[Footnote 721: Alex. K. McClure, Recollections of Half a Century, p. 204.]

[Footnote 722: George T. Curtis, Life of James Buchanan, Vol. 2, p. 530.]

[Footnote 723: O.B. Hallister, Life of Colfax, p. 173.]

[Footnote 724: F.W. Seward, Life of W.H. Seward, Vol. 2, p. 530.]

[Footnote 725: Alex. K. McClure, Life of Lincoln, p. 56.]

[Footnote 726: George T. Curtis, Life of James Buchanan, Vol. 2, p. 530.

A writer in the North American Review says, "the clamour for offices is already quite extraordinary, and these poor people undoubtedly belong to the horde which has pressed in here seeking places under the new Administration, which neither has nor can hope to have places enough to satisfy one-twentieth the number." November, 1879, p. 488.]

In this bewildering mass of humanity New York had its share. Seward sought protection behind his son, Frederick W. Seward, whom the President had appointed assistant secretary of state. "I have placed him where he must meet the whole army of friends seeking office," he wrote his wife on March 8—"an hundred taking tickets when only one can draw a prize."[727] Roscoe Conkling, then beginning his second term in Congress, needed no barrier of this kind. "Early in the year 1861," says his biographer, "a triumvirate of Republicans assumed to designate candidates for the offices which President Lincoln was about to fill in the Oneida district. To accomplish this end they went to Washington and called upon their representative, handing him a list of candidates to endorse for appointment. Mr. Conkling read it carefully, and, seeing that it contained undesirable names, he replied: 'Gentlemen, when I need your assistance in making the appointments in our district, I shall let you know.' This retort, regarded by some of his friends as indiscreet, was the seed that years afterward ripened into an unfortunate division of the Republican party."[728]

[Footnote 727: F.W. Seward, Life of W.H. Seward, Vol. 2, p. 518.]

[Footnote 728: A.R. Conkling, Life and Letters of Roscoe Conkling, pp. 119, 120.]

If Seward was more tactful than Conkling in the dispensation of patronage, he was not less vigilant and tenacious. Almost immediately after inauguration it became apparent that differences relative to local appointments existed between him and Ira Harris, the newly elected New York senator. Harris' tall and powerful form, distinguished by a broad and benevolent face, was not more marked than the reputation that preceded him as a profound and fearless judge. At the Albany bar he had been the associate of Marcus T. Reynolds, Samuel Stevens, Nicholas Hill, and the venerable Daniel Cady, and if he did not possess the wit of Reynolds or the eloquence of Cady, the indomitable energy of Stevens and the mental vigour of Nicholas Hill were his, making conspicuous his achievements in the pursuit of truth and justice. His transfer to the Senate at the age of fifty-eight and his appointment upon the judiciary and foreign relations committees, presented a new opportunity to exhibit his deep and fruitful interest in public affairs, and, as the friend of Senators Collamer of Vermont and Sumner of Massachusetts, he was destined to have an influential share in the vital legislation of the war period.

Harris took little interest in the distribution of patronage, or in questions of party politics that quicken local strife, but he insisted upon a fair recognition of his friends, and to adjust their differences Seward arranged an evening conference to which the President was invited. At this meeting the discussion took a broad range. The secretary of state had prepared a list covering the important offices in New York, but before he could present it, Lincoln, with the ready intuitions of a shrewd politician, remarked that he reserved to himself the privilege of appointing Hiram Barney collector of the port of New York. This announcement did not surprise Seward, for, at the conclusion of Weed's visit to Springfield in the preceding December, Lincoln reminded the journalist that he had said nothing about appointments. "Some gentlemen who have been quite nervous about the object of your visit here," said the President-elect, "would be surprised, if not incredulous, were I to tell them that during the two days we have passed together you have made no application, suggestion, or allusion to political appointments."

To this the shrewd manager, willing to wait until Seward's appointment and confirmation as secretary of state had placed him in a position to direct rather than to beg patronage, replied that nothing of that nature had been upon his mind, since he was much more concerned about the welfare of the country. "This," said Lincoln, "is undoubtedly a proper view of the question, and yet so much were you misunderstood that I have received telegrams from prominent Republicans warning me against your efforts to forestall important appointments in your State. Other gentlemen who have visited me since the election have expressed similar apprehensions." The President, thus cunningly leading up to what was on his mind, said further that it was particularly pleasant to him to reflect that he was coming into office unembarrassed by promises. "I have not," said he, "promised an office to any man, nor have I, but in a single instance, mentally committed myself to an appointment; and as that relates to an important office in your State, I have concluded to mention it to you—under strict injunctions of secrecy, however. If I am not induced by public considerations to change my purpose, Hiram Barney will be collector of the port of New York."[729]

[Footnote 729: Thurlow Weed Barnes, Life of Thurlow Weed, Vol. 2, p. 612.]

To Weed, Barney's name aroused no agreeable memories. At the formation of the Republican party he had found it easier to affiliate with Lucius Robinson and David Dudley Field than to act in accord with the Whig leader, and the result at Chicago had emphasised this independence. Too politic, however, to antagonise the appointment, and too wary to indorse it, Weed replied that prior to the Chicago convention he had known Barney very slightly, but that, if what he had learned of him since was true, Barney was entitled to any office he asked for. "He has not asked for this or any other office," said Lincoln, quickly; "nor does he know of my intention."[730]

[Footnote 730: Thurlow Weed Barnes, Life of Thurlow Weed, Vol. 2, pp. 612, 613.]

If the President-elect failed to draw out the adroit New Yorker, he had tactfully given notice of his intention not to be controlled by him. A political boss, outside his own State, usually bears the reputation that home opponents give him, and, although Weed was never so bad as painted by his adversaries, he had long been a chief with an odious notoriety. Apparently disinterested, and always refusing to seek or to accept office himself, he loved power, and for years, whenever Whig or Republican party was ascendant in New York, his ambition to prescribe its policy, direct its movements, and dictate the men who might hold office, had been discreetly but imperiously exercised, until his influence was viewed with abhorrence by many and with distrust by the country.[731] It is doubtful if Lincoln's opinion corresponded with the accepted one,[732] but his desire to have some avenue of information respecting New York affairs opened to him other than through the Weed machine, made the President bold to declare his independence at the outset.

[Footnote 731: Gideon Welles, Lincoln and Seward, p. 22.

"In pecuniary matters Weed was generous to a fault while poor; he is said to be less so since he became rich.... I cannot doubt, however, that if he had never seen Wall Street or Washington, had never heard of the Stock Board, and had lived in some yet undiscovered country, where legislation is never bought nor sold, his life would have been more blameless, useful, and happy. I was sitting beside him in his editorial room soon after Governor Seward's election, when he opened a letter from a brother Whig, which ran substantially thus: 'Dear Weed: I want to be a bank examiner. You know how to fix it. Do so, and draw on me for whatever sum you may see fit. Yours truly.' In an instant his face became prematurely black with mingled rage and mortification. 'My God,' said he, 'I knew that my political adversaries thought me a scoundrel, but I never till now supposed that my friends did.'"—Horace Greeley, Recollections of a Busy Life, pp. 312, 313.]

[Footnote 732: "President Lincoln looked to Mr. Weed for counsel, when, as often during the war, he met with difficulties hard to surmount. It was Mr. Lincoln's habit at such times to telegraph Mr. Weed to come to Washington from Albany or New York, perhaps at an hour's notice. He often spent the day with the President, coming and returning by night, regardless of his age and infirmities. His services in these exigencies were often invaluable."—Thurlow Weed Barnes, Life of Thurlow Weed, Vol. 2, p. 288.]

The immediate influence that led to the announcement of Barney's selection, however, is not entirely clear. At the Cooper Institute meeting in February, 1860, at which Lincoln spoke, Barney occupied a seat on the stage, and was among the few gentlemen having opportunity to pay the distinguished Illinoisan those courtesies which especially please one who felt, as Lincoln did "by reason of his own modest estimate of himself,"[733] that he was under obligation to any person showing him marked attention. But neither this fact nor Barney's subsequent support at Chicago sufficiently accounts for the strong preference indicated by such an important and far-reaching appointment. Among the few indorsements on file in the treasury department at Washington, one letter, dated March 8, 1861, and addressed to Salmon P. Chase, speaks of Barney as "a personal friend of yours." Six days later a New York newspaper announced that "the appointment of Barney has been a fixed fact ever since Chase went into the Cabinet. It was this influence that persuaded Chase to accept the position."[734] The biographer of Thurlow Weed, probably basing the statement upon the belief of Weed himself, states, without qualification, that "Barney was appointed through the influence of Secretary Chase."[735] This may, in part, account for Weed's and Seward's bitter hostility to the Ohioan's becoming a member of the Cabinet; for, if Chase, before his appointment as secretary of the treasury, had sufficient influence to control the principal federal office in New York, what, might they not have asked, would be the measure of this influence after the development of his great ability as a financier has made him necessary to the President as well as to the country?

[Footnote 733: Nicolay and Hay, Abraham Lincoln, Vol. 2, p. 217.]

[Footnote 734: New York Herald, March 14, 1861.]

[Footnote 735: Thurlow Weed Barnes, Life of Thurlow Weed, Vol. 2, p. 613.]

