Lincoln's Triumph in 1864
IN the summer of 1864 vague and indefinite rumors were circulated that peace was attainable, and actually desired by the rebels, but that the administration would not listen to overtures or receive propositions which might lead to an adjustment. Some leading and overofficious persons interested themselves in these matters, which were merely subsidiary aids to the peace democrats, projected by the rebels to divide the republicans and to promote democratic success in the pending election. For a brief period these rumors undoubtedly made an impression unfavorable and unjust, as regarded the president. Horace Greeley, often credulous and always ready to engage in public employment, was entrapped by the most skillfully contrived of these intrigues. He became the willing agent of certain prominent rebels who resorted to Canada, and from thence persuaded him that they were authorized by the rebel government to negotiate peace, and desired his assistance. They asked for full protection to proceed to Washington to effect that object, and made Greeley the medium to convey to the president their application and purpose.
Greeley, thus applied to, at once entered into the scheme, and forwarded their application, with his indorsement that while he did “ not say a just peace is now attainable, he believed it to be so.” The president had no belief in the good faith or sincerity of this proceeding, and little doubted that it was a subtle intrigue; but as it emanated from distinguished rebels, and had the indorsement of one of the most influential editors and politicians of the republican party, he was for a moment embarrassed how to treat it or what course to take. Promptly to reject the application thus made and indorsed would not only subject him to misrepresentation, and bring upon him the assaults of the malevolent, but would lead to a misconception of his own ardent desire for peace by many well-meaning men who, weary of war, earnestly praying that hostilities should cease, wished he might accept this advance and permit such conspicuous rebels as Jacob Thompson, C. C. Clay, and their associates, to visit Washington. The advent of these secession gentlemen would not be private and unheralded, but attended with the pomp and proclaimed character of ambassadors or ministers from the Confederate government to negotiate peace. Its effect would be and was evidently intended to divert attention from a vigorous prosecution of the war, and raise hopes through the North which it was the special object of this commission to defeat. Their errand of peace was obviously auxiliary to the peace democrats, and whether accepted or rejected was to be used against the administration in the presidential election. Mortified that so intelligent and eminent a republican as Mr. Greeley should in his officious desire to be useful lend himself to this intrigue of distinguished persons, who presented no credentials, even from the irresponsible rebel organization, the president deputed Greeley himself to proceed to Niagara, communicate with his rebel correspondents, and ascertain their power to act. As an authority to Greeley and an estoppel to future similar intrigues, the president issued the following: —
EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHIWGTON, July 18, 1864.
To WHOM IT MAY CONCERN: Any proposition which embraces the restoration of peace, the integrity of the whole Union, and the abandonment of slavery, and which comes by and with an authority that can control the armies now at war against the United States, will be received and considered by the executive government of the United States, and will be met by liberal terms on other substantial and collateral points; and the bearer or bearers thereof shall have safe conduct both ways.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN.
These and other schemes, projected by real and professed republicans as well as by avowed opponents, while annoying and discouraging, were skillfully met, warded off, and disposed of by the president, who never failed to prove himself able to cope with HIs adversaries and to be equal to any emergency. Greeley was surprised and taken aback on receiving his appointment as a quasi minister or agent, with authority to meet the ambassadorial trio whose mission he indorsed, and with the assurance that any proposition which embraced the restoration of peace and the integrity of the Union would be received, and the bearers should have safe conduct. The rebel representatives and the peace democrats in the North were as much astonished and disappointed with the comprehensive credentials, which extended not only to them and their mission but to any and all others whom it might concern. It virtually muzzled that species of political party electioneering that was intruding itself into the presidential campaign.
The democratic national convention met at Chicago on the 29th of August, to nominate a candidate for president, and to lay down the programme or platform of political principles which the managers professed to believe best for the country, and by which they and their associates were governed. Until within a few days of the meeting of the convention circumstances had favored them. Scarcely a cheering ray had dawned upon the administration after the renomination of Mr. Lincoln until about the time the democratic delegates convened at Chicago. Except the success of the navy in the destruction of the rebel cruiser Alabama by the Kearsarge in June, and the passage of the forts of Mobile Bay by Farragut in August, there had seemed a pall over the Union cause, and all efforts, civil and military, of the administration. Information of the surrender of Fort Morgan was received on the day the democratic convention assembled. That convention pronounced the war a failure. Not only did rambling party declaimers harangue crowds against the despotic and arbitrary measures of the government, which, they said, was alienating the South, but men of eminence, some of whom had enjoyed public confidence and held high official position, participated in the assaults upon the president, who, while thus attacked, was struggling against reverses and armed resistance to the Union.
Added to these attacks of the peace democrats were the denunciations and various intrigues of the radical element in the republican party, which assailed the president personally, and bitterly attacked his conciliatory policy, accusing him of usurpation in his mode and method of striving for peace, and of inefficiency and neglect in not prosecuting the war with greater severity. The democrats and the radicals did not coalesce, were antagonistic; yet each was hostile to the president and opposed his reëlection, but from opposite causes. Among the members of the Chicago convention were such men as James Guthrie, formerly secretary of the treasury, and Charles A. Wickliffe, once postmastergeneral, both of Kentucky, Union men at the beginning of the war, uncompromising, however, against the radicals, but now opposed to President Lincoln. They disapproved the policy of the administration, and especially the emancipation of slaves by a military order of the president. Such an act, changing the social and industrial character of nearly one half of the States, was fundamental; one, as they claimed, above and beyond the executive or legislative authority of the federal government; and it could not be legally effected except by the States interested, or possibly by an amendment of the federal constitution. These original Union men were members of the convention at Chicago, and acted in concert with such violent and denunciatory anti-Union men as Vallandigham, as well as with the more plausible and timid but scarcely less mischievous members of the convention who refused to recognize war necessity as a justification for emancipation.
