I don't see a realistic prospect at that time for the Republican Party to make real inroads with the Southern states. Their entire focus was as a Northern sectional party. They would have had to change their policies on just about everything to appeal to Southerners.
Slave uprisings were a major fear in the slave states: Gabriel’s rebellion, the German Coast uprising, Denmark Vesey, Nat Turner. Patrols for runaways were a major part of life, and they were vigilant about slave gatherings that they thought might spark a rebellion. Some slaveowners might believe that slaves were contented until abolitionists got to them, but they were terrified of abolitionists getting to them, even from a distance (hence the desire to keep slaves illiterate when possible).
of all those mentioned, Nat Turner's was the only one that was really violent. The others leaked or were squelched pretty easily. There were certainly concerns about runaway slaves. That was especially economically damaging because those most likely to flee tended to be the young and fit - precisely those slaves who were the most economically productive. I think runaways were a much bigger concern than slave rebellions though I'm sure people had fears of the latter.
In contrast, tariffs weren’t a major burden on most Southerners. If the slave states had stayed in the union, tariffs wouldn’t have gone up as high as they did. Lincoln would have lost control of Congress in the next election and tariffs would have gone down again.
The Tariff of Abominations was a major burden on everyone in the cotton producing states especially. You say tariffs would not have gone up as high as they did (53%). They didn't need to be that high to be economically devastating but they certainly would have risen to a level that would have crushed the South's economy. Given their larger population and thus more votes, the North would have every incentive to keep jacking tariff rates ever higher. After all, it lined their pockets. You say Lincoln would have lost control of Congress in the next election and Tariffs would have gone down again. I don't buy that at all. The money interests in the North had every reason to push for higher and higher tariffs. The North had a significantly larger population and thus more votes for Congress.
The militancy against the 1828 tariff was largely confined to South Carolina, the state where slave owning families were most powerful and had control of the government. Other states probably recognized that tariffs went up and down with the political climate. Later secessionists adopted talk about the tariff and fishing bounties because they were large slaveowners themselves, or because they wanted their revolt to be about more than worries about slavery. It wasn’t the main issue until after the war when no one who had supported the rebellion wanted to acknowledge the importance of slavey.
The only part of this that is even remotely accurate is that the most virulent opposition to the Tariff of Abominations came from South Carolina. South Carolina took the lead because they were the largest cotton producing state at the time. It was damaging to all of them and cotton production had soared since the 1820s so any future tariff like that was going to be quite devastating to all of them. Southerners complained bitterly about the tariff before and during the war - not just after. I've provided all kinds of quotes from Southern politicians and Newspapers before and during the war showing this. I've also provided quotes from Northern and Foreign sources backing up this assessment - ie that the North stood to gain hugely from higher tariffs and stood to lose far more if the South seceded while the South stood to gain hugely in that case. The claim that they only cared about slavery or that they only discussed other grievances after the fact is just so much Yankee propaganda.
The percentage of slaveowning families in the Deep South States was rather high, estimated at 49% in Mississippi and 46% in South Carolina, at 36.7% in the first seven seceding states and at around 25.3% in the last four states to secede. Those numbers aren’t exact, but even if one lowers them they still reflect the place of slavery in the slave states. Those who didn’t own slaves were often dependent on the slaveowners — and of course they were concerned about what a post-slavery future would look like.
We can consult the 1860 US Census. The percentage of the White population which owned slaves was indeed higher in the states of the Deep South which was more agricultural than in the Upper South which was well on the way to industrialization, but of the states that seceded, only 5.63% of the population owned slaves. My source for that is the 1860 US Census. I also dispute the claim that even people who did not have slaves were "dependent" on people who did.
“Slavery was strictly, a sectional interest” — sure, until Southern states tried to overturn the Missouri Compromise and even the Northwest Ordinance. Slaveowners brought their problems upon themselves. Eventually, unless more territory were annexed, slave states would become a minority. Wouldn’t we have hoped that would be the case?
They already were a minority. Slave owners did not create the problem all by themselves. Yankee Slave Traders had a huge hand in it. So did Bankers and Lawyers and Insurers and shipbuilders and Sailors and "Factors" (middlemen....people in wholesale and logistics we would call them today). They ALL had a big hand in slavery. They all profited from it.
The leading founders certainly wished for an eventual end to slavery. Slaveowners couldn’t face that so they engineered the situation that brought Northeast and Midwest together — just as their splitting the Democratic party created the situation where a Republican’s election would be inevitable.
They "engineered the situation" that brought the Northeast and Midwest together? No. The Republican Party did that. Southerners complained about it and saw slavery as a wedge issue Republicans and corporate interests were using to get Midwest farmers to align with Northeastern industrialists.
Lincoln’s first draft of his inaugural address didn’t mention the Corwin Amendment. The amendment hadn’t been passed by Congress then, but still, he didn’t see fit to mention it. Several historians have suggested that Seward, who had put a lot of effort into crafting the amendment and spiriting it through the Congress, prevailed upon Lincoln to the mention amendment in his inaugural address. I haven’t been able to find out if that is true, but historians who have been suspicious of Lincoln in this matter have made that suggestion when it would benefit their cause not to.
Neither side was fighting over slavery. They both said so numerous times in public and in private. Lincoln said it. Davis said it. The US Congress passed a resolution stating that they were not fighting over slavery. Slavery was an issue they could compromise on. The country's economic policy and who would wield the power of the federal government to benefit their economic interests was a long and bitter fight.
Republican votes had to be “whipped” for the Corwin Amendment because more Republicans voted against it than voted for it, but Lincoln wasn’t the one doing the whipping, nor did he bring the “whole party machinery” behind it for ratification. I asked you to provide evidence for your claims, and you haven’t.
There were LOTS of Republicans who were for it. I counted dozens and dozens who voted for it not to mention the fact that Republicans introduced it in both houses of congress. Lincoln was certainly engaged in using his influence to get Republican Congressmen to vote for it. I have provided ample evidence for what I've said on this subject numerous times on this board for years and years. You just don't want to acknowledge it.
Pushing the amendment would have broken the Republican Party in two. A substantial part of the “party machinery” didn’t and wouldn’t support the amendment, which was quickly overtaken by events and became a dead letter. The amendment wasn’t going to be ratified by the necessary 3/4ths of states.
The amendment was pushed. It did not break the Republican party in two. A substantial part of the party DID support it such that it got the necessary 2/3rds supermajority in each house of Congress and it got that AFTER the Southern Congressional delegation withdrew. It was ratified by multiple Northern states and Seward guaranteed he could get highly influential New York to ratify it if the Southern States agreed. Its extremely likely that enough states would have ratified it had the Southern states agreed to it as the price of them dropping independence.
Many, many errors in there, but I don’t have the time or the patience to carry on this pointless discussion any longer. Go on living in your fantasy world if you like.