A Political History of the State of New York Volume III Part 13

"Robinson is to-day," said the _Tribune_, "what he has always been, a genuine Democrat, a true Republican, a hearty Unionist, and an inflexibly honest and faithful guardian of the treasury. He has proved a most valuable officer, whom every would-be plunderer of the State regards with unfeigned detestation, and, if his old a.s.sociates like him well enough to support his re-election, it is a proof that some of the false G.o.ds they have for years been following have fallen from their pedestals and been crumbled into dust."[1031]

[Footnote 1031: New York _Tribune_, September 9, 1864.

"The ticket nominated was as follows: Secretary of State, Henry W.

Sloc.u.m, Onondaga; Comptroller, Lucius Robinson, Chemung; Attorney-General, John Van Buren, New York; Treasurer, Ma.r.s.ena R.

Patrick, Ontario; State Engineer, Sylva.n.u.s H. Sweet, Oneida; Ca.n.a.l Commissioner, Cornelius W. Armstrong, Albany; Prison Inspector, Andrew J. Mc.n.u.tt, Allegany; Judges of Appeals, John W. Brown, Orange; Martin Grover, Allegany; Clerk of Appeals, Edward O. Perkins, Kings."--New York _Herald_, September 9, 1864.]

The Union Republican convention, held at Syracuse on September 20, followed the policy of the Democrats in the nomination of Sloc.u.m.

Officers of distinguished service abounded. Daniel E. Sickles, a hero of Gettysburg; Francis G. Barlow, the intrepid general of Hanc.o.c.k's famous corps; Henry W. Barnum, a soldier of decided valour and energy; Charles H. Van Wyck, who left Congress to lead a regiment to the field; John H. Martindale, a West Point graduate of conspicuous service in the Peninsular campaign, and Joseph Howland, whose large means had benefited the soldiers, were especially mentioned. Of this galaxy all received recognition save Sickles and Van Wyck, Chauncey M.

Depew being dropped for Barlow, Cochrane for Martindale, Bates for Barnum, and Schuyler for Howland. In other words, the officials elected in 1863, ent.i.tled by custom to a second term, yielded to the sentiment that soldiers deserved recognition in preference to civilians.[1032]

[Footnote 1032: The ticket nominated was as follows: Secretary of State, Francis G. Barlow of New York; Comptroller, Thomas Hillhouse of Ontario; Attorney-General, John H. Martindale of Monroe; Treasurer, Joseph Howland of Dutchess; State Engineer, J. Platt Goodsell of Oneida; Ca.n.a.l Commissioner, Robert C. Dorn of Schenectady; Inspector of Prisons, Henry W. Barnum of Onondaga; Judges of Court of Appeals, Ward Hunt of Oneida; John K. Porter of Albany; Clerk of Appeals, Henry Jones of Cattaraugus.]

The question of negro suffrage troubled the convention. The Radicals had a decided majority--"not less than fifty," Greeley said; but Weed and Raymond, now the acknowledged friends of the President, had the power. Shortly after Johnson took the oath of office, Preston King presented Weed to the new Executive and the three breakfasted together. King's relations with the President bore the stamp of intimacy. They had served together in Congress, and on March 4, 1865, that ill-fated inauguration day when Johnson's intoxication humiliated the Republic, King concealed him in the home of Francis P. Blair at Silver Springs, near Was.h.i.+ngton.[1033] After Lincoln's death King became for a time the President's constant adviser, and through his influence, it was believed, Johnson foreshadowed in one of his early speeches a purpose to pursue a more unfriendly policy towards the South than his predecessor had intended. For a time it was thought King would displace Seward in the Cabinet if for no other reason than because of the latter's part in defeating the former's re-election to the Senate in 1863. However, differences between them were finally adjusted by King's acceptance of the collectors.h.i.+p of the port of New York in place of Draper. This, it was understood, meant a complete reconciliation of all the factions in the State. Within sixty days thereafter, King, in a moment of mental aberration, took his life by jumping from a Jersey City ferry-boat.

[Footnote 1033: Edward L. Pierce, _Life of Sumner_, Vol. 4, pp. 230, 250.]