As usual with political conventions or assemblages in periods of high party excitement, the radical and too often the impulsive and inconsiderate extremists, by their vociferous and inflammatory harangues, carried with them a majority of the members, most of whom had in fact been chosen, not for calm and deliberate judgment, but for their party zeal and intolerance.
On this occasion extraordinary efforts had been made to strengthen the weak and timid of the party, to oppose the government, and to fortify the bold and aggressive by a gathering at Chicago of rebel emissaries and reckless and violent factionists outside the convention, known as “ copperheads,’ ’ who were secretly in sympathy with the secessionists. Rumors that a conflict was inevitable prevailed. It was stated by Colonel Sweet, and subsequently affirmed by Holt, the judge-advocate-general, that there was a plot or conspiracy to improve the opportunity of the meeting of the democratic convention to arouse and inflame the masses and ultimately to free the rebel prisoners, of whom several thousands were confined in Chicago, at Camp Douglas, and also at Indianapolis and other places. Price and his bushwhackers in Missouri were to move in concert with an extensive secret organization that existed throughout the country under various names, but generally recognized as the Sons of Liberty, the Golden Circle, Order of American Knights, etc. These were to inaugurate an uprising which would, in its ramifications in the approaching election, be decisive.
For some time the war department and General Grant — whether wisely or unwisely it is not necessary here to discuss— had set aside and disregarded the cartel for the exchange of prisoners, and retained in confinement the rebels captured by our troops. As a consequence, Union soldiers taken in battle were held in captivity and shut up in Libby, Andersonville, Salisbury, and other prisons, where, half-starved and half-clad, their sufferings were almost incredible.
The democrats at Chicago took advantage of the fact that our soldiers were so confined to denounce the “shameful disregard of the administration to its duty, in respect to our fellow-citizens who are now and long have been prisoners of war, in a suffering condition, as deserving the severest reprobation, on the score alike of public interest and common humanity.”
Great suffering was, undoubtedly, experienced by the prisoners on both sides, in consequence of the interruption of the cartel. The president was, technically, as the head of the government, held responsible for the cruel detention and confinement of prisoners, but neither he nor the members of the administration, except the secretary of war and the lieutenant-general, were then aware that the exchange had by the authority of these two officials, ceased.
The democratic convention, in its resolutions, arraigned the administration as violently as the radicals through Wade and Winter Davis, for its usurpation and its exercise of extraordinary and dangerous powers not granted by the constitution; also for the subversion of civil by military law in States not in insurrection; for arbitrary military arrests, imprisonment, trial, and sentence of American citizens in States where civil law existed in full force; for the suppression of freedom of speech and of the press; for disregard of State’s rights; for the imposition of test oaths, etc., etc.
Although there had been some recent improvement in military operations to lighten the almost insupportable load which had depressed the Union men through the summer, the reverses actually encouraged and animated the democrats while electing their delegates. The convention thus chosen declared that “ after four years of failure to restore the Union by the experiment of war, humanity, liberty, and the public welfare demanded that immediate efforts be made for a cessation of hostilities. ”
Availing themselves of every difficulty that beset the government, — of the financial embarrassment, military stagnation, opposition to the draft and calls for more troops, the radical hostility to the president for what was called usurpation, and the general depression that prevailed and was a growing discouragement after Grant’s arrival and nonaction near Richmond, — the democrats made the clamor for peace the watch-cry at their party gatherings during the summer. The Chicago resolutions were responsive to and in coöperation with this and with the cunningly devised peace schemes which had captivated Greeley and others who, if not in full harmony with the radicals, had become tired of the war which they themselves had invoked, and, without any definite ideas of their own how to bring it to a close, were dissatisfied with the president and wanted another candidate. In fact, the whole platform of principles, though not destitute of patriotic professions, was factious, denunciatory of the administration, and unjust to tlie government involved in war for the national life. But the Chicago proceedings, although sent out with bluster and bravado, fell coldly upon the public ear. They were not what the Union men expected. It was soon evident that the convention had, under the spur and pressure of heated partisanship, committed an error, and that it would have been well to have listened to the wiser and more considerate views of the moderate and conservative members. But the conservatives lacked resolution, — courage to face and resist the violent and reckless, and proclaim and enforce a different and more statesman-like course.
General McClellan, whom the democrats nominated as their candidate for president, had the sagacity to see that the party managers at Chicago had been carried away by the vituperative harangues and inflammatory declamations of superficial and disunion speakers; he nevertheless accepted the nomination. In his letter of acceptance, however, he disavowed and virtually repudiated the platform of the convention, to the great disgust of the peace democrats, who opposed the administration and made it a point to declare “the war a failure,” and insisted on the “immediate cessation of hostilities.” He said to his friends in this letter: “ The Union was originally formed by the exercise of a spirit of conciliation and compromise. To restore and preserve it, the same spirit must prevail in our councils and in the hearts of the people. The reestablishment of the Union in all its integrity is and must continue to be the indispensable condition in any settlement. . . . The Union is the one condition of peace. . . . When any State is willing to return to the Union it should be received at once, with a full guarantee of all its constitutional rights. If a frank, earnest, and persistent effort to obtain these objects should fail, the responsibility for ulterior consequences will fall upon those who remain in arms against the Union; but the Union must be preserved at all hazards. ... I would hail with unbounded joy the permanent restoration of peace on the basis of the Union under the constitution without the effusion of another drop of blood; but no peace can be permanent without union.”
