SUNDRIES
It has been pleasant to emerge from the dismal winter of 1862-63 into
the sun-gleam of the Fourth of July of the latter year. But it is
necessary to return for a while into that dusky gloom, for the career of
a "war president" is by no means wholly a series of campaigns. Domestic
politics, foreign relations, finance, make their several demands.
Concerning one of these topics, at least, there is little to be said.
One day, in a period of financial stress, Mr. Chase expressed a wish to
introduce to the President a delegation of bankers, who had come to
Washington to discuss the existing condition with regard to money.
"Money!" exclaimed Mr. Lincoln, "I don't know anything about 'money'! I
never had enough of my own to fret me, and I have no opinion about it
any way." Accordingly, throughout his administration he left the whole
subject in the hands of the secretary of the treasury. The tariffs and
internal revenue bills, the legal tender notes, the "five-twenties," the
"ten-forties," and the "seven-thirties," all the loans, the national
banking system, in short, all the financial schemes of the
administration were adopted by Mr. Lincoln upon the recommendation of
Mr. Chase, with little apparent study upon his own part. Satisfied of
the ability of his secretary, he gave to all the Treasury measures his
loyal support. In return, he expected the necessary funds to be
forthcoming; for he had implicit confidence in the willingness of the
people to pay the bills of the Union; and he expected the secretary to
arrange methods by which they could do so with reasonable convenience.
Mr. Chase was cast for the role of magician, familiar with those
incantations which could keep the Treasury ever full. It was well thus,
for in fact no word or incident in Mr. Lincoln's life indicates that he
had any capacity whatsoever in financiering. To live within his income
and pay his dues with a minute and careful punctuality made the limit of
his dealings and his interest in money matters.
* * * * *
Foreign affairs, less technical, could not in like easy manner be
committed to others, and in these Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Seward labored
together. The blackest cloud was the Trent affair, yet after that had
passed the sky by no means became clear. In the spring of 1862 the Oreto
went out from Liverpool to become the rebel privateer Florida. Before
her departure Mr. Adams complained concerning her to the English
government, but was assured that the vessel was designed for the
Sicilian fruit trade! As it is not diplomatic to say that gentlemen in
office are telling lies, the American minister could push the matter no
farther. The Florida, therefore, escaped, not to conduct commerce with
Sicily, but to destroy the commerce of the United States. At the same
time that she was fitting out, a mysterious craft, oddly known only as
the "290," was also building in the Liverpool docks, and against her Mr.
Adams got such evidence that the queen's ministers could not help
deciding that she must be detained. Unfortunately, however, and by a
strange, if not a significant chance, they reached this decision on the
day after she had sailed! She became the notorious Alabama. Earl Russell
admitted that the affair was "a scandal," but this did not interfere
with the career of Captain Semmes. In these incidents there was both
cause and provocation for war, and hot-headed ones cried out for it,
while prudent men feared it. But the President and the secretary were
under the bonds of necessity to keep their official temper. Just at this
juncture England would have found it not only very easy, but also very
congenial to her real sympathies, to play for the South a part like that
which France had once played for certain thirteen revolted colonies, and
thereby to change a rebellion into a revolution. So Mr. Lincoln and Mr.
Seward, not willing to give the unfriendly power this opportunity, only
wrote down in the national ledger sundry charges against Great Britain,
which were afterward paid, not promptly, yet in full!
Another provoking thing was the placing of
Confederate loans in London. This could not be interfered with. The
only comfort was that the blockaded South had much difficulty in laying
hands upon the proceeds of the bonds which English friends of the Slave
Empire were induced to buy. Yet time, always the faithful auxiliary of
the North, took care of this matter also. When the news of Gettysburg
and Vicksburg came, the investors, who had scarcely finished writing the
cheques with which to pay their subscriptions, were obliged to face a
drop of thirty per cent, in the market price of their new securities.
For many years after the war was over British strong boxes wasted space
in accommodating these absurd documents, while the idea of their
worthlessness was slowly filtering through the minds of their owners.
