History of the United States, v.2, by James Ford Rhodes, 1910 [c1892].

Chapter 11, Part 2: The Republican Convention through Election of Lincoln

While Douglas and Davis were wrangling in the Senate, the Republicans were holding their convention at Chicago. It was fitting that the party, that had its origin in the Northwest, should now meet in the typical city, which, with a population of little more than one hundred thousand, had already made the word Chicago synonymous with that of progress. Five slave States—Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, Kentucky, and Missouri—were represented, and four hundred and sixty-six delegates made up the convention. They met in a "wigwam"3 built for the occasion, which, it was said, would hold ten thousand people. By the second day of the convention thirty thousand to forty thousand strangers, mostly from the Northwest, had flocked to the city, eager to be associated with the great historic event that was promised, and thinking perhaps to affect the result by their presence and their shouts.4 For since the disruption of the Charleston convention the Republicans had felt that if they took advantage of the situation, they would
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3 The building called a wigwam was a temporary frame structure, and the name is still applied in Western cities by Republicans to buildings used for party purposes.
4 Nicolay and Hay, vol. ii. p. 264; National Political Conventions, Halstead, p. 140.

surely elect their candidate for the presidency. Victory was in the air, and office-seekers, who, since 1858, had formed a noticeable part of the Republican organization,1 were now on hand in number, for the purpose of making prominent their devotion to the party and its principles. The contrast between this and the national convention of 1856 is worthy of remark. Then a hall accommodating two thousand was quite sufficient, now a wigwam holding ten thousand was jammed, and twenty thousand people outside clamored for admittance; then the wire-pullers looked askance at a movement whose success was problematical, now they hastened to identify themselves with a party that apparently had the game in its own hand; then the delegates were liberty-loving enthusiasts and largely volunteers, now the delegates had been chosen by means of the organization peculiar to a powerful party, and in political wisdom were the pick of the Republicans; then the contest to follow seemed but a tentative effort and the leading men would not accept the nomination, while now triumph appeared so sure that every one of the master spirits of the party was eager to be the candidate. And the most potent cause of this change was the split in the Democratic party, which began with the refusal of Douglas to submit to Southern dictation.

"The convention is very like the old Democratic article," wrote an observer; and he has also told the tale of the bibulous propensities of the outsiders who had come to exert a pressure in favor of Seward or Lincoln. Though a Republican himself, he was forced to confess that greater sobriety had characterized the assemblage at Charleston.2 No convention had ever attracted such a crowd of lookers on. Never before had there been such systematic efforts to create an opinion that the people demanded this or that candidate. Organized bodies of men were sent out day and
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1 See Lincoln-Douglas Debates, p. 230.
2 Halstead, pp. 121, 122, 132.

night to make street demonstrations for their favorite, or were collected to pack the audience-room in the convention hall, so that vociferous cheers might greet each mention of his name. These procedures were very different from those of similar Whig gatherings heretofore, which had been marked by respectability and decorum.

Before Lincoln made his Cooper Institute speech, the mention of his name as a possible nominee for President by the Chicago convention would have been considered a joke anywhere except in Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, and Iowa. That New York address, however, had gained him many friends, among whom was William Cullen Bryant.2 His speeches in New England that followed made it patent at the East that he might become a formidable opponent of Seward. The reception he had in New York and New England convinced Lincoln himself that the Chicago nomination was attainable, and, ceasing to take interest in his law practice, he set himself at work to secure the prize. An acute observer of the drift of opinion, a good judge of men in the face of large events, Lincoln was clumsy in the attempt to manipulate a delegation and awkward in the use of money to promote his candidacy.2 The movement in Illinois, which had been growing since the debates of 1858, culminated in giving him a most enthusiastic endorsement at the State convention held at Decatur the 9th of May. Lincoln himself was present, and John Hanks marched in among the crowd in the wigwam, bearing on his shoulder the two historic rails, on which was inscribed: "From a lot made by Abraham Lincoln and John Hanks in the Sangamon bottom in the year 1830." 3 Loud and prolonged cheers bore testimony to the effect of this manoeuvre. The following week at Chicago the continued hurrahs for "honest old Abe, the rail-splitter," told the Seward men of unlooked-for strength in one of the competitors for the nomination.
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1 Life by Godwin, vol. ii. p. 123.
3 Lamon, p. 445; Herndon, p. 460.
2 Herndon, p. 457.

Before the delegates assembled at Chicago, the condition of the contest was expressed in sporting parlance as "Seward against the field." But by the first day of the convention it became evident that the struggle would be between Seward and Lincoln. Chase had been unable to secure the united delegation of his own State, and his candidacy did not assume the prominence that was due to his ability and position.1 A month and a half before the convention met he had little hope of securing the nomination,2 and was prepared to acquiesce in that of Seward. "There seems to be at present," he wrote, "a considerable set towards Seward. Should the nomination fall to him, I shall not at all repine."3 Edward Bates, of Missouri, had the powerful support of Greeley and the New York Tribune, and also of Francis P. Blair and his sons. Knowing him to be eminently sound on the slavery question, they thought his nomination would please better than any other the conservative Republicans. Moreover, it would deprive of force the charge that their party was sectional, and give them a chance of carrying Missouri, a slave State. Pennsylvania was nearly united in support of Cameron, but the vote she would give him on the first ballot would be well understood as only the usual compliment to a favorite son. A few Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Indiana men wanted McLean, 4 while Senator Wade had friends who hoped that the time might come when he could be sprung upon the convention as a dark horse.
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1 The year before the convention, Chase had been looked upon as a possibly successful contestant against Seward. "My impression is," wrote Dana to Pike, June 23d, 1859, "that we had better concentrate on Chase, and that he is the only man we can beat Seward with."—Pike's First Blows of the Civil War, p. 441.
2 See letter of April 2d to Pike, Pike's First Blows of the Civil War, p. 505.
3 Letter of March 19th, ibid., p. 503.
4 Regarding preferences of Thaddeus Stevens and other Pennsylvania delegates for McLean, see account of A. K. McClure, Boston Herald, September 0th, 1891.

Seward's claim for the nomination was strong. He was the representative man of the party, and well fitted both by ability and experience for the position to which he aspired. Intensely anxious for the nomination, and confidently expecting it, he was alike the choice of the politicians and the people.1 Could a popular vote on the subject have been taken, the majority in the Republican States would have been overwhelmingly in his favor. One day at Chicago sufficed to demonstrate that he had the support of the machine politicians. What was urged as the most serious objection to Seward was his weakness in the doubtful States of Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Indiana, and Illinois. Pennsylvania and one of the others must be carried to insure the election of a Republican President. These States, situated on the border, were strongly tinctured with conservatism. In all four of them Seward was weak, for the reason that he was regarded as the exponent of the radical element of the party. His "irrepressible-conflict" speech had done much to lessen his availability. Why Lincoln's "house-divided-against-itself" declaration should not also have precluded his nomination is one of the curiosities of politics, although it is easily explicable. Seward paid the penalty of the greater fame, for a hundred men had read his speech where one had looked at Lincoln's. Yet it is true that the notion of Seward's greater radicalism had a basis in the fact that he had averred the higher-law doctrine—a position from which Lincoln especially held himself aloof. Seward stood in so marked a degree for the radical element of the party that eight of the Illinois delegates, who had been chosen from the northern part of the State, and represented advanced anti-slavery communities, were at heart for him, though they loyally carried out their instructions and voted for Lincoln.2

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1 Pike, Washington, May 20th, p. 517.
2 Letter of Leonard Swett to J. H. Drummond, May 27th, 1860, published in the Portland (Maine) Express, and copied into the New York Sun of July 26th, 1891,

Moreover, Seward was especially objectionable in Pennsylvania, from having been outspoken against the Know-nothing movement, which had been strong in that State. The former American element, deemed an important part of the People's party, had to be placated, for it had not been deemed wise even to assume the name Republican in the Keystone State. Besides there were men more radical than Seward—men who sympathized with him in his opposition to Know-nothingism—who were nevertheless averse to his nomination, because they did not like his political associations. A man of unquestioned integrity himself, Seward had intimate connections with men who were full of schemes requiring public grants. For these his vote and influence were frequently used. "He is a believer in the adage," said Pike, "that it is money makes the mare go."1 "I was not without apprehensions," wrote Bryant, when congratulating Lincoln, " that the nomination might fall upon some person encumbered with bad associates," 2 and it was Seward he had in mind. "There were reasons," wrote Charles A. Dana in the Tribune, a month after the convention," against Seward's nomination connected with the peculiar state of things at Albany, and the possibility of its transference to Washington." 3 In March, Dana, in a private letter to Pike, had hinted at the connection between "Seward stock" and "New York city street railroad " schemes in Albany.4 Bryant had, in the December previous, mentioned to Bigelow why Seward's prospects were not brightening. "This iteration," he wrote, "of the misconstruction put on his phrase of 'the irrepressible conflict between freedom and slavery' has, I think, damaged him a good deal; and in this city there is one thing which has damaged him still more. I mean the project of Thurlow Weed to give charters for a set of city
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1 First Blows of the Civil War, p. 518.
2 Letter of June 16th, Life by Godwin, vol. ii. p. 142.
3 New York Tribune, June 18th.
4 First Blows of the Civil War, p. 501.

railways, for which those who receive them are to furnish a fund of from four to six hundred thousand dollars, to be expended for the Republican cause in the next presidential election." 1 These expressions represented a widespread sentiment, 2 to which many allusions may be found in the political literature of 1850-60. The objection based on that feeling was little mentioned in the newspaper discussions previous to the convention, for, the general presumption being that Seward would secure the nomination, the Republicans wished to avoid furnishing arguments to the enemy.

