Springfield, Illinois, November 8, 1860
MY DEAR SIR: I am anxious for a personal interview with you at as early a day as possible. Can you, without much inconvenience, meet me at Chicago? If you can, please name as early a day as you conveniently can, and telegraph me, unless there be sufficient time before the day named to communicate by mail.
LETTER TO TRUMAN SMITH
Lincoln was determined to make no statements of policy during the dangerous period between his election and his inauguration. He explains here his reasons for maintaining this attitude. The financial depression to which he refers was caused by the fact that trade between the North and the South had come to a standstill.
(Private and confidential)
Springfield, Illinois, November 10, 1860
MY DEAR SIR: This is intended as a strictly private letter to you.… It is with the most profound appreciation of your motive, and highest respect for your judgment, too, that I feel constrained, for the present at least, to make no declaration for the public.
First. I could say nothing which I have not already said, and which is in print, and open for the inspection of all. To press a repetition of this upon those who have listened, is useless; to press it upon those who have refused to listen, and still refuse, would be wanting in self-respect, and would have an appearance of sycophancy and timidity which would excite the contempt of good men and encourage bad ones to clamor the more loudly.
I am not insensible to any commercial or financial depression that may exist, but nothing is to be gained by fawning around the “respectable scoundrels” who got it up. Let them go to work and repair the mischief of their own making, and then perhaps they will be less greedy to do the like again.
LETTER TO JOSHUA SPEED
After a long silence, Lincoln renews his correspondence with his old friend Joshua Speed, and writes to suggest that Speed meet him in Chicago where he was going to confer with Hannibal Hamlin.
Springfield, Illinois, November 19, 1860
DEAR SPEED: Yours of the 14th is received. I shall be at Chicago Thursday the 22nd. Inst, and one or two succeeding days. Could you not meet me there?
Mary thinks of going with me; and therefore I suggest that Mrs. S. accompany you.
Please let this be private, as I prefer a very great crowd should not gather at Chicago.
Respects to Mrs. S.
Your friend, as ever,
A. LINCOLN
LETTERS TO W. H. SEWARD
These two letters, one of which is a formal message informing Seward that he is to be appointed Secretary of State, and the other an informal letter graciously assuring Seward of the sincerity of Lincoln’s intentions, were not sent directly to Seward. Lincoln cautiously forwarded them to Hannibal Hamlin with a covering note which said: “Consult with Judge Trumbull; and if you and he see no reason to the contrary, deliver the letter to Governor Seward at once. If you see reason to the contrary, write me at once”
Springfield, Illinois, December 8, 1860
MY DEAR SIR: With your permission I shall at the proper time nominate you to the Senate for confirmation as Secretary of State for the United States. Please let me hear from you at your own earliest convenience.
(Private and confidential)
Springfield, Illinois, December 8, 1860
MY DEAR SIR: In addition to the accompanying and more formal note inviting you to take charge of the State Department, I deem it proper to address you this. Rumors have got into the newspapers to the effect that the department named above would be tendered you as a compliment, and with the expectation that you would decline it. I beg you to be assured that I have said nothing to justify these rumors. On the contrary, it has been my purpose, from the day of the nomination at Chicago, to assign you, by your leave, this place in the administration. I have delayed so long to communicate that purpose in deference to what appeared to me a proper caution in the case. Nothing has been developed to change my view in the premises; and I now offer you the place in the hope that you will accept it, and with the belief that your position in the public eye, your integrity, ability, learning, and great experience, all combine to render it an appointment preëminently fit to be made.
One word more. In regard to the patronage sought with so much eagerness and jealousy, I have prescribed for myself the maxim, “Justice to all”; and I earnestly beseech your coöperation in keeping the maxim good.
LETTER TO LYMAN TRUMBULL
(Private and confidential)
Talk of arriving at a last-minute compromise with the South reached its height during December, 1860. The President-elect, however, was firmly determined to allow no compromise on the matter of extending slavery from the states in which it already existed to new territories. He writes here to Trumbull to state his position and points out the still-present danger of popular sovereignty being used as an opening wedge to extend slavery.
