"Well, it is not quite so bad as that," he said. He took down his directory, and I soon discovered that he had a far more intimate knowledge of the situation than I had. He had every one marked, knew how he stood, and the list made a better showing than I had expected.

The truth is, however, that many of the strong men in Congress, especially the radicals, were against his renomination, and would have rejoiced to see some one else the nominee of the party; but they knew full well, that the great body of the people of the North were with him, and that it would be useless to attempt to prevent his renomination.

The next time I called at the White House after the convention, he reminded me of our previous conversation, and remarked that it did not turn out so badly after all.

He was reminded of a little story. A couple of Irishmen came to America and started out on foot into the country. They travelled along until they came to a piece of woods. They thought they heard a noise, but did not know what it was. They deployed on either side of the road to find out, but were unable to do so, and finally one called to the other, "Pat, Pat, let's go on; this is nothing by a domned noise." So the opposition to him, he said, was apparently nothing but a noise.

But if he never had any doubts as to his renomination, he at one time almost despaired of being re-elected, as did many of his closest and most intimate friends. The Democrats had not yet selected their candidates, and as he remarked: "At this period we had no adversary, and seemed to have no friends."

An incident in this connection is related by the late Secretary, John Hay. The President felt that the campaign was going against him, and he had made up his mind deliberately as to the course he should pursue. He resolved to lay down for himself a course of action demanded by his then conviction of duty. He wrote on the twenty-third of August the following memorandum:

"This morning, as for some days past, it seems exceedingly probable that this administration will not be re-elected. Then it will be my duty to so co-operate with the President-elect as to save the Union between the election and the inauguration; as he will have secured his election on such grounds that he cannot possibly save it afterwards."

He then folded and pasted the sheet in such manner that its contents could not be read, and as the cabinet came together he handed this paper to each member successively, requesting him to write his name across the back of it, without intimating to any member of the cabinet what the note contained. In this manner he pledged himself to accept loyally the anticipated verdict of the people against him.

Mr. Hay's diary relates what took place at the next cabinet meeting after the election, as follows:

"At the meeting of the cabinet to-day the President took out a paper from his desk and said: 'Gentlemen, do you remember last summer I asked you all to sign your names to the back of a paper of which I did not show you the inside? This is it. Now, Mr. Hay, see if you can open this without tearing it.' He had pasted it up in so singular a style that it required some cutting to get it open. He then read this memorandum (quoted above).

"The President said: 'You will remember that this was written at the time, six days before the Chicago nominating convention, when as yet we had no adversary and seemed to have no friends. I then solemnly resolved on the course of action indicated in this paper. I resolved in the case of the election of General McClellan, being certain that he would be the candidate, that I would see him and talk matters over with him. I would say, "General, the election has demonstrated that you are stronger, have more influence with the American people than I. Now let us together, you with your influence, and I with all the executive power of the Government, try to save the country. You raise as many troops as you possibly can for the final trial, and I will devote all my energies to assist and finish the war."'

"Seward said: 'And the General would have answered you, "Yes, yes," and the next day when you saw him again and pressed these views upon him, he would have said, "Yes, yes," and so on forever, and would have done nothing at all.'

"'At least,' rejoined Lincoln, 'I should have done my duty and have stood clear before my own conscience.'"

Not the least of his troubles and embarrassments during the trying period preceding his second election was the overzealous advice,— persistence, I might say—on the part of certain New Yorkers and New Englanders who seemed to think that they had the interest of the Union and the country more at heart than had Mr. Lincoln.

Horace Greeley was one of the most troublesome of this lot. He was an honest and a most loyal man, but was willing to temporize upon the most vital questions. At one time he advised that the "erring sisters" should be permitted to depart in peace. At this particular time of which I speak he had devised a plan for a peace conference, with certain prominent Confederates, Clement C. Clay, among others, to be held in Canada. Mr. Lincoln felt sure that the conference would do no good, and that the Confederates were fooling Mr. Greeley, and that they had no real power to act.

This turned out to be exactly the truth. I was with the President just as he was sending Mr. Hay to Niagara with written instructions, which were given to see that nothing which threatened the interests of the Government should be done. The President was very much annoyed, and he remarked to me: "While Mr. Greeley means right, he makes me almost as much trouble as the whole Southern Confederacy."

While, as I have previously observed, Greeley was intensely loyal to the country, yet he was so nervous and unstable in his mind that he could not resist the effort to bring about a condition of peace. I think he would have consented to almost anything in order to secure it. He was very anxious for the issuance of a proclamation abolishing slavery, and on the nineteenth of August, 1862, addressed a very arrogant open letter to President Lincoln on the subject.

Lincoln's reply was so good, so perfect, and so conclusive that I give it, as follows:

"Executive Mansion, "Washington, Friday, August 22, 1863.

"Hon. Horace Greeley:

"Dear Sir: I have just read yours of the nineteenth instant, addressed to myself through The New York Tribune.

"If there be any statements or assumptions of facts which I may know to be erroneous, I do not now and here controvert them.

"If there may be any inferences which I may to believe to be falsely drawn, I do not now and here argue against them.

"If there be perceptible in it an impatient and dictatorial tone, I waive it in deference to an old friend whose heart I have always supposed to be right.

"As to the policy 'I seem to be pursuing,' as you say, I have not meant to leave any one in doubt. I would save the Union. I would save it in the shortest way under the Constitution.

"The sooner the National authority can be restored, the nearer the Union will be—the Union as it was.

"If there be those who would not save the Union unless they could at the same time save slavery, I do not agree with them.

"If there be those who would not save the Union unless they could at the same time destroy slavery, I do not agree with them.

"My paramount object is to save the Union, and not either to save or destroy slavery.

"If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves, I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would do that.

"What I do about slavery and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union, and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union.

"I shall do less whenever I shall believe what I am doing hurts the cause, and shall do more whenever I believe doing more will help the cause.

"I shall try to correct errors when shown to be errors, and I shall adopt new views so fast as they will appear to be true views.

"I have here stated my purpose according to my view of official duty, and I intend no modifications of my oft-expressed personal wish that all men everywhere could be free.

"Yours, "A. Lincoln."

It is said that Mr. Greeley remarked after reading the letter that he had been knocked out by one letter from Mr. Lincoln, and that he "would be damned if he ever wrote him another."

There was more personal bitterness evinced against Mr. Lincoln in the campaign of 1864 than ever before or since in a Presidential campaign. He was denounced in the most intemperate language as a tyrant, a dictator, whose administration had proven a failure. A certain element of so-called "high class" New Englanders, men of the Wendell Phillips type, were particularly bitter in their denunciation. And I may remark in passing that the New England men of letters never did have a proper appreciation of the worth of Abraham Lincoln.

He was triumphantly re-elected amid the universal rejoicing of the friends of liberty throughout the North. He took the election very quietly. He apparently felt no sense of personal triumph over his opponents and those who had so bitterly attacked him during the campaign. He seemed only to have a feeling of deep gratitude to his fellow citizens who had testified their confidence in his administration. On the evening of election day, when it became evident that he was re-elected to the Presidency, in response to a serenade he said:

"I am thankful to God for this approval by the people. While deeply grateful for this mark of their confidence in me, if I know my heart, my gratitude is free from any taint of personal triumph, but I give thanks to the Almighty for this evidence of the people's resolution to stand by free government and the rights of humanity."

And again in that eloquent, simple little response which he made to the joint committee of Congress appointed to wait upon him to notify him of his second election, after the count of the electoral votes by a joint session of the Senate and House of Representatives in Congress, he said:

"With deep gratitude to my countrymen for this mark of their confidence; with a distrust of my own ability to perform the duty required under the most favorable circumstances, and now rendered doubly difficult by existing national perils; yet with a firm reliance on the strength of our free Government, and the eventual loyalty of the people to the just principles upon which it is founded, and, above all, with an unshaken faith in the Supreme Ruler of Nations, I accept this trust. Be pleased to signify this to the respective Houses of Congress."

These utterances show more clearly than any one else can describe the state of mind in which the President received his re-election, and in which he was about to enter his second term as President of the Republic. Without any personal feeling of pride, he was certain in his own mind that his re-election was necessary in order to save the Union.