These views and opinions were so much in accord with those of President Lincoln — it was so manifest that General McClellan, away from Chicago and the factious and party influences there dominant, had arrived at the same conclusion as the president in regard to conciliation and the restoration of the Union — that the extremists of the party were dissatisfied, and some of them were for taking immediate steps for another candidate. Before his letter appeared a perceptible change had taken place in the public mind. The Chicago resolutions had fallen heavy on every man of patriotic sentiments who read them; the democrats, especially those who had opposed secession and were for sustaining the government, could not accept or acquiesce in the peace programme. Regardless of mere party organization, they had, in 1861, rallied to uphold the flag when it was assailed at Sumter, in conformity with their Union principles and from a high sense of duty. The war experience and the condition of affairs in 1864 had led them to anticipate that such a course would be marked out and adopted at Chicago as would enable them to become reconciled with their former democratic associates in reorganizing the party and supporting its candidates, but the resolutions and the doctrines avowed repelled them.
President Lincoln had, with a good deal of hesitation, relieved General McClellan from the command of the army of the Potomac in November, 1862. Although the general had decided opponents in the war department, and there were military officers opposed to him, yet no one was more popular in that army or had more fully the confidence of the soldiers than the general in command. In removing him, which was with reluctance, the president gratified a large portion of the republican citizens; but there were some who, like the democrats, condemned the removal as a mistake that was almost inexcusable. Not without reason had the general been censured for dilatory movements, but his tardy operations were now contrasted with the immobility of Grant, wbo, with a much larger force, was wasting the summer of 1864 on the same ground that McClellan had occupied in 1862, without making further advance. Earnest and distinguished democrats, and some republicans in whom he had confidence, now advised and urged upon the president the reinstatement of McClellan. They gave as a reason that he was a man of intelligence and culture superior to Grant’s, and that this movement would annihilate the peace party, utterly defeat the democrats, and break down the democratic organization. The president had yielded to Stanton and Halleck in 1862, who pressed the general’s displacement while in command of the army of the Potomac before Richmond. Having reinstated him after Pope’s defeat, with Halleck’s concurrence, the president was slow in listening a second time to the earnest and persistent demand of the war department and head-quarters that he should dismiss McClellan for alleged neglect and remissness following the battle of Antietam. But added to the representations of the war department was the dilatory conduct of the general, whose vacillating and perverse course was such that the president was forced to the conclusion that it was a duty to relieve him. This he finally did, deliberately and on conviction, in 1862. He was not disposed to reverse fbe act in 1864, and again reinstate that officer, —■ certainly not on mere party grounds and for merely party purposes. In these conclusions the Union element of the country was clearly with the president. There had been, moreover, a feeling on the part of some that McClellan was not sufficiently earnest in prosecuting the war, and his nomination by the peace democrats for a time intensified that feeling.
With the Chicago clamor for peace came tidings of the triumphant achievements of Farragut at Mobile, and Sherman at Atlanta. These tidings revived at once, as if by an electric charm, the previously drooping spirits of the people. Those democrats who from the first had opposed secession and supported the war, and the republicans who were untainted with radicalism, had been the strength of the government in the great conflict from 1861, and they were now again consolidated. The radical faction, which had been fierce, insolent, and overbearing in Congress, was found to be weak with the people; and the vituperative assaults upon the president, such as the arrogant and denunciatory protest of Wade and Winter Davis, were almost universally condemned. Even their fellow congressmen who had egged them on fell away as the country was aroused, withheld their names, and shrank from association with those presuming protestants against Lincoln and his policy. Wade’s appointments to address the people of Ohio in the political campaign then progressing were canceled by the state committee, and Davis failed to secure even a renomination from the republicans of his own district in Baltimore. The discountenance of these extremists, who, in the plenitude of their party management and power in Washington, had deemed themselves irresistible, and with bold front, had denounced the conciliatory measures of the executive and his policy of reconstruction, instead of injuring President Lincoln actually inspired confidence in his administration, and contributed to bring again almost the whole of the war supporters into cordial unity. It became apparent that Congress, or the radical faction, was not, as it assumed, the embodiment or the correct exponent of the popular sentiment of the country; that though the leaders might, by secret operations and party machinery, so discipline a majority of that body as to procure a legislative sanction of their proscriptive and intolerant views, the hearts and feelings of the nation were not with them in their exclusive schemes, which were really disunion and sectional, but with the president in his endeavors to promote tranquillity, nationality, reconstruction and a restoration of the Union.
Whatever disappointment was experienced in consequence of Grant’s inaction before Richmond, it was measurably relieved by the military and naval successes in the Southwest.
