The national bank had been a contentious issue throughout President Jackson’s two terms. First proposed by Alexander Hamilton, the Bank of the United States had been chartered in 1791 during the presidency of George Washington as a vehicle to bring order and accountability to banking and currency in the new nation. Charged by its foes with being unconstitutional, the bank was dissolved just twenty years later, in 1811. Faced with financial hardship from the War of 1812, the United States chartered a Second Bank of the United States in 1816. The second bank acted to control notes issued by state banks and private speculative banks.
In 1832, Henry Clay and Daniel Webster passed a bill in Congress to recharter the second bank, even though the charter was not due until 1836. The Whigs wanted to force Jackson’s hand in the upcoming presidential election. Sure enough, Jackson vetoed the bill, criticizing the bank for being an enclave of the rich and powerful and in violation of the Constitution, against states’ rights, and subversive of the rights of the people. Jackson’s successor, Martin Van Buren, pressed ahead to set up an independent treasury, which was called a “subtreasury.”
The Whigs were robust proponents of a national bank. Lincoln closed the debate with an intelligent attack on the subtreasury, the centerpiece of a Democratic plan for an independent treasury system. He supported the Whig political belief in the role of government to promote economic growth and development, and the national bank fit well within this philosophy.
The next evening, Lincoln spoke again, but this time his remarks did not hit the target. “Mr. L. of Wednesday night was not the L. of Tuesday.” Reporting on the debates, the Illinois State Register, a Democratic newspaper in Springfield, accused Lincoln of “clownishness” in his manner and speaking style, which the newspaper advised him to correct. Lincoln, upset with himself, knew he had not done his best. His fellow legislator Joseph Gillespie commented, “He was conscious of his failure and I never saw any man so much distressed.” After this, Lincoln was looking for an opportunity to redeem himself.
The Illinois legislature convened in Springfield for the first time on December 9, 1839. With the construction of the new capitol only in the beginning stages, the House met at the Second Presbyterian Church. Springfield, now swelling to nearly three thousand residents, proudly offered hospitality to the arriving legislators.
On the evening of December 26, 1839, after careful preparation, Lincoln offered a speech on the subtreasury. Though he usually spoke with few or no notes, he came prepared with full documentation for an extended address. Clearly disappointed by the small post-Christmas audience, he began by telling the few in attendance that he found it “peculiarly embarrassing” to be put in this situation. He let his pique show as he complained that the reason for the low turnout must be “the greater interest the community feel in the Speakers who addressed them then [referring to Stephen Douglas] than they do in him who is to do so now.” Lincoln declared, “This circumstance casts a damp upon my spirits, which I am sure I shall be unable to overcome during the evening.”
In a highly partisan speech, Lincoln criticized the Democratic plan to establish a subtreasury that would collect, hold, and disburse revenues. He complained that the new banking system would decrease the quantity of money in circulation. He spent much of the speech arguing that the subtreasury would be a less secure depository of public money.
But it was his conclusion that attracted widespread attention. Shifting away from the careful, technical descriptions of monetary matters, Lincoln articulated the underlying issues at stake. “Many free countries have lost their liberty; and ours may lose hers.” Lincoln then launched into an attack against his opponents.
I know that the great volcano at Washington, aroused and directed by the evil spirit that reigns there, is belching forth the lava of political corruption, in a current broad and deep, which is sweeping with frightful velocity over the whole length and breadth of the land, bidding fair to leave unscathed no green spot or living thing, while on its bosom are riding like demons on waves of Hell, the imps of that evil spirit, and fiendishly taunting all those who dare resist its destroying course.
After portraying his opponents’ evil intentions in romantic—even apocalyptic—language, Lincoln responded to their challenge in a growing crescendo of strongly evocative words. He started out simply and directly. “Broken to it, I, too may be; bow to it I never will.” If his opponents rode the “waves of Hell,” Lincoln staked out his own position under the “Almighty Architect” and “before High Heaven.” Lincoln, who was always careful of both his words and actions as a politician, declared he was determined to act “without contemplating consequences.”