I attended the second inauguration, March 4, 1865. I have a particularly vivid recollection of the scene which took place in the Senate chamber when Mr. Johnson took the oath as Vice-President. The simple truth is, and it was plain to every one present in that chamber, Mr. Johnson was intoxicated. Johnson delivered a rambling, senseless address. I sat next to Senator Lane of Indiana, and I remarked that somebody should stop him. Lane sent up a note to the Secretary of the Senate, telling him to get Johnson to cease speaking and take the oath. We felt Johnson was making an exhibition of himself in the presence of the President, the Cabinet, the Foreign Representatives, and two Houses of Congress, and a gathering of the most distinguished men of the Nation. The Secretary wrote some lines and placed them before Mr. Johnson, who did not appear to notice them. Finally he was made to understand that he must take the oath, as the time had come when the President, according to usual custom, would have to go to the east front of the Capitol to take the oath as President of the United States. Johnson, with a sort of wild sweep of his arm said, "I will take the oath, but I regard my devotion to the Union as greater evidence of my loyalty than any oath I could take."

I was close to Mr. Lincoln at the solemn moment when Chief Justice Chase administered to him the oath of office. There was a vast crowd of people, great enthusiasm and rejoicing, and the war was practically over,—a far different scene from the one which took place just four years before, when Chief Justice Taney in the same place administered the same oath. At that time there was no noisy demonstration. There was a solemn hush, as every one realized that the country was about to be plunged into one of the mightiest civil wars of all history. Indeed many men believed that there was a concerted plot to assassinate Mr. Lincoln at that time, and that he would never be permitted to enter upon the duties of his office.

I heard him deliver his second inaugural address,—one of his two greatest speeches.

The last time I saw Abraham Lincoln alive was about three weeks before his assassination, as I now recollect. He was at the White House. There had been constant rumors throughout his first term that he was in danger of some such outrage, but as the war drew to a close, with the natural bitter and resentful feeling in the South, these rumors seemed to increase. I told him what I had heard, and urged him to be careful. It did not seem to concern him much, and the substance of his reply was that he must take his chances; that he could not live in an iron box, as he expressed it, and do his duty as President of the United States.

It is difficult for one who did not live in those terrible days from 1861 to 1865 to realize the awful shock of horror that went through the whole Nation on the morning of April 15, 1865, when the message came, "Abraham Lincoln is dead." In his old home at Springfield, it seemed the whole population assembled in the public square, and the duty devolved upon me to announce to the assembled people that the great President had passed away. There was intense suppressed excitement. No one dared utter a word in disparagement of Abraham Lincoln. The crowd was in the humor for hanging to the limb of the first convenient tree any one who dared to make a slighting suggestion. It was not alone in Springfield, but it was throughout the entire North that this feeling prevailed. There was fear that the Government would go to pieces, almost that the end of the world was at hand.

Soon the news came from different sources that he was to be buried in Washington, or somewhere in the East. The people of Springfield became very much worked up. A committee was appointed to go to Washington to insist that the remains should be taken to Springfield. I was a member of this committee. We left immediately, but before we arrived at Harrisburg it had been determined that the only fitting final resting place of all that remained of the immortal Lincoln was at his old home in Springfield; and the funeral train had already left Washington. The committee waited at Harrisburg for its arrival. Through the courtesy of Governor Curtin, of Pennsylvania, we were permitted to board the train, and we accompanied the remains from there to Philadelphia, New York, Albany, Buffalo, Cleveland, Indianapolis, Chicago, and finally to Springfield. At each place the remains lay in state and were viewed by hundreds of thousands of people.

In all, the entire journey consumed some twelve days from the time the party left Washington until it arrived in Springfield. It was determined that the funeral train should follow the same route and stop at practically the same places that Lincoln visited on his way to Washington to be inaugurated as the first Republican President of the United States. The country was so wrought up no one seemed certain what was to happen; no one knew but that there would be a second and bloodier revolution, in which the Government might fall into the hands of a dictator; and it was thought the funeral trip would serve to arouse the patriotism of the people, which it did.

I never witnessed anything like the universal demonstration of sorrow, not only at every city where the remains lay in state but all during the entire route, at every little village and hamlet; even at cross-roads thousands of people would be gathered to catch a glimpse of the funeral train as it passed by. In Philadelphia the casket rested in Independence Hall. In New York I suppose not less than half a million people passed by to view the body. General Scott came down with the procession to the station, and to him I introduced our Illinois friends. His response was given in a most dignified and ponderous style: "Gentlemen, you do me great honor."

The farther west we proceeded, drawing constantly nearer to the home of Lincoln, the more wrought up the people seemed to be. In the West there were not only expressions of deep sorrow, but of vengeance as well, especially toward the South. Before the facts became fully known, it was thought that the assassination was the result of a Southern conspiracy, and there was a feeling that the whole South should be punished for the act of one of her misguided sons. The body lay in state for two days in Chicago, and then came the last stage of the journey to Springfield. It first was taken to the State House, and was afterwards placed in the old vault at the foot of the hill in Oak Ridge Cemetery, where it remained until the monument was completed. Bishop Simpson, one of the most eloquent men in the Methodist Church, and a devoted friend of Mr. Lincoln during his life, preached the funeral sermon. The services at Springfield were simple in the extreme, just as Mr. Lincoln would have wished. Steps were at once taken for the erection of the monument, which stands in Oak Ridge Cemetery to-day.

So far as I can learn, every member of the funeral party that accompanied the remains of Abraham Lincoln from Washington to Springfield, with the exception of Mr. E. F. Leonard and myself, has passed away.

It was my good fortune to know Abraham Lincoln in all the walks of life. I knew him as President, and I was permitted to know him in the sacred precincts of his family at home. I have studied the lives of the great men of the world, and I do not hesitate to say now, after nearly fifty years have passed away since his death, that Abraham Lincoln was the peer in all that makes a man great, useful, and noble, of any man in all the world's history.

CHAPTER VIII NOTABLES IN THE THIRTY-NINTH CONGRESS 1864 to 1870

I had a very active campaign for election to Congress in 1864. As I have stated elsewhere, I had, while Speaker, so framed the district that I thought it would surely be a Republican one; but very much to my surprise, it went Democratic when Mr. Swett was a candidate. For a number of reasons I was more than anxious to carry the district. First, naturally I did not want to be defeated; second, I wanted to show that it was really a Republican district, and more especially still on President Lincoln's account, I was solicitous that a Republican should be elected from the President's own district, as was President Lincoln also. The National Committee assisted a good deal, and the President himself helped whenever there was an opportunity. I was elected by a good, safe majority, and entered the Thirty-ninth Congress in December, 1865.

The Illinois delegation in the Thirty-ninth Congress, when I entered the House, while containing few members, still compared favorably with other delegations, and consisted of very good men who reflected credit on the State, and some of whom had far more than ordinary ability. General John A. Logan, of whom I have written in another part of these memoirs, was a very prominent member of the delegation and of the House. E. B. Washburne was also a leading member. He was very influential, and at one time was in a sense the leader of the House. He early became prominent as one of the intimate friends and supporters of General Grant, who, every one supposed, would be the nominee of the Republican party to succeed President Johnson. Thaddeus Stevens was the real leader on every occasion when he chose to assume that position. His whole interest, however, seemed to be concentrated on reconstruction, one of the greatest problems that has ever confronted this country, and consequently he gave little attention to general legislation. This gave Washburne quite a commanding voice in shaping the general legislation of the House.

John Wentworth was one of the best known citizens of Chicago of his day, and was closely identified with the early history of the city. He was several times a member of the House. I found him to be a capable member of the Thirty-ninth Congress, a man of influence, and I liked him very much. He was Mayor of Chicago when President Lincoln was assassinated, and I recall that he was at the station at the head of the committee when the funeral train arrived in Chicago. John Wentworth was quite a character in our State politics, but he was particularly noted as being one of the foremost citizens of his home city.

Burton C. Cook, of Ottawa, was one of the ablest men in the Illinois delegation. He was a splendid man, a man of high character, one of the leaders of the bar of the State of Illinois, and retired from Congress to become general counsel of the Northwestern Railroad. He occupied a very important place in the House, and was chairman of the Committee on the District of Columbia. He could not endure ridicule, and he was not particularly quick in argument, although a very good debater.

A rather humorous incident occurred on one occasion when he was pushing a bill to have Pennsylvania Avenue paved. Proctor Knott, from Kentucky, was then a member of the House, and one of its cleverest and wittiest speakers. I was called to the chair because Cook knew that I would take care of him the best I could in the conduct of the bill through the committee of the whole. We got along with the bill very well for a good part of the day, until Knott took the floor and made one of his incomparably funny speeches, depicting the situation on Pennsylvania Avenue, with its fine carriages and outfits, with buckles on the coachmen's hats as big as garden gates. He made so much fun of the bill that Cook, being unable to stand it, moved that the committee rise. We never heard of the bill afterwards.