There was something peculiarly pathetic in the pa.s.sing of King. In accepting the collectors.h.i.+p he yielded to the solicitation of friends who urged him to retain it after his health, due to worry and overwork, was seriously impaired. "He thought it inc.u.mbent upon him,"

says Weed, "to sign nothing he did not personally examine, becoming nervously apprehensive that his bondsmen might suffer."[1034] It was surmised, also, that the President's change of policy occasioned him extreme solicitude as well as much embarra.s.sment, since the threatened breach between President and Radicals made him sensitive as to his future course. He was a Radical, and, deeply as he regarded the President, he hesitated to hold an office, which, by a.s.sociating him with the Administration, would discredit his sincerity and deprive him of the right to aid in overthrowing an obnoxious policy. Premeditated suicide was shown by the purchase, while on his way to the ferry, of a bag of shot which sank the body quickly and beyond immediate recovery.

[Footnote 1034: _Autobiography of Thurlow Weed_, p. 475.]

Every delegate in the Syracuse convention knew that Weed's cordial relations with Johnson, established through Preston King, made him the undisputed dispenser of patronage. Nevertheless, the failure of Pennsylvania and Ma.s.sachusetts to endorse the President's policy, supplemented by Mississippi's action, made a deep impression upon radical delegates. Besides, it had already been noised abroad that Johnson could not be influenced. Senator Wade of Ohio discovered it early in July, and in August, after two attempts, Stevens gave him up as inexorable.[1035] "If something is not done," wrote the Pennsylvanian, "the President will be crowned King before Congress meets."[1036] Under these circ.u.mstances the leading Radicals desired to vote for a resolution affirming the right of all loyal people of the South to a voice in reorganising and controlling their respective State governments, and Greeley believed it would have secured a large majority on a yea and nay vote.[1037] But Raymond resisted. His friends.h.i.+p for Johnson exhibited at the Baltimore convention had suddenly made him an acknowledged power with the new Administration which he was soon to represent in Congress, and he did not propose allowing the _Tribune's_ editor to force New York into the list of States that refused to endorse the President.

[Footnote 1035: _Sumner's Works_, Vol. 9, p. 480.]

[Footnote 1036: Edward L. Pierce, _Life of Sumner_, Vol. 4, p. 480.]

[Footnote 1037: New York _Tribune_, September 21, 1865.]

Such a course, he believed, would give the State to the Democrats, whose prompt and intrepid confidence in the President had plainly disconcerted the Republicans. Besides, Raymond disbelieved in the views of the extreme Radicals, who held that States lately in rebellion must be treated as conquered provinces and brought back into the Union as new States, subject to conditions prescribed by their conquerors. As chairman of the committee on resolutions, therefore, the editor of the _Times_ bore down heavily on the Radical dissenters, and in the absence of a decided leader they allowed their devotion to men to overbear attachment to principles. As finally adopted the platform recognised Johnson's ability, patriotism, and integrity, declared the war debt sacred, thanked the soldiers and sailors, commended the President's policy of reconstruction, and expressed the hope that when the States lately in rebellion are restored to the exercise of their const.i.tutional rights, "it will be done in the faith and on the basis that they will be exercised in the spirit of equal and impartial justice, and with a view to the elevation and perpetuation of the full rights of citizens.h.i.+p of all their people, inasmuch as these are principles which const.i.tute the basis of our republican inst.i.tutions."[1038] Greeley p.r.o.nounced this language "timid and windy."[1039]

[Footnote 1038: New York _Herald_, September 21, 1865.]

[Footnote 1039: New York _Tribune_, September 21, 1865.]

In the campaign that followed the Democrats flattered the President, very cleverly insisting that the Radicals' devotion to negro suffrage made them his only real opponents. On the other hand, conservative Republicans, maintaining that the convention did not commit itself to an enfranchis.e.m.e.nt of the negro, insisted that it was a unit in its support of the President's policy, and that the Democrats, acting insincerely, sought to destroy the Union party and secure exclusive control of the Executive. "They propose," said the _Times_, "to repeat upon him precisely the trick which they practised with such brilliant success upon John Tyler and Millard Fillmore, both of whom were taken up by the Democracy, their policy endorsed, and their supporters denounced. Both were flattered with the promise of a Democratic nomination and both were weak enough to listen and yield to the temptation. Both were used unscrupulously to betray their principles and their friends, and when the time came both were remorselessly thrown, like squeezed oranges, into the gutter. The game they are playing upon President Johnson is precisely the same. They want the offices he has in his gift, and when his friends are scattered and overthrown they will have him at their mercy. Then, the power he gives them will be used for his destruction."[1040]

[Footnote 1040: New York _Times_, October 17, 1865.]