Springfield, Illinois, December 10, 1860
MY DEAR SIR: Let there be no compromise on the question of extending slavery. If there be, all our labor is lost, and, ere long, must be done again. The dangerous ground—that into which some of our friends have a hankering to run—is Pop. Sov. Have none of it. Stand firm. The tug has to come, and better now than any time hereafter.
LETTER TO E. B. WASHBURNE
In a brief letter which comes directly to the point, Lincoln writes to E. B. Washburne, Illinois Congressman, to tell him to stand firm on the matter of compromise. Eli Thayer was a Massachusetts abolitionist who had organized the Emigrant Aid Society to send anti-slavery settlers into Kansas. In 1860 he was working with Horace Greeley to establish what he called “real popular sovereignty.”
(Private and confidential)
Springfield, Illinois, December 13, 1860
MY DEAR SIR: Yours of the 10th is received. Prevent, as far as possible, any of our friends from demoralizing themselves and our cause by entertaining propositions for compromise of any sort on “slavery extension.” There is no possible compromise upon it but which puts us under again, and leaves all our work to do over again. Whether it be a Missouri line or Eli Thayer’s popular sovereignty, it is all the same. Let either be done, and immediately filibustering and extending slavery recommences. On that point hold firm, as with a chain of steel.
LETTER TO JOHN A. GILMER
Lincoln had been desperately seeking a prominent Southerner to serve in his Cabinet. He had seriously considered John A. Gilmer, Congressman from North Carolina, as his Secretary of the Treasury. He writes to him to explain his own position on slavery in the most conciliatory terms possible.
(Strictly confidential)
Springfield, Illinois, December 15, 1860
MY DEAR SIR: Yours of the 10th is received. I am greatly disinclined to write a letter on the subject embraced in yours; and I would not do so, even privately as I do, were it not that I fear you might misconstrue my silence. Is it desired that I shall shift the ground upon which I have been elected? I cannot do it. You need only to acquaint yourself with that ground, and press it on the attention of the South. It is all in print and easy of access.
May I be pardoned if I ask whether even you have ever attempted to procure the reading of the Republican platform, or my speeches, by the Southern people? If not, what reason have I to expect that any additional production of mine would meet a better fate? It would make me appear as if I repented for the crime of having been elected, and was anxious to apologize and beg forgiveness. To so represent me would be the principal use made of any letter I might now thrust upon the public. My old record cannot be so used; and that is precisely the reason that some new declaration is so much sought.
Now, my dear sir, be assured that I am not questioning your candor; I am only pointing out that while a new letter would hurt the cause which I think a just one, you can quite as well effect every patriotic object with the old record. Carefully read pages 18, 19, 74, 75, 88, 89, and 267 of the volume of joint debates between Senator Douglas and myself, with the Re
publican platform adopted at Chicago, and all your questions will be substantially answered. I have no thought of recommending the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia, nor the slave trade among the slave States, even on the conditions indicated; and if I were to make such recommendation, it is quite clear Congress would not follow it.
As to employing slaves in arsenals and dockyards, it is a thing I never thought of in my recollection, till I saw your letter; and I may say of it precisely as I have said of the two points above.
As to the use of patronage in the slave States, where there are few or no Republicans, I do not expect to inquire for the politics of the appointee, or whether he does or not own slaves. I intend in that matter to accommodate the people in the several localities, if they themselves will allow me to accommodate them. In one word, I never have been, am not now, and probably never shall be in a mood of harassing the people either North or South.
On the territorial question I am inflexible, as you see my position in the book.26 On that there is a difference between you and us; and it is the only substantial difference. You think slavery is right and ought to be extended; we think it is wrong and ought to be restricted. For this neither has any just occasion to be angry with the other.