Having made his political stand with a use of the personal pronoun “I” twelve times in the last sentence, he suddenly switched to “we,” as if to rally those in his hearing to the cause: “We still shall have the proud consolation of saying to our consciences, and to the departed shade of our country’s freedom, that the cause approved of our judgment, and adored of our hearts, in disaster, in chains, torture, in death, WE NEVER faultered in defending.”
In his conclusion, the thirty-year-old Lincoln exposed the moral core of his national economic vision. Rejecting the charge that Whigs were the party of privilege, he laid at the feet of his Democratic opponents his indictment of their economic and political corruption. Lincoln’s continual use of “I,” his long complex sentences, and his use of dramatic contrasts between hell and heaven reflected the spirit of a self-confident if sometimes verbose young legislator. His speech, reprinted widely in the 1840 political campaigns, became a rallying cry. Lincoln portrayed in dramatic moral imagery how the Whigs, contenders but never victors, viewed the stakes in the upcoming presidential election.
The House adjourned on February 3, 1840. On February 10, two days before his thirty-first birthday, Lincoln was praised at an all-day Whig “Festival” in Peoria for “fearlessly and eloquently exposing the iniquities of the subtreasury scheme” in his address six weeks earlier. Lincoln was riding a crest of political popularity.
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WITH THE LEGISLATURE ADJOURNED, Lincoln entered into a presidential campaign for the first time. Andrew Jackson, elected in 1828, had served two terms and then handpicked his successor, Vice President Van Buren. The combination of the economic panic of 1837 and Van Buren’s effete manner compared to his predecessor eroded the electorate’s confidence in Van Buren after his first term. At their first national convention in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, in December 1839, the Whigs turned away from party stalwarts Henry Clay and Daniel Webster and nominated William Henry Harrison, a graying hero of the battle of Tippecanoe in the War of 1812.
Lincoln did not attend the convention but threw himself into the presidential campaign, taking a lead in organizing the Whigs in Illinois. Setting aside his earlier fears that an enlarged party machinery could be ripe for manipulation by party elders, in January 1840, he became a coauthor of a circular that would “appoint one person in each county as county captain,” with the precinct captain and section captain “to perform promptly all the duties assigned him.” The Whigs, put on the defensive by the organizational structures of their Democratic opponents, were determined to tighten their own organization. “Our intention is to organize the whole State, so that every Whig can be brought to the polls in the coming presidential election.”
Lincoln set out on a whirlwind speaking campaign on behalf of Harrison and other Whig candidates in the spring. He spoke at Whig rallies in Carlinville, Alton, and Belleville. He debated Stephen Douglas and other Democrats in Tremont. Many Whig campaigners, sensing that the campaign of 1840 could bring them their first presidential victory, spoke about war-hero Harrison and avoided speaking about the issues. Lincoln, on the other hand, spoke astutely about economic problems. He extolled the Second Bank of the United States, both its “constitutionality” and “utility,” and attacked “the hideous deformity and injurious effects” of the subtreasury. The Quincy Whig wrote of his speech at Decat
ur that the opposition forces “have not been able to start a man that can hold a candle to him in political debate.”
On August 3, 1840, the day of the state elections, Sangamon County elected five Whigs to the lower house of the Illinois General Assembly. Lincoln voted for four Whigs but, not willing to vote for himself, cast his final vote for a Democrat. He won election to a fourth term, receiving the lowest number of Whig votes, although 578 more than the leading Democrat.
Abraham Lincoln threw himself into the 1840 presidential campaign to elect Whig candidate William Henry Harrison, hero of the battle of Tippecanoe in the War of 1812, as depicted on this campaign ribbon.
On August 18, 1840, Lincoln started from Springfield on a campaign trip to the southern part of the state. Traveling through steamy weather punctuated by thunderstorms, Lincoln met with Whig leaders in county-seat towns. Along the route he spoke in Waterloo, debated John A. McClernand about the state bank, and continued on to Carmi, Mount Carmel, Shawneetown, Marshall, and Casey. At Equality, Lincoln was “listened to with so much patience that the Whigs were in extacies.”
Lincoln did not simply speak for Harrison, but against Van Buren. The Sangamo Journal reported that Lincoln, speaking at Tremont, “re viewed the political course of Mr. Van Buren, and especially his votes in the New York Convention in allowing Free Negroes the right of suffrage.”
