isaac
F. J. L. W.Joel
William
William
Robert
LeviJames
E.
F. John
J. Hamilton
Charles
Alex
Robert
William
James
J. Rueben
James
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
2
Slaves
12
2
60
3
7 8
31
7
8
18
25
14 2
18 8
2,000 3,100
7,80012,000 9,500
8,ooo 8,ooo
7,000
8,759
8,625
13,000 5,00017,595
18,770o
30,000
56,ooo
34,63011,480 22,625
22,135
23,510
23,365
25,000
Personal
Property
oo
I,ooo
1,8oo
5,000 1,5004,0006,420
2,500
2,960
5,000
5,500
3,000
5,ooo
3,000
6,500
2,500
Real 5,000 4,400
15,000
30,000
36,ooo
26,5589,950
25,000
Property
Surveyor
Merchant
Occupation
Clerk
Lawyer
Lawyer
Merchant
Lawyer
Lawyer
Publisher
Farmer
Lawyer
Farmer
Lawyer
Merchant
Farmer
Merchant
Lawyer
County
Lawyer
Farmer
Farmer
Planter
Planter
Physician
Farmer
Physician
Stockman
Farmer
C. C.
C.
C.
?
placePenn.
BirthMass.
Miss.
Tenn.
Ind.S. Tenn.
Ga.Va.N. N. Va.Ga.Tenn.
Ind.
Va. Ind.
D. Ind.
Va. Ky.Ky.Va.La. Tenn.
Va.
in
186o40 32 33 45 39 40 50 44 47 30
Age
27
75 5936 39 32 276o 32 47 65 54 45 39 45 58 55
of
Galveston
Galveston
Harrison
Harrison
Grimes
Harris
Harrison
Harrison
Harrison
County
Harrison
Grayson
Harrison
Harrison
Harrison
Harrison
Residence
Jackson
Jackson
Jackson
Jackson
Jackson
Jackson
Jackson
Jackson
Jackson
Jackson
Jackson
Jackson
Binkley
C.
Evans
SmithWhitmore
Bates
Dickson
Haynes
Brackenridge
McChessarey
Brackenridge
Brackenridge
D.
Peck
W.
Thompson
Burnett
C.
H.
Gentry
Barrett
McKeen
A.
Johnson
T.
Dodd
Burwell
Wood
W.
Gains
Dupuy
Ferrell W.
McKay
Perry
M. W. C. Marshall
C.
B. P. P. P.
P.
D.
Name
Christopher
A. George
David
C. J. GillT. Nathaniel
Oliver
George
A. J. Lemuel
S. James
Geo.
B. Moses
John
A. J. S. E. Thomas
Geo.
John
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
23
7
9
7,000 15,000
4,266
6,430
15,050
71,600 33,740
3
1
4
2
4
23
2
6
65 28 14
6oo
300
1,200
1,500 1,5oo
7,500
2,500
6,345
1,525
6,ooo
4,400
11,215 2,500
15,ooo00
40o,oo000 14,ooo000
91,650
20,400
47,350
500
1,ooo1,8oo
1,8oo3,2oo
8,4008,5762,0005,000
1,400oo
6,ooo
9,oo000
3,ooo
4,ooo
4,300 5,000
18,ooo5,800
15,000
13,o60
54,367
6o,ooo 4,000
37,9402,400
21,185
Raiser Raiser
Driver
Merchant
Planter
Farmer
Farmer
Physician
Farmer
Farmer
Physician
Druggist
Lawyer
Merchant
Stage
Lawyer
Lawyer
Physician
Lawyer
Lawyer
Lawyer
Stock
Stock
Merchant
Lawyer
Farmer
Soldier
Lawyer
Lawyer
Farmer
Farmer
Farmer
Scotia
C.
C.
C.
Ky.Va. Nova
Ky.N. Ky. La. Ala.S. Ky. Texas
Ky.Ky.Tenn.
Tenn.
Dela.
S. Va. Miss.
Tenn.
Ga.Ga.Tenn.
Tenn.
Ky. Va.Ga.Ga.Tenn.
