Central Confederacy

File:Central Confederacy.png

Map of proposed Central Confederacy.

The Central Confederacy was a proposed nation made up of American states in the mid-Atlantic region of the country. The plan was discussed in the border and middle states prior to the outbreak of the American Civil War in 1861.

Background

Due to concerns about the Federal government's perceived growth during the Lincoln administration, and federal policy involving the institution of slavery, states located in the southern region of the United States, discussed and eventually withdrew from the union after the 1860 election of Abraham Lincoln, forming the Confederate States of America.

Many prominent speakers from both the North and Middle States expressed a desire to allow the southern states to secede peacefully. In the middle states, there also existed a sentiment to actually join the Southern Confederacy. But other individuals, including former Congressman John Pendleton Kennedy and Governor Thomas Hicks, both of Maryland, drew up plans to form a Central Confederacy composed of the states of Delaware, New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Virginia, Missouri, and Ohio.

The plan

Kennedy published a pamphlet entitled The Border States on December 15, 1860, that detailed plans of the secession. Hicks advocated the plan during a January 2, 1861, letter to Delaware Governor William Burton. He also wrote letters to the governors of New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Virginia, Missouri, and Ohio. As the southern Confederacy peacefully formed, sentiment among the newspapers and people of Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and New York were at its highest for the formation of a Central Confederacy. However, this rhetoric reversed following the southern attack on Fort Sumter.