Horatio Seymour made two speeches. With charming candor he admitted that "signal victories have been won by generals who have made the history of our country glorious." But to him the great debt, the untaxed bonds, the inflation of the currency, the increased prices, and the absence of congressmen from the States lately in rebellion, seemed as full of peril as war itself. In his address at Seneca Falls his field of view, confined to war-burdens and rights withheld from "subjugated" States, did not include the vision that thrilled others, who saw the flag floating over every inch of American territory, now forever freed from slavery. "When we were free from debt," he said, "a man could support himself with six hours of daily toil. To-day he must work two hours longer to pay his share of the national debt.... This question of debt means less to give your families.... It reaches every boy and girl, every wife and mother.... It affects the character of our people." Prosperity also troubled him. "We see upon every hand its embarra.s.sing effect. The merchant does not know whether he will be a loser or gainer. We see men who have been ruined without fault, and men who have made great fortunes without industry. Inquire of the person engaged in mechanical operations and he will say that labour has lost its former certain reward." He disapproved the national banking act because the new banks "have converted the debt of the country into currency and inflated prices;" he disputed the correctness of the Treasury debt statement because "it is the experience of all wars that long after their close new claims spring up, which render the expense at least fifty per cent. more than appeared by the figures;" and he condemned the national system of taxation because it "disables us to produce as cheaply at home as we can buy in the markets of the world."[1041]

[Footnote 1041: New York _World_, November 2, 1865.]

The brief campaign promised to be spiritless and without incident until John Van Buren, in his extended canva.s.s for attorney-general, freely expressed his opinion of Horatio Seymour. Van Buren was not an admirer of that statesman. He had supported him with warmth in 1862, but after the development of the Governor's "pa.s.sion for peace" he had little sympathy with and less respect for his administration. In the campaign of 1864 he practically ignored him, and the subsequent announcement of his defeat liberated Van Buren's tongue. "Seymour is a d.a.m.ned fool," he said. "He spoiled everything at Chicago, and has been the cause of most of the disasters of the Democratic party."[1042]

At Troy he declared that "the Democracy were suffering now from the infernal blunder at Chicago last year," and that "if Seymour and Vallandigham had been kicked out of the national convention it would have been a good thing for the party."[1043]

[Footnote 1042: From letter of Chauncey M. Depew.--Albany _Evening Journal_, October 23, 1864.]

[Footnote 1043: New York _Tribune_, November 3, 1865.]

This opinion scarcely expressed the sentiment of a majority of Democrats, but those who had preferred John A. Dix as the man of destiny held Seymour and his school of statesmen responsible for the party's deplorable condition. It had emerged from the war defeated in every distinctive principle it had promulgated, and in the absence of an available issue it now sought to atone for the past and to gain the confidence of the people by nominating candidates who were either active in the field or recognised as sincerely devoted to a vigorous prosecution of the war. To aid in this new departure Van Buren threw his old-time fire into the campaign, speaking daily and to the delight of his audiences; but he soon discovered that things were looking serious, and when the Union Republican ticket was elected by majorities ranging from 28,000 to 31,000, with two-thirds of the a.s.sembly and all the senators save one, he recognised that the glory of Lee's surrender and the collapse of the Confederacy did not strengthen the Democratic party, although one of its candidates had led an army corps, and another, with eloquence and irresistible argument, had stirred the hearts of patriotic Americans in the darkest hours of the rebellion.[1044]

[Footnote 1044: For more than a year Van Buren's health had been impaired, and in the spring of 1866 he went to Europe. But a change of climate brought no relief, and he died, on the return voyage, at the age of fifty-six. That the people deeply mourned his loss is the evidence of those, still living, to whom there was something das.h.i.+ng and captivating even in his errors.]

CHAPTER XI

RAYMOND CHAMPIONS THE PRESIDENT

1866

When Congress convened in December, 1865, President Johnson, in a calm and carefully prepared message, advocated the admission of Southern congressmen whenever their States ratified the Thirteenth Amendment.