While much of the outside volunteer attendance from New York and Michigan favoring Seward was weighty in character as well as imposing in number, the organized body of rough fellows from New York city, under the lead of Tom Hyer, a noted bruiser, made a great deal of noise without helping his cause. Their appearance, as they marched through the streets headed by a gaily uniformed band, was in a certain way striking, but their arguments when not on parade were little fitted to win support from New England and the West. "If you do not nominate Seward, where will you get your money ?"3 they considered an unanswerable question; and the assurance that Seward's friends would put up money enough to carry Pennsylvania, in their opinion, settled the doubt that existed about the Keystone State.4 All the outside pressure was for Seward or Lincoln, there being practically none for the other candidates. While many of Seward's followers were disinterested and sincere, others betrayed unmistakably the influence of the machine. Lincoln's adherents were men from Illinois, Indiana, and Iowa, who had come to Chicago bent on having a good time and seeing the rail-splitter nominated, and while traces of
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1 Letter of December 14th, 1859, Life, by Godwin, vol. ii. p. 127.
2 See also Recollections of a Busy Life, Greeley, p. 312; and Lincoln and Seward, Gideon Welles, p. 27.
3 Horace Greeley, New York Tribune, May 22d.
4 Halstead, p. 142.

organization might be detected among them, it was such organization as may be seen in a mob.

Thus stood affairs when the convention organized on Wednesday morning, May 16th. David Wilmot, of Pennsylvania, the author of the Wilmot proviso, was the temporary chairman; George Ashmun, of Massachusetts, the friend of Webster, who had labored hard for his nomination in 1852, was chosen for the permanent presiding officer. When the platform was reported on the second day of the proceedings, Giddings offered as an amendment to the first resolution the oft-quoted assertion of the Declaration of Independence. Giddings represented the abolitionist element of the party; and, lest the convention should go too far in that direction, it was attempted to choke him off. However, respect for fair play conquered, and he was allowed to present his amendment, but it was voted down. Giddings then left the convention in sorrow and anger. A little later, George William Curtis obtained the floor and offered as an amendment to the second resolution the clause of the Declaration beginning "all men are created equal"—substantially the same that Giddings had proposed—advocating it in earnest words. "I have to ask this convention," he said, "whether they are prepared to go upon the record and before the country as voting down the words of the Declaration of Independence? I ask gentlemen gravely to consider that in the amendment which I have proposed I have done nothing that the soundest and safest man in all the land might not do; . . . and I ask gentlemen to think well before, upon the free prairies of the West, in the summer of 1860, they dare to wince and quail before the men of Philadelphia of 1776—before they dare to shrink from repeating the words that these great men enunciated."1 The effect of this speech was electric; it was greeted with deafening applause, and no further objection was made to reasserting the principles of the Declaration of Independence. This
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1 Halstead, p. 137.

action conciliated Giddings and, through him, the radical element of the party.

The platform was prepared with care. The aim of the committee had been to allow the greatest liberty of sentiment consistent with an emphatic assertion of the cardinal Republican doctrine. In this they succeeded admirably.1 The platform paid a tribute to the Union; asserted that the rights of the States should be maintained inviolate; denounced the John Brown invasion " as among the gravest of crimes;" censured the attempt of the Buchanan administration to force the Lecompton constitution upon Kansas; denounced the new dogma that the Constitution of its own force carries slavery into the territories; declared the Democratic doctrine of popular sovereignty a " deception and fraud;" denied "the authority of Congress, of a territorial legislature, or of any individual to give legal existence to slavery in any territory;" branded "the recent reopening of the African slave-trade ... as a crime against humanity and a burning shame to our country and age;" demanded the admission of Kansas; asserted that sound policy requires the adjustment of duties upon imports so as "to encourage the development of the industrial interests of the whole country;" demanded a homestead bill; and opposed any change in the naturalization laws. The authors of the platform, by steering clear of disputed questions, gave it throughout an aggressive tone. There is but one plank, said the New York Tribune, editorially," that on the tariff —which will be likely to give rise to objections in any quarter ;" 2 and when that resolution was read, Pennsylvania, the pre-eminently doubtful State, went wild with joy.3 The silence on the Fugitive Slave law, on personal liberty bills, and on the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia, also the avoidance of mentioning the Dred Scott decision,
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1 See Horace Greeley, New York Tribune, May 22d. Greeley was one of the committee on resolutions.
2 May 18th.
3 Halstead, p. 135.

were significant. The platform received the enthusiastic support of the followers of Seward, Lincoln, and the other candidates. After the vote had been taken on its adoption, the great hall rang with applause and with cheers from ten thousand lusty throats.

It was now six o'clock of Thursday, the second day, and the convention adjourned without taking a ballot. Everything seemed to point to the nomination of Seward on the morrow. Just before midnight, Greeley, who sat as a delegate from Oregon, persistently advocated Bates, and yet was earnestly in favor of almost anything to beat Seward, telegraphed the Tribune: "My conclusion, from all that I can gather to-night, is that the opposition to Governor Seward cannot concentrate on any candidate, and that he will be nominated." 1 Halstead sent the same word to his journal.2 The Seward canvass had been made with vigor and, on the whole, with discretion. Thurlow Weed, Seward's trusted friend and counsellor, was the leader of the forces. No man of the opposition equalled him in adroitness and political management. On the floor of the convention, the cause was intrusted to William M. Evarts, of New York, Austin Blair, of Michigan, and Carl Schurz, of Wisconsin, who were backed by their respective delegations. The episode of which Curtis had been the hero redounded to the credit of Seward. 3The New-Yorkers were exultant. At their headquarters, the Richmond House, champagne flowed freely in celebration of the expected victory, and Seward bands of music went the rounds, serenading the different delegations from whom support was expected.4 But during this night, made hideous by bacchanalian shouts, the blare of brass instruments and the noise of the drum, earnest men, believing that success depended on the
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1 Date of despatch, Thursday, May 17th, 11:40 p.m., published in Friday morning's New York Tribune.
2 Cincinnati Commercial. See Halstead, p. 142.
3 Ibid., p. 141.
4 Ibid.

nomination of some other man than Seward, were indefatigably at work. Prominent among them were Andrew Curtin, the nominee of the People's party for Governor of Pennsylvania, and Henry S. Lane, the Indiana Republican candidate for governor, who urged, in accents of undoubted sincerity, that if Seward were the standard-bearer they could not carry their respective States at the State elections in October, which would determine the national contest. Nothing could be done with Ohio, another October State; she would not unite on any candidate, on either the first or second ballot.1 An impression was made on Virginia; and New England, really for Seward, was influenced by the argument of availability especially and strongly urged by Greeley, whose political influence was never greater than now.

All this opposition effort pointed either to Lincoln or Bates. Could it be concentrated on one or the other? Although Bates had earnest supporters in Indiana, 2 that State naturally inclined to Lincoln, and it was eminently desirable that her entire vote should be cast for him on the first ballot. Any wavering or hanging back was this night overcome by the promise of David Davis, the manager for Lincoln, of a cabinet position to Caleb Smith, one of the Indiana delegates at large, in case of Lincoln's election.3 All but a few of the Pennsylvania delegates would vote for Cameron on the first ballot. The question was, to whom would her vote go on the second? Cameron himself, although not at Chicago, was for Seward,4 and it had been expected before the meeting of the convention that his influence would bring most of the delegates over to the support of the New York
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1 Greeley, New York Tribune, May 22d.
2 Letter of Swett, May 26th, 1860, Life of Colfax, Hollister, p. 142.
3 Herndon, p. 471; Lamon, p. 449. See also Political Recollections, Julian, p. 182; and Life of Colfax, Hollister, p. 175.
4 See Seward's letters to Weed, April 29th and March 15th, 1860, Life of Thurlow Weed, vol. ii. pp. 256, 261; note in Halstead, p. 142. See Cameron's speech, May 25th, 1860, reported in Philadelphia Press.

senator.1 But it became early apparent that the followers of Seward in Pennsylvania were few, and that her second choice lay between Lincoln and Bates, a vote of the delegates being 60 for Lincoln to 45 for Bates as their second choice.2

To win the support of the close followers of Cameron, David Davis promised that he should have a cabinet position in the event of Lincoln's election; and this, in addition to the other influences that had been used, secured nearly the whole vote of Pennsylvania.3 Lincoln himself knew nothing of these bargains at the time,4 and they were made against his positive direction. A careful and anxious observer of what was taking place at Chicago, he sent to his friends this word in writing, which reached them the day before the nomination: "I agree," he said, " with Seward in his 'irrepressible conflict,' but I do not endorse his 'higher-law' doctrine;" then, underscoring the words, he wrote: "Make no contracts that will bind me." 5

Greeley, either ignorant of these bargains, or distrusting that the Pennsylvania and Indiana delegations could be brought to fulfil their part, thought, when the convention met Friday morning, that there could be no concentration of the anti-Seward forces. The Seward managers them
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1 Lincoln and Seward, Welles. Welles was the chairman of the Connecticut delegation.
2 Greeley, New York Tribune, May 22d. Although Pennsylvania cast but fifty-four votes, she had one hundred and eight delegates on the official roll of the convention, Halstead, p. 125; see also account of A. K. McClure, Boston Herald, September 6th, 1891.
3 Herndon, p. 471; Lamon, p. 449. Article of A. K. McClure, New York Sun, December 13,1891. See also Political Recollections, Julian, p. 182; and Swett's account, Life of Thurlow Weed, vol. ii. p. 292; but Swett did not know of the promises in regard to Cameron and Smith, for he wrote Drummond privately, May 27th: "No pledges have been made, no mortgages executed, but Lincoln enters the field a free man."
4 "The responsible position assigned me comes without conditions."— Lincoln to Giddings, May 21st, 1860. Life of Giddings, Julian, p. 376.
5 Herndon, p. 462.

selves felt so confident that they sincerely asked, and with no idea of bravado, whom the opposition would like for Vice-President.1

The convention met and the candidates were put in nomination without the speeches of eulogy that have since become the rule. At the mention of the name of Seward or Lincoln, the great hall resounded with applause and cheers; but the Lincoln yell far surpassed the other in vigor. Tom Hyer's men had this morning marched through the street to the music of victorious strains, and had so prolonged their march that when they came to the wigwam they found the best places occupied by sturdy Lincoln men; all of Seward's followers were not able to get into the wigwam, and much of the effect of their lusty shouts was therefore lost.