On the 29th of August, the day on which the Chicago convention assembled, information was received, through the rebel lines, that Fort Morgan, which guarded the entrance to the bay of Mobile, had surrendered. This intelligence, after a summer of inaction of the great army on the James, was inspring and invigorating. It cheered the president and the whole administration; the navy department was encouraged to renew efforts, long previously made, to close the port of Wilmington by capturing the forts at the mouth of Cape Fear River. Through this channel, which it was difficult to blockade, the rebels had received their principal supplies; and now that the navy had obtained possession of the forts, and our squadron was in Mobile Bay, Wilmington remained the only important port where blockade running was in the least successful. To close that port, and thus terminate the intercourse of the rebels with the outer world, would be like severing the jugular vein in the human system. Richmond and the whole insurrectionary region, which, even before Grant reached the James, was in an exhausted and suffering condition, could not, if deprived of foreign aid and succor, long hold out. against the Union arms. It was in view of these circumstances, and of the almost total immobility of the armies of the Potomac and the James, that in the latter part of the summer, while the military seemed waiting events and the administration and country also were greatly depressed, I proposed that the army should send a force to coöperate with the navy against Forts Fisher and Caswell, at the mouth of Cape Fear River. The secretary of war and General Halleck had on previous occasions seemed indifferent, if not actually opposed, to the movement But the changed condition of things ir the Gulf and the Southwest, and the fact that the large military force on the James was doing so little, favored the project. The president earnestly sanctioned it, and thought the war department might now come into it, and was himself ready to make the expedition an administration measure. General Grant, he thought, would be disposed to avail himself of the opportunity to employ a portion of his large force in a work that would weaken the enemy and strengthen his own operations against the rebel capital.
The war department, after Grant was made lieutenant-general and had taken command of the armies in the field, seemed willing to devolve upon him the responsibility as well as the honors of the campaign, and in one or two interviews signified a willingness to refer the whole subject, so far as the military were concerned, to that officer, with the single exception, by the secretary of war, that General Q. A. Gillmore should be designated to command the military forces, should the expedition he ordered. To this there was on the part of the president and the navy no objection, and to facilitate the movement the assistant secretary of the navy, Mr. Fox, whose zeal and efforts in the project were earnest and devoted, and General Gillmore, designated by the war department, went to the front on the 31st of August to lay the subject before General Grant and enlist him in its favor. In this they found no difficulty; for, although the general himself had little originality, was barren of resources and by no means fertile in strategy, he possessed, in general, good judgment in passing on the plans of others, was always willing to avail himself of valuable suggestions, and in this instance was ready to adopt the plan and aid in carrying it out. It is singular that the general-in-chief should have lain three months in front of the rebel capital without any attempt or thought of cutting off its only channel of supplies from abroad, but, as already Stated, he relied on others to make suggestions. He was prompt to acquiesce in this one, and, as his friend Admiral Porter, who knew him well, remarks, was willing also to appropriate to himself the credit of the expedition. It was characteristic. It was Admiral Foote who proposed the capture of Forts Henry and llonelson, in the winter of 18G2; it was Sherman and Porter who projected the many schemes at Vicksburg and vicinity, except the last successful demonstration, which originated with Farragut, who, in 1863, when lying between Grand Gulf and Vicksburg, sent his marine officer, Captain, now Major, John L. Broome, and Paymaster Meredith, of the Hartford, across the peninsula at Vicksburg, and advised that the army should come below and make its advance, instead of wasting its strength and that of the navy above, on the Yazoo; it was the president and the navy department that, in 1864, suggested to him the capture of Cape Fear and the port of Wilmington, as an important point, not only for the blockade, but in the operations against Richmond. It is proper the facts should be stated, for the expedition against Fort Fisher was a subject of consultation at Washington, and had the sanction and approval of the president before it was communicated to or known by General Grant. No credit, however, is given by the histories of the period to the administration or the navy, which projected it and devoted months of incessant labor and a large expenditure to that great object. The honors won were awarded to General Grant, who complacently received them.
Horace Greeley, in his American Conflict, a valuable work in many respects, and which he intended should be truthful, but which exhibits at times the party prejudices and personal bias of the author, introduces the subject of the expedition and capture of Fort Fisher as follows : “ To close it [the port of Wilmington], therefore, became at length synonymous with barring all direct and nearly all commercial intercourse between the Confederacy and the non-belligerent world. Early in the autumn of 1864, General Grant proposed to General Butler the dispatch of BrigadierGenerals Weitzel and Graham to reconnoitre Fort Fisher, the main defense of the sea-approaclies to Wilmington, to determine its strength, preparatory to a combined attack.”
The impression that General Grant planned the expedition to capture Fort Fisher and the other defenses of Wilmington, and close the port, was prevalent when the History of the American Conflict was written. Grant did consult Butler, and Weitzel and Graham were sent to reconnoitre, but this was after the navy department had suggested it. Mr. Greeley was evidently confirmed in his impression, if he did not derive it from the official report of the lieutenantgeneral, who, without openly assuming the credit, certainly did not repel it.
It was a knowledge of this erroneous impression which gave dissatisfaction to naval men who were cognizant of the facts, and led Rear-Admiral Porter, who was in command, to write to me from his " Flag Ship Malvern, Cape Fear River,” January 24, 1865: “To the navy department alone is the country indebted for the capture of this rebel stronghold; for had it not been for your perseverance in keeping the fleet here, and your constant propositions made to the army, nothing would have been done. As it was, after the proposition had been received and General Grant promised that the troops should be sent, it was not done until General Butler consented to let the matter go on, and when he hoped to reap some little credit from the explosion of the powder-boat. Now the country gives General Grant the credit of inaugurating the expedition, when on both occasions he permitted it to go improperly provided. In the first place it had neither head nor tail, so far as the army was concerned. . . .
