Robert Toombs Robert Augustus Toombs ( July 2 , 1810 – December 15 , 1885 ) was an American and Confederate political leader , Whig Party senator from Georgia , a founding father of the Confederacy , its first Secretary of State , and a minor Confederate general in the Civil War . He feuded bitterly with Confederate president Jefferson Davis . According to Jacob S . Clawson , he was " a bullish politician whose blend of acerbic wit , fiery demeanor , and political tact aroused the full spectrum of emotions from his constituents and colleagues . . . [ he ] could not balance his volatile personality with his otherwise keen political skill . " Early life . Born near Washington , Wilkes County , Georgia , Robert Augustus Toombs was the fifth child of Catherine Huling and Robert Toombs . He was of English descent . His father died when he was five , and he entered Franklin College at the University of Georgia in Athens when he was just fourteen . During his time at Franklin College he was a member of the Demosthenian Literary Society , which honors him as one of its most legendary alumni to this day . After the university chastised him for unbecoming conduct in a card - playing incident , Toombs continued his education at Union College , in Schenectady , New York , from which he graduated in 1828 . Toombs went on to study law at the University of Virginia Law School in Charlottesville , Virginia . Shortly after his admission to the Georgia bar , he married his childhood sweetheart , Julia Ann DuBois ; they had three children . Public service . Toombs was admitted to the State Bar of Georgia in 1830 , and served in the Georgia House of Representatives ( 1838 , 1840 – 41 , and 1843 – 44 ) . His genial character , proclivity for entertainment , and unqualified success on the legal circuit earned Toombs the growing attention and admiration of his fellow Georgians . On the wave of his growing popularity , Toombs won a seat to the United States House of Representatives ( 1844 – 53 ) , and joined his close friend and fellow representative Alexander H . Stephens from Crawfordville , Georgia . Their friendship forged a powerful personal and political bond that effectively defined and articulated Georgia ' s position on national issues in the middle decades of the nineteenth century . Toombs , like Stephens , emerged as a states ' rights partisan , became a national Whig , and once the Whig Party dissolved , aided in the creation of the short - lived Constitutional Union Party in the early 1850s . Toombs stood with most Whigs regarding the status of Texas as the 28th state . Historian William Y . Thompson writes that Toombs was " prepared to vote all necessary supplies to repel invasion . But he did not agree that the territory between the Nueces River and the Rio Grande was a part of Texas . He declared the movement of American forces to the Rio Grande at President Polk ' s command " was contrary to the laws of this country , a usurpation on the rights of this House , and an aggression on the rights of Mexico . " From 1853 – 61 Toombs served in the United States Senate , only reluctantly joining the Democratic Party when lack of interest among other states doomed the Constitutional Union Party . From Unionist to Confederate . Throughout the 1840s and 1850s , Toombs fought to reconcile national policies with sectional interests . He had opposed the Annexation of Texas but vowed to defend the new state once it was annexed late in 1845 . He also opposed the Mexican - American War , President Polk ' s Oregon policy , the Walker Tariff of 1846 and the Wilmot Proviso , first introduced in 1846 . In common with Alexander H . Stephens and Howell Cobb , he defended Henry Clay ' s Compromise of 1850 against southerners who advocated secession from the Union as the only solution to sectional tensions over slavery . He denounced the Nashville Convention , opposed the secessionists in Georgia , and helped to frame the famous Georgia platform ( 1850 ) . His position and that of Southern Unionists during the decade 1850 – 60 has often been misunderstood . They disapproved of secession , not because they considered it wrong in principle , but because they considered it inexpedient . Toombs objected to halting the spread of slavery into the territories of California and New Mexico and even the abrogation of what John C . Calhoun had called the " peculiar institution " in Washington , D . C . He took the view that the territories were the common property of all the people of the United States and that Congress must ensure equal treatment of both slaveholder and non - slaveholder . If the rights of the South were violated , Toombs declared , " Let discord reign forever . " Toombs favored the Kansas - Nebraska Act , the admission of Kansas under the Lecompton Constitution , and the