105 “coffee—pretty mean”: Duff, A Lincoln, p. 198.
105 “a small kind”: WHH to Mrs. Leonard Swett, Feb. 22, 1890, Leonard Swett MSS, ISHL.
105 prominent local attorneys: Angle, “Abraham Lincoln: Circuit Lawyer,” remains the best evaluation.
106 “and hurrahing exercise”: Herndon, A Letter... to Isaac N. Arnold.
106 visit to Springfield: Day by Day, 1:205. Charles Strozier (Lincoln’s Quest for Union, pp. 116–117) has calculated that Lincoln was absent from home for ten to fourteen weeks a year during the 1840s.
106 on the circuit: Paul M. Angle reckoned that Lincoln in 1853 earned $325 in two weeks on the circuit. “Abraham Lincoln: Circuit Lawyer,” pp. 36–37. Harry E. Pratt, using anecdotal evidence, arrived at a different figure. Pratt, Personal Finances, pp. 37–38.
106 “and the swine”: Harry E. Pratt, ed., Illinois as Lincoln Knew It: A Boston Reporter’s Record of a Trip in 1847 (Springfield, Ill: 1938), pp. 33–34.
107 ease the situation: I am grateful to Mr. Norman Hellmers, superintendent of the Lincoln National Home Site, for a careful drawing of the Abraham Lincoln cottage, 1846–1854, showing the extent of these changes.
107 had to labor: Baker, Mary Todd Lincoln, is the only biography that recognizes how much, and how hard, Mary Lincoln had to work. See esp. pp. 109–112. The reference to the “wild Irish” is on p. 107.
107 and corset lace: Harry E. Pratt, ed., “The Lincolns Go Shopping,” JISHS 48 (1955): 65–81.
108 “love him better”: WHH, interview with James Gourley, copy, Lamon MSS, HEH.
108 piece of firewood: Hidden Lincoln, p. 141. For other, similar anecdotes, see Herndon’s Lincoln, 3:425–431.
108 “arms are long”: Herndon’s Lincoln, 2:296.
109 out on the circuit: Gibson W. Harris to AL, Nov. 7, 1860, Lincoln MSS, LC; Frederick T. Hill, Lincoln the Lawyer (New York: Century Co., 1906), p. 164n. See also John S. Goff, Robert Todd Lincoln: A Man in His Own Right (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1969), and Ruth P. Randall, Lincoln’s Sons (Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1955).
109 “to its parents”: Randall, Mary Lincoln, p. 101.
109 “than ever after”: CW, 1:391.
109 “a few days”: Mary Lincoln to My Dear Friend, July 23; 1853, photostat, ISHL.
109 “crmble to dust”: For Todd’s political career, see William H. Townsend, Lincoln and the Bluegrass (Lexington: University of Kentucky Press, 1955); for Thomas Lincoln’s political views, see Mark E. Neely, Jr., The Abraham Lincoln Encyclopedia (New York: McGraw-Hill Book Co., 1982), p. 188.
109 “of a statesman”: CW, 3:29.
109 “whig in politics”: CW, 3:512.
110 “it was so”: CW, 1:313, 334.
110 “any good government”: CW, 1:407–416 (quotations from pp. 408, 412, 415). For a more positive view of these ruminations on the tariff, together with a fine account of what Lincoln read on the subject, see Boritt, Lincoln and the American Dream, chap. 9.
110 “condition to all”: CW, 3:478–479, 468. The quoted words are from an 1859 speech, but Lincoln’s views did not change.
110 “self made man”: Irvin G. Wyllie, The Self Made Man in America (New York: Free Press, 1954), pp. 9–10.
111 “go very much”: CW, 1:306–307.
111 “I always was”: WHH, interview with James H. Matheny, May 3, 1866, HWC.
111 “fighting a duel”: CW, 1:320.
112 “own dear ‘gal’”.: CW, 1:319.
112 would succeed Baker: The following pages depend heavily on Donald W. Riddle, Lincoln Runs for Congress (New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1948).
112 “the common enemy”: CW, 1:315.
112 “present Whig tariff”: CW, 1:333; Anson G. Henry to John J. Hardin, Mar. 25, 1844, Hardin MSS, Chicago Historical Society.
