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Vox Populi-Vox Belli: a Historical Study of Southern Ante Bellum Public Attitudes and Motivations Toward Secession

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Vox Populi-Vox Belli: a Historical Study of Southern Ante Bellum Public Attitudes and Motivations Toward Secession University of Central Florida STARS Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2004-2019 2012 Vox Populi-vox Belli: A Historical Study Of Southern Ante Bellum Public Attitudes And Motivations Toward Secession Julian Boyden University of Central Florida Part of the History Commons Find similar works at: https://stars.library.ucf.edu/etd University of Central Florida Libraries http://library.ucf.edu This Masters Thesis (Open Access) is brought to you for free and open access by STARS. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2004-2019 by an authorized administrator of STARS. For more information, please contact [email protected]. STARS Citation Boyden, Julian, "Vox Populi-vox Belli: A Historical Study Of Southern Ante Bellum Public Attitudes And Motivations Toward Secession" (2012). Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2004-2019. 2100. https://stars.library.ucf.edu/etd/2100 VOX POPULI – VOX BELLI A HISTORICAL STUDY OF SOUTHERN ANTE BELLUM PUBLIC ATTITUDES AND MOTIVATIONS TOWARD SECESSION by JULIAN BOYDEN Master of Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1976 A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in History in the Department of History in the College of Arts and Humanities at the University of Central Florida Orlando, Florida Spring Term 2012 Major Professor: John Sacher ©2012 Julian Boyden ii ABSTRACT This thesis examines why the south seceded in 1860 as opposed to any other time in the 19th century and what changed the mentalité of the people in the period 1857-1860. The underlying issue in southern politics and the issue of secession was clearly slavery and slavery rested on the economics of cotton. Yet slavery and cotton do not explain why the South seceded in 1860 and not at other times in the preceding seventy years. 1807 saw the outlawing of the international slave trade and 1819 saw Congress pass the Slave Trade Act interdicting the ships involved. In 1828 and 1832 the bitter tariff disputes between northern industrial and southern agricultural interests led to the South Carolina doctrine of “Nullification” but no secession. Neither the 1846 proposed Wilmot Proviso restricting slavery in the new territories nor the immediate post Mexican War disputes over the territorial expansion of slavery caused secession and in every case the South was willing to compromise. The methodology of this work is based on the assumption that words and thoughts are intimately linked and that by measuring changes in frequency of word use, changes in thought can be detected and measured. Evidence for the changing use word frequency was provided by an etymological and article content study of selected daily editions of six newspapers in the three cities. The thesis put forward to explain the change in political attitude is that for the southern cities of Richmond, Charleston and New Orleans, political power and political issues were the most important factors. The rise of the sectional northern Republican Party and fear of its abolitionist principles weighed more heavily than any other factors in altering the psychology of the South. This raised the political dispute over slavery to an issue of secession and potential military conflict. iii To the Boyden women, Mrs. Irene F. Boyden (nee Woodward) and Mrs. Doris A. Boyden (nee Mewes) iv ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Acknowledgments should go to my thesis committee, Dr. Sacher, Dr. Crepeau and Dr. Herlihy. Additional acknowledgements should go to Dr. Zhang and Dr. Walker. v TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF TABLES ..................................................................................................................... xviii CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................... 1 CHAPTER 2 METHODOLOGY ................................................................................................. 10 CHAPTER 3 HISTORY OF STATES, CITIES, AND NEWSPAPER ....................................... 20 CHAPTER 4 THE RESULTS ...................................................................................................... 32 Overview- Comparative Article Frequency .............................................................................. 32 Word Frequency and Frequency of Articles Containing Key Words ....................................... 41 Economics ............................................................................................................................. 41 Social..................................................................................................................................... 