Another thing, which did no harm at all, but was exceedingly vexatious,
was the constant suggestion of European mediation. For a couple of
years, at least, the air was full of this sort of talk. Once, in spite
of abundant discouragement, the French emperor actually committed the
folly of making the proposal. It came inopportunely on February 3, 1863,
after the defeat of Fredericksburg, like a carrion bird after a battle.
It was rejected very decisively, and if Napoleon III. appreciated Mr.
Seward's dispatch, he became aware that he had shown gross lack of
discernment. Yet he was not without some remarkable companions in this
incapacity to understand that which he was observing, as if from aloft,
with an air of superior wisdom. One would think that the condition of
feeling in the United States which had induced Governor Hicks, in the
early stage of the rebellion, to suggest a reference to Lord Lyons, as
arbitrator, had long since gone by. But it had not; and it is the
surprising truth that Horace Greeley had lately written to M. Mercier,
the French minister at Washington, suggesting precisely the step which
the emperor took; and there were other less conspicuous citizens who
manifested a similar lack of spirit and intelligence.
All this, however, was really of no serious consequence. Talk about
mediation coming from American citizens could do little actual injury,
and from foreigners it could do none. If the foreigners had only been
induced to offer it by reason of a friendly desire to help the country
in its hour of stress, the rejection might even have been accompanied
with sincere thanks. Unfortunately, however, it never came in this
guise; but, on the contrary, it always involved the offensive assumption
that the North could never restore the integrity of the Union by force.
Northern failure was established in advance, and was the unconcealed, if
not quite the avowed, basis of the whole transaction. Now though mere
unfriendliness, not overstepping the requirements of international law,
could inflict little substantial hurt, yet there was something very
discouraging in the unanimity and positiveness with which all these
experienced European statesmen assumed the success of the Confederacy
as the absolutely sure outcome; and in this time of extreme trial to
discourage was to injure. Furthermore, the undisguised pleasure with
which this prospect was contemplated was sorely trying to men oppressed
by the burdens of anxiety and trouble which rested on the President and
his ministers. The man who had begun life as a frontiersman had need of
much moral courage to sustain him in the face of the presagings, the
condemnations, and the hostility of nearly all the sage and well-trained
statesmen of Europe. In those days the United States had not yet fully
thrown off a certain thralldom of awe before European opinion.
Nevertheless, at whatever cost in the coin of self-reliance, the
President and the secretary maintained the courage of their opinions,
and never swerved or hesitated in the face of foreign antipathy or
contempt. The treatment inflicted upon them was only so much added to
the weight under which they had to stand up.
* * * * *
Rebellion and foreign ill-will, even Copperheadism, presented
difficulties and opposition which were in a certain sense legitimate;
but that loyal Republicans should sow the path of the administration
thick with annoyances certainly did seem an unfair trial. Yet, on sundry
occasions, some of which have been mentioned, these men did this thing,
and they did it in the very uncompromising and exasperating manner which
is the natural emanation from conscientious purpose and intense
self-faith. An instance occurred in December, 1862. The blacker the
prospect became, the more bitter waxed the extremists. Such is the
fashion of fanatics, who are wont to grow more warm as their chances
seem to grow more desperate; and some of the leaders of the anti-slavery
wing of the Republican party were fanatics. These men by no means
confined their hostility to the Democratic McClellan; but extended it to
so old and tried a Republican as the secretary of state himself. It had
already come to this, that the new party was composed of, if not split
into, two sections of widely discordant views. The conservative body
found its notions expressed in the cabinet by Seward; the radical body
had a mouthpiece in Chase. The conservatives were not aggressive; but
the radicals waged a genuine political warfare, and denounced Seward,
not, indeed, with the vehemence which was considered to be appropriate
against McClellan, yet very strenuously. Finally this hostility reached
such a pass that, at a caucus of Republican senators, it was actually
voted to demand the dismission of this long-tried and distinguished
leader in the anti-slavery struggle. Later, in place of this blunt vote,
a more polite equivalent was substituted, in the shape of a request for
a reconstruction of the cabinet. Then a committee visited the President
and pressed him to have done with the secretary, whom they thought
lukewarm. Meanwhile, Seward had heard of what was going forward, and,
in order to free Mr. Lincoln from embarrassment, he had already tendered
his resignation before the committee arrived.
