I have read the speeches. But whether or not any man would have acted as Lincoln acted is not known. I believe that there is a possability that no secession would have occured if men had acted differently. I do not believe the "South" was united on secession or the reasons for it and how the South would have reacted to any other person is not known.

Lincoln did not talk to the people of the South. Lincoln did not visit the South. Lincoln did not negotiate with the South. He avoided them, he ignored them, he only communicated indirectly with them. His party was a sectional entity, practicing their form of ideology exclusively in Northern states in 1860. Lincoln did everything in my mind NOT to stop secession and avoid a collision.

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David Upton