“ Now that the most important port on the coast has been gained, as usual you will hear of but little that the navy did, and no doubt efforts will be made again to show that the work was ' not substantially injured as a defensive work.’ To General Grant, who is always willing to take the credit when anything is done, and equally ready to lay the blame of the failure on the navy when a failure takes place, I feel under no obligations for receiving and allowing a report to be spread from his headquarters that there were three days when the navy might have operated and did not. He knows as much about it as he did when he wrote to me, saying ' the only way in which the place could be taken was by running the ships past the batteries,’ showing, evidently, that he had not studied the hydrography of Cape Fear River, and did not know the virtue there was in our wooden walls when they went in for a fair stand-up fight. . . . I have served with the lieutenant - general before, when I never worked so hard in my life to make a man succeed as I did for him. You will scarcely notice in his reports that the navy did him any service, when without the help it has given him, all the way through, he would never have been lieutenant-general. he wants magnanimity, like most officers of the army, and is so avaricious as regards fame that he will never, if he can help it, do justice to our department.
“When the rebels write the history of this war, then, and only then, will the country be made to feel what the navy has done. . . . Ilis course proves to me that he would sacrifice his best friend rather than let any odium fall upon Lieutenant-General Grant. He will take to himself all the credit of this move, now that it is successful, when he deserves all the blame for the first failure. . . .
“ I remain, respectfully and sincerely, “ Your obedient servant,
“ DAVID D. PORTER.”
These are the freely and frankly expressed opinions of the chief naval officer in the Fort Fisher expedition, written in the private and unreserved confidence of an officer in command to the secretary under whom he acted and who was entitled to the facts. The publication of this letter from the files of the department was made after the close of my official connection with the navy, and without my knowledge, but the facts stated truthfully express the feelings and opinions of one who long coöperated with General Grant, and understood his character and traits.
By special request of the lieutenantgeneral, Rear-Admiral Porter had been, on the 22d of September, transferred from the Mississippi squadron, where he had served with Grant and coöperated with the army in the capture of Vicksburg, to the North Atlantic squadron, with a view to the command of the expedition against Fort Fisher. This command had been first assigned to Admiral Farragut on the 5th of September, after the successful mission of Assistant Secretary Fox and General Gillmore to induce General Grant to lend a military force to coöperate with the navy. This was at a period when the tide of affairs, political and military, had taken a favorable turn elsewhere than in the vicinity of Richmond. The proceedings and nomination at Chicago had just been promulgated, Atlanta had fallen, the bay of Mobile and the forts which guarded its entrance were in our possession, and the importance of prompt additional successes and decisive blows was felt by the administration to be necessary. But Admiral Farragut, the great and successful hero of the war, who was selected to command the expedition, had written me on the 27th of August a letter, which I did not receive until after my orders of the 5th of September assigning him to the command of the Fort Fisher expedition, saying his strength was almost exhausted, “but as long as I am able, I am willing to do the bidding of the department to the best of my abilities. I fear, however, my health is giving way. I have now been down in this Gulf and the Caribbean Sea nearly five years out of six, with the exception of the short time at home last fall, and the last six months have been a severe drag upon me, and I want rest if it is to be had.’’
On receiving this letter, it was felt that further exaction on the energies of this valuable officer ought not to be made; he was therefore relieved from that service, and Rear-Admiral Porter was substituted. The action of the department in giving Porter the command instead of Farragut was much commented upon and never fully understood by the country, which had learned to appreciate the noble qualities of Farragut, and gave him its unstinted confidence. The great admiral always regretted — though on his account I did not — that he had reported his physical sufferings and low state of health before my orders were received or even issued. I have embraced this occasion to make known the facts more in detail than was necessary, perhaps, in relating briefly, not the military, but the political and civil events of Lincoln’s administration in the early autumn of 1864. The Fort Fisher expedition was properly an administration rather than a military measure, projected at Washington, not at army head-quarters, and was, after delays, chiefly military, finally successful in January, 1865. Its inception was at a critical and turning period of the political affairs of the country, when the Chicago convention was in session, and the amnesty and reconstruction policy of the administration was opposed and undergoing a severe test. The radical opposition was by no means appeased, but eager and contriving. The party managers of that faction had hopes through the summer that Mr. Chase might yet be selected as a compromise candidate, around whom they and all republicans could rally. That gentleman, after his resignation in June, withdrew from any active participation in the political campaign, which was being prosecuted with vigor while the president was violently assailed by radical friends. So early as May 23d, before the convention met at Baltimore, but when it became certain that Lincoln would be nominated, Chase wrote to a friend that “all under God depends on Grant, So far he has achieved very little, and that little has cost beyond computation.”
This was before Mr. Chase resigned, and while he was still secretary. After he left the cabinet, he passed the summer in listless inactivity, or was secretly communing with grumblers. Months wore away without any successful military achievement and with daily increased “cost,” though in May he said it was “beyond computation. ”
In all these trying days not one word of encouragement to the president or the country came from the ex-secretary, although until the 30th of June he had, but with disappointed aspirations, been surpassed by no one in zeal and activity for the public welfare. His is abstinence from encouragement and advice during this period was not from indifference to events and occurrences that took place. Murmurs of discontent were uttered, and extracts from his letters and diary evince his feelings and those of a discontented class with whom he held communication. In July he wrote that —
“ The president pocketed the CHEAT BILL [the Winter Davis bill] providing for the reorganization of the rebel States as loyal States. He did not venture to veto, and so put it in his pocket. It [the bill] was a condemnation of his amnesty proclamation, rejecting the idea of possible reconstruction with slavery; which neither the president nor his chief advisers have, in my opinion, abandoned.” He adds that “Mr. Sumner said also that there was intense indignation against the president on account of his pocketing the Winter Davis or reconstruction bill.”
