[1] At the 1860 Democratic National Convention, he was instrumental in splitting the party into Northern and Southern factions as a leading opponent of Stephen A. Douglas and the concept of popular sovereignty.

[2] During the American Civil War, Yancey was appointed by Confederate President Jefferson Davis to head a diplomatic delegation to Europe in the attempt to secure formal recognition of Southern independence.

Yancey's mother, Caroline Bird (1790-1859), lived on her family's plantation (nicknamed "the Aviary") located near the falls of the Ogeechee River in Warren County, Georgia.

Beman worked with Reverend Charles G. Finney in the free-school movement, and became involved with abolitionism in the 1830s through contacts with Theodore Dwight Ward and Lyman Beecher.

On July 4, 1834, at a Fourth of July celebration, Yancey made a stirring nationalistic address in which he openly attacked the radicals of the state who were still talking secession from the repercussions of the Nullification Crisis: Listen, not then, my countrymen, to the voice which whispers (for as yet, it does not raise itself above a whisper) that Americans, who have been knit together by so many cords of affection, can no longer be mutual worshippers at the Shrine of Freedom—no longer can exist together, citizens of the same Republic ...[7]As a result of Yancey's political activities, he was appointed editor of the Greenville Mountaineer in November 1834.

Yancey compared Calhoun to Aaron Burr and referred to them as "two fallen arch angels—who have made efforts to tear down the battlements and safeguards of our country, that they might rule, the Demons of the Storm.

From his current economic perspective, Yancey began to identify the anti-slavery movement negatively with issues such as the establishment of a national bank, internal improvements, and the expansion of federal power.

In April 1840, Yancey started a weekly campaign newsletter that supported Democrat Martin Van Buren over Whig William Henry Harrison in the 1840 presidential election while emphasizing that slavery should now be the most important political and economic concern of the South.

His special concern in this election was the effort being made by Whigs to determine apportionment in the state legislature based on the "federal ratio" of each slave counting as three-fifths of a person.

However, Taylor announced that he would seek the Whig nomination, and, in December 1847, Lewis Cass of Michigan, the leading Democratic candidate, endorsed the policy of popular sovereignty.

[21] The opening salvo in a new level of sectional conflict occurred on December 13, 1848, when Whig John G. Palfrey of Massachusetts introduced a bill to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia.

[23]The address hit all of the main points that would ultimately resurface in the secession during the winter of 1860–1861, especially the treatment of Southerners: ...as inferiors in the Union—as degraded by your contact with slaves, and as unworthy of an association with the Northern man in the great work of extending the institution of slavery over the vast plains of the West.

Historian Emory Thomas notes that Yancey, along with Edmund Ruffin and Robert Barnwell Rhett, "remained in the secessionist forefront longest and loudest."

"[27] In January 1858, he participated in a rally supporting William Walker, the famous Nicaragua filibuster, calling the "Central American enterprise as the cause of the South.

[30]Yancey supported a plan originated by Edmund Ruffin for the creation of a League of United Southerners as an alternative to the national political parties.

In a last gasp effort to obtain party unity, Douglas supporter George Nicholas Sanders made an unauthorized offer to Yancey to run as vice-president.

In a speech before the convention, Yancey characterized the Douglas supporters as "ostrich like—their head was in the sand of squatter sovereignty, and they did not know their great, ugly, ragged abolition body was exposed".

"[35] On October 10, 1860, at Cooper Union Hall in New York, Yancey advised Northerners interested in preserving the Union to "enlarge your jails and penitentiaries, re-enforce and strengthen your police force, and keep the irrepressible conflict fellows from stealing our negroes..." Yancey cited Southern fears that, with abolitionists in power, "Emissaries will percolate between master [and] slave as water between the crevices of rocks underground.

When news of Lincoln's election reached the city, Yancey rhetorically asked a public assemblage protesting the results, "Shall we remain [in the Union] and all be slaves?

After first waiting for the official electoral votes to be counted, Governor Andrew Moore called for the election of delegates to take place on December 24, with the convention to meet on January 7, 1861.

A frustrated Yancey lashed out at those cooperationists: The misguided, deluded, wicked men in our midst, if any such there be, who shall oppose it [secession], will be in alignment with the abolition power of the Federal government, and as our safety demands, must be looked upon and dealt with as public enemies.

Don Doyle argues that Davis displayed "tone deafness" in appointing Yancey, who was "ignorant of the world" and himself realized that he was "wholly unsuited by experience and personality for diplomacy."

Confederate Secretary of State Toombs's official instructions to Yancey were to convince Europe of the righteousness and legality of Southern secession, the viability of the militarily strong Confederacy, the value of cotton and virtually duty-free trade, and the South's willingness to observe all treaty agreements in effect between Britain and the United States except for the portion of the Webster-Ashburton Treaty requiring aid in combating the African slave trade.

[45] Arriving in Britain just a few days ahead of the news about the attack on Fort Sumter, Yancey and his delegation met informally with British foreign secretary Lord John Russell on May 3 and 9.

[46] After news arrived of the Confederate victory at Bull Run, Yancey attempted to arrange another meeting with Russell, but he was forced to present his arguments in writing.

"[48] While Yancey was originally optimistic about his mission, his observations in conversations and in the British papers forced him to conclude that the slavery issue was the primary obstacle to formal diplomatic recognition.

On military matters, Yancey wanted details provided to Congress on reports of execution without trials of Confederate soldiers by General Braxton Bragg, questioned the reasons Virginia had 29 brigadier generals while Alabama only had four, authored a resolution condemning drunkenness within the army, and joined in demands that Davis account for complaints on the military administration of the Trans-Mississippi District.

In Congress, Yancey and Benjamin Hill of Georgia, who had previously clashed in 1856, had their differences over a bill intended to create the Confederate Supreme Court erupt into physical violence.

By the end of June, Yancey was extremely ill from his injures received during the attack by Hill in the Confederate Congress, but he still continued his correspondence with President Davis and others.

Yancey's funeral on July 29, 1863, brought the city of Montgomery to a standstill, and he was buried at Oakwood Cemetery on Goat Hill near the original Confederate Capitol.