Lincoln
Page 105
301 “of the government”: Lincoln summarized these extraconstitutional actions in a message to Congress on May 26, 1862. CW, 5:240–242.
301 “calm and collected”: Nicolay and Hay, 4:108.
301 “and assiduous cooperation”: Frederick W. Seward, Seward at Washington as Senator and Secretary of State, 1846–1861 (New York: Derby & Miller, 1891), p. 590.
302 to prosecute it: The complete message is in CW, 4:421–441.
303 “as we can”: Segal, Conversations, pp. 113–114. For evidence that Lincoln quite clearly understood the difference between closing the ports and declaring a blockade, see Browning, Diary, 1:489.
303 “forced upon him”: CW, 4:440.
303 “competency of Congress”: CW, 4:429.
303 among legal experts: Some of the more important controversial literature on these topics appears in Frank Freidel, ed., Union Pamphlets of the Civil War (2 vols.; Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1967). See esp. the essays by Horace Binney and Edward Ingersoll.
304 “one be violated”: CW, 4:430.
304 of his administration: Neely, The Fate of Liberty, offers a masterful examination of these problems.
304 “own domestic foes”: CW, 4:426.
304 “race of life”: CW, 4:438.
305 and “irrepressible applause”: New York Times, July 7, 1861.
305 “ways and means”: James Ford Rhodes, History of the United States from the Compromise of 1850 (New York: Macmillan Co., 1906), 3:441.
305 of Andrew Jackson: New York Weekly Tribune, July 10, 1861; New York World, July 9, 1861.
305 “of the Constitution”: The American Annual Cyclopaedia and Register of Important Events of the Year 1861 (New York: D. Appleton & Co., 1871), p. 234.
306 his subsequent campaigns: For an excellent evaluation of these plans, see Nevins, War for the Union, 1:150–154.
306 “in his fall”: CW, 4:385. See also Ruth Painter Randall, Colonel Elmer Ellsworth (Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1960).
306 “war by piecemeal”: Nicolay and Hay, 4:323.
307 bed that night: Ibid., 4:352–355.
307 “preserve the Union”: Edward McPherson, The Political History of the United States During the Great Rebellion (3rd ed.; Washington, D.C.: Solomons & Chapman, 1876), p. 286.
308 “you have been”: Segal, Conversations, p. 126.
308 “would do it”: Ibid., p. 129.
309 in the White House: For an excellent history of the White House in Lincoln’s time, with many illustrations, see William Seale, The President’s House: A History (Washington, D.C.: White House Historical Association, 1986), chaps. 15–17.
309 on the north side: In describing living arrangements in the White House, I have had the inestimable good fortune of receiving privately conducted tours by four distinguished subsequent occupants: President and Mrs. John F. Kennedy in Feb. 1962, and President and Mrs. George Bush in Jan. 1990.
310 on the arm: For a charming account of the Lincoln children in the White House, see Ruth Painter Randall, Lincoln’s Sons (Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1955), and for White House pets, see Mrs. Randall’s Lincoln’s Animal Friends (Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1958).
310 the two windows: William O. Stoddard, Inside the White House in War Times (New York: Charles L. Webster & Co., 1890), pp. 23–24. Cf. the drawing C. K. Stellwagen made of Lincoln’s office in Oct. 1864, in White House Historical Association, The White House: An Historic Guide (Washington, D.C.: White House Historical Association, 1963), p. 128.
310 “formality of signature”: On Nicolay and the administration of the President’s office, see Helen Nicolay, Lincoln’s Secretary: A Biography of John G. Nicolay (New York: Longmans, Green & Co., 1949), and Edward D. Neill, Abraham Lincoln and His Mailbag, ed. Theodore C. Blegen (St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society, 1964). The quotation is from the latter, on p. 12.
311 “‘only has two’”: Ward Hill Lamon, Recollections of Abraham Lincoln, 1847–1865, ed. Dorothy Lamon Teillard (Washington, D.C.: 1911), pp. 82–83.
311 “extend seven feet”: D. M. Jenks to AL, June 10, 1862, Lincoln MSS, LC.
311 to describe her: Randall, Mary Lincoln, offers a highly favorable portrait of Mrs. Lincoln. Baker, Mary Todd Lincoln, is more critical. For Mrs. Lincoln’s wartime letters, which are few and not very revealing, see Turner, Mary Todd Lincoln.