The crisis was serious. The recent elections indicated that even while,
as now, the government represented all the sections of Republicanism,
still the situation was none too good; but if it was to be controlled by
the extremist wing of a discordant party, the chance that it could
endure to the end the tremendous strain of civil war was reduced almost
to hopelessness. The visitors who brought this unwelcome suggestion to
the President received no immediate response or expression of opinion
from him, but were invited to come again in the evening; they did so,
and were then much surprised to meet all the members of the cabinet
except Mr. Seward. An outspoken discussion ensued, in which Mr. Chase
found his position embarrassing, if not equivocal. On the following
morning, he, with other members of the cabinet, came again for further
talk with the President; in his hand he held a written resignation of
his office. He "tendered" it, yet "did not advance to deliver it,"
whereupon the President stepped forward and took it "with alacrity."[48]
Having now in his hands the resignations of the chiefs of the two
principal factions of the party, the President had made the first step
towards relieving the situation of dangerous one-sidedness. At once he
took the next step by sending to each this note:--
December 20, 1862.
HON. WILLIAM H. SEWARD and HON. SALMON P. CHASE:
_Gentlemen_,--You have respectively tendered me your resignations as
secretary of state and secretary of the treasury of the United States. I
am apprised of the circumstances which render this course personally
desirable to each of you; but, after most anxious consideration, my
deliberate judgment is, that the public interest does not admit of it.
I therefore have to request that you will resume the duties of your
departments respectively.
Your obedient servant,
A. LINCOLN.
The next morning Mr. Seward wrote briefly: "I have cheerfully resumed
the functions of this department, in obedience to your command." Mr.
Chase seemed to hesitate. On December 20, in the afternoon, he had
written a letter, in which he had said that he thought it desirable that
his resignation should be accepted. He gave as his reason that recent
events had "too rudely jostled the unity" of the cabinet; and he
intimated that, with both himself and Seward out of it, an improved
condition might be reached. He had not, however, actually dispatched
this, when the President's note reached him. He then, though feeling
his convictions strengthened, decided to hold back the letter which he
had prepared and "to sleep on" the matter. Having slept, he wrote, on
the morning of December 22, a different letter, to the effect that,
though reflection had not much, if at all, changed his original opinion
as to the desirability of his resignation, yet he would conform to the
judgment and wishes of the President. If Mr. Chase was less gracious
than Mr. Seward in this business, it is to be remembered that he was
very much more dissatisfied with the President's course than was Mr.
Seward, who, indeed, for the most part was not dissatisfied at all.
Thus a dangerous crisis was escaped rather than overcome. For though
after the relief given by this plain speaking the situation did not
again become quite so strained as it had previously been, yet
disagreement between men naturally prudent and men naturally extremist
was inevitable. Nevertheless it was something that the two sections had
encountered each other, and that neither had won control of the
government. The President had restrained dissension within safe limits
and had saved himself from the real or apparent domination of a faction.
When it was all over, he said: "Now I can ride; I have got a pumpkin in
each end of my bag." Later on he repeated: "I do not see how it could
have been done better. I am sure it was right. If I had yielded to that
storm and dismissed Seward, the thing would all have slumped over one
way, and we should have been left with a scanty handful of supporters."
Undoubtedly he had managed very skillfully a very difficult affair, but
he ought never to have been compelled to arrange such quarrels in the
camp of his own party.
* * * * *
Those counties of Virginia which lay west of the Alleghanies contained a
population which was, by an overwhelming majority, strenuously loyal.
There had long been more of antagonism than of friendship between them
and the rest of the State, and now, as has been already mentioned, the
secession of Virginia from the Union stimulated them, in turn, to secede
from Virginia. In the summer of 1861 they took measures to form
themselves into a separate State; and in April, 1862, they adopted a
state Constitution by a vote of 18,862 yeas against 514 nays. A bill for
the admission of "West Virginia" was passed by the Senate in July, and
by the House in December, and was laid before the President for
signature. There were nice questions of constitutional law about this,
and some doubt also as to whether the move was altogether well advised.
