Yes there was. Southerners attempted repeatedly to secure a meeting with Lincoln between January and Fort Sumter. He refused EVERY SINGLE ONE of them. That included not only envoys from Davis and the confederate states but high ranking leaders from the states themselves. Among those who attempted to meet with Lincoln were the Attorney General of South Carolina, Congressman Martin Crawford of Georgia, and former Governer Andre Roman of Louisiana. Lincoln refused every single one of them. He also refused calls for meetings with the south to be hosted by at least two sitting US Senators who had not seceded yet - Robert M.T. Hunter and Louis T. Wigfall. He would not meet with any of the southerners, be it formally or informally, be they an official or simply an envoy, or even be it through an intermediary in the senate.
The simple fact is that Lincoln did not want diplomacy. He did not want to compromise. He did not want to settle the matter in any way other than either complete subservience to his demands or a meeting on the battlefield.
Yes there was. Southerners attempted repeatedly to secure a meeting with Lincoln between January and Fort Sumter. He refused EVERY SINGLE ONE of them.
Of course he did; they were traitors.
President Lincoln continued the policy of the Buchanan administration. Attorney General Stanton to President Buchanan:
"These gentlemen claim to be ambassadors," he said. "It is preposterous! They cannot be ambassadors; they are lawbreakers, traitors. They should be arrested. You cannot negotiate with them; and yet it seems by this paper that you have been led into that very thing. With all respect to you, Mr. President, I must say that the Attorney General, under his oath of office, dares not to be cognizant of the pending proceedings. Your reply to these so-called ambassadors must not be transmitted as the reply of the president. It is wholly unlawful, and improper; its language is unguarded and to send it as an official document will bring the presidency to the point of usurpation."
-- The Coming Fury, p. 165 by Bruce Catton
Walt