As to the State laws, mentioned in your sixth question, I really know very little of them. I never have read one. If any of them are in conflict with the fugitive-slave clause, or any other part of the Constitution, I certainly shall be glad of their repeal; but I could hardly be justified, as a citizen of Illinois, or as President of the United States, to recommend the repeal of a statute of Vermont or South Carolina.
LETTER TO THURLOW WEED
Thurlow Weed was Seward’s political adviser and boss of the New York Republican machine. Lincoln writes to him to explain his own attitude on the matter of compromise. Weed arrived in Springfield on December 20 to discuss compromise in detail. On December 20, news of South Carolina’s secession reached Springfield. Nevertheless, Lincoln stood firm against any compromise that would permit slavery to be extended into new territory.
Springfield, Illinois, December 17, 1860
MY DEAR SIR: Yours of the 11th was received two days ago. Should the convocation of governors of which you speak seem desirous to know my views on the present aspect of things tell them you judge from my speeches that I will be inflexible on the territorial question; that I probably think either the Missouri line exended, or Douglas’s and Eli Thayer’s popular sovereignty, would lose us everything we gain by the election; that filibustering for all south of us and making slave States of it would follow, in spite of us, in either case; also that I probably think all opposition, real and apparent, to the fugitive-slave clause of the Constitution ought to be withdrawn.
I believe you can pretend to find but little, if anything, in my speeches about secession. But my opinion is, that no State can in any way lawfully get out of the Union without the consent of the others; and that it is the duty of the President and other government functionaries to run the machine as it is.
LETTER TO LYMAN TRUMBULL
When Weed left Springfield he took with him three resolutions on compromise which Lincoln had put down in his own handwriting. These resolutions, unfortunately, have been either lost or destroyed. Lincoln writes to Trumbull to inform him about his conference with Weed.
(Confidential)
Springfield, Illinois, December 21, 1860
MY DEAR SIR: Thurlow Weed was with me nearly all day yesterday, and left last night with three short resolutions which I drew up, and which, or the substance of which, I think, would do much good if introduced and unanimously supported by our friends. They do not touch the territorial question. Mr. Weed goes to Washington with them; and says that he will first of all confer with you and Mr. Hamlin. I think it would be best for Mr. Seward to introduce them, and Mr. Weed will let him know that I think so. Show this to Mr. Hamlin, but beyond him do not let my name be known in the matter.
LETTER TO ALEXANDER H. STEPHENS
Lincoln writes to Alexander Stephens of Georgia who had been in Congress with him in 1848-49, and with whom he had, at that time, become very friendly. His letter, in essence, is the same as the one he wrote to Gilmer on December 15. Although Stephens in 1860 was still supporting the Union cause, as soon as the War was declared, he became Vice President of the Confederacy. On the day Lincoln wrote this letter, a rumor reached Springfield that Buchanan had given orders to surrender Fort Sumter it it was attacked. Lincoln is reported to have said of this, “If that is true they ought to hang him!”
(For your own eye only)
Springfield, Illinois, December 22, 1860
MY DEAR SIR: Your obliging answer to my short note is just received, and for which please accept my thanks. I fully appreciate the present peril the country is in, and the weight of responsibility on me. Do the people of the South really entertain fears that a Republican administration would, directly or indirectly, interfere with the slaves, or with them about the slaves? If they do, I wish to assure you, as once a friend, and still, I hope, not an enemy, that there is no cause for such fears. The South would be in no more danger in this respect than it was in the days of Washington. I suppose, however, this does not meet the case. You think slavery is right and ought to be extended, while we think it is wrong and ought to be restricted. That, I suppose, is the rub. It certainly is the only substantial difference between us.