Mr. Lincoln asked the opinions of the cabinet as to whether he should
sign the bill. Three said Yea, and three Nay; and it was noteworthy that
the three who thought it expedient also thought it constitutional, and
that the three who thought it inexpedient also thought it
unconstitutional. Mr. Lincoln, not much assisted, then decided in the
affirmative, and signed the bill December 31, 1862. A statement of the
reasons[49] which led him to this decision concludes thus: "It is said
that the admission of West Virginia is secession, and tolerated only
because it is _our_ secession. Well, if we call it by that name, there
is still difference enough between secession against the Constitution
and secession in favor of the Constitution." Mr. Elaine says that the
creation of this State was sustained by "legal fictions;" and Thaddeus
Stevens declared that it was a measure entirely outside of any provision
of the Constitution, yet said that he should vote for it in accordance
with his general principle: that none of the States in rebellion were
entitled to the protection of the Constitution. The Republicans
themselves were divided in their views as to the lawfulness of the
measure. However the law may have stood, it is evident to us, looking
backward, that for practical purposes the wisdom of the President's
judgment cannot be impugned. The measure was the amputation of so much
territory from that which the Confederates, if they should succeed,
could claim as their own; and it produced no inconvenience at all when,
instead of succeeding, they failed.
* * * * *
Many causes conspired to induce an obstreperous outbreak of
"Copperheadism" in the spring of 1863. The Democratic successes in the
elections of the preceding autumn were in part a premonition of this,
in part also a cause. Moreover, reaction was inevitable after the
intense outburst of patriotic enthusiasm which had occurred during the
earlier part of the war. But more than all this, Mr. Lincoln wrote, and
every one knew, that, "if the war fails, the administration fails," and
thus far the war had been a failure. So the grumblers, the malcontents,
and the Southern sympathizers argued that the administration also, at
least so far as it had gone, had been a failure; and they fondly
conceived that their day of triumph was dawning.
That which was due, punctually arrived. There now came into prominence
those secret societies which, under a shifting variety of names,
continued to scheme and to menace until the near and visible end of the
war effected their death by inanition. The Knights of the Golden Circle,
The Order of American Knights, the Order of the Star, The Sons of
Liberty, in turn enlisted recruits in an abundance which is now
remembered with surprise and humiliation,--sensations felt perhaps most
keenly by the sons of those who themselves belonged to the
organizations. Mr. Seward well said: "These persons will be trying to
forget, years hence, that they ever opposed this war." These societies
gave expression to a terrible blunder, for Copperheadism was even more
stupid than it was vicious. But the fact of their stupidity made them
harmless. Their very names labeled them. Men who like to enroll
themselves in Golden Circles and in Star galaxies seldom accomplish much
in exacting, especially in dangerous, practical affairs. Mr. Lincoln
took this sensible view of these associations. His secretaries, who
doubtless speak from personal knowledge, say that his attitude "was one
of good-humored contempt."
As a rule these "Knights" showed their valor in the way of mischief,
plotting bold things, but never doing them. They encouraged soldiers to
desert; occasionally they assassinated an enrolling officer; they
maintained communications with the Confederates, to whom they gave
information and occasionally also material aid; they were tireless in
caucus work and wire-pulling; in Indiana, in 1863, they got sufficient
control of the legislature to embarrass Governor Morton quite seriously;
they talked much about establishing a Northwestern Confederacy; a few of
them were perhaps willing to aid in those cowardly efforts at
incendiarism in the great Northern cities, also in the poisoning of
reservoirs, in the distribution of clothing infected with disease, and
in other like villainies which were arranged by Confederate emissaries
in Canada, and some of which were imperfectly carried out in New York
and elsewhere; they also made great plans for an uprising and for the
release of Confederate prisoners in Ohio, Illinois, and Indiana. But no
actual outbreak ever occurred; for when they had come close to the
danger line, these associates of mediaeval tastes and poetic
appellatives always stopped short.