113 “as a speaker”: David Davis to Will P. Walker, May 4, 1844, photostat, Davis MSS, Chicago Historical Society.
113 “something is lost”: WHH to John J. Hardin, Feb. 12, 1844, Hardin MSS, Chicago Historical Society.
113 “one for Governor”: CW, 1:351.
113 “is fair play”: CW, 1:350, 353.
113 “is fair play”: P. U. Thompson to John J. Hardin, Jan. 17, 1846, Hardin MSS, Chicago Historical Society.
113 “Abraham’s turn now”: Riddle, Lincoln Runs for Congress, p. 102.
114 “elected to congress”: CW, 1:356.
114 “to keep peace”: CW, 1:366.
114 “abilities and integrity”: Riddle, Lincoln Runs for Congress, p. 157.
114 “grossly misrepresented him”: CW, 1:384.
114 “some honest men”: CW, 1:383.
114 “scoffer at, religion”: CW, 1:382.
115 to the convention: New York Tribune, July 14,1847. The Chicago Daily Journal announced that this was Lincoln’s “first visit to the Commercial emporium of the state.” Wayne C. Temple, Lincoln’s Connections with the Illinois & Michigan Canal, His Return from Congress in ’48, and His Invention (Springfield: Illinois Bell, 1986), pp. 22–23, provides the best account of Lincoln’s participation in the convention.
115 “homely looking man”: All quotations in the two following paragraphs are from WHH, “Analysis of the Character of Abraham Lincoln,” ALQ 1 (Sept. 1941): 357–359. As Herndon indicated, Lincoln’s hair was usually disheveled, but on this occasion, while posing for a daguerreotype, it was carefully slicked down.
116 “the whig cause”: CW, 1:341.
116 “over old times”: WHH Herndon, interview with Nathaniel Grigsby, Sept. 16, 1865, HWC.
116 “sister were buried”: CW, 1:378.
116 loss of his sister: For sensitive psychoanalytical comments on Lincoln’s verse and the suggestion of “incomplete mourning,” I am indebted to Strozier, Lincoln’s Quest for Union, pp. 28–30.
116 “were certainly poetry”: CW, 1:378.
118 “in liquid light”: CW, 1:378–379.
118 “into harmless insanity”: CW, 1:384.
118 “him ling ’ring here?”: CW, 1:385–386.
118 frontier bear hunt: CW, 1:386–389.
118 “having written them”: CW, 1:392.
CHAPTER FIVE: LONE STAR OF ILLINOIS
Two valuable monographs deal with Lincoln’s years in Congress: Donald W. Riddle, Congressman Abraham Lincoln (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1979), which is sharply critical; and Paul Findley, A. Lincoln: The Crucible of Congress (New York: Crown Publishers, 1979), which takes a more favorable view. Albert J. Beveridge, Abraham Lincoln, 1809–1858 (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1928), offers many valuable details.
The best general account of the final year of Polk’s administration is The Impending Crisis, 1848–1861, by David M. Potter (completed by Don E. Fehrenbacher) (New York: Harper & Row, 1976). There is also an excellent survey in Allan Nevins, Ordeal of the Union: Fruits of Manifest Destiny, 1847–1852 (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1947), chap. 1. Robert W. Johannsen, To the Halls of the Montezumas: The Mexican War in the American Imagination (New York: Oxford University Press, 1985), is a spirited account of public reactions to the conflict. The standard work on dissent and opposition to the war is John H. Schroeder, Mr. Polk’s War (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1973).
119 “as I expected”: CW, 1:391.
120 he was playing: Samuel C. Busey, Personal Reminiscences and Recollections of Forty-Six Years’ Membership in the Medical Society of the District of Columbia and Residence in This City (Washington, D.C., privately printed, 1895), pp. 25–27.
120 “attending to business”: CW, 1:465.
121 “his own way”: Busey, Personal Reminiscences, p. 28.
121 “others say nothing”: CW, 1:465.
121 missed only 13: Paul Findley, A Lincoln: The Crucible of Congress (New York: Crown Publishers, 1979), pp. 167–168.
121 of the Congress: Pratt, Personal Finances, p. 101.
121 “speak in court”: CW, 1:430.
121 “pale-faced, consumpti
ve man”: CW, 1:448.