312 “was agreeably disappointed”: William Howard Russell, My Diary North and South (Boston: T. O. H. P. Burnham, 1863), pp. 41–42.
312 “at your feet”: Randall, Mary Lincoln, pp. 259–262.
312 a wagonload: Stoddard, Inside the White House, pp. 62–63.
313 the salary herself Randall, Mary Lincoln, pp. 254–256. Browning received a detailed account of Mrs. Lincoln’s financial misconduct from W. H. Stackpole, a White House messenger. Browning, Diary, Mar. 3, 1862, MS, ISHL. His report—which, of course, is not firsthand—was considered too explosive for inclusion in his published Diary. It was charges like these that led David Davis many years later to charge that Mary Lincoln “was a natural born thief; that stealing was a sort of insanity with her.” Browning, Diary, July 3, 1873, MS, ISHL. In evaluating this comment it must be remembered that it was made long after the event and that Davis heartily detested Mrs. Lincoln.
313 his own pocket: Benjamin Brown French, Witness to the Young Republic, ed. Donald B. Cole and John J. McDonough (Hanover, N.H.: University Press of New England, 1989), p. 382.
313 “unnatural civil war”: Jean H. Baker, Affairs of Party: The Political Culture of Northern Democrats in the Mid-Nineteenth Century (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1983), pp. 148–153.
313 “majority in rebellion”: CW, 5:494.
313 cultivated War Democrats: Christopher Dell, Lincoln and the War Democrats: The Grand Erosion of Conservative Tradition (Rutherford, N.J.: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1975), chaps. 4–6, offers a full discussion.
314 of public opinion: Williams, Lincoln and the Radicals, pp. 33–34.
314 “may desert myself”: Adam Gurowski, Diary, from March 4, 1861, to November 12, 1862 (Boston: Lee & Shepard, 1862), pp. 89–90.
315 modify his proclamation: CW, 4:506.
315 “Negro into it”: Nevins, Frémont: Pathmarker of the West, pp. 516–519. The last sentence is in italics in this source.
315 of the Confiscation Act: CW, 4:518.
316 “is dealing with”: CW, 4:513.
316 “has another chance”: Nevins, War for the Union, 1:376.
316 “to the Union”: Joshua F. Speed to AL, Sept. 3 and 7, 1861; Robert Anderson to AL, Sept. 13, 1861—all in Lincoln MSS, LC.
316 “never seen surpassed”: Coulter, Civil War and Readjustment, p. 112.
316 “and the North West”: O. H. Browning to AL, Sept. 11, 1861, Lincoln MSS, LC.
316 in the Northwest: Timothy Davis to W. H. Seward, Sept. 11, 1861, Seward MSS, UR.
316 “than your order”: L. B. Moon to AL, Sept. 16, 1861, Lincoln MSS, LC.
317 “destroyed his country”: Horace White to David Davis, Sept. 14, 1861, Davis MSS, ISHL.
317 “acres of land”: B. F. Wade to Zachariah Chandler, Sept. 23, 1861, Chandler MSS, LC.
317 “hang a man”: Donald, Lincoln’s Herndon, p. 150.
317 “property by proclamation?”: CW, 4:531–532.
317 “an ordinary man”: Browning, Diary, 1:516.
317 “and unbounded confidence”: George B. McClellan, McClellan’s Own Story (New York: Charles L. Webster & Co., 1887), pp. 82–83.
318 “scare-crow on horseback”: Levi S. Gould, “Personal Recollections of Abraham Lincoln,” Magazine of History with Notes and Queries 16 (Jan. 1913): 12.
318 “vacil[l]ating and inefficient”: Zachariah Chandler to Letitia Chandler, Oct. 27, 1861, Chandler MSS, LC.
318 “French and dancing”: B. F. Wade to Zachariah Chandler, Oct. 8, 1861, Chandler MSS, LC.
318 taken into account: Hay, Diary, pp. 31–32.
319 “by
parricidal rebellion “: CW, 5:10.
319 “do it all”: Hay, Diary, p. 33.
319 “is an idiot”: McClellan, Civil War Papers, pp. 85–86.
319 Cameron a rascal: Ibid., pp. 106–107, 113–114.
319 “a rare bird?”: Williams, Lincoln and His Generals, p. 45.