In many contemporaneous and subsequent accounts of this convention, it is set down as an important fact, contributing to the nomination of Lincoln, that on this day the Lincoln men out-shouted the supporters of Seward. One wonders if those wise and experienced delegates interpreted this manipulated noise as the voice of the people. While the shouts for "old Abe" were in a considerable degree spontaneous, due to the fact that the convention was held in his own State, art was not lacking in the production of these manifestations. The Lincoln managers, determined that the voice of Illinois should be literally heard, engaged a Chicago man whose shout, it was said, could be heard above the howling of the most violent tempest on Lake Michigan, and a Doctor Ames, a Democrat living on the Illinois river, who had similar gifts, to organize a claque and lead the cheering and applause in the convention hall.2

"As long as conventions shall be held, I believe," wrote Greeley, "no abler, wiser, more unselfish body of delegates
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1 Greeley, New York Tribune, May 22d.
2 Life of Lincoln, Arnold, p. 167. See also letter of Leonard Swett, May 27th, 1860; also Raymond's inside history of the convention, Life of Thurlow Weed, vol. ii. p. 276.

from the various States will ever be assembled than that which met at Chicago." 1 The vigor of the young men was tempered by the caution and experience of the graybeards. Sixty of the delegates, then unknown beyond their respective districts, were afterwards sent to Congress, and many of them became governors of their States.2 That a convention composed of such men—men who had looked behind the scenes and understood the springs of this enthusiasm—should have had its choice of a candidate dictated by the cheers and shouts of a mob, is difficult to believe.

The convention was now ready to ballot. As the calling of the roll proceeded, intense interest was manifested by leaders, by delegates, and by spectators. New England came first, and did not give the number of votes for Seward that had been anticipated, but New York's plumper of 70, announced dramatically by Evarts, almost neutralized this effect. All but 6 ½ votes of Pennsylvania went to Cameron. Virginia gave surprise by casting 14 votes out of her 23 for Lincoln; and the entire Indiana delegation (26 in number), declaring for the rail-splitter of Illinois caused a great sensation. The secretary announced the result of the first ballot: Seward, 173 1/2 ; Lincoln, 102; Cameron, 50 ½ ; Chase, 49; Bates, 48; scattering, 42; necessary to a choice, 233.
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1 New York Tribune, June 2d.
2 See Twenty Years of Congress, Blaine, vol. i. p. 164. There were many noted men, or men who afterwards became so, in the convention. Among them were E. H. Rollins, of New Hampshire; John A. Andrew, Geo. S. Boutwell, Edw. L. Pierce, and Samuel Hooper, of Massachusetts; Senator Simmons, of Rhode Island; Gideon Welles, of Connecticut; Evarts, Preston King, and Geo. W. Curtis, of New York; Fred. T. Frelinghuysen, of New Jersey; Wilmot, Thaddeus Stevens, and Reeder, of Pennsylvania; Francis P. Blair and Montgomery Blair, of Maryland; Cartter, Corwin, Monroe, Delano, and Giddings, of Ohio; Judd, David Davis, and Browning, of Illinois; Schurz, of Wisconsin; John A. Kasson, of Iowa; Caleb B. Smith, of Indiana; Austin Blair and T. W. Ferry, of Michigan; Francis P. Blair, Jr., and B. Gratz Brown, of Missouri. Greeley and Eli Thayer sat for Oregon.

The confidence of the Seward managers was not shaken.1 Intense excitement prevailed. "Call the roll! Call the roll!" fairly hissed through the teeth of the delegates, fiercely impatient for the second trial.2 Vermont gave the first surprise by throwing her whole vote, which before had complimented Senator Collamer, to Lincoln; Pennsylvania gave him 48, and Ohio 14. The secretary announced the second ballot. Seward had 184 ½ ; Lincoln, 181; and all the rest, 99 ½ votes. Seward's hopes were blasted. On the third ballot he had 180, while Lincoln had 231 ½ , lacking but 1 ½ votes of the necessary number to nominate. Before the result was declared, Cartter, of Ohio, mounted his chair, and, gaining the breathless attention of the convention, announced the change of four votes of Ohio from Chase to Lincoln. Many delegates then changed their votes to the successful candidate, and as soon as Evarts could obtain the floor he moved, in melancholy tones, to make the nomination unanimous.

A confidential letter of Greeley to Pike, written three days after the nomination, gives an inkling of the fluctuations of the contest. "Massachusetts," he wrote, "was right in Weed's hands, contrary to all reasonable expectation. ... It was all we could do to hold Vermont by the most desperate exertions; and I at some times despaired of it. The rest of New England was pretty sound, but part of New Jersey was somehow inclined to sin against light and knowledge. If you had seen the Pennsylvania delegation, and known how much money Weed had in hand, you would not have believed we could do so well as we did. Give Curtin thanks for that.3 Ohio looked very bad, yet turned out well, and Virginia had been regularly sold out; but the
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1 Greeley, New York Tribune, May 22d.
2 Halstead, p. 147.
3 "The wheels of the machine did not at any time in Pennsylvania run smooth. On nearly every ballot, Pennsylvania was not in readiness when her name was called, and her retirements for consultation became a joke."—Halstead, p. 143.

seller could not deliver. We had to rain red-hot bolts on them, however, to keep the majority from going for Seward, who got eight votes here as it was. Indiana was our right bower, and Missouri above praise. It was a fearful week, such as I hope and trust I shall never see repeated."1

The nomination of Lincoln was received in the wigwam with such shouts, cheers, and thunders of applause that the report of the cannon on the roof of the building, signalling the event, could at times hardly be heard inside. The excited masses in the street about the wigwam cried out with delight. Chicago was wild with joy. One hundred guns were fired from the top of the Tremont House. Processions of " Old Abe " men bearing rails were everywhere to be seen, and they celebrated their victory by deep potations of their native beverage.2

The sorrow and gloom of Seward's supporters were profound and sincere. Thurlow Weed shed bitter tears.3 Men thought that talent and long service had been set aside in favor of merely an available man borne into undue prominence by the enthusiasm of the mass over a rail-splitting episode; and that the party of moral ideas had sacrificed principle for the sake of success.

Hannibal Hamlin, of Maine, was nominated for Vice-President, and the work of the convention was done.4
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1 Pike, First Blows of the Civil War, p. 519. John D. Defrees wrote Colfax: "Greeley slaughtered Seward and saved the party. He deserves the praises of all men, and gets them now. Wherever he goes he is greeted with cheers. . . . We worked hard [for Bates], but could not make it. . . . We Bates men of Indiana concluded that the only way to beat Seward was to go for Lincoln as a unit. We made the nomination." —Life of Colfax, Hollister, p. 148. On the action of New Jersey, see letter of Thomas H. Dudley, a delegate from New Jersey, Century Magazine, July, 1890.
2 Halstead, p. 153.
3 Life, vol. ii. p. 271.
4 Besides the authorities already cited, the controversy, after the nomination, between Raymond and Weed on one side and Greeley on the other throws light on the history of the convention. Seward and his intimate New York friends thought Greeley "the chief leader " in the movement that beat him. See letter of Seward to Weed, May 24th, Life of Weed, vol. ii. p. 270. Greeley, in the Tribune, disclaimed the weighty influence ascribed to him. See also Recollections of a Busy Life, p. 390. The controversy had for a result the publication, on Greeley's persistent demand, of his letter, written in 1854, dissolving the firm of Seward, Weed, and Greeley. It may be found in the Life of Weed, vol. ii. p. 277, and in Greeley's Recollections of a Busy Life, p. 315. I have also used, in this account of the convention, Russel Errett's article in the Magazine of Western History, August, 1889, and the Chicago correspondence of the Cleveland Plain Dealer.

General delight prevailed in Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, and Iowa at the nominations; Pennsylvania regarded gleefully the defeat of Seward, but the first feeling among the Republicans of the other States was one of disappointment that the New York senator had not been chosen.1

Lowell spoke for a large number when, in the October Atlantic Monthly, he wrote: "We are of those who at first regretted that another candidate was not nominated at Chicago. . . . We should have been pleased with Mr. Seward's nomination for the very reason we have seen assigned for passing him by—that he represented the most advanced doctrines of his party." 2

On hearing of the nomination, Douglas said to a knot of Republicans who gathered round him in the Capitol: "Gentlemen, you have nominated a very able and a very honest man."3 Nevertheless, at that time no high opinion of Lincoln's ability existed outside of Illinois. But it was not long before the North came to regard the choice at Chicago as
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1 See Washington Constitution and its citations from the Albany Atlas and Argus, Utica Observer, New York Evening Express, and Boston Courier. Franklin H. Head, then living in Wisconsin, attended the convention, and has vividly described to me his heart-sinking when it became certain Lincoln would be nominated.
2 This article is printed in Lowell's Political Essays, p. 34.
3 John B. Alley, Reminiscences, published by North American Publishing Co., p. 575.

the wisest that could have been made.1 It is an indication of public sentiment that the abolitionists were grieved at the nomination of Lincoln. 2 Wendell Phillips, in a speech, said: "For every blow that Abraham Lincoln ever struck against the system of slavery, the martyr of Marshfield may claim that he has struck a hundred." 3 And later the uncompromising abolitionist called Lincoln "the slave-hound of Illinois," supporting the statement by a misrepresentation of a praiseworthy effort of his congressional career.4

The adjourned Democratic convention met at Baltimore, June 18th. The interim between the two meetings had afforded time for reflection, and the enthusiastic Republican convention, with the now generally cordial approval of its work, had shown the necessity of a united Democratic party. But the animosity between the Charleston seceders and the Douglas men of the Northwest had not been allayed in the slightest degree. Some of the delegates who had withdrawn at Charleston were ready to ask for admittance again to the convention, or at any rate their right to seats was advocated by the remaining anti-Douglas men. This was now the rock
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1 See Albany Journal (Weed's paper), cited by the Tribune, May 21st; Philadelphia Press, May 23d; New York Tribune, June 2d. The Boston Courier wrote, on May 18th: "Since the death of Webster we have not seen men so sober and so sad in this city." The sorrow was among Republicans, and the cause Lincoln's nomination. But A. A. Lawrence, a Bell and Everett man, wrote confidentially to J. J. Crittenden, May 25th: "The whole public sentiment which appears on the outside is in favor of 'Old Abe' and his split rails. The ratification meeting here last night was completely successful. Faneuil Hall was filled, and the streets around it."—Life of Crittenden, Coleman, vol. ii. p. 206. "The nomination of Lincoln strikes the mass of the people with great favor. He is universally regarded as a scrupulously honest man, and a genuine man of the people."—J. W. Grimes to his wife, June 4th, Life of Grimes, Salter, p. 158.
2 Life of Garrison, vol. iii. p. 502.
3 The Liberator, June 8th.
4 Ibid., June 22d.

on which the convention split; for the Douglas faction of Alabama and Louisiana had sent delegates to Baltimore and asked for admission. After wrangling for four days in formal session by day and hurling defiance at each other by well-attended mass-meetings at night, the quarrel came to a head on the fifth day of the convention. The Douglas delegates from Louisiana and Alabama were admitted, and other action unpalatable to the minority was taken in regard to credentials. Virginia led a new secession, followed by most of the delegates from North Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky, and Maryland; and finally the chairman, Caleb Cushing, resigned his position and joined the Southern faction.