53 53 50 26 49 52 34 32 35 28 44 3038 24 27 37 49 40 35 52 37 24 49 30 27 54 52 34 41
River
River
Navarro
Red
McLennan
Montgomery
Rusk
Rusk
Rusk
Jackson
Jackson
Navarro
Navarro
Navarro
Navarro
RedRusk
Rusk
Rusk
Rusk
Jackson
Leon
Rusk
Jackson
Jackson
Jackson
Jasper
Navarro
Nueces
Rusk
Jackson
Epperson
Brooks
H. Latimer
Simons Woolfolk
Flanagan
Armstrong
Owen
Dockon
G. Mitchell
FlanaganGibson
Davis
Rogers
Milby
F. White
Britton
H.
R. T. M.
W.Gibson
Whaley
L.
Davis
White
M.A. Neyland
T. Johnson
Bartlett
H. Robertson
Evans
A.
Lawson
Cobb
S.
D.
H.
W.
N.
J.
G.
Ward
L. A.
C.
E.
Robert
Clark
S. George
L. John
N. M. A. N. L. Thomas
Webster
James
Benjamin
Allan
A.
W.R. Forbes
Albert
James
J. John
John
James
John
J. Wm.
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
Slaves
100
to
17 25
8
4
1
8
24 4
1
12
1
100oo
8,ooo
Personal
Property
150175 1oo
500 400
500
1,00ooo 1,oo000
1,000
2,5008,ooo
1,500 4,000
o0,8oo
11,000ooo
18,ooo
28,7005,700
72,000
20,000 12,000 2,000
400
5oo
1,700oo 4,000
1,500
2,000
2,500
1,000
5,000
5,ooo
6,ooo
1,500
3,ooo
Real
16,150
10,000 4,000 2,500
io,ooo
24,000
20,000
37,700 35,00013,900
Property
Lawyer
&
Mechanic
Farmer
Farmer
Farmer
Farmer
Farmer
Lawyer
Lawyer
Occupation
Farmer
Farmer
Lawyer
Lawyer
Druggist
Lawyer
Blacksmith
Butcher
Merchant
Teacher
Physician
Teacher
Lawyer
Merchant
Farmer
Bookkeeper
Salesman
Clerk
Farmer
Preacher
C.
Y. C. C. C.
C. C.
C.
C.
placeAla.S. N. Ga.Ga.S. Ala.
BirthTenn.
N. Ga.S. Ky.Scotland
Maine
Maine
Scotland
Ky.N. N. N. N. Mass.
Maine
Mass.
Md.
Ala.Tenn.
Tenn.
in
1860 50 5484 4348 64 34 52 37 31 61 39 32 25 59 50 35 29 35 35 44 4046 34 44 39 34 52
Age
of
Rusk
Rusk
Rusk
Rusk
Rusk
Rusk
Rusk
Rusk
Rusk
Rusk
Smith
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
County
Residence
Carrington
BakerBaker
Stedman Alexander
Oliver
Latham
McCord
Allan
Barr Carr D. Cheezum Davis
Turner
C.
Chandler
P.
Robertson
B.
D. Collins
Buddington
Carrington
T. Baker Bennett
Davidson
Sevan
Conner
Prior
Spink Goodman
W.
H.
H.
McKay
J.
W.W.
L.
G. C.
W.R. B. H.
M.G. D.
Name
A. Rueben
Arch
A. John
S. J. William
John
Wade
B. William
D. S. Thomas
Robert
John
Geo.
J. A. W.L. W.F. D. L. J. John
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
6
5
6
21
1
12
5
2 2
1
11
1
7 10
4
300500
1,500
1,250
4,000
30,700
100
450
200
1,2001,oo000
1,000 1,00ooo0
5,0oo
7,000
3,000
3,500
2,ooo00
4,500
3,500
6,ooo
12,000
10,000
50,000
20,000
25,000
25,ooo000
200,000
300
3,ooo2,820
19,700
13,ooo
24,000
150o
1,oo000
1,8oo
3,500 12,500
7,500
4,280 50,000
4,000 2,000
6,ooo
4,000
12,000
25,000
30o,o000
5o,ooo
6o,ooo
50,000
150,000
Maker
Farmer
Merchant
Physician
Merchant
Lawyer
Lawyer
Merchant
Teacher
Lawyer
Druggist
Painter
Merchant
Clerk
Printer
Farmer
Merchant
Lawyer
Physician
Governor
Clerk
Bookkeeper
Lawyer
Lawyer
Printer
Farmer
Lawyer
Lawyer
Editor
BootPrinter
C. Y.
Y.