Inquiry, however, as to the one first suggesting Barney's name to Lincoln does not lead to the open. Chase's entrance into the Cabinet being settled, his influence firmly sustained Barney, but, before that, very early after the election, between November 7 and Weed's visit to Springfield on December 17, some one spoke the word in Barney's behalf which left such a deep and lasting impression upon the President's mind that he determined to advise Weed, before Seward could accept the state portfolio, of his intention to appoint Barney collector of the port of New York. The name of the person exerting such an influence, however, is now unknown. During this period Chase neither saw the President-elect, nor, so far as the records show, wrote him more than a formal note of congratulations. Another possible avenue of communication may have been Bryant or Greeley, but the latter distinctly denied that he asked, or wanted, or manipulated the appointment of any one.[736] Bryant, who had great influence with Lincoln,[737] and who strongly opposed Seward's going into the Cabinet,[738] had presided at the Cooper Institute meeting and sat beside Hiram Barney. He knew that such a man, placed at the head of the custom-house and wielding its vast patronage, could be a potent factor in breaking Weed's control, but the editor's only published letter to Lincoln during this period was confined to reasons for making Chase secretary of state. In it he did not deprecate the strengthening of the Weed machine which would probably ignore the original New York supporters of Lincoln, or in any wise refer to local matters. Bryant had been partial to Chase for President until after Lincoln's Cooper Institute speech, and now, after election, he thought Chase, as secretary of state, would be best for the country. Lincoln's reply of "a few lines," convincing his correspondent "that whatever selection you make it will be made conscientiously," contained no word about Barney. Other letters, or parties personally interested in Barney, may have passed between the President-elect and Bryant, or Chase. Indeed, Lincoln confessed to Weed that he had received telegrams and visits from prominent Republicans, warning him against the Albany editor's efforts to forestall important state appointments, but no clue is left to identify them. The mystery deepens, too, since, whatever was done, came without Barney's suggestion or knowledge.[739]

[Footnote 736: New York Tribune, editorial, April 2, 1861.]

[Footnote 737: "'It was worth the journey to the East,' said Mr. Lincoln, 'to see such a man as Bryant.'"—John Bigelow, Life of William Cullen Bryant, p. 218.]

[Footnote 738: Nicolay and Hay, Abraham Lincoln, Vol. 3, p. 257.]

[Footnote 739: Thurlow Weed Barnes, Life of Thurlow Weed, Vol. 2, p. 613.]

Hiram Barney, a native of Jefferson County, a graduate of Union College in 1834, and the head of a well-known law firm, was a lawyer of high character and a Republican of Democratic antecedents, who had stood with Greeley and Bryant in opposing Seward at Chicago, and whose appointment to the most important federal office in the State meant mischief for Weed.[740] In its effect it was not unlike President Garfield's selection of William H. Robertson for the same place; and, although it did not at once result so disastrously to Weed as Robertson's appointment did to Conkling twenty years later, it gave the editor's adversaries vantage ground, which so seriously crippled the Weed machine, that, in the succeeding November, George Opdyke, a personal enemy of Thurlow Weed,[741] was nominated and elected mayor of New York City.

[Footnote 740: "Hiram Barney belongs to the Van Buren Democratic Buffalo Free-soil wing of the Republican party. He studied law with C.C. Cambreling and practised it with Benjamin F. Butler. For President he voted for Jackson, for Van Buren in 1840 and 1848, for Hale in 1852, and for Fremont and Lincoln. He was also a delegate to the Buffalo convention of 1848; so that as an out-and-out Van Buren Democratic Free-soil Republican, Barney is a better specimen than Van Buren himself."—New York Herald, March 28, 1861.

"Mr. Barney's quiet, unostentatious bearing has deprived him of the notoriety which attaches to most of our politicians of equal experience and influence. Nevertheless, he is well known to the Republican party and universally respected as one of its foremost and most intelligent supporters."—New York Evening Post, March 27, 1861.]

[Footnote 741: Thurlow Weed Barnes, Life of Thurlow Weed, Vol. 1, p. 528; Ibid., Vol. 2, p. 322.]

At the conference of the President and New York senators, Seward, accepting the inevitable, received Lincoln's announcement of Barney's appointment in chilling silence. Without openly disclosing itself, the proposed step had been the cause of much friction, and was yet to be opposed with coolness and candour,[742] but Lincoln's firmness in declaring that Barney was a man of integrity who had his confidence, and that he had made the appointment on his own responsibility and from personal knowledge,[743] impressed his hearers with the belief that, with whatever disfavour Seward listened, he had practically surrendered to the will of his superior. Another scene occurred, as the interview proceeded, which also indicated the master spirit. After reviewing the extended list of names presented for collectors and other officers, Seward expressed the wish that the nominations might be sent forthwith to the Senate. The embarrassed senators, unprepared for such haste, found in the secretary of the navy, who had accompanied the President on the latter's invitation, a ready opponent to such a plan because other members of the Cabinet had been wholly ignored. Welles inquired if the secretary of the treasury and attorney-general had been consulted, insisting that a proper administration of the departments made their concurrence in the selection of competent subordinates upon whom they must rely, not only proper but absolutely necessary. Seward objected to this as unnecessary, for these were New York appointments, he said, and he knew better than Chase and Bates what was best in that State for the party and the Administration. The President, however, agreed with the secretary of the navy, declaring that nothing conclusive would be done until he had advised with interested heads of departments. "With this," says Welles, "the meeting soon and somewhat abruptly terminated."[744] So far as it related to the distribution of patronage, this conference, held early in March, settled nothing beyond Barney's appointment; as to the question whether Seward was President or Premier, however, the New Yorker soon learned that he was to have influence with his chief only by reason of his assiduous attention to the public business and his dexterity and tact in promoting the views of the President.[745]

[Footnote 742: "Strong protests against Barney have been received within the last twenty-four hours."—New York Herald, March 14, 1861.]

[Footnote 743: Gideon Welles, Lincoln and Seward, p. 72.]

[Footnote 744: Gideon Welles, Lincoln and Seward, p. 73.]

[Footnote 745: "Executive skill and vigour are rare qualities. The President is the best of us." Seward's letter to his wife.—F.W. Seward, Life of W.H. Seward, Vol. 2, p. 590.]

To the outsider, the appointment of Barney looked, for the moment, like a substantial defeat for Seward. "The mighty struggle," said the Herald, "is for the possession of the New York appointments, and the strife is deadly and bitter."[746] The anti-Weed forces, reinforced by the arrival of Greeley,[747] the coming of Barney,[748] and the persistence of Harris,[749] were elated over reported changes in the Weed slate, believing the fruit of their long labours was about to come at last, but from the sum-total of the nominations, made day by day, it appeared that while several attaches of the Tribune's staff had been recognised,[750] Seward had secured all the important offices save collector of the port.[751] During this turmoil the Secretary's unfailing calmness was not disturbed, nor his uniform courtesy ruffled.

[Footnote 746: New York Herald, March 30, 1861.]

[Footnote 747: "Thurlow Weed patched up the New York appointments and left this morning. Greeley arrived about the same time and has been sponging Weed's slate at an awful rate."—Ibid., March 26.]

[Footnote 748: "Barney arrived this morning in response to a summons from the President and the secretary of the treasury."—Ibid., April 1.]

[Footnote 749: "Senator Harris has proved himself more than a match for Weed."—Ibid., April 4.]

[Footnote 750: "Thus far four attaches of the Tribune have been appointed.... These appointments except the last were Mr. Lincoln's regardless of Mr. Seward, who bears the Tribune no love."—Ibid., March 29.]

[Footnote 751: "Seward secures all the important offices save the collectorship, which was given to Greeley."—New York Herald, March 30, 1861.]

Seward never forgot a real friend. Out of thirty-five diplomatic posts carrying a salary of five thousand dollars and upward, the Empire State was credited with nine; and, of these, one, a minister plenipotentiary, received twelve thousand dollars, and seven ministers resident, seventy-five hundred each. Seward, with the advice of Thurlow Weed, filled them all with tried and true supporters. Greeley, who, for some time, had been murmuring about the Secretary's appointments, let fly, at last, a sarcastic paragraph or two about the appointment of Andrew B. Dickinson, the farmer statesman of Steuben, which betrayed something of the bitterness existing between the Secretary of State and the editor of the Tribune. For more than a year no such thing had existed as personal relations. Before the spring of 1860 they met frequently with a show of cordiality, and, although the former understood that the latter boasted an independence of control whenever they differed in opinion, the Tribune co-operated and its editor freely conferred with the New York senator during the long struggle in Congress for Kansas and free labour; but after Seward's defeat at Chicago they never met,[752] dislike displaced regard, and the Tribune, with eye and ear open to catch whatever would make its adversary wince, indulged in bitter sarcasm. William B. Taylor's reappointment as postmaster at New York City gave it opportunity to praise Taylor and criticise Seward, claiming that the former, who had held office under Buchanan, though an excellent official, was not a Republican. This proved so deep a thrust, arraying office-seekers and their friends against the Secretary and Thurlow Weed, that Greeley kept it up, finding some appointees inefficient, and the Republicanism of others insufficient.

[Footnote 752: "In the spring of 1859, Governor Seward crossed the Atlantic, visiting Egypt, traversing Syria, and other portions of Asia Minor as well as much of Europe. Soon after his return he came one evening to my seat in Dr. Chapin's church,—as he had repeatedly done during former visits to our city,—and I now recall this as the last occasion on which we ever met."—Horace Greeley, Recollections of a Busy Life, p. 321.]

To the former class belonged the minister resident to Nicaragua. Dickinson had wearied of a farmer's life,[753] and Seward, who often benefited by his ardent and influential friendship, bade him make his own selection from the good things he had to offer. More than ordinary reasons existed why the Secretary desired to assist the Steuben farmer. Dickinson served in the State Senate throughout Seward's two terms as governor, and during these four years he had fearlessly and faithfully explained and defended Seward's recommendation of a division of the school fund, which proved so offensive to many thousand voters in New York. Indeed, it may be said with truth, that Seward's record on that one question did more to defeat him at Chicago than all his "irrepressible conflict" and "higher-law" declarations. It became the fulcrum of Curtin's and Lane's aggressive resistance, who claimed that, in the event of his nomination, the American or Know-Nothing element in Pennsylvania and Indiana would not only maintain its organisation, but largely increase its strength, because of its strong prejudices against a division of the school fund.

[Footnote 753: "'Bray Dickinson,' as he was generally and familiarly called, whose early education was entirely neglected but whose perceptions and intuitions were clear and ready, was an enterprising farmer,—too enterprising, indeed, for he undertook more than he could accomplish. His ambition was to be the largest cattle and produce grower in his county (Steuben). If his whole time and thoughts had been given to farming, his anticipations might have been realised, but, as it was, he experienced the fate of those who keep too many irons in the fire. In 1839 he was elected to the State Senate, where for four years he was able, fearless, and inflexibly honest. On one occasion a senator from Westchester County criticised and ridiculed Dickinson's language. Dickinson immediately rejoined, saying that while his difficulty consisted in a want of suitable language with which to express his ideas, his colleague was troubled with a flood of words without any ideas to express."—Thurlow Weed Barnes, Life of Thurlow Weed, Vol. 1, pp. 441, 442.]

