brutus clay was a slave owner. but he did like another kentuckians, he believed slavery was best protected within the union. and he felt that this was so obvious and self efdent that he couldn't even imagine why some kentuckians would consider suseeded or wanting their state to succeed. and he especially didn't get it when his own son, 20 year old zeke, began expressing sentiments. by 1860, zeke, he had begun attending pro-secession rallies in kentucky. and in time, he too despite being the son of his unionist father, began talking like a die-hard southern sympathizer. what this did is it left his stepmother, anne clay, with kind of a dilemma on her hands. it was anne who tended to be home with zeke, watching over domestic matters while brutus was tending to state business. so she was the first one to figure out that father and son seemed to be heading down these divergent paths in the secession crisis. so what should she do? should she tell brutus what going on? that would infuriate him. so she wanted to avoid tha