James Chesnut, Jr. of South Carolina tendered his resignation from the Senate just four days after the presidential election becoming the first Southern senator to do so. He returned to Charleston where he participated in the secession convention in December 1860. He later served on the committee that drafted the Confederate constitution. His fellow South Carolina senator, James Henry Hammond, followed the next day. (By John Osborne)
Source Citation
Charles Edward Cauthen, J. Tracy Power, South Carolina goes to war, 1860-1865 (Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina Press, 2005), 61.
Record Data
Date Certainty
Exact
Type
Lawmaking/Litigating
