Abraham Lincoln: A Life, Volume 2

by Michael Burlingame

  By March 1865, Lincoln had reached a conclusion about the will of God that he was to share with the public in his second inaugural address. But before he could be inaugurated once more, he must win reelection.

  Although Lincoln issued no public letters other than the one to Albert G. Hodges during the election campaign, he did draft one in response to an invitation to address a mass meeting in Buffalo. In that missive he defended his decision to go to war, blaming the Confederates for starting the conflict. “Much is being said about peace; and no man desires peace more ardently than I. Still I am yet unprepared to give up the Union for a peace which, so achieved, could not be of much duration. The preservation of our Union was not the sole avowed object for which the war was commenced. It was commenced for precisely the reverse object—to destroy our Union. The insurgents commenced it by firing upon the Star of the West, and on Fort Sumpter, and by other similar acts. It is true, however, that the administration accepted the war thus commenced, for the sole avowed object of preserving our Union; and it is not true that it has since been, or will be, prossecuted by this administration, for any other object. In declaring this, I only declare what I can know, and do know to be true, and what no other man can know to be false.”

  Addressing emancipation and the employment of black troops, he reiterated arguments he had made to his Wisconsin visitors and in his open letter to Hodges: “my present position in reference to the rebellion is the result of my best judgment, and according to that best judgment, it is the only position upon which any Executive can or could save the Union. Any substantial departure from it insures the success of the rebellion. An armistice—a cessation of hostilities—is the end of the struggle, and the insurgents would be in peaceable possession of all that has been struggled for. Any different policy in regard to the colored man, deprives us of his help, and this is more than we can bear. We can not spare the hundred and forty or fifty thousand now serving us as soldiers, seamen, and laborers. This is not a question of sentiment or taste, but one of physical force which may be measured and estimated as horse-power and Steam-power are measured and estimated. Keep it and you can save the Union. Throw it away, and the Union goes with it. Nor is it possible for any Administration to retain the service of these people with the express or implied understanding that upon the first convenient occasion, they are to be re-inslaved. It can not be; and it ought not to be.”

  Lincoln decided not to release this document. As he explained to the chief organizer of the Buffalo event, “I believe it is not customary for one holding the office, and being a candidate for re-election, to do so.” Moreover, “a public letter must be written with some care, and at some expense of time, so that having begun with your meeting, I could not well refuse others, and yet could not get through with all having equal claims.”195

  Defining the Significance of the War

  During the campaign, the president did speak informally to regiments calling at the White House. In those brief speeches, he pithily and eloquently summarized the Union cause. “I wish it might be more generally and universally understood what the country is now engaged in,” he told the 164th Ohio in mid-August. “We have, as all will agree, a free Government, where every man has a right to be equal with every other man. In this great struggle, this form of Government and every form of human right is endangered if our enemies succeed. There is more involved in this contest than is realized by every one. There is involved in this struggle the question whether your children and my children shall enjoy the privileges we have enjoyed.” Do not let side issues distract your attention, he urged. “There may be mistakes made sometimes; things may be done wrong while the officers of the Government do all they can to prevent mistakes. But I beg of you, as citizens of this great Republic, not to let your minds be carried off from the great work we have before us. This struggle is too large for you to be diverted from it by any small matter. When you return to your homes rise up to the height of a generation of men worthy of a free Government, and we will carry out the great work we have commenced.”196

  A few days thereafter, Lincoln told another Ohio regiment that “I almost always feel inclined, when I happen to say anything to soldiers, to impress upon them in a few brief remarks the importance of success in this contest. It is not merely for to-day, but for all time to come that we should perpetuate for our children’s children this great and free government, which we have enjoyed all our lives. I beg you to remember this, not merely for my sake, but for yours. I happen temporarily to occupy this big White House. I am a living witness that any one of your children may look to come here as my father’s child has. It is in order that each of you may have through this free government which we have enjoyed, an open field and a fair chance for your industry, enterprise and intelligence; that you may all have equal privileges in the race of life, with all its desirable human aspirations. It is for this the struggle should be maintained, that we may not lose our birthright—not only for one, but for two or three years. The nation is worth fighting for, to secure such an inestimable jewel.”197

  These brief, informal addresses rank among the best of Lincoln’s spontaneous utterances and demonstrate his exceptional ability to address the public without a prepared text.