Dickinson met this issue squarely. He followed the powerful Pennsylvanian and Indianian from delegation to delegation, explaining that Seward had sought simply to turn the children of poor foreigners into the path of moral and intellectual cultivation pursued by the American born,—a policy, he declared, in which all Republicans and Christian citizens should concur. He pictured school conditions in New York City in 1840, the date of Seward's historic message; he showed how prejudices arising from differences of language and religion kept schoolhouses empty and slum children ignorant, while reform schools and prisons were full. Under these circumstances, thundered the Steuben farmer, Seward did right in recommending the establishment of schools in which such children might be instructed by teachers speaking the same language with themselves, and professing the same faith.

This was the sort of defence Seward appreciated. His recommendation had not been the result of carelessness or inadvertence, and, although well-meaning friends sought to excuse it as such, he resented the insinuation. "I am only determined the more," he wrote, "to do what may be in my power to render our system of education as comprehensive as the interests involved, and to provide for the support of the glorious superstructure of universal suffrage,—the basis of universal education."[754] In his defence, Dickinson maintained the excellence of Seward's suggestion, and it deeply angered the Steuben farmer that the Tribune's editor, who knew the facts as well as he, did not also attempt to silence the arguments of the two most influential Lincoln delegates, who boldly based their opposition, not upon personal hostility or his advanced position in Republican faith, but upon what Greeley had known for twenty years to be a perversion of Seward's language and Seward's motives.

[Footnote 754: F.W. Seward, Life of W.H. Seward, Vol. 1, p. 503.]

In the Secretary's opinion Dickinson's bold defiance of the rules of grammar and spelling did not weaken his natural intellectual strength; but Greeley, whom the would-be diplomat, with profane vituperation, had charged at Chicago with the basest ingratitude,[755] protested against such an appointment to such an important post. "We have long known him," said the Tribune, "as a skilful farmer, a cunning politician, and a hearty admirer of Mr. Seward, but never suspected him of that intimate knowledge of the Spanish language which is almost indispensable to that country, which, just at this moment, from the peculiar designs of the Southern rebels, is one of the most important that the secretary of state has to fill."[756] Dickinson recognised the odium that would attach to Seward because of the appointment, and in a characteristic letter he assured the Secretary of State that, whatever Greeley might say, he need have no fear of his ability to represent the government efficiently at the court of Nicaragua.[757]

[Footnote 755: Thurlow Weed Barnes, Life of Thurlow Weed, Vol. 2, p. 273.]

[Footnote 756: New York Tribune, March 29, 1861.]

[Footnote 757: "Hornby, April 3, 1861. Dear Seward: I shall have to take a Gentleman with me that can speak the Spanish language and correct bad English. That being well done I can take care of the ballance [Transcriber's Note: so in original] Greeley to the contrary notwithstanding.... You have much at stake in my appointment as it is charged (and I know how justly) to your account."—Unpublished letter in files of State Department.]

James S. Pike's selection for minister resident to The Hague seemed to contradict Greeley's declaration that he neither asked nor desired the appointment of any one. For years Pike, "a skilful maligner of Mr. Seward,"[758] had been the Washington representative of the Tribune, and the belief generally obtained that, although Pike belonged to Maine and was supported by its delegation in Congress, the real power behind the throne lived in New York. Nevertheless, the Tribune's editor, drifting in thought and speech in the inevitable direction of his genius, soon indicated that he had had no personal favours to ask.

[Footnote 758: Thurlow Weed Barnes, Life of Thurlow Weed, Vol. 2, p. 326.]

Seward's appointment as secretary of state chilled Greeley's love for the new Administration.[759] The Tribune's editor seems never to have shown an exalted appreciation of Abraham Lincoln. Although they served together in Congress, and, for twenty years, had held to the same political faith, Greeley, apparently indifferent to his colleague's success, advocated, in 1858, the return of Stephen A. Douglas to the United States Senate, because of his hostility to the Lecompton policy of the Buchanan administration, and it was intimated that this support, backed by his powerful journal, may have resulted in Douglas' carrying the Legislature against Lincoln. In 1860, Greeley favoured Bates for President. He was not displeased to have Lincoln nominated, but his battle had been to defeat Seward, and when Lincoln turned to Seward for secretary of state, which meant, as Greeley believed, the domination of the Weed machine to punish his revolt against Seward, Greeley became irretrievably embittered against the President.

[Footnote 759: "I am charged with having opposed the selection of Governor Seward for a place in President Lincoln's Cabinet. That is utterly, absolutely false, the President himself being my witness. I might call many others, but one such is sufficient."—New York Tribune, signed editorial, July 25, 1861.]

It is doubtful if Lincoln and Greeley, under any circumstances, could have had close personal relations. Lack of sympathy because they did not see things alike must have kept them apart; but Seward's presence in the Cabinet undoubtedly limited Greeley's intercourse with the President at a time when frequent conferences might have avoided grave embarrassments. His virile and brilliant talents, which turned him into an independent and acute thinker on a wide range of subjects, always interested his readers, giving expression to the thoughts of many earnest men who aided in forming public opinion in their neighbourhoods, so that it may be said with truth, that, in 1860 and 1861, everything he wrote was eagerly read and discussed in the North. "Notwithstanding the loyal support given Lincoln throughout the country," says McClure, "Greeley was in closer touch with the active, loyal sentiment of the people than even the President himself."[760] His art of saying things on paper seemed to thrill people as much as the nervous, spirited rhetoric of an intense talker. With the air of lofty detachment from sordid interests, his sentences, clear and rapid, read like the clarion notes of a peroration, and impressed his great audiences with an earnestness that often carried conviction even to unwilling listeners.

[Footnote 760: Alex. K. McClure, Lincoln and Men of War Times, p. 295.]

Nevertheless, the Tribune's columns did not manifest toward the Administration a fine exhibition of the love of fair play. In the hottest moment of excitement growing out of hostilities, it patriotically supported the most vigorous prosecution of the war, and mercilessly criticised its opponents; but Greeley would neither conform to nor silently endure Lincoln's judgment, and, as every step in the war created new issues, his constant criticism, made through the columns of a great newspaper, kept the party more or less seriously divided, until, by untimely forcing emancipation, he inspired, despite the patient and conciliatory methods of Lincoln, a factious hostility to the President which embarrassed his efforts to marshal a solid North in support of his war policy. Greeley was a man of clean hands and pure heart, and, at the outset, it is probable that his attempted direction of Lincoln's policy existed without ill-feeling; yet he was a good hater, and, as the contest went on, he drifted into an opposition which gradually increased in bitterness, and, finally, led to a temporary and foolish rebellion against the President's renomination. Meantime, the great-hearted Lincoln, conning the lesson taught by the voice of history, continued to practise the precept,

"Saying, What is excellent, As God lives, is permanent."



A POLITICAL HISTORY

OF THE

STATE OF NEW YORK

BY

DeALVA STANWOOD ALEXANDER, A.M., LL.D.

Member of Congress, Formerly United States Attorney for the Northern District of New York

VOL. III

1861-1882



NEW YORK HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY 1909

COPYRIGHT, 1909, BY HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY

Published, September, 1909

THE QUINN & BODEN CO. PRESS RAHWAY, N.J.



CONTENTS

VOL. III

CHAPTER PAGE

I. THE UPRISING OF THE NORTH. 1861 1

II. NEW PARTY ALIGNMENTS. 1861 13

III. "THE MAD DESPERATION OF REACTION." 1862 31

IV. THURLOW WEED TRIMS HIS SAILS. 1863 53

V. GOVERNOR SEYMOUR AND PRESIDENT LINCOLN. 1863 61

VI. SEYMOUR REBUKED. 1863 73

VII. STRIFE OF RADICAL AND CONSERVATIVE. 1864 84

VIII. SEYMOUR'S PRESIDENTIAL FEVER. 1864 98

IX. FENTON DEFEATS SEYMOUR. 1864 115

X. A COMPLETE CHANGE OF POLICY. 1865 127

XI. RAYMOND CHAMPIONS THE PRESIDENT. 1866 136

XII. HOFFMAN DEFEATED, CONKLING PROMOTED. 1866 150

XIII. THE RISE OF TWEEDISM. 1867 172

XIV. SEYMOUR AND HOFFMAN. 1868 189

XV. THE STATE CARRIED BY FRAUD. 1868 208

XVI. INFLUENCE OF MONEY IN SENATORIAL ELECTIONS. 1869 219

XVII. TWEED CONTROLS THE STATE. 1869-70 223

XVIII. CONKLING DEFEATS FENTON. 1870 232

XIX. TWEED WINS AND FALLS. 1870 240

XX. CONKLING PUNISHES GREELEY. 1871 250

XXI. TILDEN CRUSHES TAMMANY. 1871 265

XXII. GREELEY NOMINATED FOR PRESIDENT. 1872 276

XXIII. DEFEAT AND DEATH OF GREELEY. 1872 291

XXIV. TILDEN DESTROYS HIS OPPONENTS. 1873-4 305

XXV. RIVALRY OF TILDEN AND CONKLING. 1875 321

XXVI. DEFEAT OF THE REPUBLICAN MACHINE. 1876 332

XXVII. TILDEN ONE VOTE SHORT. 1876 340

XXVIII. CONKLING AND CURTIS AT ROCHESTER. 1877 358

XXIX. THE TILDEN REGIME ROUTED. 1877 378

XXX. GREENBACKERS SERVE REPUBLICANS. 1878 389

XXXI. REMOVAL OF ARTHUR AND CORNELL. 1878-9 399

XXXII. JOHN KELLY ELECTS CORNELL. 1879 411

XXXIII. STALWART AND HALF-BREED. 1880 428

XXXIV. TILDEN, KELLY, AND DEFEAT. 1880 447

XXXV. CONKLING DOWN AND OUT. 1881 464

XXXVI. CLEVELAND'S ENORMOUS MAJORITY. 1881-2 483



A POLITICAL HISTORY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK



CHAPTER I

THE UPRISING OF THE NORTH

1861

While politicians indecently clamoured for office, as indicated in the concluding chapter of the preceding volume, President Lincoln, whenever escape from the patronage hunters permitted, was considering the wisdom of provisioning Fort Sumter. Grave doubt obtained as to the government's physical ability to succour the fort, but, assuming it possible, was it wise as a political measure? The majority of the Cabinet, including Seward, voted in the negative, giving rise to the report that Sumter would be abandoned. Union people generally, wishing to support the brave and loyal action of Major Anderson and his little band, vigorously protested against such an exhibition of weakness, and the longer the Government hesitated the more vigorously the popular will resented such a policy. Finally, on March 29, in spite of General Scott's advice and Secretary Seward's opinion, the President, guided by public sentiment, directed a relief expedition to be ready to sail as early as April 6.

