“Mr. Lincoln,” Bates told Francis Carpenter, “comes very near being a perfect man, according to my ideal of manhood. He lacks but one thing…the element of will. I have sometimes told him, for instance, that he was unfit to be intrusted with the pardoning power. Why, if a man comes to him with a touching story, his judgment is almost certain to be affected by it. Should the applicant be a woman, a wife, a mother, or a sister,—in nine cases out of ten, her tears, if nothing else, are sure to prevail.”
As Bates prepared to leave Washington, each of his colleagues stopped to say goodbye, in contrast to the lonely leave-taking endured by Salmon Chase. Stanton was “especially civil,” Bates noted. “Told me to write to my sons, in the army and assure them that he would [do] any thing for them that they would expect me to do.” Bates joined Seward, Welles, and Usher in the president’s office for a “pleasant” farewell. The departing Attorney General was once again touched by the president’s “affable and kind” manner.
Bates left his colleagues and staff “with regret,” but with the knowledge that his life was forever connected with the history of his country. Because Lincoln had chosen him as his Attorney General, Edward Bates had been able to “leave a trail which might make known/That I once lived—when I am gone.”
To replace Bates, Lincoln felt he had to find a man from one of the border states. “My Cabinet has shrunk up North, and I must find a Southern man,” he explained to a colleague. “I suppose if the twelve Apostles were to be chosen nowadays the shrieks of locality would have to be heeded.” His first choice was Judge Advocate General Joseph Holt. The native Kentuckian had been one of the trio of cabinet members, together with Edwin Stanton and Jeremiah Black, who had stiffened Buchanan’s will to resist secession. Lincoln liked and respected Judge Holt, having worked closely with him on court-martial cases. Holt declined the offer, however, recommending instead his fellow Kentuckian James Speed, the older brother of Lincoln’s great friend Joshua. “I can recall no public man in the State of uncompromising loyalty,” Holt told Lincoln, “who unites in the same degree, the qualifications of professional attainments, fervent devotion to the union, & to the principles of your administration, & spotless points of personal character.”
Lincoln followed Holt’s recommendation that very day, sending a telegram to Speed. “I appoint you to be Attorney General. Please come on at once.” Though taken by surprise, Speed was honored to accept: “Will leave tomorrow for Washington.”
James Speed would prove to be an excellent choice. Over the years, he had arrived at a radical position on slavery. The previous spring, he and his brother, Joshua, had been instrumental in forming a new liberal party in conservative Kentucky, the Unconditional Union Party, which supported Lincoln’s reelection and emancipation. “I am a thorough Constitutional Abolitionist,” James Speed had declared during the fall campaign, meaning he, like Lincoln, was “for abolishing Slavery under the War Power of the National Constitution, and then clinching it by a Constitutional amendment prohibiting it everywhere forever.” Though unable to swing the state for Lincoln, the Unconditionalists remained hopeful that they might eventually direct Kentucky’s future. “We are less now but true,” James Speed had written Lincoln after the election.
To those unfamiliar with the Louisville lawyer, Lincoln explained that Speed was “a man I know well, though not so well as I know his brother Joshua. That, however, is not strange, for I slept with Joshua for four years, and I suppose I ought to know him well.” Lincoln’s ease in referring to his sleeping arrangement with Joshua Speed is further evidence that theirs was not a sexual relationship. Had it been, historian David Donald suggests, the president would not have spoken of it “so freely and publicly.”
“You will find,” Lincoln predicted as James Speed set out for Washington, “he is one of those well-poised men, not too common here, who are not spoiled by a big office.”
THE EASE WITH WHICH LINCOLN filled the post of Attorney General was not replicated when Roger Taney’s death in mid-October left vacant the seat of Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. Though Lincoln had initially planned to offer Salmon Chase the position, he discovered that three of his most loyal cabinet members—Edwin Stanton, Edward Bates, and Montgomery Blair—desired the honored post for themselves. He decided to postpone his choice until after the election.