S. S. Marshall, a Democrat from Southern Illinois, and prominent as such, was a member of Congress for many terms, and at one time was the leader of the minority in the House. At that time the Democrats in the House were so few in number that occasionally they were unable to secure the ayes and noes. They exercised very little influence on legislation, and were not much in evidence in debate, the main contest then being between the radical and conservative elements of the Republican party over Reconstruction.

General John F. Farnsworth of St. Charles was quite influential as a member, and a very strong man, but was particularly noted for his dauntless courage. On one occasion I saw him shake his fist in General Benjamin F. Butler's face, daring him to resent it. Butler did not resent it, as the House was in session; and, any way, excepting with his tongue, Butler was not a fighting man.

Ebon C. Ingersoll, who was familiarly called by his friends Clark Ingersoll, served in that Congress. He was a very clever man, possessed of considerable talent, and could on occasions deliver a capitally witty speech. I remember a rather ingenious passage from one of his speeches delivered when the controversy between the President and Congress was at its height. He asserted that the country was sorely afflicted; that it suffered all sorts of troubles, trials, embarrassments and difficulties. First, he said, it was afflicted with cholera, next with trichinae, and then with Andy Johnson, all in the same year, and that was more than any country could stand. Ebon C. Ingersoll was a brother of the famous Robert G. Ingersoll, the world's greatest agnostic.

Robert G. Ingersoll was one of the most eloquent men whom I have ever heard. He could utter the most beautiful sentiments clothed in language equally beautiful. Speaking of death and the hereafter one day, I heard him express himself in about the same language he afterward used on the lecture platform. It made a wonderful impression on me. He said:

"And suppose after all that death does end all? Next to eternal joy, next to being forever with those we love and those who have loved us, next to that, is to be wrapt in the dreamless drapery of eternal peace. Next to eternal life is eternal sleep. Upon the shadowy shore of death, the sea of trouble casts no wave. Eyes that have been curtained by the everlasting dark, will never know again the burning touch of tears. Lips touched by eternal silence will never speak again the broken words of grief. Hearts of dust do not break. The dead do not weep. Within the tomb no veiled and weeping sorrow sits, and in the rayless gloom is crouched no shuddering fear.

"I had rather think of those I have loved, and lost, as having returned to earth, as having become a part of the elemental wealth of the world—I would rather think of them as unconscious dust, I would rather dream of them as gurgling in the streams, floating in the clouds, bursting in the form of light upon the shores of worlds, I would rather think of them as the lost visions of a forgotten night, than to have even the faintest fear that their naked souls have been clutched by an orthodox God. I will leave my dear where Nature leaves them. Whatever flower of hope springs up in my heart, I will cherish, I will give it breath of sighs and rain of tears. But I cannot believe that there is any being in this universe who has been created for eternal pain."

Had it not been for the manner in which Robert Ingersoll outraged the members of every Christian denomination by attacking and ridiculing their beliefs, he would certainly have been called to high office in the Nation. He did not spare any denomination. Beginning with the Catholics and ending with the Baptists, he abused them all, made fun of them, and mercilessly pointed out their weak points. He was always particularly bitter against the Presbyterian Church, because, he declared, he was raised a Presbyterian, and knew more about that church than any other. The two brothers were very fond of each other, and Ebon C. never seemed to tire of talking about his brother's great talent. Robert G. was nearly broken- hearted when his brother died. One of the most touching and eloquent addresses which I have ever heard was the address he delivered on the occasion of Ebon's funeral. He stood at the head of the casket and once or twice nearly broke down. It was in that address, standing there in the presence of death, that he expressed some doubts as to the truth of his own teaching and intimated the possibility of some life beyond the grave. This was the only public occasion of which I have any knowledge in which Robert G. Ingersoll seemed to falter in his course.

We were very intimate, and it is a real pleasure to me to pay him here a tribute. He was a man of extraordinary talent and ability, one of the most lovable natures, and a man of the cleanest, most delightful home life. In many respects, I regard him as one of the greatest men of his day; certainly he was the greatest agnostic of his time, if not of all time. No one has taken his place. The very name, Agnostic, is now rarely heard. And why? Because Robert G. Ingersoll mercilessly tore down. He did not create, or build anything; he attempted to take away the beliefs in all religion, and he offered nothing in return. Hence it is that his teachings have practically died with him.

Another member of the Illinois delegation in the Thirty-ninth Congress, a well-known citizen of the State, was Anthony Thornton. He had been a member of the Supreme Court of the State, was a fine lawyer of the best type of manhood, and he enjoyed the confidence and respect of the members of the House. He resided in Shelbyville, but after retiring from Congress he decided to go to Decatur, where there was more business for a lawyer, and better opportunities. He did not succeed very well, however, because it was too late in his life to make a change and enter new fields.

A little incident connected with him occurred while I was Governor of the State. A young boy, whose parents the Judge knew, committed a burglary and was sent to the penitentiary. The parents of the boy were naturally anxious to get him out, and appealed to Judge Thornton to assist in securing his pardon. The Judge and I had served in Congress together, and, naturally, any plea bearing his endorsement would have great weight with me. Believing that the boy had been influenced by bad companions, he yielded and came to Springfield to see me. I looked the case over and finally said:

"Judge Thornton, you are an older man than I am; you were in Congress with me; you have been a Judge of the Supreme Court of the State; if you will say that you would issue this pardon if you occupied the chair I now occupy as Governor of this State, I will pardon him."

He replied: "Governor, I would not ask you to do a thing I would not do myself, to save my right arm."

Whereupon I at once issued the pardon.

"Judge," I told him, "the train will leave in a short time; go to Joliet and take the boy home with you."

He did not do this; but he thanked me very cordially and said that he would see the boy as soon as he got home. The very night the boy left the penitentiary and returned home, he committed another burglary and was immediately arrested. I happened to see an account of the crime in the papers next morning, and I cut it out and sent it to Judge Thornton, with the inquiry, "Judge, what does this mean?" He at once came to Springfield, and told me that he had been fooled in prevailing upon me to pardon the young man, and pledged me that he would follow him to the ends of the earth if necessary in order to punish him for his crime. The boy was sent back to the penitentiary and I never heard of him afterwards.

Judge Thornton was one of the most honorable of men, a man of learning and legal ability as well.

One day, before I was elected to the Thirty-ninth Congress, President Lincoln was talking with me about the different members of that body. "There is a young man by the name of Blaine now serving in Congress," said he, "who seems to be one of the brightest men in the House. His speeches are always short, always full of facts, and always forcible. I am very fond of him. He is one of the coming men of the country."

This was one of the reasons why I was early attracted to Mr. Blaine.

He was candidate for Speaker in the Forty-first Congress. I was rather zealous in his behalf, and had more or less of a prominent part in his selection. When Mr. Blaine concluded that he would be a candidate for the Speakership, a little dinner was given at Welkers', a rather famous restaurant in Washington, at which Judge Kelley, Judge Orth, the late Senator Allison, who was then a member of the House from the State of Iowa; Mr. Mercur of Pennsylvania, the gentleman at the head of the Associated Press in Washington, and myself were present. After the dinner it was given out to the press that Mr. Blaine was a candidate for Speaker. As the campaign progressed it seemed to depend on Mr. Allison and me more largely than on any other members to take care of his interests. He was elected Speaker, and I had been given to understand by him, and had so communicated to friends in Congress whom I had induced to support Mr. Blaine, that I should be consulted in the make-up of the committees. Mr. Blaine never said a word to me on the subject, but almost at the last moment wrote me this note:

"Dear Cullom:

"Which committee would you prefer, Territories or Claims?

"James G. Blaine."

I selected Territories and became chairman of that committee. Allison told me he never spoke to him in reference to committees, although he gave him important assignments.

Probably the most bitter enemy Mr. Blaine ever had in public life was Roscoe Conkling, a Senator from New York. The quarrel between Blaine and Conkling commenced in the Thirty-ninth Congress, over some very trivial matter, and continued from that time on until Blaine was nominated as the candidate of the Republican party for the Presidency, in 1884, in which contest he was defeated by Grover Cleveland.

