onvention, the disruption of the
Democratic party, the last bond between the North and the South, filled
the heart of the pioneer with solemn joy. "Only think of it!" he exulted
at the anniversary of the American Anti-Slavery Society in New York, May
8, 1860; "only think of it! the party which has for so many years cried
out, 'There must be no agitation on this subject' is now the most
agitated of all the parties in the country. The party which declares
that there ought not to be any sectionalism as against slavery, has now
been sundered geographically, and on this very question! The party which
had said, 'Let discussions cease forever,' is busily engaged in the
discussion, so that, possibly, the American Anti-Slavery Society might
adjourn _sine die_, after we get through with our present meetings, and
leave its work to be carried on in the other direction!" This was all
true enough. The sections were at last sundered, and a day of wrath was
rising dark and dreadful over "States dissevered, discordant,
belligerent."

CHAPTER XX.

THE DEATH-GRAPPLE.

The triumph of the Republican party at the polls was the signal for the
work of dissolution to begin. Webster's terrific vision of "a land rent
with civil feuds" became reality in the short space of six weeks after
Lincoln's election, by the secession of South Carolina from the Union.
Quickly other Southern States followed, until a United States South was
organized, the chief stone in the corner of the new political edifice
being Negro slavery. It was not six weeks after the inauguration of
Abraham Lincoln, when the roar of cannon in Charleston Harbor announced
to the startled country that war between the States had begun. The first
call of the new President for troops to put down the rebellion and to
save the Union, and the patriotic uprising which it evoked made it plain
that the struggle thus opened was to be nothing less than a
death-grapple between the two sections.

Before the attack on Fort Sumter, Garrison was opposed to coercing the
rebel States back into the Union. He admitted the Constitutional power
of the National Government to employ force in maintaining the integrity
of the Republic. "The Federal Government must not pretend to be in
actual operation, embracing thirty-four States," the editor of the
_Liberator_ commented, "and then allow the seceding States to trample
upon its flag, steal its property, and defy its authority with impunity;
fo