320 “and personal dignity”: Hay, Diary, pp. 34–35.
320 win a victory: Nicolay and Hay, 4:469n.
320 “ones, at variance”: CW, 5:51.
320 “Davis at once”: Zachariah Chandler to Letitia Chandler, Oct. 27, 1861, Chandler MSS, LC.
320 “vast future also”: The full text of the message is in CW, 5:35–53.
321 Secretary of State: Clarence E. Macartney, Lincoln and His Cabinet (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1931), p. 124.
321 “Chicago Post Office”: Martin B. Duberman, Charles Francis Adams, 1807–1886 (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1961), p. 257.
321 British Foreign Office: For a facsimile of this document, showing Lincoln’s numerous corrections, see Allen Thorndike Rice, ed., Reminiscences of Abraham Lincoln by Distinguished Men of His Time (New York: North American Review, 1888), following the printed transcription on pp. lv–lxix.
322 state in Washington: I have sketched the Lincoln-Sumner relationship in Lincoln Reconsidered: Essays on the Civil War Era (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1956), chap. 6, and have drawn it in much more detail in Charles Sumner and the Rights of Man (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1970), esp. chap. 1.
322 “justly with us”: Browning, Diary, 1:516.
323 “of the nation”: Bates, Diary, p. 216.
323 “at a time”: Randall, Lincoln the President, 2:41.
323 “gall and wormwood”: Chase, Diary, p. 54.
323 “the right one”. F. W. Seward, Seward at Washington... 1861–1872, pp. 25–26.
324 “this great emergency”: Horace White, The Life of Lyman Trumbull (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1913), p. 171.
324 through investigating committees: The following pages draw heavily on Allan G. Bogue’s original and admirable study, The Congressman’s Civil War (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), chap. 3.
324 “her damnable airs”: Murat Halstead to Timothy C. Day, June 8, 1861, copy in Carl Sandburg MSS, Illinois Historical Survey, Urbana.
324 replied “Tres poo”: John Bigelow, Diary, July 9, 1861, MS, New York Public Library.
325 drop the investigation: See the excellent summary in Bogue, Congressman’s Civil War, pp. 69–71. The myth that Lincoln appeared before either this committee or the Committee on the Conduct of the War to defend Mary Lincoln has been exploded. Mark E. Neely, Jr., “Abraham Lincoln Did NOT Defend His Wife Before the Committee on the Conduct of the War,” LL, no. 1643 (Jan. 1975).
325 “the worst scandal”: John Henry Woodward, “A Narrative of the Family and Civil War Experiences and Events of His Life,” ed. Frederick Woodward Hopkins (typescript, Library of Congress, 1919), p. 14.
325 “advising general plans”: Nicolay, Lincoln’s Secretary, p. 125.
325 “as war minister”: Gustave Koerner to Lyman Trumbull, July 24, 1861, Trumbull MSS, LC.
325 “is a thief”: John P. Cranford to AL, Aug. 10, 1861, Lincoln MSS, LC.
325 should be removed: O. H. Browning to AL, Aug. 19, 1861, Lincoln MSS, LC.
325 needed to borrow: George M. Davis to AL, Aug. 24, 1861, Lincoln MSS, LC.
325 “settled de novo”: Schuyler Colfax to Simon Cameron, Sept. 24, 1861, Cameron MSS, LC.
325 the Buchanan administration: B. W. Bush to Joseph Holt, Nov. 23, 1861, Holt MSS, LC.
326 “against the rebels”: A. Howard Meneely, The War Department, 1861: A Study in Mobilization and Administration (New York: Columbia University Press, 1928), p. 348.
326 “to public trust”: Randall, Lincoln the President, 2:55–56, is especially good on the firing of Cameron.
326 “in the country”: Bogue, Congressman’s Civil War, p. 106.
326 “least equally responsible”: CW, 5:241–243.
327 played lesser roles: T. Harry Williams, “The Committee on the Conduct of the War: An Experiment in Civilian Control,” in The Selected Essays of T. Harry Williams (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1983), pp. 15–30, takes a hostile view. For other, more favorable appraisals see Brian Holden Reid, “Historians and the Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War, 1861–1865,” Civil War History 38 (Dec. 1992): 319–341. The personnel of the committee changed slightly over the next four years, but Wade and Chandler remained firmly in control. Williams, Lincoln and the Radicals, p. 65.