I occupied a seat next to Mr. Conkling during the early years of my service in Congress. He was a very friendly, companionable man, especially to any one whom he did not consider a rival, and, as I was a young man just entering Congress and politics, he gave me his friendship. I was present, sitting next to Conkling, when the famous controversy in the House took place between Blaine and Conkling. During the session, from time to time, they had been quarreling. Conkling had seemed to have a little the best of the argument. Blaine became exasperated one day, and in the course of the debate gave Conkling the worst "tongue lashing" probably ever given by one man to another on the floor of the House. Conkling, although unable to reply effectively, demeaned himself with great dignity. His manners were placid and his reply was in measured terms. It was in striking contrast to what Mr. Blaine said. To use a phrase graphic if inelegant, he jumped on Conkling with both feet and literally tore him to pieces without any attempt at dignity. This controversy with Conkling probably caused the defeat of Mr. Blaine for the nomination—first, in conventions prior to 1884, and finally after he became the nominee of that year.

Blaine was a candidate for President for many years. It seemed to be his destiny, as it was that of Henry Clay, to be able to secure the nomination only when the Republican party went down in defeat, as it did for the first time since the election of Lincoln. He was beaten in the Republican National Conventions by men of mediocre ability when the party was victorious.

He was a leading candidate at the Cincinnati Convention, when Hayes was nominated. I was there and heard Ingersoll's great speech placing him in nomination. I have always felt that Blaine would have been nominated by that convention if a strong, courageous presiding officer had been in the chair. As I sat behind Mr. McPherson, the presiding officer, and watched the proceedings, I thought that if I had had that gavel in my hands there would have been no adjournment and James G. Blaine would have been nominated. An adjournment was secured, however; the lights were extinguished, and the enemies of Blaine united, and Hayes became the nominee.

But at the convention held in Chicago, in 1884, no other candidate was seriously considered, and Blaine was nominated for President and Logan for Vice-President.

I had to do much in connection with Blaine in the campaign of 1884. He was a very agreeable man so long as things went to suit him; but he did not attempt to control himself when things went at all against him. He was campaigning through Indiana, Ohio, and Illinois, in 1884; I had been on the platform with him at Massillon, Ohio, when the people would scarcely listen to any one except Mr. McKinley. It was arranged that Blaine should come from La Fayette, Indiana, to Springfield, Illinois. I was chairman of the delegation consisting of one hundred of the most prominent men of the State, selected to accompany him to Springfield. The delegation went to La Fayette, and the Adjutant-General of the State and I waited on Mr. Blaine at the residence of Mr. George Williams, who is still living and whom I have always known intimately. Mr. Blaine's son came down in response to our call, announcing that his father had retired, ill, and would not be disturbed until eight o'clock in the morning. At the hour appointed we still had difficulty in seeing him, and finally I enlisted the assistance of Mr. McKinley, who was there, and the Hon. Joseph Medill of The Chicago Tribune, to help me to prevail upon Blaine to keep his engagement. He had come to the conclusion that he ought to go back East; that he was needed there more than he was in the West. The truth was that he was trying to evade the Springfield engagement. I told him that there would be no less than a hundred thousand people from all parts of the State gathered at Springfield to see him, and it would not do to disappoint so vast a crowd. He finally consented to go, but was very ungracious about it, telling us not to disturb him during the trip from La Fayette to Springfield, and at once retired to his drawing-room.

We soon came to a city in Indiana where there was a large crowd to greet him, and following his orders, the train did not stop. He emerged from his drawing-room very angry because the train had not been stopped when a crowd was waiting to hear him. Afterwards we halted at almost every station on the line to Springfield, where we did not arrive until almost dusk. Probably a hundred thousand people had been gathered there during the day, and at least fifty thousand waited until we arrived; but it was so dark that the audience could scarcely see the speaker. He left for Chicago that night, hurrying through that city; hence to Wisconsin, I believe, making enemies rather than friends. He had gained the election by his Western tour, but lost it during his stay in New York City. "Rum, Romanism, and Rebellion," the Delmonico dinner, the old row with Conkling beginning in the Thirty-ninth Congress, caused his defeat. I told him afterwards that if he had broken his leg in Springfield and been compelled to remain as my guest there, he would have been elected. He agreed with me that he would.

Notwithstanding his defeat, however, he continued as one of the foremost leaders of the Republican party up to the time of his death. He might have been nominated at the Chicago Convention, when Mr. Harrison received the nomination the first time had he not retired to Europe, apparently so disgusted at his own defeat four years before that he had not the heart to make the race again.

I do not think Harrison ever did like Blaine, but he invited him to become the Premier of his cabinet, a position which Mr. Blaine had held for a few months under General Garfield. Harrison and Blaine never got along. As I say elsewhere in these recollections, Harrison seemed jealous of Blaine, and Blaine was not true to his chief. Mr. Blaine sent for me one evening, and I called at his house. He related to me with considerable feeling how the President had treated both his family and himself. He urged me to become a candidate for President, but I told him that I would not think of doing so. I afterwards supported Mr. Harrison for reasons personal to myself, and not because I was particularly fond of Mr. Harrison.

James G. Blaine retired to private life and died soon afterwards, a broken, disappointed man. He was one of the greatest men of his day, and was the most brilliant and probably the most popular man with the masses in the history of the Republican party.

Rutherford B. Hayes was the nineteenth President of the United States, and preceded General Garfield in that office. He was neither as great a man nor as great an orator as General Garfield, although he was a much better executive officer, and in my opinion gave a better administration than General Garfield would have given had he served the term for which he was elected. Rutherford B. Hayes was an inconspicuous member of the House, as I recollect him now. He was what I would term a very good, conscientious man, who never made any enemies; but I do not think that any one would say that he was a great man. He did not talk very much in the House, nor accomplish very much. I became quite friendly with him there. Subsequently he was nominated for Governor of Ohio, and he invited me to come to the State and campaign for him, which I did.

Thurman was his opponent, a very strong and able man, who subsequently became a Senator from Ohio, and was a nominee of the Democratic party for Vice-President. But Hayes defeated him for the Governorship, and was once re-elected. He was nominated for President at the Cincinnati Convention of 1876, when Blaine really should have been the nominee, and would have been had the permanent chairman of the convention, Edward McPherson, grasped the situation and held it with a firm hand.

McPherson, while a man of good intentions, earnest and sincere, was Clerk of the House for many years and had occupied what might be termed a subordinate position. The fact of the matter is that he permitted the convention to get away from him; an adjournment was secured, and the same night it was framed up to beat Blaine by nominating Hayes.

Hayes was just the kind of man for a compromise candidate. He was seriously handicapped all through his administration owing to the manner in which he secured the office. The Electoral Commission, an unheard-of thing, created by act of Congress, by eight to seven declared that Hayes was elected over Tilden. Very many people were of the opinion that Tilden was entitled to the office. The Electoral Commission never would have been agreed to by the Democrats had they known that Judge David Davis, of our own State, would retire from the Bench to take a place in the Senate; and it is almost certain that had Judge Davis remained on the bench he would have been a member of the Electoral Commission, and would have surely voted in favor of Tilden, which would have made him President.

While Hayes was President the "green-back craze" seemed to almost take possession of the country. I delivered an address at Rockford, Illinois, before an agricultural society, taking issue to some extent with the public sentiment of the country, and favoring sound money. The President was going through the country at that time on a speaking tour, and in the course of some of his addresses he commended what I had said. He, accompanied by General Sherman, visited Springfield, and I entertained them at the Executive Mansion.

President Hayes, himself realizing the embarrassment under which he entered the office of President, was not a candidate for renomination, and very wisely so. But as I have said, President Hayes was a good man; he made a very commendable record as President of the United States, and he was specially fortunate in the selection of his cabinet, showing rare discrimination in selecting some of the ablest men in the country as his advisers. Evarts was his Secretary of State, and John Sherman Secretary of the Treasury.

It is a rather peculiar coincidence that both James A. Garfield and R. B. Hayes were members of the Ohio delegation in the Thirty- ninth Congress, and both afterwards arrived at the Presidency.

James A. Garfield was a man of extraordinary ability. I was very intimate with him during our service in the House. He was an extremely likable man; I became very fond of him, and I believe the feeling was reciprocated. Also he was distinguished for his eloquence, and I have heard him make some of the most wonderfully stirring and impressive speeches in the House. He was probably not the orator that Robert G. Ingersoll was, but I should say that he was one of the most effective public speakers of his period; his speeches were deeper and more serious, uttered in a graver style than the beautiful poetic imagery of the great agnostic. President Lincoln liked Garfield, and he was one of the younger men in the House who always supported the President, and on whom the President relied. He entered the Thirty-eighth Congress and served many terms. He enjoyed the peculiar distinction of being a member of Congress from Ohio, Senator-elect from Ohio, and President-elect of the United States, all at the same time.

I attended the National Republican Convention of 1880, in which Grant and Blaine were the leading candidates. I was at the time Governor of Illinois and a candidate for re-election myself; consequently I could not take any active part in the contest between Blaine and Grant, but of course, naturally, my sympathies were with General Grant.

