Compromise and the Election of 1860

The election of 1860 was one of the most consequential in our history.  The issue of slavery had come to a head and the previous two presidents had tried to find compromises and had only succeeded in exacerbating tensions.   Both of the two parties had split up into two, irreconcilable factions:
The Democrats had split into Southern, pro slavery Democrats, with John Breckinridge as their candidate, and Northern, moderate, pro appeasement Democrats, with Stephen Douglas.  The Whigs had split into anti-slavery Republicans, with Abraham Lincoln, and pro compromise, pro union Constitutional Union, with John Bell.

Lincoln got the most votes and won the election, with more votes and electors than any two of the other candidates, but his policies were viewed as too extreme by all the southern states, and they seceded long before Lincoln took office.   But New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania had different ballots, that included a Fusion party.   The two compromisers plus the Fusion got more votes than Lincoln, and together,  Lincoln and the Fusions got 6 times as many votes as Breckenridge.

What would have happened had the two appeasement parties been able to get together and put forth a single "Fusion"candidate?      Politics is often more about individual candidates than policy so it's hard to really know, but here are the numbers for Lincoln, Breckinridge and an imaginary Fusion candidate who I'll call Douglas Bell:

         Lincoln     Breckinridge     Douglas+Bell

AL:  0                 48669            41453          No Change     9 D Electors
AR:  0                 28732            25420          No Change     4 D Electors
CA:  38733         33969            24542          No Change     4 R Electors
CT:   43488         14372           16959           No Change     6 R Electors
DE:  3822            7339             4954             No Change     3 D Electors
FL:   0                  8277             5024             No Change     3 D Electors
GA:  0                  52176           54541          D+B wins      10 F Electors
IL:  172171          2331             165129        No Change     11 R Electors
IN:  139033          12295           120815        No Change     13 R Electors
IA:  70302            1035             57402          No Change     4 R Electors
KY: 1364              53143           91709          D+B Wins       12 F Electors
LA: 0                    22681           27829          D+B Wins       6 F Electors
ME: 62811            6386            31739           No Change    8 R Electors
MD: 2294            42482           47726           D+B Wins,     8 F Electors
MA: 106684        6163            56701            No Change    13 R Electors
MI: 88481            805              65472           No Change    6 R Electors
MN: 22069           748             11970            No Change    4 R Electors
MS: 0                   40768          28407           No Change    7 D Electors
MO: 17028           31362         117173         D+B Wins       9 F Electors
NH: 37519           2125            26299           No Change     5 R Electors
NJ:  58346            0                  62869          D+B Wins      7 F Electors
NY: 362646          0                  312510        No Change    35 R Electors
NC: 0                    48846          47866          No Change    10 D Electors
OH: 231709          11406          199615        No Change     23 R Electors
OR: 5329              5075             4354           No Change     3 R Electors
PA: 268030           0                  195636        No Change     27 R Electors
RI: 12244              0                   7707           No Change     4 R Electors
SC: No popular vote                                     No Change      8 D Electors
TN: 0                    65097            81009        D+B Wins       12 F Electors
TX: 0                    74454           15401          No Change      4 D Electors
VT: 33808             1866             8866           No Change      5 R Electors
VA: 1887               74325          90679         D+B Wins       15 F Electors
WI: 86110             887              65182          No Change      5 R Electors

Final Tally:
Lincoln           176 Electors
Douglas+Bell 79 Electors
Breckinridge: 48 Electors

Reality:
Lincoln:           180 Electors
Douglas:           12  Electors
Breckinridge     72 Electors
Bell:                  39 Electors

The bottom line is that had the two compromise candidates been on the same ticket, there would have been no difference in the outcome, but there would have been one more election where the popular vote didn't match the electoral college outcome.  Where there was a big change is that in the border states: Missouri, Virginia, Maryland, Kentucky, Tennessee, even Georgia, the compromisers were much more popular than the pro-slavery faction.

Is General Kelly right that a compromise could have avoided the Civil War?   No.  There is no such thing as half a slave (at least if he is to remain alive), so there is no compromise possible.  The compromises that had been made were what lead to the tensions.  There were more people that hoped for the impossible compromise than either of the more extreme factions, but that simply wasn't going to happen.

One of the interesting things I learned from doing this exercise is how many states had 0 votes for the opposing candidate.  I doubt that these states actually had zero voters for those positions, but that voter manipulation or intimidation kept such voters away from the polls or their ballots from being counted.