Before the secession, New York, with her thirty-five unanimous votes, held the balance of power. Many of her delegates were eminent men of business, anxious for peace; others were adroit politicians adept at a trade and eager to hold the party together by any means. Many were the expedients devised to bring about harmony; but it was to attempt the impossible. The Southerners were exacting, the delegates from the Northwest bold and defiant. The party still remained a house divided against itself. It might have seemed that, as the contention turned on Douglas, his withdrawal would have paved the way for a reconciliation. This he well understood. On June 20th, the third day of the convention, he wrote to Richardson from Washington: "While I can never sacrifice the principle [of non-intervention] even to obtain the presidency, I will cheerfully and joyfully sacrifice myself to maintain the principle. If, therefore, you and my other friends . . . shall be of the opinion that the principle can be preserved, and the unity and ascendency of the Democratic party maintained ... by withdrawing my name and uniting with some other nonintervention, Union-loving Democrat, I beseech you to pursue that course. ... I conjure you to act with a single eye to the safety and welfare of the country, and without the slightest regard to my individual interest or aggrandizement."1 As Richardson did not make this letter public, Douglas, at half-past nine in the morning of the day that the disruption occurred, sent a despatch similar in purport to Dean Richmond, the leader of the New York delegation, but this was also suppressed. Richardson afterwards explained that the action of the Southerners had put it out of his power to use Douglas's letter.

After the dissatisfied had withdrawn, David Tod, of Ohio, by request of his associate vice-presidents, took the chair. The convention proceeded to ballot, and, after the second trial, when Douglas had received all the votes but thirteen, he was by resolution declared nominated on the ground that he had received the votes of two-thirds of the delegates present. Senator Fitzpatrick, of Alabama, was nominated for Vice-President. When he afterwards declined the nomination, the national committee named Herschel V. Johnson, of Georgia, for the position.

The Baltimore seceders, joined by most of the seceders from the Charleston convention, met in another hall, adopted the Southern platform, and nominated Breckinridge, of Kentucky, for President, and Lane, of Oregon, for Vice-President. 2

Although Congress adjourned in June, the House had done a large amount of work since its organization. It passed a bill for the admission of Kansas under the Wyandotte free constitution, which had been ratified by a large majority of the popular vote. The Senate, however, refused to take up the bill. The House repealed the slave code of New Mexico,3 but to this the Senate did not agree. The
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1 Life of Douglas, Flint, p. 212.
2 See National Political Conventions of 1860, Halstead; New York Tribune; Pike's First Blows of the Civil War. The Charleston seceders had adjourned to Richmond, but, on meeting there, adjourned to await the action of the Baltimore convention; and when they afterwards reassembled, they endorsed the nominations of Breckinridge and Lane.
3 House Journal, 1st Session 36th Congress, Part I. pp. 220, 303; Part n. p. 815. The vote was: Yeas, 97; nays, 90.

House also passed a homestead bill. This the Senate amended, making it a less liberal measure for the landless. The House, on the principle that half a loaf is better than none, accepted the Senate's modifications; but the bill was vetoed by the President, and the necessary two-thirds vote to pass it over the veto could not be commanded in the Senate. The Morrill tariff bill, providing for a revision, and in some cases an increase, of tariff duties, went through the House, but was not acted upon by the Senate. A House committee, whose chairman was Covode, investigated the action of the administration in its attempts to carry first the Lecompton bill and then the English bill through the House of Representatives in 1858, bringing to light facts that redounded little to the credit of Buchanan and his cabinet.1 At the North, the administration had sunk so low in public estimation, and the interest in the conventions and preparations for the presidential campaign had so engrossed public notice, that the report of the Covode committee, and the criticism by the President of its manner of procedure, did not attract the attention that their importance perhaps warranted. 2

After the debate between Douglas and Davis, the most important event in the Senate was an oration by Sumner on the " Barbarism of Slavery." Sumner had returned from Europe just before the opening of the session. His former health and strength were restored sufficiently for him to give again systematic attention to the duties of a senator, and this was his first speech in the Senate since the one delivered four years previously, that had provoked the outrageous assault. He delivered a courageous invective against slavery, employing a line of argument now hardly necessary for Northern people, but then especially irritating to the South. He took up the question where he had left off at the close
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1 See p. 300.
2 For an account of this friendly to the President, see Life of Buchanan, Curtis, vol. ii. chap. xii.

of his speech, "The Crime against Kansas;" but he apparently failed to comprehend the progress of anti-slavery sentiment, and the direction it had taken during his three and a half years of enforced absence. "We have just had a four hours' speech from Sumner on the 'Barbarism of Slavery,'" wrote Senator Grimes, an earnest Republican; "in a literary point of view it was of course excellent. As a bitter, denunciatory oration, it could hardly be exceeded in point of style and finish. But to me many parts sounded harsh, vindictive, and slightly brutal. It is all true that slavery tends to barbarism; but Mr. Sumner furnishes no remedy for the evils he complains of. His speech has done the Republicans no good. Its effect has been to exasperate the Southern members, and render it impossible for Mr. Sumner to exercise any influence here for the good of his State."1

The campaign of 1860 was not so animated as that of 1856, yet the problem concerning the division of the electoral votes was substantially the same. Fremont had had 114 electors; of these, and of the 4 of Minnesota, Lincoln was reasonably certain, but he needed 34 more, which must be had from some combination of the votes of the following States: Pennsylvania, which cast 27; New Jersey, 7; Indiana, 13; Illinois, 11; Oregon, 3; California, 4. While not arithmetically necessary to carry Pennsylvania, it was, as in 1856, practically so; for if the Republicans could not obtain the vote of Pennsylvania, they certainly could not hope for that of New Jersey, and one or the other was absolutely required. Had Douglas been the candidate of the united Democracy on the Cincinnati platform, the contest would have been close and exciting and the result doubtful. Douglas himself boasted that had that been the case he would have beaten Lincoln in every State of the Union except
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1 Grimes to his wife, June 4th, Life of Grimes, Salter, p. 127; see also editorial in New York Tribune, June 5th.

Vermont and Massachusetts.1 Had the Democrats been united on Breckinridge and the Southern platform, the only conceivably different result would have been larger Lincoln majorities in the Northern States. But with the actual state of affairs, after the two nominations at Baltimore, the success of the Republicans seemed to be assured. The split in the Democratic party doomed it to certain defeat before the people; but as the contest went on, a glimmer of hope arose that while it was absolutely impossible for Douglas, Breckinridge, or Bell to obtain a majority of the electoral votes, it was within the bounds of possibility to defeat Lincoln and throw the election into the House of Representatives. Then Breckinridge might be elected, or, the House failing to make a choice, Lane would become President by virtue of having been chosen Vice-President by the Senate. 2

This contingency created some alarm among the Republicans, whose elation had been great at the failure of the Democrats to cement at Baltimore their divided party. Pennsylvania and Indiana still held their State elections in October, and it was generally conceded that if they went Republican, nothing could prevent the election of Lincoln. Pennsylvania was the more important, and at first the more doubtful, of the two; so that, as in 1856, the contest again hinged on the State election in the Keystone State. Now, however, a new issue had been brought into the canvass. A sequence of the panic of 1857 was great depression in the iron trade. As the Democrats in Congress had voted almost unanimously against the Morrill tariff bill, which, from the Pennsylvania point of view, was expected to cure the
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1 Speech at Baltimore, September 6th, Baltimore Daily Exchange.
2 In the event of the election going to the House, the voting would have been by States, and it was conjectured that Lincoln would have 15; Breckinridge, 12; Bell, 2; and 4 were divided or doubtful.—New York Tribune, July 16th. Another estimate was: Lincoln, 15; Breckinridge, 11; Douglas, 2; Bell, 1; doubtful, 4—New York Tribune, October 4th.

present trouble, Democrats in that State were lukewarm. Republicans, on the other hand, were aggressive and went to work in earnest to secure the doubtful vote, by showing the greater devotion of their party to the material interests of the State. The Chicago convention, as we have seen, recognized this sentiment by adopting a tariff plank, which, although it was called ambiguous in expression, had been satisfactory to the Pennsylvania delegation.1 But there was no doubt about the Democratic position. Both the Douglas and the Breckinridge conventions had reaffirmed the Cincinnati platform of 1856, which declared in favor of "progressive free trade throughout the world." Andrew G. Curtin, the People's candidate for governor, a man of ability and energy, and a thorough-going protectionist, gave the key-note to the Pennsylvania campaign by pushing into prominence the tariff question. Protection to home industry, and freedom in the territories, were the watchwords; but the promise of higher duties on iron appealed more powerfully to the doubtful voters than did the plea for free soil.2 Many speeches were made in which the sole issue discussed was the tariff, and it is safe to say that no Pennsylvania advocate of Lincoln and Curtin made a speech in his State without some mention of the question that now dominated all others in the Pennsylvania mind. The effect of this mode of conducting the canvass was so marked that by September it became apparent that, although the Democratic candidate for governor was supported by the adherents of Douglas, Breckinridge, and Bell, the chance of election lay decidedly on the side of Curtin. The fusion in 1856 had been against the Democrats; now the Lincoln
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1 " The Evening Post says the tariff plank in the Chicago platform means free trade; the Tribune says it means protection. . . . The tariff resolution was intended to conciliate support in Pennsylvania and New Jersey without offending free-trade Republicans in other States."—New York World, Oct 19th, then an independent journal inclining to Bell.
2 In 1860 Pennsylvania produced one-half of the iron made in the whole country.