LETTER TO GENERAL DUFF GREEN
Duff Green was an elderly Kentucky politician who had been associated with Jackson during the nullification controversy. He had come to Springfield to get a letter from Lincoln giving his stand on a proposed amendment to the Constitution which would legalize slavery forever. Lincoln did not give him a letter but sent the letter printed here to Trumbull in Washington to pass on to Green or not, as he saw fit. Lincoln took the second clause of this letter directly from the Republican platform. Trumbull evidently felt that it would be inexpedient to pass the letter on to Green, so it was never published.
Springfield, Illinois, December 28, 1860
MY DEAR SIR: I do not desire any amendment of the Constitution. Recognizing, however, that questions of such amendment rightfully belong to the American people, I should not feel justified nor inclined to withhold from them, if I could, a fair opportunity of expressing their will thereon through either of the modes prescribed in the instrument.
In addition I declare that the maintenance inviolate of the rights of the States, and especially the right of each State to order and control its own domestic institutions according to its own judgment exclusively, is essential to that balance of powers on which the perfection and endurance of our political fabric depend; and I denounce the lawless invasion by armed force of the soil of any State or Territory, no matter under what pretext, as the gravest of crimes.
I am greatly averse to writing anything for the public at this time; and I consent to the publication of this only upon the condition that six of the twelve United States Senators for the States of Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Florida, and Texas shall sign their names to what is written on this sheet below my name, and allow the whole to be published together.
Yours truly,
A. LINCOLN
We recommend to the people of the States we represent respectively, to suspend all action for dismemberment of the Union, at least until some act deemed to be violative of our rights shall be done by the incoming administration.
LETTER TO W. H. SEWARD
Although Abraham Lincoln had clearly been elected President of the United States, according to the country’s laws his election was not official until the electoral vote had been counted by the President of the Senate in the presence of both Houses of Congress. This ceremony, which is ordinarily only a ceremony and nothing more, in his case offered great possibilities for trouble, as he explains in this letter to Seward. As the letter indicates, he was also still uncertain of the composition of his Cabinet, still trying to get some represent
ation from the South. On this very day he wrote to Cameron trying to get out of his promise to take him into the Cabinet.
(Private)
Springfield, Illinois, January 3, 1861
MY DEAR SIR: Yours without signature was received last night. I have been considering your suggestions as to my reaching Washington somewhat earlier than is usual. It seems to me the inauguration is not the most dangerous point for us. Our adversaries have us now clearly at disadvantage. On the second Wednesday of February, when the votes should be officially counted, if the two Houses refuse to meet at all, or meet without a quorum of each, where shall we be? I do not think that this counting is constitutionally essential to the election; but how are we to proceed in absence of it?
In view of this, I think it best for me not to attempt appearing in Washington till the result of that ceremony is known. It certainly would be of some advantage if you could know who are to be at the heads of the War and Navy departments; but until I can ascertain definitely whether I can get any suitable men from the South, and who, and how many, I cannot well decide.…
LETTER TO JAMES T. HALE
In this, and in the next letter to Seward, Lincoln makes clear his belief that the acquisition of new territory was the real cause of the dispute over slavery, since the slaveholders would unceasingly try to extend their power to such new territory as fast as it was acquired.
(Confidential)
Springfield, Illinois, January 11, 1861
MY DEAR SIR: Yours of the 6th is received. I answer it only because I fear you would misconstrue my silence. What is our present condition? We have just carried an election on principles fairly stated to the people. Now we are told in advance the Government shall be broken up unless we surrender to those we have beaten, before we take the offices. In this they are either attempting to play upon us or they are in dead earnest. Either way, if we surrender, it is the end of us and of the Government. They will repeat the experiment upon us ad libitum. A year will not pass till we shall have to take Cuba as a condition upon which they will stay in the Union. They now have the Constitution under which we have lived over seventy years, and acts of Congress of their own framing, with no prospect of their being changed; and they can never have a more shallow pretext for breaking up the Government, or extorting a compromise, than now. There is in my judgment but one compromise which would really settle the slavery question, and that would be a prohibition against acquiring any more territory.
The Life and Writings of Abraham Lincoln Page 65