“I am too earnest, too antislavery, and say too radical to make him [the president] willing to have me connected with the administration; just as my opinion that he is not earnest enough, not antislavery enough, not radical enough, but goes naturally with those hostile to me rather than with me, makes me willing and glad to be disconnected from it.”
Garfield, Schenck, and Wetmore, he says, “ all were bitter against the timid and almost pro-slavery course of the president. ”
From the republicans as a party Chase could expect no nomination, —they had already nominated Lincoln. What had he to hope for? What could he do? In July he wrote: “ Senator Pomeroy came to breakfast. He says there is great dissatisfaction with Mr. Lincoln, which has been much excited by the pocketing of the reorganization bill [Winter Davis bill]. . . . Pomeroy says he means to goon a buffalo hunt and then to Europe. He cannot support Lincoln, but won’t desert his principles. I am much of the same sentiments, though not willing now to decide what duty may demand next fall. Pomeroy remarked that on the news of my resignation reaching the senate several of the democratic senators came to him and said: ‘ We ’ll go with you now for Chase.' This means nothing but a vehement desire to overthrow the existing administration, but might mean much if the democrats would Only cut loose from slavery and go for freedom and the protection of labor by a national currency. If they would do that I would cheerfully go for any man they might nominate.”
Governor May wrote a letter in reference to a movement in behalf of Chase for the presidency at a time when he says, “ there was great discouragement and dissatisfaction with Mr. Lincoln’s administration.”
Mr. Chase replied on the 31st of August, the Chicago convention having nominated McClellan the day previous: “ I am now a private citizen, and expect to remain such; since my retirement from the department, I have no connection with political affairs; . . . I see only, as all see, that there is a deplorable lack of harmony, caused chiefly, in my judgment, by the injudicious course of Some of Mr. Lincoln’s chief advisers, and his own action on their advice.”
Party movements and the political events of the summer had not been such as he hoped and expected. The dreams and anticipations of party politicians are often delusive, ending in disappointment. They were so in this instance. Achilles had retired to his tent, or to the White Mountains, during the summer, and there learned that his friends and supporters were less in numbers, strength, and influence than he had supposed, and were also becoming enlisted in the support of Lincoln. On the 14th of September, after the nomination of McClellan and the adoption of suicidal resolutions at Chicago, Chase returned to Washington, and was kindly welcomed by the president. He entered in his journal : —
“ September 17th. I have seen the president twice since I have been here. Both times third persons were present, and there was nothing like private conversation. His manner was cordial, and so were his words; and I hear nothing but good-will from him. But he is not at all demonstrative, either in speech or manner. I feel that I do not know him, and I found no action on what he says or does. ... It is my conviction that the cause I love and the general interests of the country will be best promoted by his reëlection, and I have resolved to join my efforts to those of almost the whole body of my friends in securing it. ... I never desired anything else than his complete, success, and never indulged a personal feeling incompatible with absolute fidelity to his administration. . . . But it would be uncandid not to say I felt wronged and hurt, by the circumstances which preceded and attended my resignation.”
The summer’s observation, reflection, and experience, with the determination of “ almost the whole body of my friends,” convinced Mr. Chase that it was unwise to kick against the pricks; that the current of public opinion after the Chicago convention was becoming irresistide; and that the really substantial and considerate men on whom he depended had yielded to events which they could not control, and concluded that they would support the reëlection of Mr. Lincoln. He therefore, in September, came to the same conclusion, which was confirmed by the genial and cordial manner and the friendly reception by the president. Other attending circumstances reconciled him to the administration. He soon enlisted in the political campaign, made speeches, and contributed to the success of the republican party in the following November.
On the same day that Mr. Chase wrote “I have resolved to join my efforts to those of almost the whole body of my friends ” to secure the election of Mr. Lincoln, namely, on the 17th of September, John C. Fremont, the radical or extreme republican candidate, withdrew his name as a presidential candidate, stating that he did so ” not to aid in the triumph of Mr. Lincoln, but to do my part toward preventing the election of the democratic candidate. In respect to Mr, Lincoln, I continue to hold exactly the sentiments contained in my letter of acceptance. I consider that his administration has been, politically, militarily, and financially, a failure, and that its necessary continuance is a cause of regret for the country.”
In this extract are exposed the radical feelings towards Mr. Lincoln and his administration. The extremists, with their sectional and proscriptive intolerance, were not recognized as correct exponents of the principles and views of the republicans in the autumn of 1864, although at a later period, and under another president, they by caucus machinery and party discipline became the despotic dictators of Congress, and the authors of those sectional measures which prolonged national differences and for years excluded from rightful representation and all participation in the government one third of the States and people of the Union.
On the 23d of September, a few days after Chase had resolved to join his friends and support the president’s reelection, and Fremont, perhaps by concert, at the same time had withdrawn in a dudgeon, Mr. Bates, the attorney-general, and myself left the cabinet meeting together. We stopped for a few moments on the platform of the north portico of the White House, where the postmaster-general, Mr. Blair, soon joined us, and as he did so remarked, “I suppose you gentlemen are aware I am no longer a member of the cabinet.” So far from being aware of this it was a surprise to us both. As the meeting, where we had only pleasant conversation on miscellaneous topics, had just adjourned, without any allusion to the subject, we were incredulous until Mr. Blair repeated that he had resigned.
