Recollections of Abraham Lincoln 1847-1865 Part 18

In December, about one month after the arrest of the Confederate Commissioners, when Mr. Lincoln and his Cabinet were in a state of alarm, fearing a war with England, Mr. Chase one day came to the President and told him that Mr. Stanton, who had been attorney-general under Buchanan, had talked with him on the subject of this trouble with Great Britain, and had expressed the opinion that the action of the American government in arresting Mason and Slidell was legal and could be sustained by international law. The President told Mr. Chase that Stanton did not like him, and had treated him rudely on one occasion; but that if Mr. Chase thought Stanton would meet him, he would be glad to have him do so and give his views on the subject. In an hour Mr.

Chase had Stanton in Mr. Lincoln's presence. Mr. Lincoln expressed his gratification at hearing of Mr. Stanton's views, and asked him to repeat them. When Mr. Stanton had finished the discussion of the case, and of the laws bearing thereon, Mr. Lincoln expressed his thanks, and asked Stanton to put his opinion in writing, which he promised to do by ten o'clock the next morning. The opinion was brought at the appointed time. Mr. Lincoln read it and filed it, and then said: "Mr. Stanton, this is a time of war, and you are as much interested in sustaining the government as myself or any other man. This is no time to consider mere party issues. The life of the nation is in danger. I need the best counsellors around me. I have every confidence in your judgment, and have concluded to ask you to become one of my counsellors. The office of the Secretary of War will be vacant, and I want you to accept the position. Will you do it?"

Stanton was amazed, and said: "Why, Mr. President, you take me by surprise! This is an embarra.s.sing question, but if you will give me a day or two to consider, I will give you an answer." Two days later he called on the President and signified his intention to accept. On the 15th day of January, 1862, the portfolio of Secretary of War was placed in his hands.[K]

[K] DENVER, COL., May 23, 1885.

_Hon. Wm. A. Wheeler, Malone, N. Y._

MY DEAR SIR,--A few days since I had the pleasure of reading your "Recollections of Lincoln" from the Malone (N. Y.) "Palladium," in which you say: "At the extra session of Congress in July, 1861, a law was pa.s.sed authorizing the appointment of additional paymasters for the Army;" that the President a.s.sented to your request that your life-long friend, Major Sabin, should be one of the appointees; that, in September following, Mr. Lincoln wrote you saying he had sent the appointment of Mr. Sabin to the Secretary of War, who would notify him to appear for muster into the Service.

October pa.s.sed, and no notice came. Then, you say, a letter written to "Secretary Stanton" failed to bring a response; that the latter part of November you went to Was.h.i.+ngton to attend the regular session of Congress, taking Mr. Sabin with you. You then say: "The day after my arrival I waited upon Secretary Stanton," etc.; you then detail the conversation had with Mr. Lincoln, and the fact of his making a somewhat imperative order to the Secretary to make the appointment "at once." You say, "I called on Mr. Stanton the next morning, who on its [the letter's or order's] presentation was simply furious." And after this you speak of what was said and done by "Mr. Stanton, the Secretary of War."

Allow me, my dear sir, to a.s.sure you that I now entertain, and always have entertained, for you the most profound respect, and to express my sincere regret that you were not President instead of Vice-President of the United States. I therefore venture to hope that you will pardon me for saying that I am unable to reconcile the statements purporting to be made by you, alluded to above, with the historical fact that Mr. Stanton was not appointed Secretary of War until in January the year following,--namely, 1862. It occurs to me that there must be a mistake made in your paper, either of _dates_ or of the name of the Secretary of War. I am certain this irreconcilable statement was not made by you as was the blunder made by Sir Walter Scott in his "Ivanhoe" (chap. i.). "The date of this story," as he says, "refers to a period towards the end of the reign of Richard I." Richard died in 1199; nevertheless, Sir Walter makes the disguised Wamba style himself "a poor brother of the Order of St. Francis," although the Order of St. Francis was not founded until 1210, and of course the saints.h.i.+p of the founder had still a later date.

If my recollection serves me correctly, Mr. Stanton, whose memory is now cherished by the great ma.s.s of the Republican party, at the dates you speak of and refer to was regarded as a Bourbon of the strictest sect. Up to the time of the capture of the "Trent," with Mason and Slidell aboard, on the 8th of November, 1861, if Mr.

Stanton had conceived any "change of heart" and cessation of hostility to the Administration, it never was publicly manifested.

It was something over a month after this capture that he was consulted by Mr. Lincoln, at the suggestion of Secretary Chase, as an international lawyer concerning the legality of the capture and arrest of Messrs. Mason and Slidell, which was the first interview that was had between Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Stanton since the commencement of the Administration. This interview led to Mr.

