Robert Toombs: Statesman, Speaker, Soldier, SageStovall, Pleasant A.
History
Robert Toombs: Statesman, Speaker, Soldier, Sage
Stovall, Pleasant A.
Toombs, Robert Augustus, 1810-1885
Both wings of the Georgia convention appointed delegates to the
Baltimore convention. That body admitted the delegation which had
seceded from the Charleston convention. As the seceding delegates from
the other States were rejected, the Georgia delegates refused to go in.
Missouri was the only Southern State which was represented entirely in
the body, composed of 190 delegates. Massachusetts withdrew and Caleb
Cushing resigned the chair. Stephen A. Douglas was nominated for
President of the United States. Governor Fitzpatrick of Alabama declined
the vice presidency, and Herschel V. Johnson of Georgia was chosen for
vice president. The seceders immediately organized a national
convention, Mr. Cushing presiding. It was composed of 210 delegates. The
majority or anti-Douglas platform of the Charleston convention was
adopted. John C. Breckenridge of Kentucky was nominated for President,
and Joseph C. Lane of Oregon for vice president. Mr. Breckenridge was at
that time vice president of the United States, and Mr. Lane was a
senator. Meanwhile, a Constitutional Union party had been formed in
Georgia, and had elected delegates to a convention of that party in
Baltimore. This body nominated for President and vice president, John
Bell of Tennessee and Edward Everett of Massachusetts. Mr. Bell had been
United States Senator at the time of the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska
bill, in 1854, and had been arraigned by Mr. Toombs for opposing the
party policy. He was one of the thirteen who voted against it in the
Senate.
The contest in Georgia waged with much vigor. Robert Toombs supported
Breckenridge. He was a delegate to the Democratic State convention which
put out a Breckenridge and Lane electoral ticket. He cut out the
business of that convention, and declared that the Constitution and
equality of the States was the only bond of everlasting union. Mr.
Stephens headed the Douglas ticket. Senator Douglas himself came to
Georgia and spoke during the campaign. The Bell and Everett ticket was
championed by Benjamin H. Hill. The vote in Georgia was: Breckenridge,
51,893; Douglas, 11,580; Bell, 42,855.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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