Stanton’s claim seemed the most compelling. The Chief Justiceship was the only position, observed a longtime friend, “Stanton ever desired.” His brilliant legal career had brought him to argue numerous cases before the Supreme Court. Lifetime tenure would secure his family’s finances, which had diminished seriously during the war. His unstable health might be restored with the pressures of the war office removed. “You have been wearing out your life in the service of your country & have fulfilled the duties of your very responsible & laborious office with unexampled ability,” wrote his friend the Supreme Court justice Robert Grier. Though Grier himself was an obvious choice to fill Taney’s position, he believed Stanton deserved the honor. “It would give me the greatest pleasure and satisfaction,” he wrote Stanton, “to have you preside on our bench…. I think the Presowes it to you.”
Ellen Stanton, doubtless acting at her husband’s behest, invited Orville Browning to their house one Sunday night when Stanton was at City Point. “She expressed to me a great desire to have her husband appointed Chief Justice,” Browning recorded in his diary, “and wished me to see the President upon the subject. I fear Mr Chase’s appointment, and am anxious to prevent it. Mr Stanton is an able lawyer, learned in his profession, and fond of it, of great application, and capacity of endurance in labor—I think a just man—honest and upright, and incapable of corruption, and I, therefore, think would be an appointment most fit to be made. I will see the President upon the subject tomorrow.”
Methodist bishop Matthew Simpson also called on Lincoln to urge Stanton’s appointment “on the grounds of his fitness, and as a reward for his services and labors.” Lincoln “listened attentively” and then, “throwing his leg over a chair, and running his hands through his hair,” responded with heartfelt emotion: “Bishop, I believe every word you have said. But where can I get a man to take Secretary Stanton’s place? Tell me that, and I will do it.”
Like Lincoln, General Grant worried about losing Stanton’s indispensable talents in the War Department. At City Point, he urged the secretary to stay at his post. The strain of the situation likely contributed to Stanton’s ongoing illness that fall. In the end, Stanton informed Lincoln through a friend that he should no longer be considered “among candidates.” He “felt that the completion of the work he had in hand,” his sister Pamphila recalled, “was nearer to his heart, and a far higher ambition.”
A heartfelt note from Henry Ward Beecher helped to dispel Stanton’s disappointment at relinquishing his ambition. “The country cannot spare your services from your present place,” wrote the celebrated minister, “or I could wish that you might redeem Taney’s place and restore to that Court, the honor and trust of Marshall’s day…. I regard your administration of the War Department, from whatever point it is viewed, as one of the greatest features of this grand time. Your energy vitalizing industry, and fidelity, but above all, Your moral vision… are just as sure to give your name honor and fame…. If you were to die to-morrow you have done enough for your own fame already.”
In an emotional reply, Stanton told Beecher that he was deeply moved by his generous remarks. “Often, in dark hours, you have come before me, and I have longed to hear your voice, feeling that above all other men you could cheer, strengthen, guide, and uphold me in this great battle, where, by God’s providence, it has fallen upon me to hold a post and perform a duty beyond my own strength. But being a stranger I had no right to claim your confidence or ask for help…. Now, my dear Sir, your voice has reached me, and your hand is stretched forth as to a friend…. Already my heart feels renewed strength and is inspired with fresh hope.”
Montgomery Blair desi
red the post of Chief Justice even more fervently than Stanton. He had gracefully acceded to Lincoln’s request for his resignation, but the high appointment would certainly compensate for the remnant wound. His distinguished career as a lawyer had been defined by his eloquent representation of the slave Dred Scott in the case that had forever cast a blight on Justice Taney’s name. Monty had powerful backers, including Seward, Weed, and Welles, all of whom vastly preferred him to Chase. Welles told Lincoln that, of all the candidates, Blair “best conformed to these requirements—that the President knew the man, his ability, his truthfulness, honesty and courage.” Lincoln “expressed his concurrence…and spoke kindly and complimentarily of Mr. Blair but did not in any way commit himself, nor did I expect or suppose he would.”