English Bill ( 1858 ) . However , his faith in the resiliency and effectiveness of the national government to resolve sectional conflicts waned as the 1850s drew to a close . On June 24 , 1856 , Toombs introduced the Toombs Bill , which proposed a constitutional convention in Kansas under conditions which were acknowledged by various anti - slavery leaders as fair , and which mark the greatest concessions made by the pro - slavery senators during the Kansas struggle . The bill did not provide for the submission of the constitution to popular vote , and the silence on this point of the territorial law under which the Lecompton Constitution of Kansas was framed in 1857 was the crux of the Lecompton struggle . Thompson refers to Toombs as " hardly a man of the people with his wealth and imperious manner . But his handsome imposing appearance , undoubted ability , and boldness of speech appealed to Georgians , who kept him in national office until the Civil War brought him home . " Secession . In the presidential campaign of 1860 he supported John C . Breckinridge , and on December 22 , soon after the election of Abraham Lincoln , sent a telegram to Georgia that asserted that " secession by the 4th of March next should be thundered forth from the ballot - box by the united voice of Georgia . " He delivered a farewell address in the Senate ( January 7 , 1861 ) in which he said : “ We want no negro equality , no negro citizenship ; we want no negro race to degrade our own ; and as one man [ we ] would meet you upon the border with the sword in one hand and the torch in the other . ” He returned to Georgia , and with Governor Joseph E . Brown led the fight for secession against Stephens and Herschel V . Johnson ( 1812 – 80 ) . His influence was a most powerful factor in inducing the " old - line Whigs " to support immediate secession . Unlike the crises of 1850 , these events galvanized Toombs and energized ambitions for becoming the president of the new Confederate nation . Confederacy . The selection of Jefferson Davis as the new nation ' s chief executive dashed any hopes Toombs ' s had imagined of holding the high office of the fledgeling Confederacy . Davis chose Toombs as his first Confederate States Secretary of State . Toombs was the only member of Davis ' administration to voice reservations about the attack on Fort Sumter . After reading Lincoln ' s letter to the governor of South Carolina , Toombs said memorably : " Mr . President , at this time it is suicide , murder , and will lose us every friend at the North . You will wantonly strike a hornet ' s nest which extends from mountain to ocean , and legions now quiet will swarm out and sting us to death . It is unnecessary ; it puts us in the wrong ; it is fatal . " Army general . Within months of his cabinet appointment , a frustrated Toombs stepped down to join the Confederate States Army . He received a commission as a brigadier general on July 19 , 1861 , and served first as a brigade commander in the ( Confederate ) Army of the Potomac , and then in David R . Jones ' division of the Army of Northern Virginia through the Peninsula Campaign , Seven Days Battles , Northern Virginia Campaign , and Maryland Campaign . He was wounded in the hand at the Battle of Antietam . He resigned his CSA commission on March 3 , 1863 , to become Colonel of the 3rd Cavalry of the Georgia Militia , and subsequently served as a brigadier general and adjutant and inspector - general of General Gustavus W . Smith ' s division of Georgia militia . Denied a military promotion , he resigned his commission in March 1863 . He then launched a major attack on Davis and the government , opposed conscription and the suspension of habeas corpus , as newspapers warned that he verged on treason . As the war ended he fled to Europe . Final years . He returned to Georgia in 1867 but he refused to request a pardon from the president and regained neither his right to vote nor his political career . He did restore his lucrative law practice . In addition , he dominated the Georgia constitutional convention of 1877 , where once again he demonstrated the political skill and temperament that earlier had earned him a reputation as one of Georgia ' s most effective leaders . He gained a populist reputation for his attacks on railroads . In his final years , he was blinded and ravaged by alcoholism . Legacy . Georgia ' s Toombs County is named for Robert Toombs . So is the Georgia town of Toomsboro , though with a slightly altered spelling . His legacy also lives on in his hometown of Washington , Georgia . Visitors to Washington can tour the Robert Toombs House , a State Historic Site operated by the Georgia Department of Natural Resources . Robert Toombs Christian Academy in Lyons , Georgia was named in his honor . Retrieved on 2008 - 02 - 13