Stanton's appointment as Secretary of War. Mr. Lincoln had occasion for regret about the "Trent" capture, but never for the capture of Mr. Stanton.

The immortal Shakespeare, like yourself and others, sometimes got his dates confused; for instance, in his "Coriola.n.u.s," he says of C. Marcius, "Thou wast a soldier even to Cato's will," when in fact Marcius Coriola.n.u.s was banished from Rome and died over two hundred years before Cato was born. Again, his reference in the same play, of Marcius sitting in state like Alexander: the latter was not born for a hundred and fifty years after Coriola.n.u.s's death. He also says in "Julius Caesar," "The clock strikes three," when in truth and in fact there were no striking clocks until more than eight hundred years after the death of Caesar. Another inaccuracy is to be found in "King Lear" in regard to spectacles. Spectacles were not worn until the thirteenth century. And still another in this immortal writer's statements in his play of "Macbeth," where he speaks of cannon: cannon were not invented until 1346, and Macbeth was killed in 1054.

You will pardon me these citations, for they are made in a spirit of playful ill.u.s.tration, to show how great minds often become confused about dates.

"What you have said I have considered; what you have to say I will with patience wait to hear."

I read your "Recollections of Lincoln" with great interest, as I do everything I see written about that most wonderful, interesting, and unique of all of our public men. I sincerely hope you will receive this in the same kindly spirit that it is written, prompted as it is by a curiosity to know how this variance about Mr.

Stanton's official status during the first year of Mr. Lincoln's Administration can be reconciled. I will regard it as an esteemed favor if you will drop me a line explaining it.

Your interesting and graphic description of Mr. Lincoln's pardon of the soldier convicted and condemned for sleeping at his post interested me very much. I have a curiosity to know whether this soldier's name was not William Scott? If Scott was his name, I have a reason to believe he was the person whom Francis De Haes Janvier immortalized in verse.

I have the honor to be, very sincerely,

Your humble servant, WARD H. LAMON.

MALONE, N. Y., June 2, 1885.

_Ward H. Lamon, Denver, Col._

MY DEAR SIR,--I thank you most sincerely for your letter of the 23d ultimo, and for the friendly feeling you evince for me.

I am simply mortified at my gross blunder, and can only plead in mitigation the lapse of more than twenty years since the affairs alluded to transpired, in which time, aside from having performed a large amount of hard public and private work, I have experienced an amount of trouble exceptional to ordinary men, having buried every one near to me,--father, mother, brothers, and sisters. I have no one left of nearer kin to me than cousins, and no one to care for my house except servants. For the last three years I have been an invalid, confined to my house and for a considerable portion of the time to my bed: what wonder that "the warder of the brain" should be sometimes at fault! The mistake must be one of _time_, for the actors in the transaction are too vividly impressed upon my memory ever to be forgotten until that faculty is wholly dethroned.

I may be mistaken in the fact that Sabin accompanied me when I went on for the regular session in December, 1861; but so sure was I of it that before your letter I would have sworn to it. You have furnished me with a needed caution. It is unpleasant to find out that years are telling upon us, but it is healthful nevertheless.

And so I may be mistaken as to the time intervening between the successive stages of the appointment. Sabin is somewhere in the West, and I will endeavor to find his whereabouts and get his statement of the facts. Brevet Brig.-Genl. Chauncey McKeever, now a.s.sistant Adjutant-General of the Army, was at the time in Stanton's office in a confidential capacity, and I think will remember the transaction.

I do not remember the name of the pardoned soldier. One of Kellogg's sons lives in the southern part of the State; I will endeavor to get the name, and if successful will write you.

Now, my dear sir, mortified as I am, I feel almost compensated in having drawn from you such an admirable collection of anachronisms of famous literary men of the world. I am greatly interested in it, and shall take the liberty of showing it to my literary friends. In your readings have you ever encountered the "Deathless City," a beautiful poem written by Elizabeth A. Allen? I never saw but this single production from her pen. Who was or is she, and did she write other things?

My memories of Mr. Lincoln are a source of great pleasure to me.

Many of them recall ill.u.s.trations just a little "off color."

If you ever come east, I wish you would come across northern New York and drop in upon me. I should greatly delight to live over the days of the war with you.

Again thanking you for your letter, and fully reciprocating your good-will, I am

Very cordially yours, WM. A. WHEELER.