I was not a delegate to the National Convention, but I attended it, and it so happened that I occupied a room directly opposite that occupied by General Garfield.

One evening, leaving my room, I met General Garfield just as he was leaving his, and we dropped into general conversation and walked along together.

I have always been considered a pretty fair judge of a political situation in State and National conventions, and it struck me as soon as Garfield had completed one of the most eloquent of all his eloquent addresses, placing in nomination Mr. Sherman, that he was the logical candidate before that convention.

To digress for a moment, it is a peculiar coincidence that McKinley made his great reputation, in part, by nominating Mr. Sherman as a candidate for the Presidency in the Minneapolis convention of 1892. Like General Garfield in 1880, Mr. McKinley was perfectly willing to receive the nomination himself, although he was then, as Garfield was in 1880, the leader of the Sherman forces.

But to return. General Garfield and I walked down the hall together, and being very intimate friends, I used to call him by his first name, as he did me. I said: "James, if you will keep a level head, you will be nominated for the Presidency by this convention before it is over." This was a couple of days before he was actually nominated.

He replied: "No, I think not."

But as we walked along together discussing the matter, I contended that I was right.

At the end of that memorable struggle between Grant and Blaine, in which the great Republican party refused to accept General Grant, the foremost Republican and soldier of his time, Garfield was nominated.

I remember vividly the form and features of Garfield in that convention. I see him placing Sherman in nomination, probably not realizing at the time that he was nominating himself. I see him taking an active part in all the debates, and as I look back now I do not think I ever saw a man apparently so affected as General Garfield was when it was announced that he was the nominee of the Republican party for the Presidency of the United States. Seemingly he almost utterly collapsed. He sank into his seat, overcome. He was taken out of the convention and to a room in the Grand Pacific, where I met him a very few minutes afterward.

After General Garfield was elected to the Presidency, but before his inauguration, I determined that I would urge upon him the appointment of Mr. Robert T. Lincoln as a member of his cabinet. I thought then that his selection would not only be an honor to the State, but that the great name of Lincoln, so fresh then in the minds of the people, would materially strengthen General Garfield's administration.

With this purpose in view, I visited Garfield at his home in Mentor. This journey was an extremely difficult one, owing to the circumstance that the snow was yet deep on the ground; so I arranged with the conductor to stop at the nearest point to General Garfield's house to let me off, which he did. I walked from the train through banks of snow, and after the hardest kind of a walk, finally reached his house.

I at once told him the mission on which I had come. We had quite a long talk, at the end of which he announced that he would appoint Mr. Lincoln his Secretary of War.

In this connection I desire to say a few words concerning Robert T. Lincoln. He is still living. I have known him from boyhood. He has the integrity and the character which so distinguished his father, and was marked in his mother's people as well. It is my firm conviction that long ago Robert T. Lincoln could have been President of the United States had he possessed the slightest political aspiration. He has never been ambitious for public office; but, on the contrary, it has always seemed to me that the Presidency was especially repugnant to him, which would be natural, considering the untimely death of his father, if for no other reason. He was almost forced to take an active interest in public affairs, but as soon as he was permitted to do so he retired to private life to engage in large business undertakings, and finally to become the head of the Pullman Company.

It seems strange to me that he should consider the presidency of a private corporation, no matter how great the emoluments, above the Presidency of the greatest of all Republics. How unlike his father! He was a most excellent Secretary of War, and one of General Garfield's cabinet officers whom General Arthur invited to remain in his cabinet, which he did.

Under President Harrison he consented to become Minister to England. Neither my colleague, Senator Farwell, nor I favored this appointment —not because of any antipathy for Mr. Lincoln, for whom I not only have the highest respect and admiration, but like personally as well; but Mr. Blaine, who was Harrison's Secretary of State, called on me one day and asked me to recommend some first-class man from Illinois for the post. After a consultation with my colleague, we determined to recommend an eminent lawyer and cultured gentleman of Chicago, John N. Jewett. We did recommend him, and assumed that his appointment was assured; but Harrison—probably to humiliate Mr. Blaine—called Senator Farwell and me to him one day and announced that he had determined to appoint Robert T. Lincoln Minister to England.

Farwell was extremely angry, and wanted to fight the nomination. However, I counselled moderation. I pointed out that no criticism could be made of Mr. Lincoln, and that since he was my personal friend I could not very well oppose him. So I was glad to favor the appointment, although I was as humiliated as my colleague at the cool manner with which Harrison had snubbed us after Mr. Blaine's overtures.

I recollect very well the telegram which Mr. Lincoln received when he was in Springfield, attending the business of the Pullman Company. It was from his office in Chicago. It stated that there was a letter there that demanded immediate attention, and asked whether it should be forwarded. He gave instructions to forward it to Springfield. It turned out to be the invitation of General Garfield to enter his cabinet as Secretary of War, and asking an immediate reply. He brought it to me in the Governor's office, where he sat down and wrote his reply accepting General Garfield's invitation.

But to return to General Garfield. He was not a strong executive officer. In the brief period in which he occupied the White House, he did not make a good President, and in my judgment would never have made a good one. He vacillated in the disposition of his patronage. When I visited him while he was yet President-elect, he told me that Mr. Conkling would be with him the next day, and asked my advice as to what he should say to him. It was understood that Conkling was coming to protest against the appointment of Blaine as Secretary of State. My advice was to let Mr. Conkling understand that he would appoint whomsoever he pleased as members of his cabinet; that he would run the office of President without fear or favor; and that he would appoint Mr. Blaine as Secretary of State because he considered him the very man best qualified for that high office. Garfield agreed with me, asserting that I had expressed exactly what he intended saying to Conkling; but if we are believe the stories of Senator Conkling's friends, he made far different promises to Senator Conkling in reference to this as also to other appointments.

But the culmination of the trouble between Garfield and Conkling was the appointment of Robertson as Collector of Customs at the Port of New York. The President took the ground, for his own reasons, that the Collector of Customs of New York was a National office, in which every State had an interest, and was not to be considered as Senatorial patronage. Conkling strenuously contended that it was exclusively Senatorial patronage, and in this he was sustained by precedents.

It so happened that I was in Washington when the trouble between Conkling and Garfield was at its height, over the appointment of Robertson. I called to see the President to pay my respects. He asked me if I knew what General Logan would do in reference to the nomination of Mr. Robertson. I told him I did not know, and he asked me if I could find out, and to come to breakfast with him next morning. I did find out that General Logan expected to stand by the President, and I so reported to him next morning.

I bade him good-bye and this was the last time that I ever saw him alive. I attended his funeral at Cleveland, and as I saw his body laid away, I thought of the strange caprice of fate. Was it premonition that made him so sad and castdown—so utterly crushed, as it seemed to me—when he became the Republican candidate for President before that great convention of 1880? Had he not been elected President, he would probably have enjoyed a long, useful, and highly creditable public career. He would have been one of the most distinguished representatives that Ohio ever had in the upper branch of Congress. He was to the most eminent degree fitted for a legislator. In the national halls of Congress his public life had been spent; there he was at home. He was not at all fitted for the position of Chief Executive of the United States. And I say this not in a spirit of hostility, but in the most kindly way, because I loved General Garfield as one of my earliest friends, in those days of long ago, when I served in the Thirty-ninth Congress.

There was no man in the Thirty-ninth Congress with whom I was afterwards so long and intimately associated as I was with the late Senator William B. Allison of Iowa, with whom I served in the Senate for a quarter of a century.

Senator Allison was quite a prominent member of the House when I entered Congress, and was serving then as a member of the important Ways and Means Committee. He was regarded as one of the ablest and most influential of the Western members.

From the very earliest time I knew him, Senator Allison was an authority on matters pertaining to finance. While he was in favor of a protective tariff, he was not particularly a high-tariff advocate; he, and the late General Logan who was then in the House, and I worked together on tariff matters, as against the high-tariff advocates, led by General Schenck.

On one occasion we defeated a high-tariff proposition that General Schenck was advocating. He was furious, and rising up in his place, declared:

"I might as well move to lay the bill on the table and to write as its epitaph—'nibbled to death by pismires!'"

The remark made General Logan terribly angry; but Senator Allison, who had a quiet, keen sense of humor, and I were very much amused, —as much at the fury of Logan as at the remark of Schenck.

As a member of the House, Senator Allison followed the more radical element against President Johnson. He was much more radical than I was in those days, and he attacked President Johnson repeatedly on the floor of the House, in tone and manner utterly unlike himself when later he served in the Senate.