C.
France
England
OhioS. Ky.
Sweden
Ga.Conn.
N. Penn.
N. Miss.
Sweden
Va.Ala.
Va.Va.Va. Ky.Va.Tenn.
N. Ky. Vt.Mass.
Norway
Tenn.
Ala.Va.Ala.
52 35 49 29 40 32 45 51 51 35 39 3367 47 54 35 34 32 54 5o 30 23 45 47 4548
21
30 26 37
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Johnson
Norton
Hamilton
Paschal
Hamilton
F.
Pease
Normandie J. C.
B.
Haynes
Gray Hancock
Davis
Palm W.M.
Gilhart
Johnson
Philips
Humphreys
DeDuffan H.
Lane Morrill
Peery
Hancock
L. Herndon
Houston KinneyMiner Palm
Penrod
Perry
P. T.
C.
B.
M.
N.
Parwert
G.
Goodman
W.
H.
W.S. S.
Elisha
W.F. Frank
E. Geo.
Morgan
George
R. H. R. Joel
G. George
Amos
Anthony
C. Swante
J. S. J.W.
Jenkins
Andrew
John
J. SamP. Benjamin
John
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
Slaves
11
1,000
Personal
Property
9
25,000
20,000
4
5 3
1
28
1 8
12 26
4 14 1
23
500
6oo
1,o000 5,000
2,000
5,500
8,500
5,350 10,000
4,000 2,700
15,000
10,000
18,500
6o,ooo
20,000
40,00030,000
176,650
150,000
200
000
1,ooo
1,300
i,8oo00
2,000
2,000
6,ooo
7,000
5,oo000
3,800
5,960 5,ooo
7,000
2,300
lo,ooo
15,000
20,000
35,000
20,000
41,000
loo,ooo
1oo,ooo
1oo,ooo
Property
Real
Broker
Teacher
Laborer
Lawyer
Lawyer
Dentist
Merchant
Merchant
Clerk
Merchant
Physician
Physician
Stockman
Lawyer
Clerk
Farmer
Merchant
Merchant
Occupation
Physician
Teacher
Physician
Lawyer
Merchant
Lawyer
Cabinetmaker
Farmer
Lawyer
Farmer
Exchange
C. C.
C.
placeFla.Ind.
BirthS. S. Ala.
Ky.Ky.Mass.
Tenn.
Tenn.
Miss.
Sweden
Ohio
Va. Tenn.
Va.Va.S. Ga.Tenn.
Va. La.Ind.
Vt.Ky.Ga.Tenn.
Vt.
in
860 23 28 30 39 3736 30 30 44 41 29 38 50
1
Age
21
32 35 39 25 38 30 44 3036 30 35 24 3539
of
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Upshur
Travis
Travis
Upshur
Upshur
Travis
Travis
Upshur
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Travis
Williamson
Travis
Walker
Walker
Walker
Washington
Walker
Walker
County
Residence
Branch
Turney
Branch
RandolphScott
Townes
M.M.GibbsMcAdoo
Swisher
J.
H.
R.
J.
TounsendChivers
Tong
Singletary
Price
Baker
Rutherford
Morgan
Swenson
Rentfro
M.Taylor
Slaughter
Tounsend
D. Talbot
Turner Coppage
Hart
Rancke
Stiles
D.
L.
A.
J.
A.
M.
W.
W.
M.
D. A. B.
R. B.
F.
W.
M.
E.
Name
E. R. George
M.H. Robert
W.J. Thomas
A. W. S. John
B. M.E. Thomas
M. John
E.