The appointment of Mr. Stanton in Mr. Lincoln's Cabinet was a great surprise to the country. Those who were acquainted with the relations existing between these two men when they were both practising lawyers were not only astonished at this appointment, but were apprehensive that there could not possibly be harmony of action and co-operation between them. There were perhaps seldom, if ever, two really great men who were as unlike in all respects as Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Stanton. They were dissimilar in their habits of life, disposition, taste, in fact in every particular of the general make-up of man. But Mr. Lincoln fully appreciated Mr. Stanton's great ability, both as a lawyer and as a Cabinet counsellor under Mr. Buchanan. The President needed the ablest counsel he could obtain, and allowed no personal consideration to influence him in selecting the right man for the service.

In order to make the history of this appointment complete in its personal element, it will be necessary to go back to the year 1858, when Abraham Lincoln was practising law in Springfield, Illinois, and Edwin M. Stanton was at the head of his profession in Cincinnati. The celebrated McCormick Reaper and Mower case was before the United States Court in Cincinnati. Mr. Stanton had been retained as counsel-in-chief on one side of the case, and to be a.s.sociated with him were T. D.

Lincoln of Cincinnati, and Abraham Lincoln of Illinois. When Mr. Lincoln arrived in Cincinnati to attend the trial, he called upon Mr. Stanton, who treated him in so impolite and rude a manner that he went to his client and informed him that he should have to withdraw as his counsel in the case and stated his reasons therefor. Mr. Lincoln was entreated to remain in the case, and Mr. Stanton was seen and was talked to about the matter. Mr. Lincoln happened to be in a room adjoining where this conversation occurred, and overheard Mr. Stanton say that he would not a.s.sociate with such a d----, gawky, long-armed ape as that; if he could not have a man who was a gentleman in appearance a.s.sociated with him in the case, he would himself abandon it. When the client returned, Mr.

Lincoln refunded to him the five-hundred dollar retainer fee, peremptorily declining to keep it. He then returned to Urbana, Illinois, where court was in session, and, to explain his unexpected return, related the fact and his mortification to his a.s.sociate members of the bar. After this event, Mr. Lincoln never met Mr. Stanton until the "Trent" affair brought them together; yet it is certain that Mr. Lincoln never forgot the gratuitous insult then cast upon him.

To this day there is a settled belief that at this time the Administration councils manifested a lack of hearty co-operation and unity of purpose and sentiment. This is a mistake, for throughout Mr.

Lincoln's Administration as much harmony as could reasonably be expected existed between him and his Cabinet ministers. Differences arose between them at times in regard to minor considerations of policy, but never to the extent that the differences were not eventually harmonized, compromised, or accommodated. To be sure, many things occurred during the fearful war-struggle about which he and his Cabinet differed in their estimates and conclusions, and Mr. Lincoln thereby was often disappointed and grieved. As one instance of his disappointment, may be mentioned his abandonment of a message to Congress in deference to the opinion and counsel of his advisers. This occurred directly after his return from the conference he and Mr. Seward had with Messrs. Stephens, Campbell, and Hunter at City Point on the James River.

Notwithstanding his hatred of the inst.i.tution of slavery, Mr. Lincoln believed that the holder of slaves had a right of property in them which the government had no right, legally or morally, to interfere with in the States unless forced thereto by the necessities of war. He gladly approved the action of Congress in providing for the payment of compensation for the slaves liberated in the District of Columbia. The message above referred to recommended an appropriation of three hundred million dollars to be apportioned among the several slave States, in proportion to slave population, as compensation to the owners of liberated slaves in the insurgent States, with the condition that the insurgents should lay down their arms, disband their troops, and return and renew their allegiance to the United States government. Mr. Seward at this time was not present, being confined to bed by injuries he had received by being thrown from his carriage. All the other members of the Cabinet were present, every one of whom opposed the message. Lincoln then asked: "How long will this war last?" No reply came. He then answered his own question, saying: "It will doubtless last one hundred days longer; we are now spending three million dollars a day, which rate will aggregate the amount I propose to appropriate in order to put an end to this terrible blood-shedding." Then with a deep sigh he said, "Since you are all opposed to me I will not send this message," and turning round he placed the paper in his drawer. It is rather a curious coincidence that the war did last just about a hundred days after Lincoln's remarkable interview with his Cabinet on this subject.

There is also a prevailing opinion that the Secretary of War (Stanton) at times arbitrarily refused to obey or carry out Mr. Lincoln's orders.

This is also not true. This opinion is largely based upon Mr. Stanton's refusal of permits to persons desirous of going through the lines into insurgent districts. The persons who were disobliged in this respect were very severe in their comments on Mr. Stanton's course, which they considered harsh, disobliging, and sometimes cruel. On refusal of Mr.