party breasted the combined opposition. Douglas himself was affected by the drift of sentiment. Although he had always been regarded as inclining to free trade, he argued in a speech made in Pennsylvania in favor of protection to the industries of that great manufacturing State.1 But outside of Pennsylvania and New Jersey, one hardly heard the tariff question mentioned. The theoretical difference between the contending parties was regarding slavery in the territories; but so far as the existing territory of the country was concerned, it can hardly be called a practical issue. 2 No "bleeding Kansas" gave point to Republican
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1 See New York Tribune, September 8th and 10th. "The October contest in Pennsylvania will settle the future tariff policy of the government."— Stump speech of Alex. K. McClure, September 6th. The tariff plank "constitutes the essential plank in the platform" of the Lincoln and Hamlin party.—Philadelphia North American. In Southern Pennsylvania, " they are all tariff men and will vote solid for Curtin."—Ibid., September 3d. The iron industry, said W. D. Kelley, languishes under the legislation of the free-trade Democracy.—Ibid., September 4th. A club in Philadelphia was called the " Mercantile Tariff Men." A banner at a great meeting at Germantown bore the inscription, "Pennsylvania demands adequate protection to her great iron, coal, and manufacturing interests."—Ibid., October 2d and 5th. At a great demonstration in Pittsburgh," the manufacturing establishments were well represented, and the men carried mottoes relating chiefly to a protective tariff."—National Intelligencer, October 2d. Instances like these may be multiplied. "The people of Pennsylvania, like those of New Jersey, are nearly unanimous in favor of a protective tariff. Questions concerning slavery and all other political topics hold a subordinate place in their regard to this one, 'By what action on our part shall we secure the effective Protection of Home Industry V "—New York Tribune, September 26th.
2 The editor of the Memphis Appeal, after a trip to New Orleans, wrote a well-considered article from which I extract: "There are not enough slaves in the slave States to cultivate the States which border on the inland sea, two-thirds of the area of each of which has never yet been pressed by the foot of a slave. For centuries to come, unless other sources of supply of Southern labor are opened up, there cannot and will not be, in the possibility of things, another slave territory added to the Union. ... If men must extend slavery, let them come out for the African slave-trade, but do not be quarrelling about the miserable twaddle of slavery protection by Breckinridge, or of intervention to destroy it, on the other hand, by Lincoln."—Cited by New York World, October 8th.

arguments, as had been the case in 1856. Yet the Republican canvass was a protest against the policy of Pierce and Buchanan, who had used the executive influence invariably against freedom; it was opposition to acquiring more slave territory; it was opposition to the revival in any shape of the African slave-trade, which, if accomplished, would make the territorial question as vital as ever Kansas affairs had done. The speech of Gaulden, a Georgia delegate in the Charleston convention, which had been received with demonstrations of approval, was widely published at the North, and, being regarded as the sincere avowal of one who spoke for many planters, it had produced a marked effect on Northern sentiment. "I am a Southern states rights man," he had said; "I am an African slave-trader. I am one of those Southern men who believe that slavery is right, morally, religiously, socially, and politically. I believe that the institution of slavery has done more for this country, more for civilization, than all other interests put together. ... I believe that this doctrine of protection to slavery in the territories is a mere theory, a mere abstraction. . . . We have no slaves to carry to these territories. We can never make another slave State with our present supply of slaves. ... I would ask my friends of the South to come up in a proper spirit, ask our Northern friends to give us all our rights, and take off the ruthless restrictions which cut off the supply of slaves from foreign lands.... I tell you, fellow-Democrats, that the African slave-trader is the true Union man. ... If any of you Northern Democrats will go home with me to my plantation in Georgia, I will show you some darkies that I bought in Maryland, some that I bought in Virginia, some in Delaware, some in Florida, some in North Carolina, and I will also show you the pure African, the noblest Roman of them all." 1
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1 New York Tribune, May 7th. A large part of this speech is published in Greeley's American Conflict, vol. i. p. 316.

"We can extend slavery into new territories," said Seward, at Detroit, September 4th, "and create new slave States only by reopening the African slave-trade." 1 "The same power that abrogated the Missouri Compromise in 1854," said he at Madison, September 12th, "would, if the efforts to establish slavery in Kansas had been successful, have been, after a short time, bold enough, daring enough, desperate enough, to have repealed the prohibition of the African slave-trade. And, indeed, that is yet a possibility now."2 "I have said that this battle was fought and this victory won," declared Seward, at St. Paul, September 18th. "There is one danger remaining—one only. Slavery can never more force itself or be forced, from the stock that exists among us, into the territories of the United States. But the cupidity of trade and the ambition of those whose interests are identified with slavery are such that they may clandestinely and surreptitiously reopen, either within the forms of law or without them, the African slave-trade, and may bring in new cargoes of African slaves at one hundred dollars a head, and scatter them into the territories; and once getting possession of new domain, they may again renew their operations against the patriotism of the American people." 3 The slave States, Seward averred at New York city, November 2d," are going to say next, as they logically must, that they should reopen the African slave-trade, and so furnish the supplies for slavery." 4

While the divided opposition made Republican success almost certain, the lack of a common enemy, who took the same form and advocated the same principles everywhere, deprived the canvass of the vigor and excitement that prevail when a line is sharply drawn between two parties on one decided issue. In New England—excepting Connecticut—and in the Northwest, the contest lay between Lincoln
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1 Seward's Works, vol. iv. p. 317.
2 Ibid., p. 317.
3 Ibid., p. 346.
4 Ibid., p. 418; see also speech at Seneca Falls, ibid., p. 408.

and Douglas. The other candidates were barely mentioned, and as Douglas had no chance whatever of election, the contest could not be called spirited. In New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Connecticut, Breckinridge and Bell had a following;' but in those States there was little enthusiasm, except that drawn out by Republican meetings. In the slave States outside of Missouri, the contest lay between Breckinridge and Bell. Douglas had supporters everywhere, but it was recognized he could carry no slave State but Missouri, and his candidacy in the South resulted only as a diversion which redounded to the advantage of Bell, for the supporters of Douglas and Bell agreed in pronounced devotion to the Union; while it was practically true, which Douglas intimated at Baltimore, that, although every Breckinridge man was not a disunionist, every disunionist in America was a Breckinridge man.2 As the canvass proceeded, Lincoln, as representing the more positive resistance to Southern domination, drew to himself Douglas Democrats at the North; while Breckinridge, as representing the logical Southern doctrine, drew from the adherents of Douglas at the South.

More political machinery was employed in the Republican canvass than in 1856. Office-seekers had been present in force at the Chicago convention, and, as the prospect of success increased, their number grew and they were on hand everywhere to do the necessary work of party organization. The Wide-awakes, in their inception merely a happy accident, were turned to good account in arousing enthusiasm. Companies and battalions of them, wearing capes and bearing torches, were a necessary feature of every Republican demonstration.3 Lincoln's early occupation was
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1 Bell had a considerable following in Massachusetts. 2 Baltimore Daily Exchange, September 7th. 3 For the origin of the Wide-awakes, see Nicolay and Hay, vol. ii. p. 284; see also New York Tribune, June 2d, and New York Herald, Sept 19th. The Herald of that date estimated that there were over four hundred thousand drilled and uniformed Wide-awakes, and the number was constantly increasing.

glorified, and men bearing fence-rails might be seen in every procession. In Boston, a significant feature of a parade was a rail-splitters' battalion composed of men averaging six feet two inches in height. The Sumner Blues, a company of colored men from Portland, took part in the same procession, for it was not overlooked that the result of the election might affect the lot of the negro.1 Lincoln meetings, large and small, addressed by men of character and ability, were a feature of the summer and autumn; in every village, town, and county, there was frequent opportunity for the inquiring voter to familiarize himself with the issue before the people. Nearly all the educational features of the campaign of 1856 were repeated; the published debates of Lincoln and Douglas were read with interest and effect; yet less reliance was placed on newspapers and campaign documents than in the previous presidential canvass. 2 The religious element, with the active personal participation of the clergy, which was one of the characteristics of 1856,
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1 Boston Evening Transcript, October 17th. 2 "While the circulation of speeches, campaign lives, and pamphlet essays has not been remarkably large, the number of meetings and oral addresses in this canvass has been beyond precedent. We judge that the number of speeches made during the recent campaign has been quite equal to that of all that were made in the previous presidential canvasses from 1789 to 1856 inclusive."—New York Tribune, November 8th. I will mention some of the men who spoke frequently from the stump: Seward, Chase, Senator Wade, Senator Wilson, Greeley; David D. Field, William M. Evarts, George W. Curtis, Conkling, Fenton, Charles A. Dana, C. M. Depew, and Stewart L. Woodford, of New York; Thaddeus Stevens, John Hickman, Grow, Covode, Wilmot, and Reeder, of Pennsylvania; Dayton, of New Jersey; Corwin, John Sherman, and Schenck, of Ohio; Burlingame and Charles F. Adams, of Massachusetts; Morrill and Fessenden, of Maine; Caleb B. Smith, Henry S. Lane, and Oliver P. Morton, of Indiana; Trumbull, Browning, Lovejoy, and David Davis, of Illinois; Howard, of Michigan; Senator Doolittle and Carl Schurz, of Wisconsin; Francis P. Blair, of Missouri; and Cassius M. Clay, of Kentucky.