  Celebrating Emancipation in Maryland

  In October, Lincoln responded to civilian serenaders congratulating him on the emancipationists’ victory in Maryland. Behind the scenes he had helped promote their cause, for he believed that its success “would aid much to end the rebellion.”198 Six months earlier, as voters in the Free State prepared to decide whether to summon a new constitutional convention, he wrote the recently elected Congressman John A. J. Creswell that he was “very anxious for emancipation to be effected in Maryland in some substantial form.” He feared that his “expressions of a preference for gradual over immediate emancipation, are misunderstood.” He “had thought the gradual would produce less confusion, and destitution, and therefore would be more satisfactory; but if those who are better acquainted with the subject, and are more deeply interested in it, prefer the immediate, most certainly” he had “no objection to their judgment prevailing.” He wished “that all who are for emancipation in any form, shall co-operate, all treating all respectfully, and all adopting and acting upon the major[ity] opinion, when fairly ascertained.” He was afraid “that by jealousies, rivalries, and consequent ill-blood—driving one another out of meetings and conventions—perchance from the polls—the friends of emancipation themselves may divide, and lose the measure altogether.” Lincoln instructed Creswell not to make his letter public, but the congressman was free to let people know that anyone agreeing with its sentiments would not “be in any danger of contradiction” from the White House.199

  Lincoln also shared his concern with the newly appointed commander of the Middle Department, Lew Wallace. When that general called at the White House, the president said at the close of their conversation, “I came near forgetting that there is an election nearly due over in Maryland, but don’t you forget it.” He urged Wallace “to be fair, but to give the benefit of all doubts to the emancipationists.” Stanton, who had opposed assigning Wallace to a command, gravely explained to the general that the “Maryland legislature passed an act for an election looking to the abolition of slavery in the state by constitutional amendment. The President has set his heart on the abolition in that way; and mark, he don’t want it to be said by anybody that the bayonet had anything to do with the election. He is a candidate for a second nomination. You understand?”200

  Perversely, Henry Winter Davis, who scorned compensation for slave owners, predicted that “in spite of the Pres[iden]t.’s ill will, we will carry the constitutional conv[ention] for emancipation.”201 But it was in part because of Lincoln’s support, as well as Wallace’s tactful adherence to his instructions, that the pro-convention forces triumphed handily in the spring.

  Shortly after that emancipationist victory, Lincoln helped open the Baltimore Sanitary Fair with a spe
ech congratulating the people of Maryland for promoting the cause of liberty: “The world has never had a good definition of the word liberty, and the American people, just now, are much in want of one. We all declare for liberty; but in using the same word we do not all mean the same thing. With some the word liberty may mean for each man to do as he pleases with himself, and the product of his labor; while with others the same word may mean for some men to do as they please with other men, and the product of other men’s labor. Here are two, not only different, but incompatable things, called by the same name—liberty. And it follows that each of the things is, by the respective parties, called by two different and incompatable names—liberty and tyranny.” With some sarcasm, he observed that the “shepherd drives the wolf from the sheep’s throat, for which the sheep thanks the shepherd as a liberator, while the wolf denounces him for the same act as the destroyer of liberty, especially as the sheep was a black one. Plainly the sheep and the wolf are not agreed upon a definition of the word liberty; and precisely the same difference prevails to-day among us human creatures, even in the North, and all professing to love liberty. Hence we behold the processes by which thousands are daily passing from under the yoke of bondage, hailed by some as the advance of liberty, and bewailed by others as the destruction of all liberty. Recently, as it seems, the people of Maryland have been doing something to define liberty; and thanks to them that, in what they have done, the wolf’s dictionary, has been repudiated.”202

  In early September, the Maryland constitutional convention voted to outlaw slavery. Late in the month, when William L. W. Seabrook, commissioner of the Maryland land office, expressed skepticism about the proposed constitution’s chances for ratification, Lincoln exclaimed: “You alarm me sir! you alarm me! you alarm me! I did not dream there was the slightest danger of such a calamity as the defeat of this Constitution. I fear you and others of our friends in Maryland are not alive to the importance of this matter and its influence upon the conflict in which we are engaged. The adoption of your Constitution abolishing slavery will be equal to a victory by one of our armies in the field. It will be a notification to the South that, no matter what the result of the war shall be, Maryland is lost to that section forever. I implore you, sir, to go to work and endeavor to induce others to go to work for your Constitution, with all your energy. Try to impress other unionists with its importance as a war measure, and don’t let it fail! Don’t let it fail.”203 To help bolster the pro-ratification cause, Lincoln urged Henry W. Hoffman, collector of the port of Baltimore and chairman of the Maryland Unconditional Union Central Committee, to harmonize Maryland’s Republican factions.

  On the eve of the vote, Lincoln sent a letter to be read at a pro-constitution rally: “I presume the only feature of the instrument, about which there is serious controversy, is that which provides for the extinction of slavery. It needs not to be a secret, and I presume it is no secret, that I wish success to this provision. I desire it on every consideration. I wish all men to be free. I wish the material prosperity of the already free which I feel sure the extinction of slavery would bring. I wish to see, in process of disappearing, that only thing which ever could bring this nation to civil war. I attempt no argument. Argument upon the question is already exhausted by the abler, better informed, and more immediately interested sons of Maryland herself. I only add that I shall be gratified exceedingly if the good people of the State shall, by their votes, ratify the new constitution.”204 As the ratification vote approached, Lincoln was informed that Henry Winter Davis was still bad-mouthing him; in response, the president said that if the congressman “and the rest can succeed in carrying the state for emancipation, I shall be very willing to lose the electoral vote.”205

