Diary of Governor John Floyd, February 1832 (excerpt)

                  [p. 177] Third day: The General Assembly rejected the bill to-day which was intended to loan money to improve the State. This the members on the East side of the Blue Ridge Mountains did, saying they had no interest in such improvements and in revenge for the debate on the negro subject of abolition. Goode, of Mecklenburgh, said to me the day the debate closed upon the “slave question” as it was called, that the Eastern and Western people were not at all the same people, that they were essentially a different people, that they did not think alike, feel alike, and had no interests in common, that a separation of the State must ensue, and rather than have the subject of abolition again debated he would be glad for a separation. Both sides seem ready to separate the State if any one would propose it. I think that event from appearances highly probable.