Stanton to accommodate in many such cases, Mr. Lincoln was appealed to, and his invariable reply was: "I cannot always know whether a permit ought to be granted, and I want to oblige everybody when I can; and Stanton and I have an understanding that if I send an order to him which cannot be consistently granted, he is to refuse it. This he sometimes does." This state of things caused him to say to a man who complained of Stanton, "I have not much influence with this Administration, but I expect to have more with the next."

Not long before the death of Mr. Lincoln, Mr. Stanton tendered his resignation as Secretary of War. His letter of resignation was couched in the kindest language, paying a heartfelt tribute to Mr. Lincoln's uniform and constant friends.h.i.+p, and his faithful devotion to the country. It stated that the writer had accepted the position of Secretary of War for the purpose of holding it only till the war should end, and that now he felt that his work was completed, and that it was his duty to resign. Mr. Lincoln was greatly moved by the tone of the letter, and said: "Mr. Stanton, you have been a faithful public officer, and it is not for you to say when you will be no longer needed here." At the President's earnest solicitation, the letter of resignation was withdrawn, and Mr. Stanton continued to occupy the War Office until after Mr. Lincoln's death.

When Mr. Lincoln submitted his Proclamation of Emanc.i.p.ation for the consideration of the Cabinet, he had not conferred with any one about the phraseology of the instrument. He read the doc.u.ment through, without a single interruption or comment. They all concurred in opinion that it was an admirable paper. Mr. Chase then said: "Mr. President, you have invoked the considerate judgment of mankind, but you have not invoked the blessing of Almighty G.o.d on your action in this matter. I believe He has something to do with this question." Mr. Lincoln then said: "You are right, Mr. Secretary. I most humbly thank you for that suggestion; it was an oversight of mine. Do me the favor of taking a pen and paper and adding what you would have in conclusion." Mr. Chase wrote seven words,--namely, "and the gracious favor of Almighty G.o.d." Mr. Lincoln then added them to the end of the last paragraph, which made it read as follows: "And upon this act, sincerely believed to be an act of justice, warranted by the Const.i.tution upon military necessity, I invoke the considerate judgment of mankind and the gracious favor of Almighty G.o.d."[11]

[11] Page 235, line 25, after the word "G.o.d."

John W. Crisfield served in Congress with Mr. Lincoln in 1847 and was a warm friend of Lincoln. Being elected again as Representative in 1861, he was in Congress when the proposition was made for gradual emanc.i.p.ation in the border states by paying the loyal owners for their slaves. Mr. Crisfield was on the committee that was to draft the reply to this proposition. When he was at the White House one day in July, 1862, Mr. Lincoln said: "Well, Crisfield, how are you getting along with your report, have you written it yet?" Mr. Crisfield replied that he had not. Mr. Lincoln--knowing that the Emanc.i.p.ation Proclamation was coming, in fact was then only two months away--said, "You had better come to an agreement. n.i.g.g.e.rs will never be higher."

In referring to the differences of opinion entertained between Mr.

Lincoln and the members of his Cabinet, it will be observed that in the matter of reconstruction of the State governments his policy was, according to his proclamation, that the persons who were authorized to re-establish such governments were to be "the qualified voters of the respective States before the acts of secession." Mr. Chase alone of all the Cabinet objected to this clause of the proclamation, and insisted that it should be changed so as to read, instead of "qualified voters,"

"citizens of the State." But the Attorney-General in the year 1862 had given an opinion that the colored men born in the United States were citizens of the United States; and if the phrase "one-tenth of the qualified voters required to re-organize" were changed to "one-tenth of the citizens," the organization might have been legally composed entirely of colored men. Mr. Lincoln was set in his purpose that the restored governments in the seceded States should be organized by the "qualified voters" of those States before secession was attempted, and Mr. Chase had to submit to the inevitable.

The great caution with which Mr. Lincoln approached the important subject of elective franchise may be shown in his letter to Governor Hahn:--

(PRIVATE.)

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WAs.h.i.+NGTON, March 13, 1864.

_Hon. Michael Hahn_:

MY DEAR SIR,--I congratulate you on having fixed your name in history as the first free-state Governor of Louisiana. Now, you are about to have a convention, which among other things will probably define the elective franchise. I barely suggest for your private consideration, whether some of the colored people may not be let in,--as, for instance, the very intelligent, and especially those who have fought gallantly in our ranks. They would probably help, in some trying time to come, to keep the jewel of liberty within the family of freedom. But this is only a suggestion,--not to the public, but to you alone.