Part 10(c) – South Carolina Secession Convention declares “Immediate Causes Which Induce and Justify the Secession of South Carolina from the Federal Union”
– SLAVERY, SLAVERY, SLAVERY – December 24, 1860

December 24, 1860 (Charleston, SC) – “David F. Jamison, President of Convention of the People of South Carolina, appointed a committee “to draft a summary statement of the causes which justify the secession of South Carolina.” Charles G. Memminger was part of this committee and is considered the main author of the “summary statement” that became known as the “Declaration of Immediate Causes which Induce and Justify the Secession of South Carolina.”
www.teachingushistory.org/lessons/DecofImCauses.htm

“The convention, … , in formulating a separate justification for its simple statement of repeal, would make it clear that it adopted the Ordinance of Secession to defend slavery.

“… the convention … voted by a margin of more than four to one to issue the declaration. Thus they agreed, in the words of delegate Lawrence M. Keitt, to “rest disunion upon the question of slavery.”
Source: Relic of the Lost Cause, The Story of South Carolina’s Ordinance of Secession, by Charles H. Lesser, South Carolina Department of Archives and History, 1990, page 11.

[ emphasis added ]

“The convention, … , in formulating a separate justification for its simple statement of repeal, would make it clear that it adopted the Ordinance of Secession to defend slavery. Shortly before the committee to draft the ordinance made its report on the 20th, President Jamison, who doubtless was privy to the committee’s work, had appointed another “Committee to draft a summary statement of the causes which justify the secession of South Carolina.” Christopher G. Memminger, a conservative former Unionist from Charleston who later served as secretary of the treasury of the Confederacy, chaired the committee. Memminger’s committee reported the next day, but it was the 24th before the convention adopted the “Declaration of the Immediate Causes which Induce and Justify the Secession of South Carolina from the Federal Union.”

“A short document, the “Declaration of Immediate Causes” claimed that the northern states had “deliberately broken” the federal compact by repudiating their responsibility under the fourth article of the United States Constitution to return runaway slaves. South Carolina was thus “released from her obligation.” This constitutional argument did not please everyone. In the debate in the convention, Maxcy Gregg, in particular, argued that the committee’s proposed statement was insufficient for “a new Declaration of Independence.” The document should, he said, also emphasize the tariff and federal expenditures for internal improvements. Although Gregg’s unhappiness with the document’s exclusive emphasis on slavery would be echoed later, the convention overrode his objections and voted by a margin of more than four to one to issue the declaration. Thus they agreed, in the words of delegate Lawrence M. Keitt, to “rest disunion upon the question of slavery.”

continued…

” … the Ordinance of Secession endures at “the vital center of our history,” a Declaration of Independence, defense of slavery, trophy of war, and relic of the Lost Cause.”

Source: Relic of the Lost Cause, The Story of South Carolina’s Ordinance of Secession, by Charles H. Lesser, South Carolina Department of Archives and History, 1990, pp. 11, 20.

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Part 3 – John C. Calhoun’s last speech in the United States Senate: 1850

March 4, 1850 – U.S. Senator John C. Calhoun: Agitation of the subject of Slavery would, if not prevented, end in Disunion.
[Calhoun died March 31, 1850]

In the United States Senate: “I have, senators, believed from the first that the agitation of the subject of slavery would, if not prevented by some timely and effective measure, end in disunion.”

continued…

“The agitation has been permitted to proceed, with almost no attempt to resist it, until it has reached a point when it can no longer be disguised or denied that the Union is in danger.”

continued…

“Unless something decisive is done, I again ask, What is to stop this agitation before the great and final object at which it aims — the abolition of slavery in the States — is consummated? Is it, then, not certain that if something is not done to arrest it, the South will be forced to choose between abolition and secession?”

THE CAUSES BY WHICH THE UNION IS ENDANGERED
United States Senator (SC) John C. Calhoun
March 4, 1850
http://civilwarcauses.org/saddress.htm

____________________________________________

John C. Calhoun: Unitarian [denier of Christ’s divinity, i.e., not a Christian], Scotch-Irish, South Carolinian, advocate of Slavery, States’ Rights, and Nullification.

John C. Calhoun (1782-1850)

United States Senator (SC) (1845-1850)
United States Secretary of State (1844-1845)
United States Senator (SC) (1832-1843)
Vice President of the United States (1825-1832)
United States Secretary of War (1817-1825)
U.S. House of Representatives (SC) (1811-1817)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_C._Calhoun

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Part 2 – Baptist Church Splits over Slavery: 1845

1845 – The Southern Baptist Convention is formed, splitting from the Baptist Triennial Convention.

Southern Baptist Beginnings
The Southern Baptist Convention Organized
www.baptisthistory.org/sbaptistbeginnings.htm
[ emphasis added ]

In 1844, Georgia Baptists asked the Home Mission Society to appoint a slaveholder to be a missionary in Georgia. After much discussion, the appointment was declined. A few months later, the Alabama Baptist Convention asked the Foreign Mission Society if they would appoint a slaveholder as a missionary. When the society said no, Virginia Baptists called for Baptists of the South to meet at Augusta, Georgia, in early May, 1845, for the purpose of consulting “on the best means of promoting the Foreign Mission cause, and other interests of the Baptist denomination in the South.”

Thus, on May 8, 1845, about 293 Baptist leaders of the South gathered at the First Baptist Church, Augusta, Georgia, representing over 365,000 Baptists. They concluded, with expressions of regret from their own leaders and from distinguished northern Baptist leaders,that more could be accomplished in Christian work by the organization in the South of a separate Baptist body for missionary work. The Methodists in the South had already separated over the issue of slavery, and southern Presbyterians would do so later.

[ source quoted more extensively further below ]

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Part 1 – Methodist Church Splits over Slavery: 1843, 1844

1843 – Wesleyan Methodist Church separates from Methodist Episcopal Church

1844 – The Methodist Episcopal Church splits into:
The Methodist Episcopal Church (North), and The Methodist Episcopal Church, South.

John Wesley advocated for freedom from slavery to William Wilberforce, who was a member of the English Parliament.

(Read more.)
http://gbgm-umc.org/umw/bible/slavery.html

“The churches divided over the issue of slavery. American Methodists at first followed John Wesley’s strong anti-slavery stance, denouncing participation in the slave trade and slaveholding, but later they yielded to economic and political pressures.”

Read and download the complete report here.