to justify secession.  At the same time they opposed “coercion,” and since a reconstructed Union was impossible they would have solved the difficulty by peaceful separation.  Writing to Gen. McClellan June 8, 1861, Garrett Davis said:  “The sympathy for the South and the inclination to secession among our people is much stronger in the southwestern corner of the state than it is in any other part, and as you proceed toward the upper section of the Ohio and our Virginia line, it gradually becomes weaker until it is almost wholly lost....  I doubt not that two thirds of our people are unconditionally for the Union.  The timid are for it and they shrink from convulsion and civil war, while all the bold, the reckless, and the bankrupt are for secession."[18] This categorical distinction, however, is hardly right.  There were Kentuckians of representative families on both sides in all parts of the State except in the extreme West.[19] A careful study of the facts, however, leads one to the conclusion that even in the beginning there were more Unionists than Secessionists.  The Unionists, unhappily, were not organized while the Secessionists were led by the State officials, chief among whom was Governor Magoffin.

When the Southern States began to secede Governor Magoffin called a special session of the State legislature, thinking that he could have a secession convention called.  He said in part:  “I therefore submit to your consideration the propriety of providing for the election of delegates to a convention to be assembled at an early day to which shall be referred for full and final determination the future of the Federal and interstate relations of Kentucky.”  He further said:  “Kentucky will not be an indifferent observer of the force policy.  The seceding States have not in their haste and inconsiderate action our approval, but their cause is our right and they have our sympathies.  The people of Kentucky will never stand by with folded arms while those States are struggling for their constitutional rights and resisting oppression and being subjugated to an anti-slavery government."[20] He believed that the idea of coercion, when applied to great political communities, is revolting to a free people, contrary to the spirit of our institutions, and if successful would endanger the liberties of the people.[21] But the legislature did not provide for such a convention.  On the eleventh of February this body adjourned.  It reassembled on the twentieth of March and remained in session until the fourth of April, but still these important matters were not decided.  Pursuant to another call of the Governor, it reassembled on the 6th of May and sat until the twenty-fourth of May when it adjourned.  On the second of September the legislature elected in August came in, but still the important question as to what should be done hung in the balance.  At first there came up the resolutions introduced by George W. Ewing on the twenty-first of January, expressing