He also recommended that negro suffrage be left to the States. On the other hand, extreme Radicals, relying upon the report of Carl Schurz, whom the President had sent South on a tour of observation, demanded suffrage and civil rights for the negro, and that congressional representation be based upon actual voters instead of population.

Schurz had remained three months in South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana, and to him "treason, under existing circ.u.mstances, does not appear odious in the South. The people are not impressed with any sense of its criminality. And there is yet among the Southern people an utter absence of national feeling.... While accepting the abolition of slavery, they think that some species of serfdom, peonage, or other form of compulsory labour is not slavery, and may be introduced without a violation of their pledge." Schurz, therefore, recommended negro suffrage as "a condition precedent to readmission."[1045]

[Footnote 1045: Senate Ex. Doc. No. 2, 39th Cong., 1st Session.]

On the contrary, General Grant, who had spent a couple of weeks in the South upon the invitation of the President, reported that the ma.s.s of thinking men accepted conditions in good faith; that they regarded slavery and the right to secede as settled forever, and were anxious to return to self-government within the Union as soon as possible; that "while reconstructing they want and require protection from the government. They are in earnest in wis.h.i.+ng to do what is required by the government, not humiliating to them as citizens, and if such a course was pointed out they would pursue it in good faith."[1046]

[Footnote 1046: McPherson, _History of Reconstruction_, pp. 67-68.]

The North had been too happy over the close of the war and the return of its soldiers to antic.i.p.ate the next step, but when Thaddeus Stevens of Pennsylvania, the leader of the Radicals, opened the discussion in Congress on December 10 (1865), the people quickly saw the drift of things. Stevens contended that hostilities had severed the original contract between the Southern States and the Union, and that the former, in order to return to the Union, must come in as new States upon terms made by Congress and approved by the President. In like manner he argued that negroes, if denied suffrage, should be excluded from the basis of representation, thus giving the South 46 representatives instead of 83. "But why should slaves be excluded?"

demanded Stevens. "This doctrine of a white man's government is as atrocious as the infamous sentiment that d.a.m.ned the late Chief Justice to everlasting fame, and, I fear, to everlasting fire."[1047]

[Footnote 1047: _Congressional Globe_, Vol. 37, Part 1, pp. 73-74.]

Stevens' speech, putting Johnson's policy squarely in issue, was answered by Henry J. Raymond, now the selected and acknowledged leader of the Administration in the House. Raymond had entered Congress with a prestige rarely if ever equalled by a new member. There had been greater orators, abler debaters, and more profound statesmen, but no one had ever preceded him with an environment more influential. He was the favourite of the President; he had been brought into more or less intimate a.s.sociation with all the men of his party worth knowing; he was the close friend of Weed and the recognized ally of Seward; his good will could make postmasters and collectors, and his displeasure, like that of a frigid and bloodless leader, could carry swift penalty.

Indeed, there was nothing in the armory of the best equipped politician, including able speaking and forceful writing, that he did not possess, and out of New York as well as within it he had been regarded the earnest friend and faithful champion of Republican doctrines. On the surface, too, it is doubtful if a member of Congress, whether new or old, ever seemed to have a better chance of winning in a debate. Only three months before the people of the North, with great unanimity, had endorsed the President and approved his policy. Besides, the great body of Republicans in Congress preferred to work with the President. He held the patronage, he had succeeded by the a.s.sa.s.sin's work to the leaders.h.i.+p of the party, and thus far had evinced no more dogmatism than Stevens or Sumner. Moreover, the sentiment of the North at that time was clearly against negro suffrage. All the States save six[1048] denied the vote to the negro, and in the recent elections three States had specifically declared against extending it to him.

[Footnote 1048: New York and the New England States except Connecticut, although New York required a property qualification, but none for the white.]

Thus fortified Raymond did not object to speaking for the Administration. To him Stevens' idea of subjecting the South to the discipline and tutelage of Congress was repulsive, and his ringing voice filled the s.p.a.cious hall of the House with clear-cut sentences.