was not now so obtrusive or pronounced;1 but in New England and along the lines of New England influence, the hearty wishes and fervent prayers of most Protestant ministers were for Republican success. Henry Ward Beecher, and Dr. Chapin, the eminent Universalist, did not scruple to deliver political speeches from their pulpits the Sunday evening before the election. The young men and first voters, who had been studying the slavery question since 1852, took a vital interest in this campaign. They read the political literature with avidity. Filled with enthusiasm, they were glad to enroll themselves in the Wide-awake order, and make manifest their determination to do all in their power to avert the longer misrule of the Southern oligarchy. "The Republican party," said Seward at Cleveland, October 4th, "is a party chiefly of young men. Each successive year brings into its ranks an increasing proportion of the young men of this country." 3 Northern school-teachers, under the inspiration of the moral principle at stake, impressed upon eager listening boys that they were living in historic times, and that a great question, fraught with weal or woe to the country, was about to be decided. The torch-bearers of literature were on the side of Lincoln. "I vote with the Republican party," wrote Holmes to Motley; "I cannot hesitate between them and the Democrats."' Whittier offered the resolutions at a Republican meeting at Amesbury ;4 William Cullen Bryant was at the head of the Lincoln electoral ticket of New York, and George William Curtis spoke frequently from the stump. Few political
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1 See New York Herald, September 11th. A poll of voters showed that all the clergymen of Springfield, Illinois, but three, were against Lincoln. Herndon, p. 466.
2 Seward's Works, vol. iv. p. 384. On the importance of young men, see New York Tribune, July 30th; for a prediction made in December, 1856, of the Republican vote in 1860, see Olmsted's Texas Journey, p. xxvi.
3 Motley's Correspondence, vol. i. p. 341.
4 The Independent, September 20th.

arguments have been more cogent, or expressed in choicer phrase, than that of James Russell Lowell, published in the Atlantic Monthly for October. It may be said to represent the opinion of the men of thought and culture of the country. "The slave holding interest," he wrote, "has gone on step by step, forcing concession after concession, till it needs but little to secure it forever in the political supremacy of the country. Yield to its latest demand—let it mould the evil destiny of the territories—and the thing is done past recall. The next presidential election is to say yes or no. . . . We believe this election is a turning-point in our history. ... In point of fact ... we have only two parties in the field: those who favor the extension of slavery, and those who oppose it." The Republican party "is not unanimous about the tariff, about State rights, about many other questions of policy. What unites the Republicans is ... a common resolve to resist the encroachments of slavery everywhen and everywhere. ... It is in a moral aversion to slavery as a great wrong that the chief strength of the Republican party lies." The question that needs an answer in the election is: "What policy will secure the most prosperous future to the helpless territories which our decision is to make or mar for all coming time? What will save the country from a Senate and Supreme Court where freedom shall be forever at a disadvantage ?"1

Dr. Francis Lieber, who for years held a chair in the University of South Carolina, and was now a professor in Columbia College, presided over a German Republican meeting in New York city. When the news reached South Carolina, the Euphradian Society of the college expelled him from honorary membership, and his bust and portrait were removed from the halls of the society. 2 "I am denounced at this moment at the South in very virulent language," wrote Lieber to his son. 3.
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1 See Political Essays, p. 21 et seq.
2 New York Evening Post, October 30th.
3 Life and Letters, p. 313.

But one argument was used with any show of success by the opponents of the Republicans at the North. The sectional character of the Republican party was urged, with the averment that if Lincoln were elected, the cotton States would certainly secede from the Union. Southern speakers of ability and influence made such declarations freely, and the press teemed with threats of like tenor. The menaces were no more arrogant than those of 1856, but they seemed more grave and sincere. It may be that the Southern leaders had little idea that Lincoln could be elected, and used the threats of disunion as an electioneering cry;1 but the less prominent speakers were terribly in earnest, and avowed themselves ready to make good their words.2 The slaveholders whom they addressed were persuaded that Lincoln's election would mean emancipation; the poor whites were convinced that negro equality and citizenship would follow. At the South, the Wide-awakes were regarded as a semi-military organization whose determination was to see Lincoln inaugurated if elected; and soon companies of minute-men as a counter-demonstration began forming in the cotton States. 3

In judging these events, it is impossible to divest ourselves of the knowledge of the end, yet there certainly seems in the Southern threats a seriousness that foreboded trouble, and thus to many well-informed men they appeared in 1860.

Douglas, since his nomination, had spoken in several Southern States. He knew more of the aims of the secessionists than any other Northern man, and he was sincere when he declared at Chicago: "I believe that this country is in more
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1 See A. H. Stephens, War between the States, vol. ii. pp. 275, 277.
2 See Recollections of Mississippi, Reuben Davis, p. 390; Iron Furnace, pp. 15,19.
3 Richmond Enquirer, September 28th and October 19th; Charleston Mercury, October 2d, 15th, 19th; New York Evening Post, October 17th; Georgia Chronicle, cited by the Washington Constitution, October 16th; Charleston Courier, October 25th; Washington correspondence of the New York Herald, October 30th; speech of H. W. Hilliard, New York, September, 1860, Politics and Pen Pictures, p. 295,

danger now than at any other moment since I have known anything of public life."1 The supporters of Douglas and Bell made no attempt to conceal their fears, but the cry of "wolf" was so obviously in their interest that Republicans could not be blamed for regarding it as an effort to frighten people from voting for Lincoln. And for the most part it was so looked upon. Seward said at St. Paul: "Slavery to-day is for the first time not only powerless, but without influence in the American republic. For the first time in the history of the United States, no man in a free State can be bribed to vote for slavery. . . . For the first time in the history of the republic, the slave power has not even the ability to terrify or alarm the freeman so as to make him submit, or even to compromise. It rails now with a feeble voice, instead of thundering as it did in our ears for twenty or thirty years past. With a feeble and muttering voice they cry out that they will tear the Union to pieces. . . . 'Who's afraid V Nobody's afraid. Nobody can be bought." 2 "For ten, aye for twenty, years," declared Seward at New York, four days before the election, "these threats have been renewed, in the same language and in the same form, about the first day of November every four years when it happened to come before the day of the presidential election. I do not doubt but that these Southern statesmen and politicians think they are going to dissolve the Union, but I think they are going to do no such thing." 3 Lowell spoke of " the hollowness of those fears for the safety of the Union in case of Mr. Lincoln's election," and called to mind that false alarms had been sounded before. "The old Mumbo-Jumbo," he asserted, "is occasionally paraded at the North, but, however many old women may be frightened, the pulse of the stock-market remains provokingly calm."4 A certain support for this view was found in the expression of the Douglas and Bell newspapers at the South
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1 October 5th, National Intelligencer.
2 Seward's Works, vol. iv. p. 344.
3 Ibid., p. 420.
4 Political Essays, pp. 26, 41.

that deprecated any move in the direction of secession until an overt act had been committed by the coming Republican administration.1

There were Republicans who knew too much of the South to regard these threats as gasconade, yet who were determined to force the issue. They had not forgotten that the cry of "The Union is in danger" had elected Buchanan; and they could see no hope for the country if the Southern party were always going to be able to frighten voters from opposing the extension of slavery. Therefore, in their opinion, the North was bound to answer the threat of the South by a defiance. "We are summoned to surrender," said Carl Schurz at St. Louis. "And what price do they offer to pay us for all our sacrifices if we submit? Why, slavery can then be preserved!" 2

Dr. Lieber, who knew by long actual contact the people of both sections, and who was linked to the South and the North by ties of family and friendship, judged the situation with remarkable insight. "As to the threats of dissolution of the Union should Mr. Lincoln be elected," he wrote to his son, "I do not reply, 'Try it, let us see;' on the contrary, I believe the threat is made in good earnest, and that it is quite possible to carry it into execution. . . . It sometimes has occurred to me that what Thucydides said of the Greeks at the time of the Peloponnesian War applies to us at present. 'The Greeks,' he said, 'did not understand each other any longer, though they spoke the same language; words received a different meaning in different parts.'" 3
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1 See "Occasional" from Washington (probably J. W. Forney) to the Philadelphia Press, cited by New York Evening Post, October 12th; New York World, October 8th; extracts from Southern papers cited, and editorial comments on the same, New York World, October 19th; also World, October 27th.
2 Speeches by Carl Schurz, p. 144.
3 Lieber added, "I quote from memory."—Life and Letters, p. 314. This letter has a peculiar interest, as it was written to his son Oscar, then Southern in sympathy, who afterwards entered the Confederate army and died from wounds received in battle. Two of Lieber's sons served in the Union army during the war.

In truth, when Senator Hammond wrote, "Every sensible man in the country must know that the election of Mr. Lincoln will put the Union at imminent and instant hazard;"1 when James L. Orr said that "the honor and safety of the South required its prompt secession from the Union in the event of the election of a Black Republican to the presidency;"2 and when Alexander Stephens declared that the success of Lincoln was certain, and the result would be "undoubtedly an attempt at secession and revolution," 3 Northern men of discretion were forced to pause and ask whether there were not as much sincerity as bravado in the threats that were heard from all parts of the South.