Meanwhile a Confederate constitution had been adopted, a Confederate flag raised over the capitol at Montgomery, and a Confederate Congress assembled, which had authorised the enlistment of 100,000 volunteers, the issue of $1,000,000 in treasury notes, and the organisation of a navy. To take charge of military operations at Charleston, the Confederate government commissioned Pierre T. Beauregard a brigadier-general and placed him in command of South Carolina.

Beauregard quickly learned of Lincoln's decision to relieve Sumter, and upon the Confederate authorities devolved the grave responsibility of reducing the fort before the relief expedition arrived. In discussing this serious question Robert Toombs, the Confederate secretary of state, did not hesitate to declare that "the firing upon it at this time is suicide, murder, and will lose us every friend at the North. You will wantonly strike a hornet's nest which extends from mountain to ocean, and legions now quiet will swarm out and sting us to death. It is unnecessary; it puts us in the wrong; it is fatal."[761]

[Footnote 761: Pleasant A. Stovall, Life of Robert Toombs, p. 226.]

Nevertheless, Jefferson Davis, already overborne by pressure from South Carolina, ordered Beauregard to demand its evacuation, and, if refused, "to reduce it."[762] Answering Beauregard's aides, who submitted the demand on the afternoon of April 11, Anderson refused to withdraw, adding, "if you do not batter the fort to pieces about us, we shall be starved out in a few days."[763] To this message the Confederate Secretary of War replied: "Do not desire needlessly to bombard Fort Sumter. If Major Anderson will state the time at which, as indicated by him, he will evacuate, and agree in the meantime he will not use his guns against us unless ours should be employed against Sumter, you are authorised thus to avoid the effusion of blood. If this or its equivalent be refused, reduce the fort as your judgment decides to be the most practicable."[764] Four aides submitted this proposition at a quarter before one o'clock on the morning of April 12, to which Anderson, after conferring two hours and a half with his officers, replied, "I will evacuate by noon on the 15th instant, and I will not in the meantime open fire upon your forces unless compelled to do so by some hostile act against this fort or the flag of my Government, should I not receive, prior to that time, controlling instructions from my Government or additional supplies."[765]

[Footnote 762: Official Records, Vol. 1, p. 297.]

[Footnote 763: Ibid., pp. 13, 59.]

[Footnote 764: Ibid., p. 301. Davis's message to the Confederate Congress, April 29; Moore's Rebellion Record, Vol. 1, Docs. p. 171.]

[Footnote 765: Official Records, Vol. 1, pp. 14, 60.]

The aides refused these terms, and without further consultation with Beauregard notified Anderson that in one hour their batteries would open fire on the fort. Prompt to the minute, at 4.30 o'clock in the morning, a shell from Fort Johnson, signalling the bombardment to begin, burst directly over Sumter. At seven o'clock Anderson's force, numbering one hundred and twenty-eight officers, men, and non-combatant labourers, who had breakfasted upon half rations of pork and damaged rice, began returning the fire, which continued briskly at first and afterwards intermittently until the evacuation on Sunday afternoon, the 14th inst.[766]

[Footnote 766: Ibid., Vol. 1, p. 12.]

Within twenty-four hours the prophecy of Robert Toombs was practically fulfilled, for when, on Monday, April 15, President Lincoln called for 75,000 State militia to execute the laws, the people of the North rose almost as one man to support the government. "At the darkest moment in the history of the Republic," Emerson wrote, "when it looked as if the nation would be dismembered, pulverised into its original elements, the attack on Fort Sumter crystalised the North into a unit, and the hope of mankind was saved."[767]

[Footnote 767: J.E. Cabot, Life of Ralph Waldo Emerson, p. 605.]

Much speculation had been indulged respecting the attitude of New York City. It was the heart of the Union and the home of Southern sympathy. Men had argued coolly and philosophically about the right of secession, and journals of wide influence daily exhibited strong Southern leanings. Owing to business connections and social intercourse with the South, merchants had petitioned for concessions so offensive to Lincoln that Southern statesmen confidently relied upon their friendship as an important factor in dividing the North. On many platforms Daniel S. Dickinson, James T. Brady, John Cochrane, and others equally well known and influential, had held the North responsible for conditions that, it was claimed, were driving the South into secession. So recently as December 20, in a meeting of more than ordinary importance, held on Pine Street, at which Charles O'Conor presided, and John A. Dix, John J. Cisco, William B. Astor, and others of similar character were present, Dickinson declared that "our Southern brothers will reason with us when we will reason with them.... The South have not offended us.... But their slaves have been run off in numbers by an underground railroad, and insult and injury returned for a constitutional duty.... If we would remain a united people we must treat the Southern States as we treated them on the inauguration of the government—as political equals."[768]

[Footnote 768: Life and Speeches of Daniel S. Dickinson, Vol. 1, pp. 700-702.]

In a speech at Richmond on March 14 Cochrane promised that New York would sustain Virginia in any policy it adopted,[769] and on April 4 a Confederate commissioner, writing from Manhattan, reported to Jefferson Davis that two hundred of the most influential and wealthy citizens were then arranging the details to declare New York a free city. Several army officers as well as leading ship-builders, said the letter, had been found responsive, through whose assistance recruits from the ranks of the conspirators were to seize the navy yard, forts, and vessels of war, and to hold the harbor and city.[770] While nothing was known to the friends of the Union of the existence of such a conspiracy, deep anxiety prevailed as to how far the spirit of rebellion which had manifested itself in high places, extended among the population of the great metropolis.

[Footnote 769: New York Tribune, March 15, 1861.]

[Footnote 770: Letter of John W. Forsyth, MSS. Confederate Diplomatic Correspondence, April 4, 1861.]

The guns aimed at Sumter, however, quickly removed the impression that the greed of commerce was stronger than the love of country. The Stock Exchange resounded with enthusiastic cheers for Major Anderson, and generous loans showed that the weight of the financial and trade centre of the country was on the side of the national government. But more convincing proof of a solid North found expression in the spirit of the great meeting held at Union Square on Saturday, April 20. Nothing like it had ever been seen in America. Men of all ranks, professions, and creeds united in the demonstration. Around six platforms, each occupied with a corps of patriotic orators, an illustrious audience, numbering some of the most famous Democrats of the State, who had quickly discarded political prejudices, stood for hours listening to loyal utterances that were nobly illustrated by the valour of Major Anderson, whose presence increased the enthusiasm into a deafening roar of repeated cheers. If any doubt heretofore existed as to the right of coercing a State, or upon whom rested the responsibility for beginning the war, or who were the real enemies of the Union, or where prominent members of the Democratic party would stand, it had now disappeared. The partisan was lost in the patriot.

Daniel S. Dickinson travelled two hundred miles to be present at this meeting, and his attitude, assumed without qualification or reservation, especially pleased the lovers of the Union. Of all men he had retained and proclaimed his predilections for the South with the zeal and stubbornness of an unconverted Saul. Throughout the long discussion of twenty years his sympathy remained with the South, his ambitions centred in the South, and his words, whether so intended or not, encouraged the South to believe in a divided North. But the guns at Sumter changed him as quickly as a voice converted St. Paul. "It were profitless," he said, his eyes resting upon the torn flag that had waved over Sumter—"it were profitless to inquire for original or remote causes; it is no time for indecision or inaction.... I would assert the power of the government over those who owe it allegiance and attempt its overthrow, as Brutus put his signet to the death-warrant of his son, that I might exclaim with him, 'Justice is satisfied, and Rome is free.' For myself, in our federal relations, I know but one section, one Union, one flag, one government. That section embraces every State; that Union is the Union sealed with the blood and consecrated by the tears of the revolutionary struggle; that flag is the flag known and honoured in every sea under heaven; that government is the government of Washington, and Adams, and Jefferson, and Jackson; a government which has shielded and protected not only us, but God's oppressed children, who have gathered under its wings from every portion of the globe."[771]

[Footnote 771: Life, Letters, and Speeches of Daniel S. Dickinson. Vol. 2, pp. 4-7.]

Fernando Wood, until recently planning to make New York an independent city, now declared the past buried, with its political associations and sympathies, and pledged the municipality, its money and its men, to the support of the Union. "I am with you in this contest. We know no party, now."[772] Of the fifty or more speeches delivered from the several platforms, perhaps the address of John Cochrane, whose ridiculous Richmond oration was scarcely a month old, proved the most impressive. Cochrane had a good presence, a clear, penetrating voice, and spoke in round, rhetorical periods. If he sometimes illustrated the passionate and often the extravagant declaimer, his style was finished, and his fervid appeals deeply stirred the emotions if they did not always guide the reason. It was evident that he now spoke with the sincere emotion of one whose mind and heart were filled with the cause for which he pleaded. In his peroration, pointing to the torn flag of Sumter, he raised the vast audience to such a pitch of excitement that when he dramatically proclaimed his motto to be, "Our country, our whole country—in any event, a united country," the continued cheering was with great difficulty sufficiently suppressed to allow the introduction of another speaker.[773]

[Footnote 772: New York Tribune, April 22, 1861. New York Times, New York Herald, April 21.]

