In 1848 Yancey had aroused the people of Alabama into demanding that the United States protect slavery in the Territories, and he advocated secession in 1850. But in both these things he was premature. As compared with Toombs he uncompromisingly stood for every tittle of what he believed were the rights of the south. Toombs was a far more practical and able opportunist. His falling back upon the Georgia Platform from a much more advanced position, as I have just told, is an instance. I want to give others. He always declared in private conversation after the war that the democratic party was ripened and committed by Douglas and his co-workers to the repeal of the Missouri compromise while he was kept away from Washington by necessary attention to the interests of a widowed sister, otherwise, with his commanding position at the time, he would have crushed the scheme at its first proposal. When he returned to his public duties, to his amazement he found that every prominent member of the party was irrevocably for the repeal, and he could do nothing but embrace the inevitable. Then he would say substantially, "Had it not been for that administratorship which I could not avoid taking, we would all still be working our slaves in peace and comfort. That Missouri settlement was not right, but we had agreed to it; and with me a wrong settlement, when I agree to it, is just as binding as a righteous one." When others are urging that the United States ought to protect slavery in the Territories, the record does not show that he is interested at first; although when at last the question is forced into debate he makes by far the strongest speech of all in championship of the Davis resolutions. I believe the current sucked him in. Just after Lincoln's election--an event which influenced nearly all of even the most moderate elderly people of my acquaintance to declare at once for a southern confederacy--he proposed that Stephens join with him in an address to the people of Georgia, counselling that no immediate secessionist nor non-resistance man be elected to the convention;[109] and later he professed willingness to accept the Crittenden compromise. The truth is that the ablest leaders, as we call them, do not lead--they are led. If they should become non-representative, their followers would go elsewhere. And those of these leaders whose influence is the most potent and permanent are the conservative and moderate. Toombs was never really ahead in the southern movement except when for a brief while in the session of 1849-50 he planted the standard far to the front and called his people forward. Afterwards there were always others who appeared to be fighting much in advance of him.