Lincoln, new to national politics, more than once became antagonistic—if not angry—with adversaries in the campaign. On a summer afternoon, Jesse Thomas, a young Democratic lawyer and politician, criticized Lincoln while speaking in a political debate in the Sangamon County Court. Not present when Thomas began his speech but alerted by friends, Lincoln came quickly. He came angry. He asked for the platform to reply, and then proceeded to assail Thomas. His attack quickly moved beyond the content of Thomas’s remarks. “He imitated Thomas in gesture and voice, at times caricaturing his walk and the very motion of his body.” The crowd began to yell and cheer. Lincoln, emboldened by the crowd’s response, continued his ridicule until Thomas, humiliated and reduced to tears, fled the platform.
The story quickly became known in Springfield as “the skinning of Thomas.” The incident would stay in the public memory for years. Lincoln was mortified. Sometime later he found Thomas and offered an apology. The young Lincoln, the man who prized reasonableness, struggled to control his emotions when he felt he was wronged.
In November, the 1840 presidential election drew an astounding 80.2 percent of eligible voters to the polls, up from 57.8 percent in 1836. American political democracy was surging.
For Lincoln, who had worked so hard in the election campaign, the results were bittersweet. Harrison became the first Whig to win the presidency, but he failed to carry Illinois, losing to Van Buren 47,433 to 45,576. The 1840 presidential election represented a coming-of-age in national politics for the thirty-one-year-old Lincoln. His leadership as a party organizer as well as his thoughtful campaign speeches brought him to the forefront of the Whig Party in Illinois.
THE ELECTION OF JOHN TODD STUART to a second term in Congress prompted the senior and junior partner to dissolve their law practice. In four years, the firm had taken on at least seven hundred cases. Stuart had served as Lincoln’s first mentor, but when he moved to Washington in 1839, Lincoln lost the benefit of his tutelage.
Lincoln entered immediately into partnership with Stephen T. Logan, the most esteemed jurist in Springfield. Logan, of Scotch-Irish lineage, was small and stern in appearance, with a wrinkled face and an enormous head of red hair. Logan’s plain, bedraggled dress and shrill, unappealing voice masked an impressive legal mind. On the bench, Logan was known both for the impartiality of his courtroom demeanor and his penchant for whittling; he always kept a stack of white pine shingles near at hand.
Before they became partners, Lincoln and Logan had gone head-to-head three times in the Illinois Supreme Court, and the younger Lincoln had won all three court verdicts. Lincoln was idealistic but raw, ready to be seasoned by Judge Logan. The senior partner instructed Lincoln in the discipline of preparation. Stuart, who was more or less absent in their four-year partnership, had pretty much left Lincoln to his own patterns of preparedness. Logan did not allow any spontaneous or slapdash approaches to serious legal matters.
Logan reread Blackstone every year. He believed that success was a by-product of hard and consistent work. He taught Lincoln that he should know his adversary’s case as well as his own so that he was never surprised by the argument of an opponent. He impressed upon Lincoln that it was crucial to understand both the logic and the passion of those who stood on the other side of the courtroom.
EVEN AFTER LIVING for five years in Springfield, Lincoln did not join societies, organizations, or churches. He enjoyed his time alone, when he could read without interruption. Although comfortable in political meetings, he remained uncomfortable in ordinary social gatherings.
He did, however, speak at the meetings of various voluntary societies, especially temperance societies. The American Temperance Society established a Springfield branch in 1832. It was one of thousands of societies springing up in which members took a pledge of total abstinence. On George Washington’s birthday, February 22, 1842, Lincoln gave the oration at the first large gathering of the Springfield branch of a new national temperance movement. The Washingtonians, named for the first president, had been founded in Baltimore in 1840. Whereas the American Temperance Union worked through religious organizations, the Washingtonians was a secular organization that appealed directly to the drunkard, seeking to portray him not as a sinner, but as a man to respect.