57 Political ................................................................................................................................. 67 CHAPTER 5 CONCLUSIONS .................................................................................................... 99 APPENDIX A COMPARATIVE ARTICLE FREQUENCY TABLE BY STATE, CITY AND NEWSPAPER ARTICLE RANK............................................................................................... 101 APPENDIX B ECONOMIC WORD FREQUENCY TOTAL PER 1000 SLAVERY ARTICLES ..................................................................................................................................................... 103 APPENDIX C POLITICAL WORD FREQUENCY TOTAL PER 1000 SLAVERY ARTICLES ..................................................................................................................................................... 105 APPENSDIX D MILITARY WORD FREQUENCY TOTAL PER 1000 SLAVERY ARTICLES ..................................................................................................................................................... 107 APPENDIX E SOCIAL WORD FREQUENCY TOTAL PER 1000 SLAVERY ARTICLES . 109 vi APPENDIX F TOTAL NUMBER OF ECONOMIC ARTICLES CONTAINING KEY WORDS PER 1000 SLAVERY ARTICLES ............................................................................................. 111 APPENDIX G TOTAL NUMBER OF POLITICAL ARTICLES CONTAINING KEY WORDS PER 1000 SLAVERY ARTICLES ............................................................................................. 113 APPENDIX H TOTAL NUMBER OF MILITARY ARTICLES CONTAINING KEY WORDS PER 1000 SLAVERY ARTICLES ............................................................................................. 115 APPENDIX I TOTAL NUMBER OF SOCIAL ARTICLES CONTAINING KEY WORDS PER 1000 SLAVERY ARTICLES ..................................................................................................... 117 APPENDIX J RICHMOND ENQUIRER ECONOMIC WORD FREQUENCY PER 1000 SLAVERY ARTICLES .............................................................................................................. 119 APPENDIX K RICHMOND ENQUIRER POLITICAL WORD FREQUENCY PER 1000 SLAVERY ARTICLES .............................................................................................................. 121 APPENDIX L RICHMOND ENQUIRER MILITARY WORD FREQUENCY PER 1000 SLAVERY ARTICLES .............................................................................................................. 123 APPENDIX M RICHMOND ENQUIRER SOCIAL WORD FREQUENCY PER 1000 SLAVERY ARTICLES .............................................................................................................. 125 APPENDIX N RICHMOND ENQUIRER ARTICLES WITH KEY ECONOMIC WORDS FREQUENCY PER 1000 SLAVERY ARTICLES .................................................................... 127 APPENDIX O RICHMOND ENQUIRER ARTICLES WITH KEY POLITICAL WORDS FREQUENCY PER 1000 SLAVERY ARTICLES .................................................................... 129 APPENDIX P RICHMOND ENQUIRER ARTICLES WITH KEY MILITARY WORDS FREQUENCY PER 1000 SLAVERY ARTICLES .................................................................... 131 vii APPENDIX Q RICHMOND ENQUIRER ARTICLES WITH KEY SOCIAL WORDS FREQUENCY PER 1000 SLAVERY ARTICLES .................................................................... 133 APPENDIX R RICHMOND ENQUIRER ARTICLE FREQUENCY TABLE ARTICLE PERCENTAGE........................................................................................................................... 135 APPENDIX S RICHMOND ENQUIRER ARTICLE FREQUENCY TABLE NUMBER OF ARTICLES ................................................................................................................................. 137 APPENDIX T RICHMOND ENQUIRER ECONOMIC WORD FREQUENCY ..................... 139 APPENDIX U RICHMOND ENQUIRER POLITICAL WORD FREQUENCY ..................... 141 APPENDIX V RICHMOND ENQUIRER MILITARY WORD FREQUENCY ...................... 143 APPENDIX W RICHMOND ENQUIRER SOCIAL WORD FREQUENCY .......................... 145 APPENDIX X RICHMOND ENQUIRER NUMBER OF ARTICLES CONTAINING KEY ECONOMIC WORDS ................................................................................................................ 147 APPENDIX Y RICHMOND ENQUIRER NUMBER OF ARTICLES CONTAINING KEY POLITICAL WORDS ................................................................................................................ 149 APPENDIX Z RICHMOND ENQUIRER NUMBER OF ARTICLES CONTAINING KEY MILITARY WORDS.................................................................................................................. 151 APPENDIX AA RICHMOND ENQUIRER NUMBER OF ARTICLES CONTAINING KEY SOCIAL WORDS ......................................................................................................................
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