In the upper body he was decidedly a conservative. He never committed himself until he was absolutely certain. He was always regarded as a wise man, and he exercised an extraordinary control over members, in settling troublesome questions and bringing about harmony in the Senate. He had powerful influence, not only with members of his own party, but with members of the opposition. Every one had confidence in him. His statements were accepted without question. He never attempted oratory, but by cool statement of facts he moulded the opinions of legislators. He was one of those even tempered, level-headed, sound, sensible men to whom we naturally turned when there were difficult questions to settle.

There has been no man in our history who had a longer or more distinguished public career, and I do not know of any man who was more often invited to enter the cabinets of different Presidents than was Senator Allison. The Secretaryship of the Treasury was urged and almost forced upon him repeatedly. I visited Indianapolis to see the President-elect, Mr. Harrison, and it so happened that Senator Allison and I entered together, Mr. Harrison having sent for him. I saw Harrison first, and he told me that he was going to ask Senator Allison to become his Secretary of the Treasury. I assured him that I was confident that he would decline the office —an assertion that occasioned much surprise, even a display of temper. Mr. Harrison seemed to think that it was Senator Allison's duty to accept the place. When Senator Allison saw him a short time later, the office was tendered him and he promptly declined to accept it. Nothing that Mr. Harrison could do or say would induce him to change his mind.

Mr. McKinley was anxious to have Senator Allison in his cabinet, and I do not think I shall be violating any confidence, now that they are both dead, in saying that in declining the appointment Allison urged McKinley, as he afterwards told me, to appoint me as Secretary of the Treasury, and McKinley gave him so strong an assurance that he intended to invite me to enter his cabinet, that when Allison saw me in Washington at the beginning of the session, I being a member of his Committee on Appropriations, he said: "Cullom, you are to enter the cabinet; now you will not be able to do much work on the Appropriations Committee, and you had better devote your time to getting your affairs in shape preparing to leave the Senate and become Secretary of the Treasury."

I had urged President McKinley to beg Senator Allison to enter his cabinet. Coming from the source that Allison's assurance did, I naturally took it more or less seriously, but I did not give the matter much thought.

The nearest that Mr. McKinley came to inviting me to enter the cabinet, was an inquiry he made of me, which position I would prefer in a cabinet, Secretary of State or Secretary of the Treasury. I replied that, personally, I should prefer the Treasury, as I had at that time no particular interest or training in foreign affairs. I know now that Mr. McKinley did fully intend to tender to me the Treasury portfolio, and I also know, but I do not feel at liberty at this time to reveal, the influence in Illinois which induced him to change his mind. I am very glad now that the position was not tendered to me, as I might have accepted it, because of the known desire of certain friends in this State to secure my seat in the Senate, in which event I should have been long since retired to private life.

Senator Allison was the trusted adviser of President after President —Grant, Hayes, Garfield, Arthur, Harrison, McKinley, Roosevelt all called upon him. There was no Senator who had to a greater extent their confidence. Had he lived he would have been as close, if not closer to President Taft. He served in the Senate longer than any other man in all our history. He broke Benton's long record. He broke the long record of Senator Morrill. He served eight years in the House and more than thirty-five years in the Senate, a total of forty-three years and five months in Congress. For forty-three years the history of his life embodies the complete financial legislative history of the United States.

Another conspicuous member of the Thirty-ninth Congress was Nathaniel P. Banks of Massachusetts. He had a long, varied, and interesting career, both in public and private life. He was many times elected to Congress from Massachusetts, and in 1856, after a long contest which lasted more than two months, was elected Speaker of the House of Representatives. He was Governor of his State, and in 1861, for a short time, president of the Illinois Central Railroad, from which position he resigned to enter the Union army as a major- general, serving throughout the war.

I did not know him when he was stationed at Chicago but I became very well acquainted with him in Congress. He was Chairman of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, of which committee I was a member. Not only was General Banks a polite, agreeable man, but he was an exceptionally effective speaker, and very popular in the House.

There occurs to me a little controversy which he had with the late Senator Dawes, who was at that time a member of the House from Massachusetts.

General Banks was undertaking to pass a bill to which Mr. Dawes objected. Banks was nettled. Taking the floor, he accused his colleague of always objecting to bills he attempted to pass. Dawes arose in his place, and in the most ponderous fashion, turned to Banks.

"I appeal to my colleague," he asked, "when did I ever before object to any bill which he was attempting to pass?"

Banks jumped to his feet, and said in his high-pitched voice: "I do not know that my colleague ever did, but I always thought that he was just about to."

General Banks served during the six years that I was a member of the House, and several terms afterwards, his public service ending with the Fifty-first Congress. He died at his home in Massachusetts, in 1894.

Daniel W. Voorhees was another celebrated member of the Thirty- ninth Congress, and was later a Senator from Indiana. Senator Voorhees was a very able man and a zealous, consistent Democrat. He was charged, and I have no doubt at all that it was true, with being a Rebel sympathizer, and a prominent member of the Knights of the Golden Circle. A fine, gifted speaker, a kind-hearted gentleman, he was very popular with the people of Indiana. Dan Voorhees and Thomas A. Hendricks, who was afterward Vice-President of the United States, were the two most prominent Democrats of Indiana in all its history, and indeed were two of the foremost Democrats of the North.

Senator Voorhees' seat, as a member of the House in the Thirty- ninth Congress, was successfully contested; and I can see him now, with his imposing presence, making his final speech in the House, after the result of the contest had become known. Garbed in a long cloak, he defended his right to his seat with the greatest dignity. The vote was taken; his opponent was seated; then he drew his cloak about him, and with the air of a king, walked out of the House, almost triumphantly. I had voted against him, but the dignity with which he carried off the occasion certainly commanded my deepest admiration.

He was a great admirer of Mr. Lincoln. He knew him well; had been associated with him in many lawsuits on the circuit, at Danville, and in the eastern part of the State; and although they belonged to opposing political parties, he evinced for Lincoln a very warm feeling.

Senator Voorhees once told me a rather interesting story in connection with President Lincoln. It was the occasion of the dedication of what was known as the Foundery Methodist Church in Washington. Mr. Lincoln was present, Voorhees was there, and Bishop Simpson delivered the dedicatory address. The bishop was an eloquent speaker and his sermon was a characteristic one. The President was seated in an armchair in front of the pulpit, with his back to the minister, and after the sermon was over, an effort was at once made to raise funds to pay the debt of the church. This phase of the meeting was tiresomely protracted, the minister, in the customary style, earnestly urging an unresponsive congregation to contribute until nearly every inducement had been exhausted. Finally someone started a movement to raise a certain definite amount of money, the achievement of which would make the President a life member of some church society. But even this scheme was not accepted with much enthusiasm, and Bishop Simpson renewed his plea for donations. At last Mr. Lincoln, who had been growing tired and bored at the performance, craned his head around toward Bishop Simpson, and said in a tone that everybody heard: "Simpson, if you will stop this auction I will pay the money myself."

And since Bishop Simpson's name has been mentioned, another incident in which he figured is suggested, which might as well be related here.

In the Methodist Church Bishop Simpson's name is a household word. He was one of its most prominent divines, and in sympathy with that branch which remained loyal to the Union. Naturally he was a great admirer of Mr. Lincoln—in fact, so close was he to the President that it was his influence that secured the appointment of Senator Harlan of Iowa as Secretary of the Interior. What follows will demonstrate that this statement is not made on hearsay.

Several prominent men of Illinois, and other parts of the country, were in Washington trying to secure the appointment of Uncle Jesse K. Dubois (the father of Senator Dubois of Idaho who served in the United States Senate two terms with great credit to himself and State), as Secretary of the Interior. Uncle Jesse Dubois was there himself, and we all met one evening at the National Hotel, at which meeting I was designated to go to the White House and use my influence with President Lincoln in Uncle Jesse's behalf. Uncle Jesse had no business coming to Washington when he was being pushed for a cabinet office; but he did, nevertheless, and he was not in good health. About ten o'clock at night I saw the President, and laid before him Uncle Jesse's claims. His reply was:

"I cannot appoint him. I must appoint Senator Harlan. I promised Bishop Simpson to do so. The Methodist Church has been standing by me very generally; I agreed with Bishop Simpson to give Senator Harlan this place, and I must keep my agreement. I would like to take care of Uncle Jesse, but I do not see that I can as a member of my cabinet."

I replied: "If you have determined it, that is the end of the matter, and I shall so report to the friends who are gathered at the National, so that Uncle Jesse may go on home."