[Footnote 773: New York Herald, April 21, 1861.]

Of the regiments called for New York's quota was seventeen. Governor Morgan immediately communicated it to the Legislature, which authorised in a few hours the enlistment of 30,000 volunteers for two years. Instantly every drill room and armory in the State became a scene of great activity, and by April 19, four days after the call, the Seventh New York, each man carrying forty-eight rounds of ball cartridge, received an enthusiastic ovation as it marched down Broadway on its way to Washington. Thereafter, each day presented, somewhere in the State, a similar pageant. Men offered their services so much faster than the Government could take them that bitterness followed the fierce competition.[774] By July 1 New York had despatched to the seat of war 46,700 men—an aggregate that was swelled by December 30 to 120,361. Loans to the government, offered with an equally lavish hand, approximated $33,000,000 in three months.

[Footnote 774: New York Tribune, July 21, 24.]

To aid in the purchase and arming of steamships and in the movement of troops and forwarding of supplies, President Lincoln, during the excitement incident to the isolation of Washington, conferred extraordinary powers upon Governor Morgan, William M. Evarts, and Moses H. Grinnell, to whom army officers were instructed to report for orders. Similar powers to act for the Treasury Department in the disbursement of public money were conferred upon John A. Dix, George Opdyke, and Richard M. Blatchford. These gentlemen gave no security and received no compensation, but "I am not aware," wrote Lincoln, at a later day, "that a dollar of the public funds, thus confided, without authority of law, to unofficial persons, was either lost or wasted."[775]

[Footnote 775: F.W. Seward, Life of W.H. Seward, Vol. 2, p. 552.]

The Union Square meeting appointed a Union Defence Committee to raise money, provide supplies, and equip regiments. For the time this committee became the executive arm of the national government in New York, giving method to effort and concentrating the people's energies for the highest efficiency. John A. Dix, who had seen sixteen years of peace service in the regular army, equipped regiments and despatched them to Washington, while James S. Wadsworth, a man without military experience but of great public spirit, whose courage and energy especially fitted him for the work, loaded steamboats with provisions and accompanied them to Annapolis. Soon afterwards Dix became a major-general of volunteers, while Wadsworth, eager for active service, accepted an appointment on General McDowell's staff with the rank of major. This took him to Manassas, and within a month gave him a "baptism of fire" which distinguished him for coolness, high courage, and great capacity. On August 9 he was made a brigadier-general of volunteers, thus preceding in date of commission all other New Yorkers of similar rank not graduates of West Point.

A few weeks later Daniel E. Sickles, no less famous in the political arena, who was to win the highest renown as a fighter, received similar rank. Sickles, at the age of twenty-two, began public life as a member of the Assembly, and in the succeeding fourteen years served as corporation attorney, secretary of legation at London, State senator, and congressman. A Hunker in politics, an adept with the revolver, and fearless in defence, he had the habit of doing his own thinking. Tammany never had a stronger personality. He was not always a successful leader and he cared little for party discipline, but as an antagonist bent on having his own way his name had become a household word in the metropolis and in conventions. In the anti-slavery crusade his sympathies were Southern. He opposed Lincoln, he favoured compromise, and he encouraged the cotton States to believe in a divided North. Nevertheless, when the Union was assaulted, the soldier spirit that made him major of the Twelfth National Guards in 1852 took him to Washington at the head of the Excelsior Brigade, consisting of five regiments, fully armed and equipped, and ready to serve during the war. He reached the capital at the time when more regiments were offered than General Scott would accept, but with the energy that afterward characterised his action at Gettysburg he sought the President, who promptly gave him the order that mustered his men and put him in command.[776] Other leaders who had voiced Southern sentiments, notably John Cochrane, soon found places at the front. Indeed, those who had professed the warmest friendship for the South were among the first to speak or take up arms against it.

[Footnote 776: "He went direct to the President, and asked him, in proper language, if he approved of the petty intrigues that sought to defeat his patriotic purpose. 'I know nothing of them, General,' said the President, 'and have only this to say, that, whatever are the obstacles thrown in your way, come to me, and I will remove them promptly. Should you stand in need of my assistance to hasten the organisation of your brigade, come to me again, and I will give or do whatever is required. I want your men, General, and you are the man to lead them. Go to the Secretary of War and get your instructions immediately.'"—New York Herald, May 17, 1861.]

The Confederates, entering upon the path of revolution with the hope of a divided North, exhibited much feeling over this unanimity of sentiment. "Will the city of New York 'kiss the rod that smites her,'" asked the leading paper in Virginia, "and at the bidding of her Black Republican tyrants war upon her Southern friends and best customers? Will she sacrifice her commerce, her wealth, her population, her character, in order to strengthen the arm of her oppressors?"[777] Ten days later another influential representative of Southern sentiment, watching the proceedings of the great Union Square meeting, answered the inquiry. "The statesmen of the North," said the Richmond Enquirer, "heretofore most honoured and confided in by the South, have come out unequivocally in favor of the Lincoln policy of coercing and subjugating the South."[778] The Charleston Mercury called the roll of these statesmen in the several States. "Where," it asked, "are Fillmore, Van Buren, Cochrane, McKeon, Weed, Dix, Dickinson, and Barnard, of New York, in the bloody crusade proposed by President Lincoln against the South? Unheard of in their dignified retirement, or hounding on the fanatic warfare, or themselves joining 'the noble army of martyrs for liberty' marching on the South."[779] Other papers were no less indignant. "We are told," said the Richmond Examiner, "that the whole North is rallying as one man—Douglas, veering as ever with the popular breeze; Buchanan lifting a treacherous and time-serving voice of encouragement from the icy atmosphere of Wheatland; and well-fed and well-paid Fillmore, eating up all his past words of indignation for Southern injuries, and joining in the popular hue-and-cry against his special benefactors."[780] The Enquirer, speaking of Daniel S. Dickinson as "the former crack champion of Southern Rights," sneered at his having given his "adhesion to Lincoln and all his abolition works."[781] To the South which believed in the constitutional right of secession, the contest for the Union was a war of subjugation, and whoever took part in it was stigmatised. "The proposition to subjugate," said the Examiner, "comes from the metropolis of the North's boasted conservatism, even from the largest beneficiary of Southern wealth—New York City."[782]

[Footnote 777: Richmond Examiner, April 15, 1861.]

[Footnote 778: April 26, 1861.]

[Footnote 779: April 23, 1861.]

[Footnote 780: April 24, 1861.]

[Footnote 781: April 22, 1861.]

[Footnote 782: April 30, 1861.]

In the midst of the patriotic uprising of the North, so disappointing and surprising to the South, an event occurred that cast a deep shadow over New York in common with the rest of the country. The press, presumably voicing public opinion, demanded that the army begin the work for which it was organised. Many reasons were given—some quixotic, some born of suspicion, and others wholly unworthy their source. The New York Tribune, in daily articles, became alarmingly impatient, expressing the fear that influences were keeping the armies apart until peace could be obtained on humiliating terms to the North.[783] Finally, on June 27, appeared a four-line, triple-leaded leader, printed in small capitals, entitled "The Nation's War-Cry." It was as mandatory as it was conspicuous. "Forward to Richmond! Forward to Richmond! The Rebel Congress must not be allowed to meet there on the 20th of July! By that date the place must be held by the National Army!"[784] This war-cry appeared from day to day with editorials indicating a fear of Democratic intrigue, and hinting at General Scott's insincerity.[785]

[Footnote 783: June 24, 1861.]

[Footnote 784: Ibid., June 27.]

[Footnote 785: "Do you pretend to know more about military affairs than General Scott? ask a few knaves, whom a great many simpletons know no better than to echo. No, Sirs! we know very little of the art of war, and General Scott a great deal. The real question—which the above is asked only to shuffle out of sight—is this: Does General Scott contemplate the same ends, and is he animated by like impulses and purposes, with the great body of the loyal, liberty-loving people of this country? Does he want the Rebels routed, or would he prefer to have them conciliated?"—Ibid., July 1, 1861.]

General Scott did not approve a battle at that time. He thought the troops insufficiently drilled and disciplined. On the other hand, the President argued that a successful battle would encourage the country, maintain the unanimity of the war sentiment, and gain the respect of foreign governments. General McDowell had 30,000 men in the vicinity of Bull Run, Virginia, of whom 1,600 were regulars—the rest, for the most part, three months' volunteers whose term of enlistment soon expired. At Martinsburg, General Patterson, a veteran of two wars, commanded 20,000 Federal troops. Opposed to the Union forces, General Beauregard had an effective army of 22,000, with 9,000 in the Shenandoah Valley under command of Joseph E. Johnston. In obedience to the popular demand McDowell moved his troops slowly toward Beauregard's lines, and on Sunday, July 21, attacked with his whole force, gaining a complete victory by three o'clock in the afternoon. Meantime, however, Johnston, having eluded Patterson, brought to the field at the supreme moment two or three thousand fresh troops and turned a Confederate defeat into a Union rout and panic.[786]

[Footnote 786: Of 49 regiments engaged, 19 were from New York, and of the 3,343 killed, wounded, and missing, 1,230 were New Yorkers.—Official Records, Series 1, Vol. 2, pp. 314, 315, 351, 387, 405, 426.]

After coolness and confidence had displaced the confusion of this wild stampede, it became clear that the battle of Bull Run had been well planned, and that for inexperienced and undisciplined troops McDowell's army had fought bravely. It appeared plain that had Patterson arrived with 2,300 fresh troops instead of Johnston, the Confederates must have been the routed and panic-stricken party. To the North, however, defeat was the source of much shame. It seemed a verification of the Southern boast that one Confederate could whip two Yankees, and deepened the conviction that the war was to be long and severe. Moreover, fear was expressed that it would minimise the much desired sympathy of England and other foreign governments. But it brought no abatement of energy. With one voice the press of the North demanded renewed activity, and before a week had elapsed every department of government girded itself anew for the conflict.[787] The vigour and enthusiasm of this period have been called a second uprising of the North, and the work of a few weeks exhibited the wonderful resources of a patriotic people.