Efforts were not lacking to bring about a union of the opponents of the Republicans. As has been stated, the followers of Douglas and of Bell and Breckinridge supported the same ticket in Pennsylvania. In Indiana, where Bell had but little support, the Douglas and Breckinridge factions united on a candidate for governor. A partial fusion on an electoral ticket was accomplished in Pennsylvania and New Jersey; a more perfect one in New York. Jefferson Davis tried to concentrate the opposition to Lincoln on a single candidate. Bell, "profoundly impressed by the danger which threatened the country," was willing to withdraw in conjunction with Douglas and Breckinridge, provided some man more acceptable than any of the three could be put forward, and he gave Davis an authorization to open negotiations with that end in view. Breckinridge gave Davis similar authority. The matter was broached in an amicable spirit to Douglas. "He replied that the scheme proposed was impracticable, because his friends,
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1 Letter of August 5th to J. T. Broyles, published in the Charleston Mercury, August 25th.
2 National Intelligencer, September 27th.
3 Interview with a special correspondent of the New York Herald, September 29th.

mainly Northern Democrats, if he were withdrawn, would join in the support of Lincoln rather than of any one who should supplant him; that he was in the hands of his friends, and was sure they would not accept the proposition."1 But at no time had Douglas any hope of election. Early in the canvass he told Wilson and Burlingame that Lincoln would be elected; 2 and we may believe him sincere when in September he declared: "Believing that the Union is in danger, I will make any personal sacrifice to preserve it. If the withdrawal of my name would tend to defeat Mr. Lincoln, I would this moment withdraw it."' When he had this conference with Wilson and Burlingame, he told them that he was going South to urge submission to the probable verdict, and after his stumping tour in New England he wended his way southward. At Norfolk, Virginia, he had an opportunity to avow his sentiments. The head of the Breckinridge electoral ticket for Virginia asked him: "If Abraham Lincoln be elected President, will the Southern States be justified in seceding from the Union?"

"To this I answer emphatically no," said Douglas. "The election of a man to the presidency by the American people, in conformity with the Constitution of the United States, would not justify any attempt at dissolving this glorious confederacy."

Another question was put: "If they, the Southern States, secede from the Union upon the inauguration of Abraham Lincoln, before he commits an overt act against their constitutional rights, will you advise or vindicate resistance by force to their secession?" Douglas replied: "I answer emphatically that it is the duty of the President of the United States, and all others in authority under him, to enforce the laws of the United States as passed by Congress and as the
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1 The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government, Jefferson Davis, vol. i. p. 52.
2 Rise and Fall of the Slave Power, Wilson, vol. ii. p. 699; also, New York Tribune, August 31st.
3 New York Tribune, September 13th.

court expound them. And I, as in duty bound by my oath of fidelity to the Constitution, would do all in my power to aid the government of the United States in maintaining the supremacy of the laws against all resistance to them, come from what quarter it might. In other words, I think the President of the United States, whoever he may be, should treat all attempts to break up the Union by resistance to its laws as Old Hickory treated the nullifiers of 1832. . . . I acknowledge the inherent and inalienable right to revolution whenever a grievance becomes too burdensome to be borne." But the election of Lincoln "is not such a grievance as would justify revolution or secession."1 This declaration brought down upon the head of Douglas a shower of abuse from the secessionist faction at the South. The Charleston Mercury contemptuously called him "a regular old John Adams federalist and consolidationist." 3 Nothing daunted, however, and in spite of the remonstrance of Senator Clingman, a political friend,3 Douglas repeated assertions similar in emphasis and vigor at other places in the South. At Baltimore he still further elaborated his position and warned his hearers of impending danger. "States that secede," he declared, "cannot screen themselves under the pretence that resistance to their acts 'would be making war upon sovereign States.' Sovereign States cannot commit treason. Individuals may. . . . I tell you, my fellow-citizens," he continued," I believe this Union is in danger. In my opinion, there is a mature plan through the Southern States to break up the Union. I believe the election of a Black Republican is to be the signal for that attempt, and that the leaders of the scheme desire the election of Lincoln so as to have an excuse for disunion."4

Douglas took the unusual course for a presidential
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1 National Intelligencer, September 1st. The speech was made August 25th.
2 September 3d.
3 Clingman's Speeches and Writings, p. 513.
4 Speech at Baltimore, September 6th, Baltimore Daily Exchange.

candidate of visiting different parts of the country and discussing the political issues and their personal bearing. Speaking on all occasions—from the platform of the railroad car, the balcony of the hotel, at monster mass-meetings, frequently jaded from travel, many times without preparation and on the suggestion of the moment—he said much that was trivial and undignified; but he also said much that was patriotic, unselfish, and pregnant with constitutional wisdom. His love for the Union and devotion to the Constitution inspired all his utterances. The cynosure of all eyes, he taught lessons that were destined to bear important fruit. Coldly received at the South, looked upon as a renegade, he aroused great enthusiasm everywhere at the North, and his personal presence was the only feature that gave any life to the struggle against the Republicans.

Apart from the rail-splitting episode, the personality of Lincoln counted for little in the campaign. It was everywhere conceded that he was thoroughly honest, but his opponents sneered at his reputed capacity, and, outside of his own State, few regarded his nomination as other than the sacrifice of commanding ability in favor of respectable mediocrity. In popular estimation his great merit consisted in being able to carry the doubtful States. Schurz deemed it necessary to assure his constituents at Milwaukee that Lincoln was not merely an available candidate, "a second or third rate man like Polk or Pierce," but that the debate with Douglas had shown that he had a "lucid mind and honest heart."1 The campaign went on without direction, with hardly a suggestion even, from the Republican standard-bearer.2 Seward filled the minds of Republicans, attracting such attention and honor, and arousing such enthusiasm, that the closing months of the campaign were the most brilliant epoch of his life. It was then he reached the climax of his career. His grief and sense of humiliation
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1 Speeches by Schurz, p. 113.
2 Nicolay and Hay, vol. ii. p. 287.

at not receiving the nomination in Chicago were poignant. "I am," he wrote, "a leader deposed by my own party, in the hour of organization for decisive battle."1 In common with his intimate friends, he charged his defeat chiefly to Greeley. He felt towards that influential editor as much vindictiveness as was possible in a man of so amiable a nature.2 But he did not retire to his tent. At the time of the meeting of the convention he had left the Senate and gone to his home in Auburn, where he expected to receive the news of his success surrounded by the friends and neighbors whom he loved, and who repaid his love by veneration. When the news of Lincoln's nomination came, and when his friends were quivering with disappointment, and no one in Auburn had the heart to write the conventional editorial endorsing the nomination, Seward, smiling, took pen in hand and wrote the article for the Republican evening journal. "No truer or firmer defenders of the Republican faith," he declared," could have been found in the Union than the distinguished and esteemed citizens on whom the honors of nomination have fallen."3 He also gave at once, over his own signature, a public and emphatic support to platform and candidates; 4 and, while then of the opinion that he would soon seek the repose of private life, 5 he came, when time had assuaged his grief, to a better conclusion, and devoted his hearty and energetic efforts to the success of the cause. "The magnanimity of Mr. Seward, since the result of the convention was known," wrote Lowell, " has been a greater ornament to him and a greater honor to his party than his election to the presidency would have been."6
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1 Letter of Seward to his wife, May 30th, Life of Seward, by Frederick W. Seward, vol. ii. p. 454.
2 See Seward's letter to Weed, May 24th, Life of Weed, vol. ii. p. 270. 3 Life of Seward, by Frederick W. Seward, vol. ii. p. 452.
4 See letter of May 21st, published in the Evening Post, cited by the New York Tribune, May 25th; also Seward's Works, vol. iv. p. 79.
5 Letter to Weed, May 24th.
6 Atlantic Monthly, October, 1860; Lowell's Political Essays, p. 84.

Seward's friends followed the example set them. "We all feel that New York and the friends of Seward have acted nobly," wrote Swett to Weed, after the election.1

In the early part of September, Seward began a tour of speech making at Detroit. He went as far west as St. Paul and Lawrence, Kansas, ending with an address to his townsmen the night before election. The sincere and hearty demonstrations wherever he went were an "earnest tribute."2 The crowds that gathered to hear him felt what Schurz had put in words, that Seward was " the intellectual head of the political anti-slavery movement," and had " in the hearts of his friends a place which hardly another man in the nation could fill.3 As the people of the sure Republican States, where he for the most part spoke, heard the words of wisdom, they could not but feel a profound regret that he was not their standard-bearer. When we consider the great moral question involved, the variety of presentation, the many-sided treatment, the fearlessness of statement, the appeal to reason and the highest feelings, the absence of any attempt to delude the people by the smallest misrepresentation, Seward's efforts in this campaign are the most remarkable stump-speeches ever delivered in this country. While he paid Lincoln well-chosen compliments, the references to the opposing candidates were courteous. The speeches are a fit type of the campaign—a campaign conducted on a great moral principle. Seward reaffirmed almost everywhere the declaration of the "irrepressible conflict," maintaining that the Republicans simply reverted to the theory and
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1 Life of Weed, vol. ii. p. 301.
2 New York Tribune, September 4th and 5th; New York Evening Post, September 5th; New York Times, September 8th; New York Herald, September 8th and October 20th; St. Louis Democrat, cited by Evening Post, October 2d; New York World, November 3d. "Listen to Mr. Seward on the prairies! Notice how free and eloquent he has been since the Chicago convention ! And this change is not due to age."—Wendell Phillips, November 7th.
3 Speeches of Schurz, p. 109.

practice of the fathers. He made appear at all times the political, social, and moral evil of slavery. "There is no man," he said," who has an enlightened conscience who is indifferent on the subject of human bondage."' Yet he spoke with forbearance of the people of the South. "You must demonstrate the wisdom of our cause," he affirmed, "with gentleness, with patience, with loving-kindness, to your brethren of the slave States."2 He maintained that "most men . . . are content to keep the Union with slavery if it cannot be kept otherwise."3 At Chicago he showed what a bulwark of freedom was the great Northwest, by its prosperity and commercial importance;4 and he prophesied that "the last Democrat is born in this nation . . . who will maintain the Democratic principles which constitute the present creed of the Democratic party."5 The night before election he averred that the question to be decided was: "Shall freedom, justice, and humanity ultimately and in the end prevail; are these republican institutions of ours safe and permanent?" He referred to the threats of disunion, and while expressing no defiance, he declared: "Fellow-citizens, it is time, high time, that we know whether this is a constitutional government under which we live. It is high time that we know, since the Union is threatened, who are its friends and who are its enemies." 6 At the beginning of the canvass no doubt existed on the part of the Republican managers of any of the important States but Pennsylvania and Indiana. Occasional fears were expressed about Indiana as late as August,7 but that State soon came to be regarded as reasonably sure. By
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1 At Chicago, October 3d, Works, vol. iv. p. 350.
2 At Madison, September 12th, ibid., p. 327.
3 At Chicago, October 3d, ibid., p. 355.
4 Ibid., p. 360.
5 Ibid.
6 At Auburn, November 5th, ibid., pp. 422, 429.
7 See letter of David Davis to Thurlow Weed, Life of Weed, vol. ii. p. 299.

