Lincoln would have talked with the southern leaders. The southerners would only agree to meet with Lincoln as official delegates of the sovereign nation The Confederate States of America. This was something Lincoln could not agree to. His position (and there were many who obviously agreed with him) was that the States had no right to leave the Union in the first place, let alone create another nation. Meeting with an official delegation would be tantamount to accepting that the southern states were no longer part of the Union.