[Footnote 787: See the New York Tribune, Herald, Times, World, Evening Post, July 22, 23, 25, and later dates.]



CHAPTER II

NEW PARTY ALIGNMENTS

1861

The battle of Bull Run fomented mutterings, freighted with antagonism to the war. Certain journals violently resented the suspension of the writ of habeas corpus, while the Act of Congress, approved August 3, providing for the freedom of slaves employed in any military or naval service, called forth such extreme denunciations that the United States grand jury for the Southern District of New York asked the Court if the authors were subject to indictment. "These newspapers,"[788] said the foreman, "are in the frequent practice of encouraging the rebels now in arms against the Federal Government by expressing sympathy and agreement with them, the duty of acceding to their demands, and dissatisfaction with the employment of force to overcome them. Their conduct is, of course, condemned and abhorred by all loyal men, but the grand jury will be glad to learn from the Court that they are also subject to indictment and condign punishment." The Postmaster-General's order excluding such journals from the mails intensified the bitterness. The arrests of persons charged with giving aid and comfort to the enemy also furnished partisans an opportunity to make people distrustful of such summary methods by magnifying the danger to personal liberty. In a word, the Bull Run disaster had become a peg upon which to hang sympathy for the South.[789]

[Footnote 788: New York Journal of Commerce, News, Day-Book, Freeman's Journal, Brooklyn Eagle.—Appleton's Cyclopaedia, 1861, p. 329.]

[Footnote 789: "I have had a conversation this morning with a prominent Democrat, who is entirely devoted to sustaining the government in the present struggle. He informs me that the leaders of that party are opposed to the war and sympathise with the South; that they keep quiet because it will not advance their views to move just now." Letter of William Gray, dated September 4, to Secretary Chase.—Chase Papers, MS.]

Differences likewise appeared among Republicans. The Weed and anti-Weed factions still existed, but these divisions now grew out of differences far deeper than patronage. After the bombardment of Fort Sumter, Thurlow Weed desired the conflict conducted on lines that would unite the North into one party responding to the cry of "Union, now and forever." He believed this might be done and that rebellion could thus be confined to the extreme cotton region, if the loyal element in the Border States was cherished and representatives of all parties were permitted to participate in civil as well as military affairs. To this end he sought to avoid the question of emancipation, cordially approving the President's course in modifying Fremont's proclamation of the preceding August, which liberated the slaves of traitorous owners in Missouri. Weed pushed his contention to the extreme. Following the spirit of his rejected compromise he insisted that every act of the Government should strengthen and encourage the Union men of the Border States, among which he included North Carolina and Tennessee, and he bitterly resented the policy of urging the army, hastily and without due preparation, to fight "political battles" like that of Bull Run. On the other hand, the radical anti-slavery element of the country, led by Secretary Chase in the Cabinet, by Senator Sumner in Congress, and backed by Horace Greeley in the Tribune, disliked the President's policy of trying to conciliate Kentucky and other Border States by listening to the demands of slavery. This factional difference became doubly pronounced after Lincoln's modification of the Fremont proclamation.

Notwithstanding Democratic criticisms and Republican differences, however, the supporters of Lincoln, anxious to teach the seceding States an object lesson in patriotism, desired to unite both parties into one Union organisation, pledged to the vigorous prosecution of the war and the execution of the laws in all parts of the country. To Republicans this plan looked easy. Most people professed to favour the preservation of the Union, and thousands of young men irrespective of party had enlisted for the suppression of armed rebellion. Moreover, a union of parties at such a critical moment, it was argued, would be more helpful in discouraging the South than victory on the battlefield. Accordingly the Republican State Committee proposed to the Democrats early in August that in the election to occur on November 4 a single ticket be nominated, fairly representative of all parties upon a simple war platform.

About Dean Richmond, chairman of the Democratic State Committee, still clustered Peter Cagger, William B. Ludlow, Sanford E. Church, and other Soft leaders, with Horatio Seymour substantially in control. These men had not participated in the Union Square meeting on April 20, nor had their sentiments been voiced since the fall of Fort Sumter; but it was well known that their views did not coincide with those of Daniel S. Dickinson, John A. Dix, James T. Brady, Greene C. Bronson, and other leaders of the Hards. Richmond's reply, therefore, was not disappointing. He admitted the wisdom of filling public offices with pure and able men who commanded the confidence of the people, and suggested, with a play of sarcasm, that if such an example were set in filling Federal offices, it would probably be followed in the selection of State officers. But the politics of men in office, he continued, was of little importance compared to sound principles. Democrats would unite with all citizens opposed to any war and equally to any peace which is based upon the idea of the separation of these States, and who regard it the duty of the Federal government at all times to hold out terms of peace and accommodation to the dissevered States.

"Our political system," he continued, "was founded in compromise, and it can never be dishonourable in any Administration to seek to restore it by the same means. Above all, they repel the idea that there exists between the two sections of the Union such an incompatibility of institutions as to give rise to an irrepressible conflict between them, which can only terminate in the subjugation of one or the other. Repelling the doctrine that any State can rightfully secede from the Union, they hold next in abhorrence that aggressive and fanatical sectional policy which has so largely contributed to the present danger of the country. They propose, therefore, to invite to union with them all citizens of whatever party, who, believing in these views, will act with them to secure honest administration in Federal and State affairs, a rigid maintenance of the Constitution, economy in public expenditures, honesty in the award of contracts, justice to the soldier in the field and the taxpayer at home, and the expulsion of corrupt men from office."[790]

[Footnote 790: New York Herald, August 9, 1861.]

It was hardly to be expected, perhaps, that Dean Richmond and other representatives of a great party would be willing, even if moved by no other motive than a love of country, to abandon a political organisation that had existed for years, and that had already shown its patriotism by the generous enlistment of its members; but it is doubtful if they would have proclaimed, without the guidance of a State convention, such an elaborate and positive platform of principles, had not the serious defeat at Bull Run and the action of the President in suspending the writ of habeas corpus, subjected the national Administration to severe criticism. This, at least, was the view taken by the radical Republican press, which viciously attacked the patriotism of Richmond and his associates, charging them with using the livery of Democracy to serve the cause of treason.[791]

[Footnote 791: New York Tribune, August 10.]

In the midst of these developments the Democratic State convention, made up of a larger number of old men than usual, assembled at Syracuse on September 4. It was not an enthusiastic body. The division upon national affairs plainly had a depressing influence. Francis Kernan became temporary chairman. At the Oneida bar, Kernan, then forty-five years old, had been for nearly two decades the peer of Hiram Denio, Samuel Beardsley, Ward Hunt, and Joshua Spencer. He was a forceful speaker, cool and self-possessed, with a pleasing voice and good manner. He could not be called an orator, but he was a master of the art of making a perfectly clear statement, and in defending his position, point by point, with never failing readiness and skill, he had few if any superiors. He belonged, also, to that class of able lawyers who are never too busy to take an active interest in public affairs.

In his brief address Kernan clearly outlined the position which the Democracy of the whole country was to occupy. "It is our duty," he said, "to oppose abolitionism at the North and secession at the South, which are equally making war upon our Government. Let us consign them both to a common grave. Never will our country see peace unless we do.... We care not what men are in charge of the Government, it is our duty as patriots and as Democrats to protect and preserve that Government, and resist with arms, and, if need be, with our lives, the men who seek to overthrow it; but this must be no war for the emancipation of slaves."[792]

[Footnote 792: New York Tribune, September 5, 1861.]

The vigor of Kernan as a speaker and presiding officer exaggerated by contrast the feebleness of Herman J. Redfield, the permanent president of the convention. Redfield was an old man, a mere reminiscence of the days of DeWitt Clinton, whose speech, read in a low, weak voice, was directed mainly to a defence of the sub-treasury plan of 1840 and the tariff act of 1846.[793] He professed to favour a vigorous prosecution of the war, but there were no words of reprobation for its authors, while he expressed the belief that "civil war will never preserve, but forever destroy the union of States." This was the prophecy of Reuben H. Walworth, the ex-chancellor, made at the Albany peace convention in the preceding January, and the applause that greeted the statement then, as it did at Syracuse, indicated a disposition on the part of many to favour concessions that would excuse if it did not absolutely justify secession.

[Footnote 793: "From what lodge in some vast wilderness, from what lone mountain in the desert, the convention obtained its Rip Van Winkle president, we are at a loss to conceive. He evidently has never heard of the Wilmot Proviso struggle of 1848, the compromise contest of 1850, the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854, the Lecompton constitution of 1858, nor the presidential election of 1860. It is plain that he has never even dreamed of the secession ordinances and of the fall of Sumter."—New York Tribune, September 6, 1861.

"The speech of Mr. Redfield is universally laughed at. He has completely proven that he does not belong to the present century, or, at least, that he has been asleep for the last twenty years. Barnum should deposit it among the curiosities of his shop."—New York Herald, September 5, 1861.]

The party platform, however, took little notice of the Redfield speech and the Redfield cheers. It declared that the right of secession did not anywhere or at any time exist; that the seizure of United States property and the sending out of privateers to prey on American commerce had precipitated the war; and that it was the duty of the government to put down rebellion with all the means in its power, and the duty of the people to rally about the government; but it also demanded that Congress call a convention of all the States to revise the Constitution, and that the Administration abandon the narrow platform of the Chicago convention, expel corrupt men from office, and exclude advocates of abolition from the Cabinet, declaring that it would "regard any attempt to pervert the conflict into a war for the emancipation of slaves as fatal to the hope of restoring the Union."

