In this perspective, each state individually had agreed to allow the national government to act as its agent without ever relinquishing fundamental sovereignty. The Southern position assumed that the United States was a compact of Southern states. Davis's inaugural address emphasized secession as a peaceful move that rested upon the consent of the governed to alter or abolish forms of government that were destructive to their freedoms and interests. Alexander Stephens, a moderate Georgia Whig who had become a Democrat, was named vice president. senator who had been the secretary of war in the Pierce administration. Davis was a Mississippi slaveowner and U.S. Passing over the most radical Southern secessionists, the convention named Jefferson Davis as president of the new nation.

The Confederate constitution supported states' sovereignty, guaranteed the perpetual existence of slavery in the states and territories, prohibited Congress from enacting a protective tariff and giving government aid to internal improvements, and limited the presidential term to six-years. They drafted and passed a constitution that was similar to the U.S. Delegates from these states met in Montgomery, Alabama, and formed the Confederate States of America. Between the time of his election in November and his inauguration in March of 1861, seven states from the lower South seceded from the Union. Abraham Lincoln's presidential campaign victory lit the fuse that would explode into the Civil War.

When did tennessee rejoin the union