The sudden and unexpected retirement of a member of the administration would at any time create a sensation in the country, and especially excite his colleagues and associates in the government; this wholly unanticipated and unexplained step astounded us. Each inquired what it meant, what was the cause, and how long the subject had been under consideration. There had been grumbling, complaints, intrigues, often unjust, as there always will be, against members of every cabinet. Mr. Blair, as well as others, had been the subject of such assaults. Probably no member of the cabinet bad greater influence with the president on important questions, especially those of a military character. than Mr. Blair. Politically, he had little sympathy with or respect for the radicals, and did not conceal his opposition to their ultra ideas, which would, if carried out, end in sectionalism, exclusion, and, ultimately, in separation. On the subject of amnesty and reconstruction be and the president agreed, and those subjects were, in the pending political campaign, to be put to a test. Why then this break ? It was from no dissatisfaction on the part of either the president or the postmaster-general. In answer to an inquiry how long the subject of his resignation had been meditated, be replied that we were as well enlightened on that point as he was.
Mr. Blair called at my house that evening, and read the correspondence which had passed between the president and himself. The whole proceeding had been in the most amicable spirit and with the utmost harmony of feeling and friendly understanding on the part of both. Thinking that parties had assumed such shape, personally and politically, that the president might, in the course of events, deem it expedient and politic to modify or change his cabinet, or a portion of it, and yet feel a delicacy in taking such a step, Blair had repeatedly said that if his resignation would conduce to pacification or be a relief, the president had only to signify the fact and the office of postmaster-general was at his disposal. No farther interchange of sentiments between them had ever taken place, nor anything which could be construed into an intimation of a purpose to make a change, with perhaps the single exception of what he at the time supposed were casual remarks, the preceding day, when Fremont’s letter declining to be a candidate was discussed and criticised. The president, in that conversation, said that Fremont, when getting out of the way. had stated “the administration was a failure, politically, militarily, and financially; ” this, the president remarked, included, he supposed, the secretaries of state, treasury, and war, and the postmastergeneral, and he thought the interior also, but not the secretary of the navy or the attorney-general.
With this exception, Mr. Blair said he had received no intimation from the president that his retirement was wanted until he found upon his table, when he came in that morning from Silver Spring, the following letter:
EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, September 23, 1864.
HON. MONTGOMERY BLAIR:
MY DEAR SIR, — You have generously said to me more than once that whenever vour resignation could be a relief to me it was at my disposal. The time has come. You very well know that this proceeds from no dissatisfaction with you, personally or officially. Your uniform kindness has been unsurpassed by that of any friend; and while it is true that the war does not so greatly add to the difficulties of your department as to those of some others, it is yet much to say, as I most truly can, that in the three years and a half during which you have administered the general post-office, I remember no single complaint against you in connection therewith. Yours as ever,
ABRAHAM LINCOLN.
The resignation was promptly written, and handed to the president personally, who received it with many expressions of kind regard and friendship.
In answer to a question as to the immediate cause which led to this step, — for there must be a reason for it, — Blair said it certainly was not from any disagreement between the president and himself, as I would see by the letter, but he had no doubt his retirement was a peace-offering to Fremont and the radicals. He reminded me that the president, if somewhat peculiar, was also sagacious, and that he comprehended the true condition of affairs; that his own retirement was all right, and would eventuate well; that something was needed to propitiate Fremont and furnish the radicals an excuse in their retreat; that they had, in their wild crusade against the South, mounted a high horse which they found unmanageable, and they required help to dismount; that the tide of public sentiment for the rcëlection of the president was irresistible; and that the radicals and all discontented republicans would now come in to the support of Lincoln, who would certainly be elected and successful in his policy.
In a conversation with the president, subsequently, he not only spoke of reconciling the Fremont element, but said Mr. Chase had many friends who felt grieved that he should have left the cabinet, and left alone. There had been for a year a bitter fend between Chase and the Blairs, growing out of alleged abuse and misrepresentation of General Blair by certain of the treasury agents, in which the secretary of the treasury took part with his subordinates, and the post master-general, very naturally, defended his brother, who he believed was unjustly treated. It is not necessary here to enter into the details of that quarrel, more personal than political, though for a time it partook, with some, of a partisan character. The president regretted the feud, but avoided any committal to either party. The secretary of the treasury, who at that time had high aspirations, was not satisfied with neutrality, but thought that in not sustaining him the president supported the Blairs.
This was also one of the charges made by the friends of the secretary in Congress, and by the treasury officials generally, who insisted that the retention of General Blair in a high position in the army, his brother, the postmastergeneral, in the cabinet, and Commodore Lee, a brother-in-law, in command of the North Atlantic squadron, while Mr. Chase, with whom they had a personal quarrel, left the cabinet., was in effect a discrimination in favor of the Blairs.
As indicative of the feeling of Mr. Chase himself, and that the subject, which some strove to make political and general, may be fully understood, one or two brief extracts from letters of Mr. Chase may be introduced. He wrote to Jay Cooke on the 5th of May: —
“ I sele am consult personal considerations in my public conduct, and so suppressed my inclination to resign my office and denounce the conspiracy of which the Blairs are the most visible embodiments.’’
The next day, the 6th of May, he wrote to Colonel R. C. Parsons: —
“ Of Blair’s outrageous speech and its apparent, though I am sure not intended, indorsement by Mr. Lincoln, nothing can change the character of the Blair-Lincoln transaction so far as the public is concerned.”