The debate upon the platform was destined to bring into prominence a broader loyalty than even Francis Kernan had exhibited. Arphaxed Loomis moved to restore the resolution, expunged in the committee's report, protesting against the passport system, the State police system, the suppression of free discussion in the press, and the suspension of the writ of habeas corpus. It is doubtful if the freedom of the press had been materially abridged, since restrictions upon a few newspapers, charged with giving aid and comfort to the enemy, scarcely exceeded the proscription of anti-slavery papers before the war. The suspension of the writ of habeas corpus, however, furnished better grounds for complaint. Men were apprehended, often on the telegram of Secretary Seward, and committed to prison, without any offence being charged or an examination being made. Among others arrested were two men at Malone, besides an editor of the New York News, and a crippled newsboy who sold the News. Public sentiment generally sustained the Administration in such action, but many persons, including conservative Republicans, frequently questioned the right or justice of such procedure. "What are we coming to," asked Senator Trumbull of Illinois, "if arrests may be made at the whim or the caprice of a cabinet minister?"[794] Loomis, in insisting upon his resolution, had these arbitrary arrests in mind, maintaining that it embodied the true principles of Democracy, which he was unwilling to see violated without recording a protest.

[Footnote 794: "Lieber says that habeas corpus, free meetings like this, and a free press, are the three elements which distinguish liberty from despotism. All that Saxon blood has gained in the battles and toils of two hundred years are these three things. But to-day, Mr. Chairman, every one of them is annihilated in every square mile of the republic. We live to-day, every one of us, under martial law. The Secretary of State puts into his bastille, with a warrant as irresponsible as that of Louis, any man whom he pleases. And you know that neither press nor lips may venture to arraign the government without being silenced. At this moment at least one thousand men are 'bastilled' by an authority as despotic as that of Louis, three times as many as Eldon and George III seized when they trembled for his throne. For the first time on this continent we have passports, which even Louis Napoleon pronounces useless and odious. For the first time in our history government spies frequent our cities."—Lecture of Wendell Phillips, delivered in New York, December, 1861.]

This brought to his feet Albert P. Laning of Buffalo. He was younger by a score of years than Loomis, and although never as prominent, perhaps, as the great advocate of legal reformative measures, his remarkable memory and thorough grasp of legal principles had listed him among the strong lawyers of Western New York. To the convention he was well known as a clear, forceful speaker, who had been a student of political history as well as of law, and who, in spite of his ardent devotion to his profession, had revealed, when shaping the policy of his party, the personal gifts and remarkable power of sustained argument that win admiration.

At Syracuse, in 1861, Laning, just then in his early forties, was in the fulness of his intellectual power. He had followed Douglas and favored the Crittenden Compromise, but the fall of Sumter crippled his sympathy for the South and stiffened his support of the Federal administration. Moreover, he understood the difficulty, during a period of war, of conducting an impartial, constitutional opposition to the policy of the Administration, without its degeneration into a faction, which at any moment might be shaken by interest, prejudice, or passion. The motion of Loomis, therefore, seemed to him too narrow, and he opposed it with eloquence, maintaining that it was the duty of all good men not to embarrass the Government in such a crisis. Rather than that bold rebellion should destroy the government, he said, he preferred to allow the President to take his own course. The responsibility was upon him, and the people, irrespective of party, should strengthen his hands until danger had disappeared and the government was re-established in all its strength.

Kernan did not take kindly to these sentiments. Like Loomis he resented arbitrary arrests in States removed from actual hostilities, where the courts were open for the regular administration of justice, and with a few ringing sentences he threw the delegates into wild cheering. Though brief, this speech resulted in restoring the Loomis resolution to its place in the platform, and in increasing the clamour that Kernan lead the party as a candidate for attorney-general. Kernan was not averse to taking office. For three years, from 1856 to 1859, he had been official reporter for the Court of Appeals, and in 1860 served in the Assembly. Later, he entered Congress, finally reaching the United States Senate. But in 1861 prudence prompted him to decline the tempting offer of a nomination for attorney-general, and although entreated to reconsider his determination, he stubbornly resisted, and at last forced the nomination of Lyman Tremaine of Albany, who had previously held the office.[795]

[Footnote 795: The State ticket was made up as follows: Secretary of State, David R. Floyd Jones of Queens; Judge of the Court of Appeals, George F. Comstock of Onondaga; Comptroller, George F. Scott of Saratoga; Attorney-General, Lyman Tremaine of Albany; Treasurer of State, Francis C. Brouck of Erie; Canal Commissioners, Jarvis B. Lord of Monroe, William W. Wright of Ontario; State Prison Director, William C. Rhodes of New York.]

The work of the convention did not please all members of the party. To some the drift of the speeches and resolutions seemed an encouragement to armed rebellion; to others, although jealous of individual rights, it appeared to confuse the liberty of the press with license. One paper, an able representative of the party, disclaiming any desire "to rekindle animosities by discussing its various objectionable points," felt "bound to express its heartfelt repugnance of the malignant and traitorous spirit which animates the Loomis resolution."[796] These were severe words, showing that others than Laning opposed such criticism of the President.

[Footnote 796: New York Leader, September 9, 1861.]

Dean Richmond's refusal to unite in a Union convention did not stifle the hope that many Democrats might participate in such a meeting, and to afford them an opportunity a People's convention met at Wieting Hall in Syracuse, on September 11, contemporaneously with the Republican State convention. It became evident that the purpose was attained when the Democrats present declared that the banner of their former party no longer marked a place for them to muster. In character the members resembled determined Abolitionists in the forties. Its president, Thomas G. Alvord of Onondaga, had been speaker of the Assembly, a competitor of Gordon Granger for Congress, and a pronounced Hard Shell until the repeal of the Missouri Compromise drove him into the camp of the Softs. One of the delegates, James B. McKean, was soon to lead the Sixty-seventh Regiment to the field; another, Alexander S. Diven of Chemung was to enter Congress, and subsequently to distinguish himself at Antietam and Chancellorsville at the head of the One Hundred and Seventh; other participants, conspicuous in their respective localities, were to suffer bitterly and struggle bravely to maintain the Union. One delegate sung the "Star Spangled Banner," while the others, with radiant faces, broke into cheers. This was followed by several brief and vigorous speeches approving the war and the methods by which it was conducted. "There is no medium, no half way now," said one delegate, "between patriots and traitors."[797] This was the sentiment of the platform, which waived all political divisions and party traditions, declaring that the convention sought only, in this hour of national peril, to proclaim devotion to the Constitution and Union, and to defend and sustain the chosen authorities of the government at whatever cost of blood and treasure.

[Footnote 797: New York Tribune, September 10, 1861.]

Rumours of Daniel S. Dickinson's nomination had been in the air from the outset. He had been much in the public eye since the 20th of April. In his zeal for the Union, said the Tribune, "his pointed utterances have everywhere fired the hearts of patriots." Freedom from the blighting influence of slavery seemed to give him easier flight, and his criticism of the Democratic convention was so felicitous, so full of story and wit and ridicule and the fire of genuine patriotism, that his name was quickly upon every lip, and his happy, homely hits the common property of half the people of the State.[798] The mention of his name for attorney-general, therefore, evoked the most enthusiastic applause. Since the constitutional convention of 1846 it had been the custom, in the absence of a candidate for governor, to write the name of the nominee for secretary of state at the head of the ticket; but in this instance the committee deemed it wise to nominate for attorney-general first and give it to the man of first importance. The nomination proved a popular hit. Instantly Syracuse and the State were ablaze, and Republican as well as many Democratic papers prophesied that it settled the result in November. The convention professed to discard party lines and traditions, and its sincerity, thus put early to the test, did much to magnify its work, since with marked impartiality it placed upon its ticket two Hards, two Softs, one American, and four Republicans.[799]

[Footnote 798: Dickinson's Ithaca speech, delivered the day after the Democratic convention adjourned, is printed in full in the New York Tribune of September 10, 1861.]

[Footnote 799: The ticket was as follows: Attorney-general, Daniel S. Dickinson of Broome; Secretary of State, Horatio Ballard of Cortland; Comptroller, Lucius Robinson of Chemung; Treasurer, William B. Lewis of Kings; Court of Appeals, William B. Wright, Sullivan; Canal Commissioners, Franklin A. Alberger of Erie and Benjamin F. Bruce of New York; State Engineer, William B. Taylor of Oneida; State Prison Inspector, Abram B. Tappan of Westchester.]

Whenever the People's convention recessed delegates to the Republican convention immediately took control. Indeed, so closely related were the two assemblies that spectators at one became delegates to the other. Weed did not attend the convention, but it adopted his conciliatory policy. "The popular fiat has gone forth in opposition, on the one hand, to secession and disunion, whether in the shape of active rebellion, or its more insidious ally, advocacy of an inglorious and dishonourable peace; and, on the other, to everything that savors of abolition, or tends towards a violation of the guarantees of slave property provided by the Constitution."[800]

[Footnote 800: New York Herald (editorial), September 13, 1861.]

It cannot be said that the Democratic campaign opened under flattering conditions. Loomis' resolution, known as the ninth or "secession" plank, had led to serious difficulty. Men recognised that in time of war more reserve was necessary in dealing with an Administration than during a period of peace, for if the government's arm was paralysed it could not stay the arm of the public enemy. This had been the position of Laning, and it appealed strongly to Lyman Tremaine, who believed the machinations of treason had forced the Government to suspend the writ of habeas corpus, and to organise systems of passports and State police. He boldly declined, therefore, to accept a nomination as attorney-general on a platform that emphatically condemned such measures, when deemed essential to the government's safety.

Tremaine, tall, portly, and commanding, belonged to the more independent members of the party. He was not a stranger to public life. Although but forty-two years old he had been an active party worker for a quarter of a century and an office-holder since his majority. Greene County made him supervisor, district attorney, and county judge, and soon after his removal to Albany in 1854 he became attorney-general. But these honours did not break his independence. He inherited a genius for the forum, and although his gifts did not put him into the first class, his name was familiar throughout the State.

Francis C. Brouck's withdrawal soon followed Tremaine's.[801] Then Tammany repudiated the Loomis resolutions,[802] and the Albany Argus shouted lustily for war.[803] But the blow that staggered Richmond came from the candidates who caught the drift of public sentiment, and in a proclamation of few words declared "in favour of vigorously sustaining the Government in its present struggle to maintain the Constitution and the Union, at all hazards, and at any cost of blood and treasure."[804] This was the act of despair. For days they had waited, and now, alarmed by the evident change, they jumped from the plank that was sinking under them. "It is the first instance on record," said the Herald, "where the nominees of a convention openly and defiantly spit upon the platform, and repudiated party leaders and their secession heresies."[805]

[Footnote 801: Marshal M. Champlain of Allegany and William Williams of Erie were substituted for Tremaine and Brouck.]