W.W.B. W. G. Anthony
Edward
Sanford
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
Constitutional
Union Party in Texas
263
a total of nineteen men of medicine (physicians, dentists, and druggists),
six clerks, and five teachers. All other occupations numbered three or
fewer. Over one-half of the Constitutional Unionist leaders were Upper
South natives: Tennessee
(28), Kentucky (26), Virginia (23), and North
Carolina (15) were the most widely represented states, with Maryland,
Delaware, Arkansas, and the District of Columbia accounting for 6
more. Nearly another one-fourth were born either in the North (30) or
in a foreign country (17), and the remaining one-fourth (49) of the
Unionists were of Lower South origin. Thus, it might appear from the
Upper South origin of over one-half of these men that their Whiggery
and hence their Constitutional Unionism partially resulted from their
place of origin. Yet their nativity did not differ to any great degree from
that of the majority of Texans. It is true that a larger percentage of the
Unionist leaders did not own any slaves (50.3 percent) if compared, for
example, with the secession convention delegates (28.2 percent); however, most of the slaveholders in each group were small slaveholders
who owned fewer than ten slaves; for example, 32-3 percent of the
Unionists (63 of 195) owned fewer than ten slaves, while 38.4 percent
of the delegates (68 of 177) owned fewer than ten slaves.41
A comparison of the personal and real property of each group proves
that the size of each group's estate differed little. Both groups contained
only a few individuals who possessed over $1oo,ooo in real and personal
property (Unionists 4 percent and the delegates 7 percent); the percentage for those having estates valued over $50o,ooobut less than $ioo,ooo
was almost identical, approximately io percent for each group. Of those
possessing over $5,ooo but less than $50,000 in property, the Unionist
leaders totaled 53 percent while the convention delegates totaled 63 percent. This leaves each group with close to one-third of its members with
estates less than $5,000 or who did not have their property listed by the
census taker.
The Constitutional Unionist leaders probably did not differ significantly from other Texas political leadefs in age, nativity, wealth, or in
slaveholdings. Their difference was one of political background and
past party affiliation, and to a lesser degree attitudes and beliefs. It involved love of Union or contrariwise feeling of southern nationalism;
on the one hand, a belief in the wisdom of remaining in the Union,
and on the other hand, fears of real or imagined threats to "the south41For the census data on the secession convention delegates see Ralph A. Wooster, "An
Analysis of the Membership of the Texas Secession Convention," Southwestern Historical
Quarterly,
LXII
(Jan.,
1959), 322-335.
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
264
Southwestern Historical Quarterly
ern way of life." To the Unionists the fight over slavery in the territories was unrealistic-nature had already answered that question. Furthermore, most believed southern slavery safer in the Union than out.
They despised equally all disunionists: fire-eaters whom they feared
would pay the price of secession to reopen the foreign slave trade, and
abolitionists whom they felt would disrupt the Union to free the slaves.
Eventually, most who had supported Bell became, as he did, reluctant
Confederates; some retired from public life altogether; and a few fled
as war refugees, or actively resisted the Confederacy. Still in 186o the
sentiment of most Texas Constitutional Union leaders toward disunionists was expressed by words Sam Houston quoted during the secession
crisis:
Is there not some chosen curse,
Some hidden thunder in the stores of heaven,
Red with uncommon wrath, to blast the men,
Who owe their greatness to their country's ruin?42
42This quotation is found in the Haynes Scrapbook, p. 36, John L. Haynes Papers (Archives, University of Texas Library, Austin). Haynes noted that "this quotation was . .
used in one of [Houston's] speeches during the session of the Secession Convention. .. "
Haynes, a prewar Starr County legislator and a Houston supporter, became a Constitutional Unionist, Civil War refugee, and Union army colonel, and the first chairman of the
Texas Republican party. The quotation used by Houston is a slightly altered version of
Joseph Addison's Cato, Act. I, sc. i, lines 21-24.
This content downloaded from 74.217.196.33 on Thu, 14 Nov 2013 14:12:45 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions