YANCEY, WILLIAM LOWNDES Ameri can political leader, son of Benjamin Cudworth Yancey, lawyer of South Carolina, was born in Warren county, Ga., on Aug. 1o, 1814. He attended Williams college for one year, studied law at Greenville, S.C., and was admitted to the bar. He was elected in 1841 to the State house of representatives, became State senator in 1843 and in 1844 was elected to the na tional House of Representatives to fill a vacancy, being re-elected in 1845. In 1846 he resigned his seat, and devoted himself to the resistance of anti-slavery aggression. In 1848 he secured the adoption by the State Democratic convention of the so-called "Alabama Platform," declaring that it was the duty of Congress not only to allow slavery in all the territories but to protect it, that a territorial legislature could not exclude it, and that the Democratic Party should not support for president or vice presi dent a candidate not openly opposed to the exclusion of slavery from the Territories. When the Democratic convention in Balti more refused to incorporate his ideas into the platform, Yancey with one colleague left the convention. He opposed the Compro mise of 1850, and went so far as openly to advocate secession. In 1858 he advocated the appointment of committees of safety, the formation of a league of united southerners, and the repeal of the laws making the African slave-trade piracy. He attended the Charleston convention of the Democratic Party in April 186o, and again demanded the adoption of his ideas. Defeated,
he again left the hall, followed by the delegates of Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, South Carolina, Florida, Texas and two of the three delegates from Delaware. On the next day the Georgia and a majority of the Arkansas delegation withdrew.
In the Baltimore convention of the seceders he advocated the nomination of John C. Breckinridge, and made a tour of the country on his behalf. When the South seceded, he delivered the address of welcome to Jefferson Davis on his arrival at Mont gomery, but declined a place in President Davis's cabinet. On March 31, 1861, he sailed for Europe as the head of a commis sion sent to secure recognition of the Confederate Government, but returned in 1862 to take a seat in the Confederate senate. On account of his failing health, he left Richmond early in 1863, and on July 27 died at his home near Montgomery.