The President was often urged to take decisive measures against these
devisers of ignoble treasons. Such men as Governor Morton and General
Rosecrans strove to alarm him. But he said that the "conspiracy merited
no special attention, being about an equal mixture of puerility and
malice." He had perfect information as to all the doings and plottings,
and as to the membership, of all the societies, and was able to measure
accurately their real power of hurtfulness; he never could be induced to
treat them with a severity which was abundantly deserved, but which
might not have been politic and would certainly have added to the labor,
the expense, and the complications of the government. "Nothing can make
me believe," he once charitably said, "that one hundred thousand Indiana
Democrats are disloyal!" His judgment was proved to be sound; for had
many of these men been in grim earnest in their disloyalty, they would
have achieved something. In fact these bodies were unquestionably
composed of a small infusion of genuine traitors, combined with a vastly
larger proportion of bombastic fellows who liked to talk, and foolish
people who were tickled in their shallow fancy by the element of secrecy
and the fineness of the titles.
The man whose name became unfortunately preeminent for disloyalty at
this time was Clement L. Vallandigham, a Democrat, of Ohio. General
Burnside was placed in command of the Department of the Ohio, March 25,
1863, and having for the moment no Confederates to deal with, he turned
his attention to the Copperheads, whom he regarded with even greater
animosity. His Order No. 38, issued on April 13, brought these hornets
about his ears in impetuous fury; for, having made a long schedule of
their favorite offenses, which he designed for the future severely to
proscribe, he closed it by saying that "the habit of declaring sympathy
for the enemy will not be allowed in this Department;" and he warned
persons with treasonable tongues that, unless they should keep that
little member in order, they might expect either to suffer death as
traitors, or to be sent southward within the lines of "their friends."
Now Mr. Vallandigham had been a member of Congress since 1856, and was
at present a prominent candidate for any office which the Democrats of
his State or of the United States might be able to fill; he was the
popular and rising leader of the Copperhead wing of the Democracy. Such
was his position that it would have been ignominious for him to allow
any Union general to put a military gag in his mouth. Nor did he. On the
contrary, he made speeches which at that time might well have made
Unionists mad with rage, and which still seem to have gone far beyond
the limit of disloyalty which any government could safely tolerate.
Therefore on May 4 he was arrested by a company of soldiers, brought to
Cincinnati, and thrown into jail. His friends gathered in anger, and a
riot was narrowly avoided. At once, by order of General Burnside, he was
tried by a military commission. He was charged with "publicly expressing
sympathy for those in arms against the government of the United States,
and declaring disloyal sentiments and opinions, with the object and
purpose of weakening the power of the government in its efforts to
suppress an unlawful rebellion." Specifications were drawn from a speech
delivered by him on or about May 1. The evidence conclusively sustained
the indictment, and the officers promptly pronounced him guilty,
whereupon he was sentenced by Burnside to confinement in Fort Warren. An
effort to obtain his release by a writ of habeas corpus was ineffectual.
The rapidity of these proceedings had taken every one by surprise. But
the Democrats throughout the North, rapidly surveying the situation,
seized the opportunity which perhaps had been too inconsiderately given
them. The country rang with plausible outcries and high-sounding oratory
concerning military usurpation, violation of the Constitution, and
stifling freedom of speech. It was painfully obvious that this
combination of rhetoric and argument troubled the minds of many
well-affected persons. If the President had been consulted in the
outset, it is thought by some that he would not have allowed matters to
proceed so far. Soon afterward, in his reply to the New York Democrats,
he said: "In my own discretion, I do not know whether I would have
ordered the arrest of Mr. Vallandigham." On the other hand, Mr. Blaine
states that Burnside "undoubtedly had confidential instructions in
regard to the mode of dealing with the rising tide of disloyalty which,
beginning in Ohio, was sweeping over the West."
In a very short time the violence of the fault-finding reached so
excessive a measure that Burnside offered his resignation; but Mr.
Lincoln declined to accept it, saying that, though all the cabinet
regretted the necessity for the arrest, "some perhaps doubting there was
a real necessity for it, yet, being done, all were for seeing you
through with it." This seems to have been his own position. In fact it
was clear that, whether what had been done was or was not a mistake, to
undo it would be a greater mistake. Accordingly Mr. Lincoln only showed
that he felt the pressure of the criticism and denunciation by commuting
the sentence, and directing that Vallandigham should be released from
confinement and sent within the Confederate lines,--which was, indeed, a
very shrewd and clever move, and much better than the imprisonment.