On the 10th of May he writes: —
“ I use as much philosophy as I can in relation to the Blairs . . . and the apparent indifference co it all of Mr. Lincoln, who, though he disclaims all sympathy with them in their speech and action, does nothing to arrest either.”
May 19th he writes: —
“ The convention [at Baltimore, in June] will not be regarded as a Union convention, but simply as a Blair-Lineoln convention, by a great body of citizens whose support is essential to success. ’ ’
To Alfred P. Stone he says, on the 23d of May: —
“ I have not written a word to Ohio, I believe, on the villainous, malignant, and lying assault of the Blairs — for the congressional general was only the mouth-piece of the trip — and its apparent indorsement by Mr. Lincoln.”
These extracts from his writings are quoted as exhibiting the animus, the intense personal animosity, that existed and for months had been nursed and cherished by Mr. Chase and his friends. It was probably not less intense on the part of those whom he denounced. The president had been anxious, even while beset with public affairs, to allay this controversy in his political family, and to unite all, indeed, who were opposed to secession.
For some time there had also been an estrangement between the postmastergeneral and the secretary of war, which seemed connected with the Chase and Blair controversy. This difference or enmity had been not only unpleasant but exceedingly annoying and distressing to the president. The estrangement was mysteriously brought on by some one who had an object in producing alienation, and was of such a character that it could not be reconciled or removed. The facts were that at an early period of tlie administration, in the spring of 1861, Edwin M. Stanton was pressed by Mr. Seward for the office of attorney for the District of Columbia. The attorneygeneral, Mr. Bates, was very earnest for General Carrington. Other members of the cabinet abstained from interference, until the president, tired of delay, requested the opinion of each. Mr. Blair, who, being a resident in Washington, knew all the competitors, personally and professionally, was specially asked his opinion. Thus called upon, Mr. Blair spoke of Mr. Stanton as possessing superior legal ability, and as occupying a higher standing at the bar, but stated a fact within his personal knowledge which affected the integrity of that gentleman. This was decisive against Mr. Stanton. Within less than a year, however, on the retirement of Mr. Cameron, Mr. Seward succeeded, by skillful management assisted by adventitious circumstances, in securing the position about to be made vacant for his friend and confidant, Mr. Stanton, the unsuccessful candidate for district attorney. It has been represented by Mr. Chase and Mr. Cameron respectively, and perhaps believed by each, that he procured the selection of Stanton to be secretary of war. Mr. Stanton himself knew otherwise, and so did Mr. Seward. The latter, however, satisfied with his success in bringing his friend and confidant into the cabinet, was willing that the others should assume credit for what he had accomplished. The president took no part in those rivalries and pretensions, nor in the differences between Stanton and Blair at a later period. In administering the government, however, be was necessarily brought into close official and personal intimacy with Mr. Stanton on all military questions, yet he seldom failed to consult and he relied greatly on the intelligence, experience, and judgment of Mr. Blair, who had received a military education, had been an army officer, and was more familiar with and better understood the personnel of the service than the secretary of war or any of his colleagues. Mr. Stanton himself took much the same view as the president, and for a year or two deferred much to the opinions and judgment of Mr. Blair, who was almost daily at the war office, consulting and advising in regard to military operations. About the close of the year 1863, it was noticed that Mr. Stanton became reticent and uncommunicative towards the postmaster-general. This coolness grew so marked that Blair demanded an explanation. Stanton said he had been informed that Blair had made statements injurious to his character. Blair, understanding to what he alluded, replied that he had volunteered no statement, hut when called upon by the president, on a Certain occasion, he had communicated, in the frankness and confidence of cabinet consultation, as was his duly, certain facts which Stanton knew to be true. Without inquiring who had betrayed confidence, Blair said he had stated what Stanton knew to be a fact. This terminated all friendly intercourse. Neither ever after visited the other, or exchanged civilities. Whenever the president desired the views of either, he was compelled to get their opinions separately, or in general cabinet consultations. This political domestic controversy, which it was impossible to reconcile, had added to the other troubles of the president.
Mr. Blair comprehended all these embarrassments, personal and political, that environed Mr. Lincoln, not only in putting down the rebellion, but in quelling differences in the administration and in overcoming the radical faction that persistently opposed his reëlection; as well as the wretched intrigues which sought to place the president on a level with Fremont, and, by antagonizing the two, compel him to decline for a more acceptable and more radical candidate, who would carry into effect the radical scheme of putting the States of the South under ban, and by federal power disfranchise and degrade the whites, and enfranchise the blacks, reducing the one and elevating the other to a condition of legal and social equality. These factious intrigues, which had been active through 1864, failed in their purpose. The unpatriotic action of the Chicago convention largely contributed to bring into harmonious action every element of the republican party, but something seemed wanting as an excuse or reason for radical support of Mr. Lincoln, after the violent denunciations which had been uttered. As Mr. Blair, who, besides his personal differences with Chase and Stanton, was emphatic and pronounced against the aggressive, exclusive, and sectional policy of the radicals, bad generously proposed to the president that he would resign whenever his doing so would relieve the president, his resignation, so unselfishly tendered, wasrequosted. When it took place, his retirement was considered a peace-offering which would close uj) differences, contribute to insure success in the election, and put an end to the proscriptive intolerance and sectional exclusion of the radical leaders.
Such was the result in the election, and such would also have been the result in the matter of restoration and reconstruction but for the assassination of President Lincoln, after his second inauguration, and just as the rectitude of his benignant policy was beginning to be appreciated.
Gideon Welles.