President Lincoln seemed much affected. He followed me to the door, repeating that he would like to take care of Uncle Jesse, but could not do so.

Jesse Dubois went home to Springfield, but he remained as stanch a friend to Lincoln as ever, and was one of the committee sent from Springfield to accompany the remains of the immortal President to their last resting-place.

George S. Boutwell was another member of the Thirty-ninth Congress who merits some attention. He afterward became very influential among the radical element, and was one of the managers on the part of the House in the impeachment of President Johnson. It is hard to understand in a man of his sober, sound sense; but I am convinced that he firmly believed President Johnson to have been a conspirator in securing the assassination of Mr. Lincoln. He was Secretary of the Treasury under President Grant, who had for him the greatest respect and confidence. I never was very intimate with him, but I knew him fairly well, and considered him one of the leading public men of Massachusetts of his day.

One of the leading members of the Pennsylvania delegation in the Thirty-ninth Congress was William D. Kelley. He was a prominent member of the House, a good speaker, although he always prepared his addresses at great length, principally on the tariff; but he did not confine himself to his manuscripts entirely. His specialty in Congress was the tariff. He was called "Pig-iron Kelley" because he was for high duties on pig-iron and, in fact, everything manufactured in Pennsylvania. That State, as everybody knows, is the great iron and steel manufacturing State of the Union, and its representatives in Congress were in that day, as they are in this, the highest of high protective tariff advocates.

Before entering Congress, William D. Kelley for a number of years had been a judge of one of the more important courts of Philadelphia. He was elected to and kept in the House, without any particular effort on his own part, because he was considered one of the most valuable men in Congress in matters pertaining to the tariff. When I was a candidate for re-election to the House he visited my district and made several very able speeches for me at my request, and, with his wife, was my guest in Springfield for several days. At that time Republicans were for a high protective tariff, and it was not considered then, as it seems to be in these days of so-called insurgency, a crime for a Republican to stand up and say that he was in favor of high tariff duties. In any event, Judge Kelley did me much good in the speeches he made in my district.

We occupied apartments in the same house in Washington—on F Street near the Ebbitt House, at which hotel we took our meals. F Street is now the heart of the business centre, but it was then one of the principal residence streets, and many Representatives and Senators lived in that vicinity. The only objection I had to living in the same house with Judge Kelley was that he was always preparing speeches, and when he got ready to deliver a speech he would insist on reading it all over to me; and as his speeches were generally two or three hours long, and always on the tariff, in which I did not take an extraordinary amount of interest, I became pretty tired of hearing them.

On one occasion when he was making quite an eloquent speech in the House, he was interrupted by a member from Kentucky, whose name I do not remember. He had already answered him once or twice and then gone on. He was interrupted again, and this time he answered: "Oh, don't interrupt me when the glow is on." The "glow" did happen to be on at that time, and naturally he did not desire to be interrupted.

In the same Pennsylvania delegation there were two members named Charles O'Neill and Leonard Myers, who were very short in stature. For some reason or other, some wag dubbed them "Kelley's ponies." They heard of it and became very angry, and on every occasion, when there was half a chance, they watched to see how Judge Kelley voted and would then vote the opposite.

They were both good men and good Republicans, and O'Neill served the same number of terms as Judge Kelley—fifteen—but O'Neill remained his full fifteen terms and retired from Congress. Judge Kelley was serving his fifteenth term when he died in Washington, in 1890.

Samuel J. Randall was one of the prominent Democrats of his day; but strange to say he favored a protective tariff. He also served about fifteen terms, two of them in the Speaker's chair. He had an anxious solicitude for the success of his party, and made many political speeches. He was a young member when I first knew him, away back in the sixties, but even then he occupied an influential position.

I remember meeting him in Mr. Blaine's office one day, when the latter was Secretary of State, and Mr. Blaine not being in, we sat on the settee and had a talk. He was in poor health, but curious respecting the relations between President Harrison and his party. I told him they were not getting along very well; that he satisfied his party about as well as Mr. Cleveland satisfied his when he was in the White House.

"I think," he observed, "he is better than our President. We never could do much with Cleveland." Then he added this characteristic remark: "If you want an army to fight, you must feed it. It is the same with a political party: if a party is to take care of itself, its workers must be recognized in the distribution of its patronage."

I never saw Samuel J. Randall afterwards.

Judge Godlove S. Orth was one of my most intimate friends in the House of Representatives. He was a splendid man, and was regarded as an honorable and able member. He and I saw much of each other every day, as we roomed in the same neighborhood and generally visited the departments together. We were seen with each other so often on the streets, in fact, that when we were separated, friends would ask either one or the other of us: "What has become of your partner?" At one time I canvassed his district for him and he was re-elected.

He had a peculiar name, "Godlove." I never heard of a man named Godlove, either before or since. The story was told of a lady sitting in the gallery, listening to the proceedings of the House. She could not hear very well. When the roll was being called, and she heard the name "Godlove" called by the clerk, she did not understand it; she wend down stairs and told her friends that the House of Representatives was a most pious body; that every time they called the roll, and the clerk got about half way through, he would stop and exclaim: "God love us all!"

Judge Orth has been dead for many years, but I have always remembered with great pleasure our friendship when we served as colleagues in the House, nearly half a century ago.

Oakes Ames of Boston was a prominent member of the House. He had charge of the Union Pacific Railroad construction, and it was charged—and proven, I believe, afterwards—that he secured the concessions for the railroad by undue influence,—the use of money, gifts of stock, etc.,—and the whole thing finally culminated in what is known as the Credit Mobilier scandal, the exposure of which came after I retired from the House.

Ames was a member of the Thirty-eighth, Thirty-ninth, Fortieth, Forty-first, and Forty-second Congresses, and I knew him very well during my six years' service. I was made chairman of the Committee on Territories in the Forty-first Congress, by Mr. Blaine, who was then Speaker. Ames annoyed me very much by coming to me almost every day in the interest of legislation in the Territories affecting the Union Pacific, and I asked him one day, being a little out of temper, whether he was so absorbed in the Pacific Railroad that he had not time to devote to anything else. He made some light rejoinder; sometime later the exposure came, and I found that he was engaged in most unfortunate and unlawful practices in securing legislation in the interest of his road.

I never believed that Oakes Ames was naturally a dishonest man, but the proof was against him, and the scandal resulted in his death, as it also did in the death of James Brooks, of New York, and the ruination of other public men.

I knew S. S. Cox ("Sunset" Cox, as he was called), as a member of the Forty-first Congress. He had served in some previous Congress as a member from Ohio; but when I knew him he was serving as a member from New York.

Cox was an able man, as a speaker, a writer, and a diplomat. He was always listened to with great respect and attention when he addressed the House, but a considerable amount of fun was poked at him after a certain occasion when he had interrupted General Butler a time or two in debate, and the General, finally losing patience, replied to one of his questions with the admonition: "Shoo, fly, don't bodder me!" I was present at the time; the galleries were filled, as they always were in those days; and when General Butler uttered this reproof the whole House, galleries, and floor, was in an uproar, maintaining the confusion for some minutes. When it seemed like subsiding, it would break out again and again, and so it continued for quite a while. When order was finally restored Cox undertook to reply; but he could not do so. He had been so crippled by the response of the audience to Butler's remark that he never recovered from it.

Cox was a splendid man. He always thought in those days that he had not been quite appreciated by his friends in the Democratic party, and they thought the same way; but he was so good-humored, and such a whole-souled man and so fond of wit that he really never did get what he was entitled to.

I was trying to pass a bill which I had prepared for the purpose of prohibiting and wiping out polygamy in Utah. I had reported the bill from the Committee on Territories, and I was doing my best to pass it. For some reason or other (afterwards I learned it was an ulterior reason to help out a friend), General Schenck undertook to defeat the measure, and for this purpose he asked to have it referred to the Committee on Judiciary. This committee probably had jurisdiction over the subject; I did not think so at the time, and believed that such a reference would kill the bill. He seemed to be making some headway with the Republicans, when Cox came over to me from the Democratic side of the House, and proposed that if I would yield to him for five minutes he would help me to pass the bill. I told him to go back to his seat and that I would yield to him directly. When I did Cox took the floor, and to my utter astonishment he denounced the bill as the most outrageous bill that had ever been brought before the House, declaring in the most spirited manner that of course it ought to be referred to the Judiciary Committee, because every one knew that such a reference would kill it.

But he was shrewder than I apprehended at the moment. His talk had the desired effect, for the Republicans who had been following Schneck determined that they would not be responsible for killing the bill; they came back to me, and the measure was passed through the House by a substantial majority.

