[52] Letters, II. 111, 121, 127.


To the judgments and legislative acts of Southerners already
quoted, may be added some of the opinions of men from the North.
Erving, the diplomat, wrote from New York, "The real danger is in
the fanatics and disunionists of the North". "I see no salvation
but in the total abandonment of the Wilmot Proviso." Edward
Everett, on the contrary, felt that "unless some southern men of
influence have courage enough to take grounds against the
extension of slavery and in favor of abolition . . . we shall
infallibly separate".[53]

[53] Winthrop MSS., Jan. 16, Feb. 7.


A Philadelphia editor who went to Washington to learn the real
sentinments of the Southern members, reported February 1, that
if the Wilmot Proviso were not given up, ample provision made for
fugitive slaves and avoidance of interference with slavery in the
District of Columbia, the South would secede, though this was not
generally believed in the North. "The North must decide whether
she would have the Wilmot Proviso without the Union or the Union
without the Wilmot Proviso."[54]

[54] Philadelphia Bulletin, in McMaster, VIII. 15.


In answer to inquiries from the Massachusetts legislature as to
whether the Southern attitude was "bluster" or "firm Resolve",