Lincoln began his address by recognizing that the temperance “cause,” although at work for several decades, was “just now, being crowned with a degree of success, hitherto unparalleled.” He then offered an astute and withering critique of the temperance movement’s founding ideas before offering his analysis of the way forward. The problem lay with both leaders and tactics. The earliest champions had been “Preachers, Lawyers, and hired agents,” but he faulted all three for their “want of approachability.” Lincoln asserted that these first leaders lacked sympathy with the very persons they tried to help. He believed there was “too much denunciation against the dram sellers and dram drinkers.” Rather than “the thundering tones of anathema and denunciation,” Lincoln counseled “the accents of entreaty and persuasion.” He spoke out of his own social morality when he told his audience, “If you would win a man to your cause, first convince him that you are his sincere friend.”
Although ostensibly about temperance, this speech revealed Lincoln’s larger understanding of human nature. He argued that if you approach a man and “mark him as one to be shunned and despised … he will retreat within himself, close all the avenues to his head and heart.” Lincoln set up a contrast between old and new reformers. To the old reformers, “all habitual drunkards were utterly incorrigible, and therefore, must be turned adrift, and damned without remedy.” Lincoln found this approach “repugnant to humanity, so uncharitable, so coldblooded and feelingless.”
A problem arising within the new Washingtonian movement was the place and attitude of those who had never been drunkards. “But,” say some, “we are no drunkards; and we shall not acknowledge ourselves such by joining a reformed drunkard’s society, whatever our influence might be.” Lincoln’s answer to a secular temperance group critical of the earlier religious reform efforts was, paradoxically, to invoke the central analogy of the Christian narrative. “Omnipotence condescended to take on himself the form of sinful man, and, as such, to die an ignominious death for their sakes, surely they will not refuse submission to the infinitely lesser condescension … of a large, erring, and unfortunate class of their own fellow creatures.” Despite Lincoln’s use of the analogy of Christ’s death on the cross, his criticism of earlier religious temperance reformers ended up antagonizing some religious leaders in Springfield.
THE INVITATION TO SPEAK to the Washingtonians in 18
42 was one more sign of how far Lincoln had come in his professional and public life in his five years in Springfield. He had now been elected to the Illinois legislature four times. He enjoyed a partnership with one of the most eminent lawyers in Illinois. His distinctive speaking abilities brought him numerous invitations to speak on behalf of Whig candidates and to a variety of reform organizations.
If Lincoln was finding his professional footing in Springfield during these years, privately he often felt awkward and unsure of himself. He was proving himself in his public life with men, but could he find a woman with whom to share his private life?
This first photograph of twenty-eight-year-old Mary Lincoln reveals her style and taste. She wears a silk dress with a large pin and ruffles visible at her wrists. In contrast to the photographs of most other women of the time, she exhibits a feminine sensuality.
CHAPTER 7
A Matter of Profound Wonder 1831–42
I AM NOW THE MOST MISERABLE MAN LIVING. IF WHAT I FEEL WERE EQUALLY DISTRIBUTED TO THE WHOLE HUMAN FAMILY, THERE WOULD NOT BE ONE CHEERFUL FACE ON THE EARTH.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN TO JOHN TODD STUART
January 23, 1842
HEN LINCOLN GREW UP IN INDIANA, HIS STEPMOTHER, SALLY BUSH Lincoln, remembered, “He was not very fond of girls as he seemed to me.” Anna Caroline Gentry, a schoolmate, reported that Lincoln “did not go much with the girls—don’t like crowds—didn’t like girls much.” In New Salem, Lincoln was even shy about waiting on young women in his store.
But if young women did not know what to make of Lincoln, older women adored him. In New Salem, several older women mothered this awkward young man, cooking and cleaning for him and repairing his clothes. Lincoln reciprocated their affection, finding a safe harbor in their matronly company. One young woman from New Salem recalled, “Lincoln loved my Mother and would frequently ask her for advice on different questions—Such as love—prudence of movements.” Jack Armstrong’s wife, Hannah, took a liking to Lincoln. Fun-loving Jack enjoyed telling people that one of the boys in his family might actually be “Abe’s son,” an allusion that Lincoln, although a pretty good practical joker himself, did not find funny. Some of these women, in mothering Lincoln, also wanted to assist him in finding a suitable bride.
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