The
idea of losing the support of these strong personalities
terrified Buchanan, who immediately fell into a panic. Handing
Black the paper he had drawn up, Buchanan begged him to retain
office and to alter the paper as he saw fit. To this Black
agreed. The demand for the surrender of the forts was refused;
Anderson was not ordered back to Moultrie; and for the brief
remainder of Buchanan's administration Black acted as prime
minister.
A very powerful section of the Northern democracy, well typified
by their leaders at Washington, had thus emerged from political
evasion on the Northern side. These men, known afterwards as War
Democrats, combined with the Republicans to form the composite
Union party which supported Lincoln. It is significant that
Stanton eventually reappeared in the Cabinet as Lincoln's
Secretary of War, and that along with him appeared another War
Democrat, Gideon Welles, Lincoln's Secretary of the Navy. With
them, at last, Douglas, the greatest of all the old Democrats of
the North, took his position. What became of the other factions
of the old Democratic party remains to be told.
While Buchanan, early in the month, was weeping over the
pitilessness of fate, more practical Northerners were grappling
with the question of what was to be done about the situation.
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