[Footnote 802: New York Tribune, October 4, 1861.]

[Footnote 803: November 6, 1861.]

[Footnote 804: New York Herald, October 23, 1861.]

[Footnote 805: Ibid., October 23, 1861.]

Nevertheless, the difference between the great mass of Democrats and the supporters of the People's party was more apparent than real.[806] Each professed undying devotion to the Union. Each, also, favoured a vigorous prosecution of the war. As the campaign advanced the activity of the army strengthened this loyalty and minimised the criticism of harsh methods. Moreover, the impression obtained that the war would soon be over.[807] McClellan was in command, and the people had not yet learned that "our chicken was no eagle, after all," as Lowell expressed it.[808] Controversy over the interference with slavery also became less acute. John Cochrane, now commanding a regiment at the front, declared, in a speech to his soldiers, that slaves of the enemy, being elements of strength, ought to be captured as much as muskets or cannon, and that whenever he could seize a slave, and even arm him to fight for the government, he would do so.

[Footnote 806: "There are sympathisers with the secessionists still remaining in the Democratic ranks, but they compose a small portion of the party. Nine-tenths of it is probably strenuous in the determination that the constitutional authority of the government shall be maintained and enforced without compromise. This sentiment is far more prevalent and decided than it was two months ago."—New York Tribune, November 19, 1861.]

[Footnote 807: "I have now no doubt this causeless and most flagitious rebellion is to be put down much sooner than many, myself included, thought practicable."—Edwin Croswell, letter in New York Tribune, November 25, 1861.]

[Footnote 808: Political Essays, p. 94.—North American Review, April, 1864.]

In conducting the campaign the People's leaders discountenanced any criticism of the Government's efforts to restore the Union. "It is not Lincoln and the Republicans we are sustaining," wrote Daniel S. Dickinson. "They have nothing to do with it. It is the government of our fathers, worth just as much as if it was administered by Andrew Jackson. There is but one side to it."[809] As a rule the Hards accepted this view, and at the ratification of the ticket in New York, on September 20, Lyman Tremaine swelled the long list of speakers. A letter was also read from Greene C. Bronson. To those who heard James T. Brady at Cooper Institute on the evening of October 28 he seemed inspired. His piercing eyes burned in their sockets, and his animated face, now pale with emotion, expressed more than his emphatic words the loathing felt for men who had plunged their country into bloody strife.

[Footnote 809: Daniel S. Dickinson's Life, Letters, and Speeches, Vol. 2, pp. 550-551.]

Nevertheless, it remained for Daniel S. Dickinson to stigmatise the Democratic party. At the Union Square meeting he had burned his bridges. It was said he had nowhere else to go; that the Hards went out of business when the South went out of the Union; and that to the Softs he was non persona grata. There was much truth in this statement. But having once become a Radical his past affiliations gave him some advantages. For more than twenty years he had been known throughout the State as a Southern sympathiser. In the United States Senate he stood with the South for slavery, and in the election of 1860 he voted for Breckinridge. He was the most conspicuous doughface in New York. Now, he was an advocate of vigorous war and a pronounced supporter of President Lincoln. This gave him the importance of a new convert at a camp meeting. The people believed he knew what he was talking about, and while his stories and apt illustrations, enriched by a quick change in voice and manner, convulsed his audiences, imbedded in his wit and rollicking fun were most convincing arguments which appealed to the best sentiments of his hearers.[810] Indeed, it is not too much to say that Daniel S. Dickinson, as an entertaining and forceful platform speaker, filled the place in 1861 which John Van Buren occupied in the Free-soil campaign in 1848.

[Footnote 810: "I have just finished a second reading of your speech in Wyoming County, and with so much pleasure and admiration that I cannot refrain from thanking you. It is a speech worthy of an American statesman, and will command the attention of the country by its high and generous patriotism, no less than by its eloquence and power."—Letter of John K. Porter of Albany to D.S. Dickinson, August 23, 1861. Dickinson's Life, Letters, and Speeches, Vol. 2, p. 553. Similar letters were written by Henry W. Rogers of Buffalo, William H. Seward, Dr. N. Niles, and others.—Ibid., pp. 555, 559, 561.]

A single address by Horatio Seymour, delivered at Utica on October 28, proved his right to speak for the Democratic party. He had a difficult task to perform. Men had changed front in a day, and to one of his views, holding rebellion as a thing to be crushed without impairing existing conditions, it seemed imperative to divorce "revolutionary emancipators" from the conservative patriots who loved their country as it was. He manifested a desire to appear scrupulously loyal to the Government, counseling obedience to constituted authorities, respect for constitutional obligations, and a just and liberal support of the President, in whose favour every presumption should be given. The suspension of the writ of habeas corpus and the long list of arbitrary arrests had provoked Seymour as it did many conservative Republicans, but however much individual rights may be violated, he said, so long as the country is engaged in a struggle for its existence, confidence, based upon the assumption that imperative reasons exist for these unusual measures, must be reposed in the Administration. This was the incarnation of loyalty.

But Seymour closed his address with an ugly crack of the whip. Dropping his well-selected words with the skill of a practised debater, he blended the history of past wrongs with those of the present, thus harrowing his auditors into a frame of mind as resentful and passionate as his own. When the public safety permits, he said threateningly, there will be abundant time to condemn and punish the authors of injustice and wrong, whether they occupy the presidential chair or seats in the cabinet. "Let them remember the teachings of history. Despotic governments do not love the agitators that call them into existence. When Cromwell drove from Parliament the latter-day saints and higher-law men of his day, and 'bade them cease their babblings;' and when Napoleon scattered at the point of the bayonet the Council of Five Hundred and crushed revolution beneath his iron heel, they taught a lesson which should be heeded this day by men who are animated by a vindictive piety or a malignant philanthropy.... It is the boast of the Briton that his house is his castle. However humble it may be, the King cannot enter. Let it not be said that the liberties of American citizens are less perfectly protected, or held less sacred than are those of the subjects of a Crown."

The slavery question was less easily and logically handled. He denied that it caused the war, but admitted that the agitators did, putting into the same class "the ambitious man at the South, who desired a separate confederacy," and "the ambitious men of the North, who reaped a political profit from agitation." In deprecating emancipation he carefully avoided the argument of military necessity, so forcibly put by John Cochrane, and strangely overlooked the fact that the South, by the act of rebellion, put itself outside the protection guaranteed under the Constitution to loyal and law-abiding citizens. "If it be true," he said, "that slavery must be abolished to save this Union, then the people of the South should be allowed to withdraw themselves from the Government which cannot give them the protection guaranteed by its terms." Immediate emancipation, he continued, would not end the contest. "It would be only the commencement of a lasting, destructive, terrible domestic conflict. The North would not consent that four millions of free negroes should live in their midst.... With what justice do we demand that the South should be subjected to the evils, the insecurity, and the loss of constitutional rights, involved in immediate abolition?" Then, dropping into prophecy, the broad, optimistic statesmanship of the forties passed into eclipse as he declared that "we are either to be restored to our former position, with the Constitution unweakened, the powers of the State unimpaired, and the fireside rights of our citizens duly protected, or our whole system of government is to fall!"

Seymour, in closing, very clearly outlined his future platform. "We are willing to support this war as a means of restoring our Union, but we will not carry it on in a spirit of hatred, malice, or revenge. We cannot, therefore, make it a war for the abolition of slavery. We will not permit it to be made a war upon the rights of the States. We shall see that it does not crush out the liberties of the citizen, or the reserved powers of the States. We shall hold that man to be as much a traitor who urges our government to overstep its constitutional powers, as he who resists the exercise of its rightful authority. We shall contend that the rights of the States and the General Government are equally sacred."[811]

[Footnote 811: Public Record of Horatio Seymour, pp. 32-43.]

If the campaign contributed to the South a certain degree of comfort, reviving the hope that it would yet have a divided North to contend against, the election, giving Dickinson over 100,000 majority, furnished little encouragement. The People's party also carried both branches of the Legislature, securing twenty out of thirty-two senators, and seventy out of the one hundred and twenty-eight assemblymen. Among the latter, Henry J. Raymond and Thomas G. Alvord, former speakers, represented the undaunted mettle needed at Albany.

To add to the result so gratifying to the fusionists, George Opdyke defeated Fernando Wood by a small plurality for mayor of New York. Wood had long been known as a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. He talked reform and grew degenerate; he proclaimed patriotic views and held disloyal sentiments; he listened respectfully to public opinion, and defied it openly in his acts. He did not become a boss. It was ten years later before William M. Tweed centralised Tammany's power in one man. But Wood developed the system that made a boss possible. He dominated the police, he organised the lawless, he allied himself with the saloon, and he used the judiciary. In 1858, being forced out of Tammany, he retreated like a wounded tiger to Mozart Hall, organised an opposition society that took its name from the assembly room in which it met, and declared with emphasis and expletives that he would fight Tammany as long as he lived. From that moment his shadow had kept sachems alarmed, and his presence had thrown conventions into turmoil.

The arts of the card-sharper and thimble-rigger had been prodigally employed to save the candidate of Mozart Hall. Even the sachems of Tammany, to avert disaster, nominated James T. Brady, whose great popularity it was believed would draw strength from both Opdyke and Wood; but Brady refused to be used. Opdyke had been a liberal, progressive Democrat of the Free-Soil type and a pioneer Republican. He associated with Chase in the Buffalo convention of 1848 and cooeperated with Greeley in defeating Seward in 1860. He had also enjoyed the career of a busy and successful merchant, and, although fifty years old, was destined to take a prominent part in municipal politics for the next two decades. One term in the Assembly summed up his office-holding experience; yet in that brief and uneventful period jobbers learned to shun him and rogues to fear him. This was one reason why the brilliant and audacious leader of Mozart Hall, in his death struggle with an honest man, suddenly assumed to be the champion of public purity.