WI Lincoln negotiates in 1861?

The Confederate government sent a peace delegation to Washington before the firing on Fort Sumter but Lincoln refused to meet them. Seward did meet with the peace commissioners, and Lincoln himself did negotiate with Confederate officials in 1865.

I think either Lincoln changing his mind and negotiating with the Confederacy in 1861 or Seward being President and negotiating as President instead of Secretary of State are reasonably plausible PODs that don't require changing lots of other things. Its also important to realize that only seven states had seceded at that point and actually no other state was inclined to secede. A POD could be a clearer communication by Virginia that they would go if the federal government used force to suppress secession (regardless of who fired the first thought), or several border states making a joint declaration, better yet if this includes Kentucky.

Also emancipation was a wartime measure and support within the federal government for outright abolition was pretty much zero. An amendment guaranteeing the existence of slavery was passed by Congress and sent to the states about this time. And actually most northerners, including abolitionists, except apparently Lincoln, thought that if a state seceded there wasn't anything constitutionally a state could do about it.

The issues to be negotiated were the Confederacy's share of the national debt, tariffs (a lot of tariff revenue for the federal government was collected in southern ports), navigation rights on the Mississippi, and federal property within the seceding states. Maybe the federal government could threaten to stop enforcing the fugitive slave law as a negotiating tactic (it was enforced after 1861 IOTL), but that is the only way I can see slavery entering into the discussion.

So what would have been the consequence of a negotiation? Could either side have negotiated in good faith? Would the fire-eaters in the South have engineered a war anyway?
 
So you think that, after lynching and shooting, all these tensions and hate, a Northern Senator almost caned to death by his Southern colleagues, the Brown's Raid, the polemics after Scott Case and with Kansas that was bleeding, it was possible a negotiation?
Good luck.
Legally speaking, Lincoln was right: although Supreme Court will prohibit Secession only in 1867, the Constitution declare that any territorial cession (to anyone, including new Confederate Government) must have Congressional approval. And Southerns can blame only themselves for their decision to retire all their members in the Congress. The precedents, with Presidents Jackson and Taylor, from two different and opposite parties, were clear.
When Confederates declared their secession, they occupied federal proprieties and arsenals, sized federal ships and removed many officials, judges and lawmakers that are against the move: this made them more rebels or coup plotters then secessionists and Lincoln refused to meet with them, wanting avoid a unofficial recognition of parity between Federal Government and rebels.
And Lincoln was not alone, because most of Congress was with him and so was the Supreme Court.
And what is the reason? That Lincoln privately was against Slavery? So what? Also Presidents Adams (both of them) and Van Buren were against Slavery, and Thomas Jefferson studied a way to abolish it before be blocked by Congress. Lincoln was against the Kansas-Nebraska Act, that extended Slavery to Western Territories but was in favor to mantein it in the South and this is a common knowledge.
And to negotiate what? Tariffs and debts? Really? And so why the Founding Fathers wrote the Constitution and created the House, the Senate, the Presidency, the Cabinet, the Supreme Court, the Appeal Courts, the States's Governors, the States's Legislatures and all the Institutions legitimated by free and fair Elections (where voted only white males, if I can) if not to discuss about such political questions?
If a President is ready to negotiate with the first group of rebels or the first group of States that don't want to pay the common debt what the second? And the third? It would be the end of Federal Goverment and a return to something similar to Articles of Confederacy as any group of States could successfully pressure the Government to renegotiate their obligations with a such precedent: you can imagine today, Progressive and Conservatives States that, instead try a legal way before the Supreme Court, simply threat the secession or refused to obey about Trump's controversial Immigration policies or very criticized Obamacare?
So the conclusion is that Lincoln was right, the Law was with him and Slavers, mostly for arrogant proud and miscalculation, made the biggest mistake of their life.
 
So you think that, after lynching and shooting, all these tensions and hate, a Northern Senator almost caned to death by his Southern colleagues, the Brown's Raid, the polemics after Scott Case and with Kansas that was bleeding, it was possible a negotiation?
Good luck.
Legally speaking, Lincoln was right: although Supreme Court will prohibit Secession only in 1867, the Constitution declare that any territorial cession (to anyone, including new Confederate Government) must have Congressional approval. And Southerns can blame only themselves for their decision to retire all their members in the Congress. The precedents, with Presidents Jackson and Taylor, from two different and opposite parties, were clear.
When Confederates declared their secession, they occupied federal proprieties and arsenals, sized federal ships and removed many officials, judges and lawmakers that are against the move: this made them more rebels or coup plotters then secessionists and Lincoln refused to meet with them, wanting avoid a unofficial recognition of parity between Federal Government and rebels.
And Lincoln was not alone, because most of Congress was with him and so was the Supreme Court.
And what is the reason? That Lincoln privately was against Slavery? So what? Also Presidents Adams (both of them) and Van Buren were against Slavery, and Thomas Jefferson studied a way to abolish it before be blocked by Congress. Lincoln was against the Kansas-Nebraska Act, that extended Slavery to Western Territories but was in favor to mantein it in the South and this is a common knowledge.
And to negotiate what? Tariffs and debts? Really? And so why the Founding Fathers wrote the Constitution and created the House, the Senate, the Presidency, the Cabinet, the Supreme Court, the Appeal Courts, the States's Governors, the States's Legislatures and all the Institutions legitimated by free and fair Elections (where voted only white males, if I can) if not to discuss about such political questions?
If a President is ready to negotiate with the first group of rebels or the first group of States that don't want to pay the common debt what the second? And the third? It would be the end of Federal Goverment and a return to something similar to Articles of Confederacy as any group of States could successfully pressure the Government to renegotiate their obligations with a such precedent: you can imagine today, Progressive and Conservatives States that, instead try a legal way before the Supreme Court, simply threat the secession or refused to obey about Trump's controversial Immigration policies or very criticized Obamacare?
So the conclusion is that Lincoln was right, the Law was with him and Slavers, mostly for arrogant proud and miscalculation, made the biggest mistake of their life.
Well said. Another factor is that the Slavers were not willing to make any concessions; they wanted the US and Lincoln to make all the concessions.
 
It would be very difficult negotiations. Southerners decided to secede and Lincoln wanted keep Union tpgether. He couldn't offer anyhing for the South. Even in OTL Lincoln was ready keep slavery around if it just could stop civil war and went to emancipation route only when the war was lasted while.
 
It would be very difficult negotiations. Southerners decided to secede and Lincoln wanted keep Union tpgether. He couldn't offer anyhing for the South. Even in OTL Lincoln was ready keep slavery around if it just could stop civil war and went to emancipation route only when the war was lasted while.
Not difficult, but impossible. the Southern leaders wanted Lincoln and the Republicans to recognize the Dred Scott decision and pass a Federal Slave code to allow slave owners to take their slaves anywhere in the US; they also wanted the administration to repeal personal liberty laws in the North. Needless to say, there is no way in hell Lincoln or the Republicans would ever agree to such proposals.
 
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