327 harmony was maintained: Detroit Post and Tribune, Zachariah Chandler: An Outline Sketch of His Life and Public Services (Detroit: Post and Tribune Co., Publishers, 1880), pp. 217–218.
327 “perfectly good mood”: CW, 5:88.
327 “our own people”: CW, 5:35.
CHAPTER TWELVE: THE BOTTOM IS OUT OF THE TUB
On military affairs in 1862, and especially on Lincoln’s relationship with McClellan, the standard works are Kenneth P. Williams, Lincoln Finds a General: A Military Study of the Civil War (New York: Macmillan Co., 1949), vols. 1–2, and T. Harry Williams, Lincoln and His Generals (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1952). I have learned much from both these historians, though I do not fully share their hostility toward McClellan. Stephen W. Sears, George B. McClellan: The Young Napoleon (New York: Ticknor & Fields, 1988), is the best biography. Stephen W. Sears, ed., The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan: Selected Correspondence, 1860–1865 (New York: Ticknor & Fields, 1989), and George B. McClellan, McClellan’s Own Story (New York: Charles L. Webster, 1887), are invaluable.
T. Harry Williams, Lincoln and the Radicals (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1941), is the basic work on factionalism within the Republican party. I have questioned some of Williams’s conclusions—especially those concerning the solidarity of the Radical faction and the hostility of Radicals toward Lincoln—in “The Radicals and Lincoln,” in Lincoln Reconsidered: Essays on the Civil War Era (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1956), and in “Devils Facing Zionwards,” in Grady McWhiney, ed., Grant, Lee, Lincoln and the Radicals: Essays on Civil War Leadership (Evanston, III.: Northwestern University Press, 1964). Hans L. Trefousse, The Radical Republicans: Lincoln’s Vanguard for Racial Justice (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1969), sees the Radicals as largely helping, rather than hindering, Lincoln. Allan G. Bogue, The Earnest Men: Republicans of the Civil War Senate (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1981), is an important, objective study that uses roll-call analysis and other statistical techniques to define membership in the Republican factions.
The best account of Lincoln’s plans for what he called “gradual, and not sudden emancipation” is in J. G. Randall, Lincoln the President: Springfield to Gettysburg (New York: Dodd, Mead, & Co., 1945), chap. 21.
328 “power to command”: Bates, Diary, p. 220.
328 “of boyish cheerfulness”: Ralph L. Rusk, The Life of Ralph Waldo Emerson (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1949), p. 414.
328 “submit to it”: P. P. Enos to Lyman Trumbull, Jan. 7, 1862, Trumbull MSS, LC.
328 “being two nations”: Day by Day, 3:87.
329 “to General McClellan”: George W. Julian, Political Recollections, 1840 to 1872 (Chicago: Jansen, McClurg & Co., 1884), p. 201.
329 “concert at once”: CW, 5:87.
329 “in the South”: CW, 5:91.
329 rather than orders: CW, 5:98.
329 “can be done”: CW, 5:95.
330 “What shall I do?”: “General M. C. Meigs on the Conduct of the Civil War,” American Historical Review 26 (Jan. 1921): 292.
330 out his problems: The following paragraphs follow Irvin McDowell’s diary account in William Swinton, Campaigns of the Army of the Potomac (New York: Charles B. Richardson, 1866), pp. 79–82.
330 adjourned the meeting: “General M. C. Meigs on the Conduct of the Civil War,” pp. 292–293; Henry J. Raymond, The Life and Public Serv
ices of Abraham Lincoln (New York: Derby & Miller, 1865), pp. 776–777.
331 “his own hands”: Virginia Woodbury Fox, Diary, Jan. 26, 1862, Levi Woodbury MSS, LC.
331 his “political education”: CW, 4:214.
331 to veto measures: Anna Prentner, “Application of Veto Power by Abraham Lincoln,” Western Pennsylvania Historical Magazine 6 (Jan. 1923): 51–55. Lincoln vetoed or pocket-vetoed only seven bills during his presidency, mostly unimportant measures rejected for technical reasons. The Wade-Davis bill, discussed in a subsequent chapter, was highly exceptional. For a different view of Lincoln’s use of the veto, see Allan G. Bogue, The Congressman’s Civil War (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), pp. 52–53.