  On October 12, Maryland voters ratified the constitution by the narrow margin of 30,174 to 29,799 (50.3% to 49.7%). Only the soldier vote (2,633 to 263) enabled it to win. Abolitionists rejoiced. “Glory to God!” exclaimed Lydia Maria Child. “This is marvelous progress. Glory to God! Hallelujah!”206

  Lincoln, too, was delighted. To Charles H. Philbrick, an Illinoisan who had recently joined the White House staff to assist his friends Nicolay and Hay, Lincoln remarked that the outcome of the Maryland vote “was a victory worth double the number of electoral votes of the state because of its moral influence.”207 Similarly, the president confided to Noah Brooks: “I had rather have Maryland upon that issue than have a State twice its size upon the Presidential issue; it cleans up a piece of ground.” Brooks observed that anyone “who has ever had to do with ‘cleaning up’ a piece of ground, digging out vicious roots and demolishing old stumps, can appreciate the homely simile applied to Maryland.”208

  When several hundred black residents of Washington descended on the White House to celebrate the new Maryland constitution, he told them: “It is no secret that I have wished, and still do wish, mankind everywhere to be free. [Great cheering and cries of ‘God bless Abraham Lincoln.’] And in the State of Maryland how great an advance has been made in this direction. It is difficult to realize that in that State, where human slavery has existed for ages, ever since a period long before any here were born—by the action of her own citizens—the soil is made forever free. [Loud and long cheering.] I have no feeling of triumph over those who were opposed to this measure and who voted against it, but I do believe that it will result in good in the white race as well as to those who have been made free by this action of emancipation, and I hope that the time will soon come when all will see that the perpetuation of freedom for all in Maryland is best for the interests of all, though some may thereby be made to suffer temporary pecuniary loss. And I hope that you, colored people, who have been emancipated, will use this great boon which had been given you to improve yourselves, both morally and intellectually.”209

  That night Lincoln addressed another issue when a group of Marylanders serenaded him. Democrats had been warning that the president would cling to power no matter how the election turned out. A former Ohio congressman speculated that even if the Democratic candidate won the presidency, the Republicans “will proclaim themselves in power during the war.”210 The Illinois State Register echoed the charge. Lending credence to this speculation was a widely read speech delivered by Seward in October, arguing that Lincoln had been chosen president of all the states but had not actually served in that capacity, since several states had seceded. The opposition press interpreted Seward’s remarks as a sure sign that Lincoln would not relinquish the White House if defeated. To the Maryland serenaders, the president (who was reportedly unhappy about Seward’s speech) insisted that it was not his intention “to ruin the government.” To the contrary, said he, “I am struggling to maintain government, not to overthrow it. I am struggling especially to prevent others from overthrowing it. I therefore say, that if I shall live, I shall remain President until the fourth of next March; and that whoever shall be constitutionally elected therefor in November, shall be duly installed as President on the fourth of March; and that in the interval I shall do my utmost that whoever is to hold the helm for the next voyage, shall start with the best possible chance to save the ship. This is due to the people both on principle, and under the constitution. Their will, constitutionally expressed, is the ultimate law for all. If they should deliberately resolve to have immediate peace even at the loss of their country, and their liberty, I know not the power or the right to resist them. It is their own business, and they must do as they please with their own. I believe, however, they are still resolved to preserve their country and their liberty; and in this, in office or out of it, I am resolved to stand by them.”211

  Presidential Anger

  Lincoln’s anger burst forth toward the end of the presidential campaign when a delegation from Tennessee called to protest the strict loyalty oath that Governor Andrew Johnson had prescribed for would-be voters. (An applicant for the franchise had to swear that he was “an active friend of the Government of the United States, and the enemy of the so-called Confederate State
s,” that he “ardently desire[d] the suppression of the present rebellion,” that he “sincerely rejoice[d] in the triumph of the armies and navies of the United States,” and “cordially oppose[d] all armistices or negotiations for peace with rebels in arms.”)212 The Tennesseeans submitted a petition implying that Lincoln was abusing his power.

  In reply, the president impatiently asked: “May I inquire how long it took you and the New-York politicians to concoct that paper?” (In fact, New York Democratic leaders complained with some justice that the oath virtually “commands every loyal citizen of Tennessee to vote for the Republican candidate or to abstain from the polls.”)213 The delegation’s spokesman, John Lellyett, insisted that it accurately represented the opinion of the people of Tennessee. Lincoln snorted: “I expect to let the friends of George B. McClellan manage their side of this contest in their own way; and I will manage my side of it in my way.”214 Democrats denounced this “undignified and rude” response from “our coarse despot” as “an exhibition of party spite and petulance.”215 (A week later the president sent the Tennesseeans a far more civil response in which he asserted somewhat disingenuously that he had no control over the governor, Andrew Johnson, whom he had appointed.)