Accordingly the quasi rebel was tendered to and accepted by a
Confederate picket, on May 25. He protested vehemently, declared his
loyalty, and insisted that his character was that of a prisoner of war.
But the Confederates, who had no objection whatsoever to his peculiar
methods of demonstrating "loyalty" to their opponents, insisted upon
treating him as a friend, the victim of an enemy common to themselves
and him; and instead of exchanging him as a prisoner, they facilitated
his passage through the blockade on his way to Canada. There he arrived
in safety, and thence issued sundry manifestoes to the Democracy. On
June 11 the Democratic Convention of Ohio nominated him as their
candidate for governor, and it seems that for a while they really
expected to elect him.
In the condition of feeling during the months in which these events were
occurring, they undeniably subjected the government to a very severe
strain. They furnished the Democrats with ammunition far better than any
which they had yet found, and they certainly used it well. Since the
earliest days of the war there had never been quite an end of the
protestation against arbitrary military arrests and the suspension of
the sacred writ of habeas corpus, and now the querulous outcry was
revived with startling vehemence. Crowded meetings were held everywhere;
popular orators terrified or enraged their audiences with pictures of
the downfall of freedom, the jeopardy of every citizen; resolutions and
votes without number expressed the alarm and anger of the great
assemblages; learned lawyers lent their wisdom to corroborate the
rhetoricians, and even some Republican newspapers joined the croaking
procession of their Democratic rivals. Erelong the assaults appeared to
be producing effects so serious and widespread that the President was
obliged to enter into the controversy. On May 16 a monster meeting of
"the Democrats of New York" was told by Governor Seymour that the
question was: "whether this war is waged to put down rebellion at the
South, or to destroy free institutions at the North." Excited by such
instigation, the audience passed sundry damnatory resolutions and sent
them to the President.
Upon receiving these, Mr. Lincoln felt that he must come down into the
arena, without regard to official conventionality. On June 12 he replied
by a full presentation of the case, from his point of view. He had once
more to do the same thing in response to another address of like
character which was sent to him on June 11 by the Democratic State
Convention of Ohio. In both cases the documents prepared by the
remonstrants were characterized, to more than the usual degree, by that
dignified and _ore rotundo_ phraseology, that solemnity in the
presentation of imposing generalities, which are wont to be so dear to
committees charged with drafting resolutions. The replies of the
President were in striking contrast to this rhetorical method alike in
substance and in form; clear, concise, and close-knit, they were models
of good work in political controversy, and like most of his writing they
sorely tempt to liberal transcription, a temptation which must
unfortunately be resisted, save for a few sentences. The opening
paragraph in the earlier paper was cleverly put:--
"The resolutions are resolvable into two propositions,--first, the
expression of a purpose to sustain the cause of the Union, to secure
peace through victory, and to support the administration in every
constitutional and lawful measure to suppress the rebellion; and,
secondly, a declaration of censure upon the administration for supposed
unconstitutional action, such as the making of military arrests. And,
from the two propositions, a third is deduced, which is, that the
gentlemen composing the meeting are resolved on doing their part to
maintain our common government and country, despite the folly or
wickedness, as they may conceive, of any administration. This position
is eminently patriotic, and, as such, I thank the meeting, and
congratulate the nation for it. My own purpose is the same, so that the
meeting and myself have a common object, and can have no difference,
except in the choice of means or measures for effecting that object."
Later on followed some famous sentences:--
"Mr. Vallandigham avows his hostility to the war on the part of the
Union; and his arrest was made because he was laboring, with some
effect, to prevent the raising of troops, to encourage desertion from
the army, and to leave the rebellion without an adequate military force
to suppress it. He was not arrested because he was damaging the
political prospects of the administration or the personal interests of
the commanding general, but because he was damaging the army, upon the
existence and vigor of which the life of the Nation depends....
"I understand the meeting whose resolutions I am considering to be in
favor of suppressing the rebellion by military force, by armies. Long
experience has shown that armies cannot be maintained unless desertion
shall be punished by the severe penalty of death.
"The case requires, and the law and the Constitution sanction, this
punishment. Must I shoot a simple-minded soldier boy who deserts, while
I must not touch a hair of a wily agitator who induces him to desert?