122 Mexicans as “greasers”: Mark E. Neely, Jr., “War and Partisanship: What Lincoln Learned from James K. Polk” JISHS 74 (Autumn 1981): 205.
122 as “altogether inexpedient”: CW, 1:337.
122 “of the people”: CW, 2:4.
123 to encourage volunteering: Day by Day, 1:273; Beveridge, 1:381.
123 “should be ended”: CW, 1:432.
123 “our own soil”: James D. Richardson, ed., A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the President (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1897), 4:534.
123 “protection of Texas”: CW, 1:421–422.
123 “that is wrong”: This passage in Lincoln’s manuscript (Lincoln MSS, LC) was deleted from the printed speech.
124 “charms to destroy”: CW, 1:437, 439.
124 “on a hot stove”: This passage in Lincoln’s manuscript (Lincoln MSS, LC) was deleted from the printed speech.
124 “of a fever-dream”: CW, 1:439–442.
124 “sending me again”: CW, 1:431.
124 an unpatriotic speech: Riddle, Congressman Abraham Lincoln, pp. 50–51.
124 “tall Mr. Lincoln”: Ibid., p. 35.
124 “most conclusive arguments”: Herbert Mitgang, ed., Abraham Lincoln: A Press Portrait (Chicago: Quadrangle Books, 1971), p. 55.
125 “of one term”: Riddle, Congressman Abraham Lincoln, pp. 35–39, gives an excellent sampling of editorial opinion.
125 “in the House”: Gabor S. Boritt, “Lincoln’s Opposition to the Mexican War,” JISHS 67 (Feb. 1974): 91.
125 “be successfully controverted”: Riddle, Congressman Abraham Lincoln, pp. 35–36.
125 “side so long”: Anson G. Henry to AL, Dec. 29, 1847, Lincoln MSS, LC.
125 “aggression on Mexico”: CW, 1:473.
125 “the Whig ranks”: Herndon’s Lincoln, 2:279.
125 “of another country”: Herndon’s letters have not been preserved, but it is possible to reconstruct their contents from Lincoln’s replies in CW, 1:446–447, 451–452.
126 “have always stood”: Ibid.
126 “pestilence, and famine”: Riddle, Congressman Abraham Lincoln, p. 56.
126 the Young Indians: In addition to Lincoln and Stephens, the group included Truman Smith, the Connecticut political organizer, Robert Toombs of Georgia, and three first-term Virginia congressmen. Holman Hamilton, Zachary Taylor: Soldier in the White House (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill Co., 1951), pp. 63–64.
126 “if he is not”: CW, 1: 452, 463.
127 in the fall: CW, 1:475–476.
127 “be hanged themselves”: CW, 1:477.
127 “want of consideration”: CW, 1:506.
127 “and clear cases”: CW, 1:454.
127 “’as you please’”: CW, 1:503–504.
128 “their own business”: CW, 1:505.
128 “Spotty Lincoln”: E.g., in his August 27, 1858, speech at Freeport. CW, 3:56–57.
128 “oppression upon us”: CW, 1:452.
128 “you can not”: CW, 1:453.
128 “liberate the world”: CW, 1:438. See Thomas J. Pressly, “Bullets and Ballots: Lincoln and the ‘Right of Revolution,’ “American Historical Review 67 (Apr. 1962): 647–662.
128 “than it is”: CW, 1:488.
129 policy at all: I have developed this argument more fully in “Abraham Lincoln: Whig in the White House,” in Lincoln Reconsidered: Essays on the Civil War Era (New York: Vintage Books, 1961), pp. 196–208.
130 “have helped himself”: CW, 1:501–516. Quotations are from pages 508, 514.
130 “work down again”: Riddle, Congressman Abraham Lincoln, p. 105.
130 “likely to go”: CW, 1:516–2:1.
130 “fellows forget father”: CW, 1:465–466.
130 “to marry again”: Ibid.
130 “away from you”: Turner, Mary Todd Lincoln, p. 38.
131 “I see you”: CW, 1:477.
131 he had appointments: The following paragraphs draw heavily on William F. Hanna’s excellent monograph, Abraham Among the Yankees: Abraham Lincoln’s 1848 Visit to Massachusetts (Taunton, Mass.: Old Colony Historical Society, 1983), and on Wayne C. Temple’s authoritative Lincoln’s Connections with the Illinois & Michigan Canal, His Return from Congress in ’48, and His Invention (Springfield: Illinois Bell, 1986).