He denied that the Southern States had ever been out of the Union. "If they were," he asked, "how and when did they become so? By what specific act, at what precise time, did any one of those States take itself out of the American Union? Was it by the ordinance of secession? An ordinance of secession is simply a nullity, because it encounters the Const.i.tution which is the supreme law of the land. Did the resolutions of those States, the declaration of their officials, the speeches of the members of their Legislatures, or the utterances of their press, accomplish the result desired? Certainly not. All these were declarations of a purpose to secede. Their secession, if it ever took place, certainly could not date from the time when their intention to secede was first announced. They proceeded to sustain their purpose of secession by arms against the force which the United States brought to bear against them. Were their arms victorious? If they were, then their secession was an accomplished fact. If not, it was nothing more than an abortive attempt--a purpose unfulfilled. They failed to maintain their ground by force of arms. In other words, they failed to secede. But if," he concluded, "the Southern States did go out of the Union, it would make those in the South who resisted the Confederacy guilty of treason to an independent government. Do you want to make traitors out of loyal men?"[1049]

[Footnote 1049: _Congressional Globe_, Vol. 37, Part 1, pp. 120-123.]

Raymond received close attention. Several leaders acknowledged their interest by asking questions, and the congratulations that followed evidenced the good will of his colleagues. His speech had shown none of the usual characteristics of a maiden effort. Without advertising his intention to speak, he obtained the floor late in the afternoon, referred with spirit to the sentiments of the preceding speaker, and moved along with the air of an old member, careless of making a rhetorical impression but intensely in earnest in what he had to present. As an argument in favor of the adoption of a liberal policy toward the South, regardless of its strict legal rights, the speech commended itself to his colleagues as an admirable one, but it entirely failed to meet Stevens' logic that the States lately in rebellion could not set up any rights against the conqueror except such as were granted by the laws of war. In his reply the Pennsylvanian taunted Raymond with failing to quote a single authority in support of his contention. "I admit the gravity of the gentleman's opinion," he said, "and with the slightest corroborating authority should yield the case. But without some such aid I am not willing that the sages of the law--Grotius, Vattel, and a long line of compeers--should be overthrown and demolished by the single arm of the gentleman from New York. I pray the gentleman to quote authority; not to put too heavy a load upon his own judgment; he might sink under the weight. Give us your author."[1050]

[Footnote 1050: _Congressional Globe_, Vol. 37, Part 2, pp. 1307-1308.]

As the debate continued it became evident the President's friends were losing ground. Aside from the withering blows of Stevens, unseen occurrences which Raymond, in his eagerness to champion Johnson's policy, did not appreciate or willingly ignored, had a most disturbing influence. The Northern people welcomed peace and approved the generosity of the government, but they wanted the South to exhibit its appreciation by corresponding generosity to the government's friends.

Its acts did not show this. Enactments in respect to freedmen, pa.s.sed by the President's reconstructed legislatures, grudgingly bestowed civil rights. A different punishment for the same offence was prescribed for the negroes; apprentice, vagrant, and contract labour laws tended to a system of peonage; and the prohibition of public a.s.semblies, the restriction of freedom of movement, and the deprivation of means of defence ill.u.s.trated the inequality of their rights. Such laws, for whatever purpose pa.s.sed, had a powerful effect on Northern sentiment already influenced by reported cruelties, while the Southern people's aversion to Union soldiers settling in their midst intensified the feeling. Moreover, Southern and Democratic support of the President made Republicans distrust his policy. If States can be reconstructed in a summer and congressmen admitted in a winter, it was said, the South, helped by the Democracy of the North, might again be in control of the Government within two years. These considerations were bound to affect the judgment of Republicans, and when Stevens began to talk and the real conditions in the South came to be known, it aroused party indignation to a high pitch in the House.

Raymond, in his brilliant rejoinders, endeavoured to recover lost ground. He had created no enemies. On the contrary his courtesy and tact smoothed the way and made him friends. But after weeks of discussion an effort to adopt a resolution of confidence in the President met with overwhelming defeat. Stevens asked that the resolution be referred to the Committee on Reconstruction--Raymond demanded its adoption at once. On a roll-call the vote stood 32 to 107 in favour of reference, Raymond and William A. Darling of New York City being the only Republicans to vote against it. It was a heavy blow to the leader of the Conservatives. It proved the unpopularity of Johnson's policy and indicated increasing estrangement between the President and his party. Moreover, it was personally humiliating. On a test question, with the whole power of the Administration behind him, Raymond had been able, after weeks of work, to secure the support of only one man and that a colleague bound to him by the ties of personal friends.h.i.+p.