This is none the less injurious when effected by getting a father, or
brother, or friend, into a public meeting, and there working upon his
feelings until he is persuaded to write the soldier boy that he is
fighting in a bad cause, for a wicked administration of a contemptible
government, too weak to arrest and punish him if he shall desert. I
think that, in such a case, to silence the agitator, and save the boy,
is not only constitutional, but withal a great mercy."
The Ohio Democrats found themselves confronted with this:--
"Your nominee for governor ... is known to you and to the world to
declare against the use of an army to suppress the rebellion. Your own
attitude therefore encourages desertion, resistance to the draft, and
the like, because it teaches those who incline to desert and to escape
the draft to believe it is your purpose to protect them, and to hope
that you will become strong enough to do so."
The arguments of the President called out retort rather than reply, for
in fact they really could not be answered, and they were too accurately
put to be twisted by sophistry; that they reached the minds of the
people was soon made evident. The Democratic managers had made a fatal
blunder in arraying the party in a position of extreme hostility to the
war. Though there were at the North hosts of grumblers who were
maliciously pleased at all embarrassments of the administration, and who
were willing to make the prosecution of the war very difficult, there
were not hosts who were ready to push difficulty to the point of
impossibility. On the other hand the fight was made very shrewdly by the
Union men of Ohio, who nominated John Brough, a "war Democrat," as their
candidate. Then the scales fell from the eyes of the people; they saw
that in real fact votes for Brough or for Vallandigham were,
respectively, votes for or against the Union. The campaign became a
direct trial of strength on this point. Freedom of speech, habeas
corpus, and the kindred incidents of the Vallandigham case were laid
aside as not being the genuine and fundamental questions. It was one of
those instances in which the common sense of the multitude suddenly
takes control, brushes away confusing details, and gets at the great and
true issue. The result was that Vallandigham was defeated by a majority
of over 100,000 votes; and thus a perilous crisis was well passed. This
incident had put the Republican ascendency in extreme peril, but when
the administration emerged from the trial with a success so brilliant,
it was thereafter much stronger than if the test had never been made.
The strain was one of that kind to which the war was subjecting the
whole nation, a strain which strengthens rather than weakens the body
which triumphantly encounters it. The credit for the result was
generally admitted to be chiefly due to Mr. Lincoln's effective
presentation of the Republican position.
* * * * *
As the second year of the war drew towards its close, the administration
had to face a new and grave difficulty in the recruitment of the army.
Serious errors which had been made in calling and enlisting troops now
began to bear fruit. Under the influence of the first enthusiasm a large
proportion of the adult male population at the North would readily have
enlisted "for the war;" but unfortunately that opportunity had not been
seized by the government, and it soon passed, never to return. That the
President and his advisers had been blameworthy can hardly be said; but
whether they had been blameworthy or excusable became an immaterial
issue, when they found that the terms of enlistment were soon to expire,
and also that just when the war was at its hottest, the patriotism of
the people seemed at its coldest. Defeats in the field and Copperheadism
at home combined in their dispiriting and deadly work. Voluntary
enlistment almost ceased. Thereupon Congress passed an act "for
enrolling and calling out the national forces." All able-bodied
citizens between twenty and forty-five years of age were to "perform
military duty in the service of the United States, when called on by the
President for that purpose."[50] This was strenuous earnest, for it
portended a draft.
The situation certainly was not to be considered without solicitude
when, in a war which peculiarly appealed to patriotism, compulsion must
be used to bring involuntary recruits to maintain the contest. Yet the
relaxation of the patriotic temper was really not so great as this fact
might seem to indicate. Besides many partial and obvious explanations,
one which is less obvious should also be noted. During two years of war
the people, notoriously of a temperament readily to accept new facts and
to adapt themselves thereto, had become accustomed to a state of war,
and had learned to regard it as a _condition_, not normal and permanent,
yet of indefinite duration. Accordingly they were now of opinion that
the government must charge itself with the management of this condition,
that is to say, with the conduct of the war, as a strict matter of
business, to be carried on like all other public duties and functions.
