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Some presecession Senators had stayed in their seats, most notably Andrew Johnson of Tennessee, and thus did not forfeit those seats. But those who left following secession were not replaced, except for the two new men from “Virginia.” That was a major advantage to the Republicans, who overwhelmingly dominate d Congress throughout the war. Finally, Carlile and Willey were formally recognized and seated by the U.S. Senate. They were seated as United States Senators from Virginia! 41
    Most actions taken by the new “Restored” legislature of “Virginia” related to financial and military affairs for this “Reorganized Government of Virginia.” Late in the session, House Bill No. 21, giving legislative approval for creation of a separate new state under certain specific terms and conditions, was introduced and debated. The Reconstituted House eventually voted against the bill, while the Restored Senate chose to table the proposed legislation. 42
    It was hardly an overwhelming show of support for the idea of allowing a permanent separation by a portion of Virginia from the rest of the Old Dominion. The extra session at Wheeling concluded on July 26, 1861. However, all of the legislators except one [George Arnold of Lewis County] returned on August 6, 1861 as delegates to the Second Session of the Second Wheeling Convention. 43
    Delegates of the Second Wheeling Convention reassembled on August 6, 1861. They passed a number of resolutions, including an ordinance to nullify proceedings of the Richmond Convention in April 1861 that had produced Virginia’s Ordinance of Secession. The Convention also assumed that resolution and all other actions of the Richmond Convention were “illegal, inoperative, null, void, and without force or effect.” 44
    This was a clear effort at nullification, albeit on the state level, a doctrine whose validity was denied by President Lincoln himself, as well as such predecessors as Andrew Jackson in 1832. It was indicative of the expediencies and double standards at work. Nullification and secession were rightfully inappropriate for a state vis a vis the United States of America, but allowable as expedient for a segment of a state in “war time.” Yet Lincoln and Congress always insisted the Civil War was a rebellion and not legally a war. So went the reasoning in Washington.
    The Wheeling Convention formed a Committee on a Division of the State. That occurred despite earlier votes in the newly constituted ‘Restored’ legislature tabling or opposing a separation from Virginia. 45 The convention appeared to be circumventing or usurping the powers of the “Restored” Legislature and Government of “Virginia.”
    On August 13, after a week of deliberations, the Committee on a Division of the State formulated and presented to the convention a dismemberment ordinance. Delegates debated boundaries of the proposed state for five days, without input from the regular Virginia state government in Richmond or the counties in question. They then referred the question to another committee. 46
    On August 20, this committee proposed that the new state, which no w was slated to be named Kanawha, would consist of thirty-nine counties. Seven other counties (Berkeley, Greenbrier, Hampshire, Hardy, Jefferson, Morgan and Pocahontas) were to be added, making it forty-six counties, if the majority of voters in those counties approved. The convention offered no provision for a preliminary plebiscite to affirm the decision in the first thirty-nine counties. Their consent to inclusion in the proposed new state was presumed by virtue of those counties being represented in Wheeling. 47
    The Wheeling Convention adopted the committee’s recommendations by a vote of fifty to twenty-eight, about two to one, but far from unanimous. Affirmation by voters in all counties of the proposed state in regard to the broader issues of separation from the rest of