131 “of the soil”: CW, 2:3–4.
131 “a melancholy display”: For these newspapers’ verdicts, see Hanna, Abraham Among the Yankees, pp. 30, 34, 37, 64.
132 “of his countenance”: Ibid., pp. 72–73.
132 “a tasteful speech”: Sheldon H. Harris, “Abraham Lincoln Stumps a Yankee Audience,” New England Quarterly 38 (June 1965), p. 228.
132 “in the Union”: E. L. Pierce to Jesse W. Weik, Feb. 12, 1890, HWC; Hanna, Abraham Among the Yankees, p. 40.
132 visited Niagara Falls: The date of this visit is problematic. By careful research in the shipping records Wayne C. Temple has shown that the Lincolns probably arrived in Buffalo on Sept. 25 and left the next morning for Chicago on the Great Lakes steamer Globe. He concludes that “it is most doubtful that they visited Niagara Falls for anything more than a brief glance, if at all.” They did return and see the Falls in 1857. Temple, Lincoln’s Connections with the Illinois & Michigan Canal, pp. 32–34.
132 water came from: Donald, Lincoln’s Herndon, p. 128.
132 “overwhelming, glorious triumph”: CW, 1:477.
132 “known them to be”: David Davis to W. P. Walker, May 16, 1848, photostat, David Davis MSS, Chicago Historical Society.
133 termed “heart-sickening”: CW, 1:490.
133 Lincoln’s “Spot” resolutions: Thomas L. Harris to Messrs. Lanphier and Walker, Apr. 5, 1848, in Charles C. Patton, comp., “Glory to God and the Sucker Democracy” (Springfield, Ill, 1973, photocopy), vol. 2.
133 “to do this”: CW, 1:491.
133 “young men back”: Herndon’s Lincoln, 2:285.
133 the Democratic candidate: Herndon blamed Logan’s defeat on Lincoln’s Mexican War stand, which he said was the equivalent of committing “political suicide” (Herndon’s Lincoln, 2:284), and a number of subsequent biographers echoed this view. It has recently been challenged by Gabor S. Boritt in “Lincoln’s Opposition to the Mexican War” and by Mark E. Neely, Jr., in “War and Partisanship,” and in “Lincoln and the Mexican War: An Argument by Analogy,” Civil War History 24 (Mar. 1978): 5–24, who point out that Lincoln’s antiwar views were shared by most Western Whigs and that criticism of his stand came mostly from partisan Democratic sources. Sangamon County poll books show that Mexican War veterans must not have been alienated by Lincoln’s stand, since they split their vote almost evenly between Logan and Harris. Mark E. Neely, Jr., “Lincoln, the Mexican War, and Springfield’s Veterans,” LL, no. 1701 (Nov. 1979).
133 “newly acquired territory”: CW, 2:11.
133 the congressional contest: Mark E. Neely, Jr., “Did Lincoln Cause Logan’s Defeat?” LL, no. 1660 (June 1976).
133 and its expansion: For Lincoln’s limited commitment to antislavery up to 1854, see Robert W. Johannsen’s incisive Lincoln, the South, and Slavery: The Political Dimension (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1991), chap. 1.
134 “the different States”: CW, 1:75.
134 “abate its evils”: Ibid.
134 “in the old”: CW, 1:347–348.
135 voted for it: Beveridge, 1:480. Beveridge correctly notes that Lincoln’s 1854 statement that he had voted for the Wilmot Proviso forty times while in Congress was “a campaign exaggeration.”
135 him into custody: Findley, A. Lincoln: The Crucible of Congress, p. 130.
135 “Negro livery-stable”: Ibid., p. 124.
135 “of the earth”: Congressional Globe, 30 Cong., 2 sess., pp. 31, 38, 55, 83.
136 “of said District”: CW, 1:75.
136 “to be abolished”: Findley, A. Lincoln: The Crucible of Congress, pp. 138, 139.
136 “I was nobody”:
Arlin Turner, “Elizabeth Peabody Visits Lincoln, February, 1865,” New England Quarterly 48 (March 1975): 119.
136 “District of Columbia”: CW, 2:22.
136 “into said District”: CW, 2:20–22.
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