In the first months of stress every man had felt called upon to
contribute, personally, his own moral, financial, and even physical
support; but that crisis had passed, and it was now conceived that the
administration might fairly be required to arrange for getting men and
money and supplies in the systematic and business-like fashion in which,
as history taught, all other governments had been accustomed to get
these necessaries in time of war.
At any rate, however it was to be explained or commented upon, the fact
confronted Mr. Lincoln that he must institute enrollment and drafting.
The machinery was arranged and the very disagreeable task was entered
upon early in the summer of 1863. If it was painful in the first
instance for the President to order this, the process was immediately
made as hateful as possible for him. Even loyal and hearty
"war-governors" seemed at once to accept as their chief object the
protection of the people of their respective States from the operation
of the odious law. The mercantile element was instantly and fully
accepted by them. The most patriotic did not hesitate to make every
effort to have the assigned quotas reduced; they drew jealous
comparisons to show inequalities; and they concocted all sorts of
schemes for obtaining credits. Not marshaling recruits in the field, but
filling quotas upon paper, seemed a legitimate purpose; for the matter
had become one of figures, of business, of competition, and all the
shrewdness of the Yankee mind was at once aroused to gain for one's
self, though at the expense of one's neighbors. Especially the
Democratic officials were viciously fertile in creating obstacles. The
fact that the Act of Congress was based on the precedent of an Act of
the Confederate Congress, passed a year before, did not seem in the
least to conciliate the Copperheads. Governor Seymour of New York
obtained a discreditable preeminence in thwarting the administration. He
gathered ingenious statistics, and upon them based charges of dishonest
apportionments and of fraudulent discrimination against Democratic
precincts. He also declared the statute unconstitutional, and asked the
President to stay all proceedings under it until it could be passed upon
by the Supreme Court of the United States,--an ingenuous proposition,
which he neglected to make practicable by arranging with General Lee to
remain conveniently quiescent while the learned judges should be
discussing the methods of reinforcing the Northern armies.
In a word, Mr. Lincoln was confronted by every difficulty that
Republican inventiveness and Democratic disaffection could devise. Yet
the draft must go on, or the war must stop. His reasonableness, his
patience, his capacity to endure unfair trials, received in this
business a demonstration more conspicuous than in any other during his
presidency. Whenever apportionments, dates, and credits were questioned,
he was liberal in making temporary, and sometimes permanent allowances,
preferring that any error in exactions should be in the way of
moderation. But in the main business he was inflexible; and at last it
came to a direct issue between himself and the malcontents, whether the
draft should go on or stop. In the middle of July the mob in New York
city tested the question. The drafting began there on Saturday morning,
July 11. On Monday morning, July 13, the famous riot broke out. It was
an appalling storm of rage on the part of the lower classes; during
three days terror and barbarism controlled the great city, and in its
streets countless bloody and hideous massacres were perpetrated. Negroes
especially were hanged and otherwise slain most cruelly. The governor
was so inefficient that he was charged, of course extravagantly, with
being secretly in league with the ringleaders. A thousand or more lives,
as it was roughly estimated, were lost in this mad and brutal fury,
before order was again restored. The government gave the populace a
short time to cool, and then sent 10,000 troops into the city and
proceeded with the business without further interruption. A smaller
outbreak took place in Boston, but was promptly suppressed. In other
places it was threatened, but did not occur. In spite of all, the
President continued to execute the law. Yet although by this means the
armies might be kept full, the new men were very inferior to those who
had responded voluntarily to the earlier calls. Every knave in the
country adopted the lucrative and tolerably safe occupation of
"bounty-jumping," and every worthless loafer was sent to the front,
whence he escaped at the first opportunity to sell himself anew and to
be counted again. The material of the army suffered great depreciation,
which was only imperfectly offset by the improvement of the military
machine, whereby a more effective discipline, resembling that of
European professionalism, was enforced.[51]
FOOTNOTES:
[48] N. and H. vi. 268; this account is derived from their twelfth
chapter.
[49] N. and H. vi. 309, from MS.
[50] The act was signed by the President, March 3, 1863.
[51] Concerning the deterioration of the army, in certain particulars,
see an article, "The War as we see it now," by John C. Ropes,
_Scribner's Magazine_, June, 1891.