CHAPTER IX THE IMPEACHMENT OF PRESIDENT JOHNSON 1865

As I look back now over the vista of years that have come and gone, it seems to me that I entered the Lower House of Congress just at the beginning of the most important period in all our history. The great President had been assassinated; the war was over; Andrew Johnson, a Union Democrat, was President of the United States. Reconstruction was the problem which confronted us, how to heal up the Nation's wounds and remake a Union which would endure for all time to come. These were the difficult conditions that had to be dealt with by the Thirty-ninth Congress.

Andrew Johnson was the queerest character that ever occupied the White House, and, with the exception of Lincoln only, he entered it under the most trying and difficult circumstances in all our history; but Lincoln had, what Johnson lacked, the support and confidence of the great Republican party. Johnson was never a Republican, and never pretended to be one. He was a lifelong Democrat, and a slave-holder as well; but he was loyal to the Union, no man living more so. As a Senator from Tennessee, alone of all the Southern Senators he faced his colleagues from the South in denouncing secession as treason. His subsequent phenomenal course in armed opposition to the rebellion brought about his nomination for the Vice-Presidency as a shrewd stroke to secure the support of the War Democrats of the North and the Union men of his State and section.

He came to the Presidency under the cloud of President Lincoln's assassination, when the majority of the North believed that a Southern conspiracy had laid the great President low. The seceding States hated him as a traitor to his own section; the North distrusted him as a Democrat. At first I believe the very radical element of the Republican party in Congress, led by old Ben Wade of Ohio, than whom there was no more unsafe man in either house of Congress, were disposed, if not openly to rejoice, which they dared not do, to see with some secret satisfaction the entrance of Johnson into the White House. It is well known that Wade did say in his first interview with President Johnson, when, as a member of the committee on the conduct of the war, he waited on him, "Johnson, we have faith in you. By the gods, there will be no more trouble in running the Government."

I have already, in another chapter, described the scene which took place in the Senate chamber when Johnson was inducted into office as Vice-President; the exhibition he made of himself at the time of taking the oath of office, in the presence of the President of the United States and the representatives of the Governments of the world. All this, advertised at the time in the opposition press, added to the prejudice against Johnson in the North and made his position more trying and difficult.

There were two striking points in Johnson's character, and I knew him well: First, his loyalty to the Union; and, second, his utter fearlessness of character. He could not be cowed; old Ben Wade, Sumner, Stevens, all the great leaders of that day could not, through fear, influence him one particle.

In 1861, when he was being made the target of all sorts of threats on account of his solitary stand against secession in the Senate, he let fall this characteristic utterance:

"I want to say, not boastingly, with no anger in my bosom, that these two eyes of mine have never looked upon anything in the shape of mortal man that this heart has feared."

This utterance probably illustrates Johnson's character more clearly than anything that I could say. He sought rather than avoided a fight. Headstrong, domineering, having fought his way in a State filled with aristocratic Southerners, from the class of so-called "low whites" to the highest position in the United States, he did not readily yield to the dictates of the dominating forces in Congress.

Lincoln had a well-defined policy of reconstruction. Indeed, so liberal was he disposed to be in his treatment of the Southern States, that immediately after the surrender of Richmond he would have recognized the old State Government of Virginia had it not been for the peremptory veto of Stanton. Congress was not in session when Johnson came to the Presidency in April, 1865. To do him no more than simple justice, I firmly believe that he wanted to follow out, in reconstruction, what he thought was the policy of Mr. Lincoln, and in this he was guided largely by the advice of Mr. Seward.

But there was this difference. Johnson was, probably in good faith, pursuing the Lincoln policy of reconstruction; but when the Legislatures and Executives of the Southern States began openly passing laws and executing them so that the negro was substantially placed back into slavery, practically nullifying the results of the awful struggle, the untold loss of life and treasure, Mr. Lincoln certainly would have receded and would have dealt with the South with an iron hand, as Congress had determined to do, and as General Grant was compelled to do when he assumed the Presidency.

From April to the reassembling of Congress in December, Johnson had a free hand in dealing with the seceded States, and he was not slow to take advantage of it. He seemed disposed to recognize the old State Governments; to restrict the suffrage to the whites; to exercise freely the pardoning power in the way of extending executive clemency not only to almost all classes, but to every individual who would apply for it. The result was, it seemed to be certain that if the Johnson policy were carried out to the fullest extent, the supremacy of the Republican party in the councils of the Nation would be at stake.

To express it in a word, the motive of the opposition to the Johnson plan of reconstruction was the firm conviction that its success would wreck the Republican party, and by restoring the Democrats to power bring back Southern supremacy and Northern vassalage. The impeachment, in a word, was the culmination of the struggle between the legislative and the executive departments of the Government over the problem of reconstruction. The legislative department claimed exclusive jurisdiction over reconstruction; the executive claimed that it alone was competent to deal with the subject.

This is a very brief summary of the conditions which confronted us when I entered the Thirty-ninth Congress. Representatives of the eleven seceding States were there to claim their seats in Congress. The Republican members met in caucus the Saturday evening preceding the meeting of Congress on Monday. I, as a member-elect, was present, and I remember how old Thaddeus Stevens at once assumed the dominating control in opposition to the President's plan. Stevens was a most remarkable character,—one of the most remarkable in the legislative history of the United States. He believed firmly in negro equality and negro suffrage. As one writer eloquently expresses it:

"According to his creed, the insurgent States were conquered provinces to be shaped into a paradise for the freedman and a hell for the rebel. His eye shot over the blackened southern land; he saw the carnage, the desolation, the starvation, and the shame; and like a battered old warhorse, he flung up his frontlet, sniffed the tainted breeze, and snorted 'Ha, Ha!'"

It was at once determined by the Republican majority in Congress that the representatives of the eleven seceding States should not be admitted. The Constitution expressly gives to the House and Senate the exclusive power to judge of the admission and qualification of its own members.

We were surprised at the moderation of the President's message, which came in on Tuesday after Congress assembled. In tone and general character the message was wholly unlike Johnson. It was an admirable state document, one of the finest from a literary and probably from every other standpoint that ever came from an Executive to Congress. It was thought at the time that Mr. Seward wrote it, but it has since been asserted that it was the product of that foremost of American historians, J. C. Bancroft, one of Mr. Johnson's close personal friends.

There existed three theories of dealing with the Southern States: one was the President's theory of recognizing the State Governments, allowing the States to deal with the suffrage question as they might see fit; the Stevens policy of wiping out all State lines and dealing with the regions as conquered military provinces; and the Sumner theory of treating them as organized territories, recognizing the State lines.

Johnson dealt in a masterful manner with the subject in his message. He said:

"States, with proper limitations of power, are essential to the existence of the Constitution of the United States.

"The perpetuity of the Constitution bring with it the perpetuity of the States; their mutual relations makes us what we are, and in our political system this connection is indissoluble. The whole cannot exist without the parts nor the parts without the whole. So long as the Constitution of the United States endures, the States will endure; the destruction of the one is the destruction of the other; the preservation of the one is the preservation of the other.

"The true theory is that all pretended acts of secession were, from the beginning, null and void. The States cannot commit treason, nor screen the individual citizens who may have committed treason, any more than they can make valid treaties or engage in lawful commerce with any foreign power. The States attempting to secede placed themselves in a condition where their vitality was impaired but not extinguished, their functions suspended but not destroyed."

It was but the Johnson theory which we presented to the world, denying the right of any State to secede; asserting the perpetuity, the indissolubility of the Union.

But the question was, whether the members from the seceding States should be admitted to the Senate and House; and he dealt with this most difficult problem in a statesmanlike way. He said:

"The amendment to the Constitution being adopted, it would remain for the States whose powers have been so long in abeyance, to resume their places in the two branches of the National Legislature, and thereby complete the work of restoration. Here it is for you, fellow citizens of the Senate, and for you, fellow citizens of the House of Representatives, to judge, each of you for yourselves, of the elections, returns and qualifications of your own members."

On the suffrage question, he said:

"On the propriety of making freedmen electors by proclamation of the Executive, I took for my counsel the Constitution itself, the interpretations of that instrument by its authors, and their contemporaries, and the recent legislation of Congress. They all unite in inculcating the doctrine that the regulation of the suffrage is a power exclusively for the States. So fixed was this reservation of power in the habits of the people, and so unquestioned has been the interpretation of the Constitution, that during the Civil War the late President never harbored the purpose,—certainly never avowed it,—of disregarding it; and in acts of Congress nothing can be found to sanction any departure by the Executive from a policy which has so uniformly obtained."