Lincoln understood that the appointment mattered greatly, not only to Monty but to his father, who had taken his son’s forced resignation as a personal blow. A week after Taney died, the elder Blair wrote Lincoln an impassioned plea: “I beg you to indulge me with a little conference with you on paper about a thing which as involving a good deal of egotism, I am ashamed to talk about face to face.” He went on to describe the Blairs’ enduring loyalty to both the Union and the president. “Now I come,” he pressed, “to what I hope you will consider another & higher opportunity of serving you & the Republic by carrying your political principles & the support of your policy expressed in relation to the reconstruction of the Union & the support of the freedman’s proclamation, into the Supreme Court. I think Montgomery’s unswerving support of your administration in all its aspects coupled with his unfaltering attachment to you personally fits him to be your representative man at the head of that Bench.”
When Mary Lincoln warned Old Man Blair that “Chase and his friends are besieging my Husband for the Chief-Justiceship,” Blair discarded his embarrassment and requested a personal interview. Lincoln listened graciously as Monty’s father suggested that his son “had been tried as a Judge and not found wanting, that his practice in the West had made him conversant with our land law, Spanish law, as well as the common and civil law in which his university studies had grounded him, that his practice in the Supreme Court brought him into the circle of commercial and constitutional questions. That, besides on political issues he sustained him [the President] in every thing,” and “when Chase and every other member of [the] Cabinet declined to make war for Sumter, Montgomery stood by him.”
Lincoln agreed that Monty would admirably acquit himself as Chief Justice, but he was also aware that the nomination would produce a storm of criticism from his many enemies in the Congress. He had no desire to provoke unnecessary animosity among the radicals, who probably held sufficient power to deny confirmation. Nor did Lincoln trust where Monty Blair’s conservative philosophy would lead on issues surrounding Reconstruction and the integration of the country’s new black citizens.
The same objections most likely applied to Edward Bates. Believing the post would be “a crowning and retiring honor,” Bates had “personally solicited” Lincoln to consider his name. “If not overborne by others,” Lincoln told Bates, he would happily consider him for the post, but “Chase was turning every stone, to get it, and several others were urged, from different quarters.” Hearing this, Bates declared himself “happy in the feeling that the failure to get the place, will be no painful disappointment for my mind is made up to private life.”
In the end, Lincoln returned to his first impulse upon learning of Roger Taney’s illness—Salmon P. Chase. “Of Mr. Chase’s ability and of his soundness on the general issues of the war there is, of course, no question,” he told Chase’s friend Henry Wilson. “I have only one doubt about his appointment. He is a man of unbounded ambition, and has been working all his life to become President. That he can never be; and I fear that if I make him chief-justice he will simply become more restless and uneasy and neglect the place in his strife and intrigue to make himself President. If I were sure that he would go on the bench and give up his aspirations and do nothing but make himself a great judge, I would not hesitate a moment.” He made a similar comment when Schuyler Colfax gave his word that Chase “would dedicate the remainder of his life to the Bench.”
When supporters of other candidates reminded the president of Chase’s myriad intrigues against him, Lincoln responded, “Now, I know meaner things about Governor Chase than any of those men can tell me,” but “we have stood together in the time of trial, and I should despise myself if I allowed personal differences to affect my judgment of his fitness for the office.”
Chase remained in Ohio throughout this tumult, confident that the nomination would be his. Oblivious to Stanton’s own hopes, he told the war secretary two days after Taney’s death that “within the last three or four months I have been assured that it was the Presidents intention, to offer the place to me in case of a vacancy. I think I should accept it if offered: for I am weary of political life & work.” However, when weeks passed with no word from the president, Chase anxiously decided to come to Washington. Fessenden and Sumner assured him that the appointment would be made as soon as the elections were over, but Lincoln waited until December 6 to announce his choice.
