Voted Unanimously

The only South Carolina convention to vote unanimously for secession was held December 17^th 1860 at the First Baptist Church of Columbia, South Carolina.

The First Baptist Church of Columbia, South Carolina was organized in 1809, with a building on Sumter Street.  The current church was built in 1856 with funding from the former president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary; James P Boyce.

In 1860, following the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, the Church became the site of the first South Carolina state convention to discuss secession.  The meeting was called to order by chairman D F Jamison with delegates who had been selected a month early.  They left with a unanimous vote of 159 to 0 in favor of South Carolina seceding from the Union on December 17^th 1860.

The convention at the Church in Columbia lasted only one day do to an outbreak of smallpox.  The South Carolina Order of Secession wasn’t signed until delegates reconvened in Charleston, South Carolina on December 20^th 1860.