Immediately after finding out the election results, a special South Carolina convention
declared "that the Union now subsisting between South Carolina and other states under the name of the 'United States of America' is hereby dissolved;" by February six more cotton states would follow (
Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Texas), forming the
Confederate States of America. In 1960, Lipset examined the secessionist vote in each Southern state in 1860–61. In each state he divided the counties by the proportion of slaves, low, medium and high. He found that in the 181 high-slavery counties, the vote was 72% for secession. In the 205 low-slavery counties, the vote was only 37% for secession, and in the 153 middle counties, the vote for secession was at 60%. Both the outgoing Buchanan administration and the incoming Lincoln administration refused to recognize the legality of secession or the legitimacy of the Confederacy. After Lincoln called for troops, four border states (that lacked cotton) seceded (Virginia, Arkansas, North Carolina, Tennessee). The Upper Southern States were in a dilemma: they wanted to retain their slaves but were afraid that if they joined with the lower southern states that were rebelling they would be caught in the middle of a conflict, and their states would be the battle ground. By staying in the Union the Upper Southern states felt that their slave rights would continue to be recognized by the Union.