That morning, Chase’s friend John Alley of Massachusetts had called on the president. “I have something to tell you that will make you happy,” Lincoln announced. “I have just sent Mr. Chase word that he is to be appointed Chief-Justice, and you are the first man I have told of it.” Alley enthusiastically replied, “Mr. President, this is an exhibition of magnanimity and patriotism that could hardly be expected of any one. After what he has said against your administration, which has undoubtedly been reported to you, it was hardly to be expected that you would bestow the most important office within your gift on such a man.”
“To have done otherwise I should have been recreant to my convictions of duty to the Republican party and to the country,” Lincoln answered. “As to his talk about me, I do not mind that. Chase is, on the whole, a pretty good fellow and a very able man. His only trouble is that he has ‘the White House fever’ a little too bad, but I hope this may cure him and that he will be satisfied.”
Lincoln later told Senator Chandler that personally he “would rather have swallowed his buckhorn chair than to have nominated Chase,” but the decision was right for the country. “Probably no other man than Lincoln,” Nicolay wrote to Therena, “would have had, in this age of the world, the degree of magnanimity to thus forgive and exalt a rival who had so deeply and so unjustifiably intrigued against him. It is however only another most marked illustration of the greatness of the President.”
Chase got the official word from Kate when he arrived home that night. He immediately sat down to write the president. “I cannot sleep before I thank [you] for this mark of your confidence…. Be assured that I prize your confidence & good will more than nomination or office.”
On December 15, the Supreme Court was “overflowing with an immense throng of dignitaries of various degrees, ladies, congressmen, foreign ministers, and others who wished to view the simple but impressive ceremony of swearing in the chief judicial officer of the republic.” Kate Sprague and her sister, Nettie, were there, “gorgeously dressed,” according to Noah Brooks. Secretary Seward was also present, along with Nathaniel Banks, Ben Wade, Reverdy Johnson, and Charles Sumner, whose “handsome features plainly showed his inward glow of gratification.” At the usher’s solemn announcement, everyone stood as the robed justices entered the room. The senior justice, James W. Wayne, administered the oath, which Chase “read in a clear but tremulous voice.” When he finished, Chase “lifted his right hand, looked upward to the beautiful dome of the court-room, and with deep feeling added, ‘So help me God.’”
“I hope the President may have no occasion to regret his selection,” Gideon Welles confided in his diary, sharing Lincoln’s apprehension that Chase would “use the place for political advancement and thereby endanger confidence in the court.” Still, Lincoln believed the risk worth
taking. He trusted that Chase would help secure the rights of the black man, for which he had fought throughout his career, a belief that outweighed concerns about Chase’s restless temperament.
Chase quickly justified Lincoln’s confidence in this regard. Within hours of Chase’s accession to the Court, John Rock, a black lawyer from Massachusetts, wrote a hopeful letter to Charles Sumner. Rock had been seeking to practice before the Supreme Court for over a year, but his efforts had been denied on the basis of his race. “We now have a great and good man for our Chief Justice, and with him I think my color will not be a bar to my admission,” he wrote. Sumner immediately contacted Chase, who was delighted to pursue the cause of opening the Court to its first black barrister.
Six weeks later, Sumner stood before the Supreme Court as Rock’s sponsor: “May it please the Court, I move that John S. Rock, a member of the Supreme Court of the State of Massachusetts, be admitted to practice as a member of this Court.” Then, with Chase’s assent, Rock stepped forward for the oath that would allow him to practice before the highest court in the land. “This event,” Harper’s Weekly observed, represented an “extraordinary reversal” of the decision in the Dred Scott case. Rock’s admission, Harper’s predicted, would “be regarded by the future historian as a remarkable indication of the revolution which is going on in the sentiment of a great people.”
MARY LINCOLN TOOK special satisfaction in her husband’s reelection. The White House “has been quite a Mecca of late,” she wrote to her friend Mercy Conkling. “We are surrounded, at all times, by a great deal of company,” and “it has been gratifying, from all quarters, to receive so many kind & congratulatory letters, so fraught, with good feeling.”
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