the latter part of August, also, owing to the vigorous and effective canvass under the leadership of Curtin and McClure, there were adequate grounds for believing that Pennsylvania would elect the People's candidate for governor in October, and choose Lincoln electors in November. Then Republican alarm began to be excited in regard to the State of New York. "Brethren in the doubtful States, trust New York; you may do it undoubtingly," said the Tribune in July;1 but a different tale had to be told in September, when it announced that "the opposition are going to concentrate their efforts on New York." 2 "I think," wrote Lincoln to Thurlow Weed, "there will be the most extraordinary effort ever made to carry New York for Douglas. You and all others who write me from your State think the effort cannot succeed, and I hope you are right. Still, it will require close watching and great efforts on the other side." 3

Without the thirty-five electoral votes of the Empire State, Lincoln could not be chosen President; and a determined effort now began to be made to carry that State against him. Negotiations were had with a view of a fusion electoral ticket; and after protracted conferences, some ending in failure, but renewed again with hope, a scheme of fusion was at last completed. Supporters of Douglas, Bell, and Breckinridge were to vote for common electors; of these, eighteen were apportioned to Douglas, ten to Bell, and seven to Breckinridge.4 This combination had a show of success, but it had the faults of a negative programme. No intelligent opponent of Lincoln could for a moment think it possible to elect by the people any one of the other candidates,
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1 July 27th.
2 September 4th
3 Letter of August 17th, Life of Weed, vol. ii. p. 297.
4 New York Tribune, September 25th: "New York, especially, was the arena of a struggle as intense, as vehement and energetic, as had ever been known."—Greeley's American Conflict, vol. i. p. 326. "It was only after a most determined canvass that fusion was defeated in New York."— Recollections of a Busy Life, Greeley, p. 392.

and the movement, divested of subterfuge, was simply one to throw the election into the House of Representatives. Many men, alarmed at the condition of affairs, thought the election of Lincoln a lesser evil than to have the contest continued in Congress. In spite of the union of the opposition, the chances were all with the Republicans. "I find no reason to doubt," wrote Seward to Lincoln, after his return from the Western tour, "that this State will redeem all the promises we have made."1 The Germans strongly supported Lincoln. Carl Schurz was making speeches everywhere in his favor.2 The majority of the Fillmoreans of 1856 were also on his side.3 The elections of Maine and Vermont in September increased the encouragement of the Republicans, but as New England was considered strongly Republican, the result had little effect on the opposition.

Although great confidence was felt and expressed in the success of Curtin at the October State election,4 so much depended on the result in Pennsylvania that the Republicans felt a nervous anxiety until the votes had been counted. This was especially the case, since the week before election the Democrats had sent considerable money into Pennsylvania, making a last desperate effort to carry the State.5 But October 9th decided the contest. Curtin carried Pennsylvania by thirty-two thousand majority, and Lane in Indiana had nine thousand seven hundred and fifty-seven more votes than his competitor. The prominence given the tariff question, and the undoubted position of the supporters of Lincoln on that issue, contributed more than any other
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1 Life of Seward, F. W. Seward, vol. ii. p. 471.
2 New York Tribune, June 30th, August 15th, 17th, September 3d, October 19th.
3 New York Tribune, July 17th. "The names of eighty-one thousand New York men who voted for Fillmore in 1856 are inscribed on Republican poll-lists."—Letter to Baltimore Patriot, cited by Tribune, September 11th. G. T. Curtis was amazed at the number of conservative men for Lincoln, Tribune, July 28th; also see New York Evening Post, September 11th.
4 See, for example, New York Evening Post, September 28th and October 2d.
5 New York World, October 10th.

one factor to the result in Pennsylvania.1 After the October elections it was conceded, South as well as North, that nothing could prevent the election of Lincoln. "Emancipation or revolution is now upon us," said the Charleston Mercury. 2 There began a stampede of floating voters, whose desire to be on the winning side overpowered other motives. The Republican National Committee in a public address considered that the October elections settled the presidential contest, but urged unabated effort in order that a majority of the House of Representatives in the next Congress might be secured.3 From this time on the contest had the flavor rather of a congressional than a presidential canvass, except in so far as imposing Wide-awake demonstrations implied larger contrivance and greater expense than usual.

The conditions in New York were somewhat different from those existing in the other Northern States. A faint hope lingered that the fusionists might there be successful. The commercial and property interests of New York city, honestly fearing secession in the event of Republican success, bestirred themselves to use their most potent weapon in averting the threatened danger. It was reported that William B. Astor had contributed one million dollars, and wealthy merchants a second million, in aid of the fusion ticket.4 A systematic effort to frighten business and financial
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1 "The Pennsylvania journals, without distinction of party, admit that the result of the recent election held in that State was mainly determined by politico-economical considerations growing out of the tariff policy to be pursued by the federal government."—National Intelligencer, October 13th. The Philadelphia American and Gazette (Rep.) said: "Our election on Tuesday determined that the vital and absorbing question in this State is protection to American industry."—Cited by National Intelligencer. But see also the New York Evening Post, October 10th.
2 October 18th.
3 New York Evening Post, October 11th.
4 Charleston Mercury, cited by National Intelligencer, November 1st; Richmond Enquirer, November 2d.

interests was made with the result of causing a stock-panic in Wall Street during the last days of October. The grave charge was made that the Secretary of the Treasury, on a visit to New York city at this time, had abetted this movement by avowing repeatedly, and with no attempt at concealment, that Lincoln's election would be followed by disunion and a general derangement of the monetary concerns of the country.1

Three days before the election Thurlow Weed wrote Lincoln: "Since writing you last Sunday, the fusion leaders have largely increased their fund, and they are now using money lavishly. This stimulates and to some extent inspires confidence, and all the confederates are at work. Some of our friends are nervous. But I have no fear of the result in this State." 2

Election day came and passed off quietly. In New York city, where excitement and trouble were expected—for in the decade between 1850-60 turbulent elections were not infrequent—the election was the most orderly and quiet that could be remembered. Even the newspaper reporters were forced to confess that the day was intolerably dull.3 The Republicans were successful. Lincoln and Hamlin carried States which would give them one hundred and eighty electoral votes; Douglas would receive twelve, Breckinridge seventy-two, and Bell thirty-nine. Lincoln had carried every free State but New Jersey, whose electoral vote was divided, Lincoln receiving four, and Douglas three of her votes.4 Of the popular vote Lincoln had 1,857,610; Douglas,
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1 See New York World, October 29th, 30th, 31st. The World asked the Journal of Commerce, which constituted itself the defender of Secretary Cobb, to deny these imputations, but it did not satisfactorily meet the charges. See Journal of Commerce, November 1st; New York Evening Post, October 29th, November 2d; Boston Evening Transcript, October 29th and 30th.
2 Life of Weed, vol. ii. p. 300.
3 New York World, November 7th.
4 This arose from the fact that a number of Douglas men would not support the whole of the fusion ticket, composed of three Douglas, two Bell, and two Breckinridge electors, with the result that four of the Lincoln electors received more votes than the two Bell and two Breckinridge electors.

1,291,574; Breckinridge, 850,082; Bell, 646,124. Lincoln had 930,170 votes less than all his opponents combined.1 But while all the members of the next Congress had not been elected, enough was known to make it certain that in neither the House nor the Senate would the Republicans have a majority.2 This was understood and admitted to be the case at the South.3

While the electoral vote Douglas received was insignificant, his popular vote was a triumph. With the influence and patronage of the administration against him, holding the machinery of the party in most of the Northern States only by protracted struggles, fighting Breckinridge at the South and Lincoln at the North, waging a hopeless battle, and attracting hardly any votes by the prospect of success, it was a high tribute that so many turned out on election day to show their confidence and do him honor.

On election day, Longfellow wrote in his journal: "Voted early," and the day after: "Lincoln is elected; overwhelming
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1 Greeley's American Conflict, vol. i. p. 328, where a sufficiently exact attempt is made to apportion the fusion vote. Other interesting data are given. Lincoln received in the slave States 26,430; Douglas, 163,525. Breckinridge received in the free States 279,211; Bell, 130,151. Lincoln's majority over Douglas was 566,036. Breckinridge lacked 135,057 of a majority in the slave States.
2 The estimate of the National Intelligencer was—Senate: Republicans already elected, 24; to be elected, 5—total, 29. Opposition already elected, 30; to be elected, 7—total, 37; opposition majority,8. House: Republicans already elected, 99; to be elected, 9—total, 108. Opposition already elected, 54; to be elected, 75—total, 129; opposition majority, 21. The estimate of the New York World was the same for the Senate, and made the opposition majority in the House 17. The representatives that were to be elected were nearly all from the Southern States, so that practically an exact estimate could be made.
3 See speech of A. H. Stephens, November 14th, 1860, The War between the States, Stephens, vol. ii. p. 282.

majorities in New York and Pennsylvania. This is a great victory; one can hardly overrate its importance. It is the redemption of the country. Freedom is triumphant." 1 Motley, from across the sea, wrote, when the news reached him: "Although I have felt little doubt as to the result for months past, . . . yet as I was so intensely anxious for the success of the Republican cause, I was on tenterhooks till I actually knew the result. I rejoice at last in the triumph of freedom over slavery more than I can express. Thank God it can no longer be said, after the great verdict just pronounced, that the common law of my country is slavery, and that the American flag carries slavery with it wherever it goes. 2

The meaning of the election was that the great and powerful North declared slavery an evil, and insisted that it should not be extended; that while the institution would be sacredly respected where it existed, the conduct of the national government must revert to the policy of the fathers and confine slavery within bounds; that they hoped, if it were restricted, the time might come when the Southern people would themselves acknowledge that they were out of tune with the enlightened world and take steps gradually to abolish the system. The persistent and emphatic statement by the opposition that the Republicans were the radical party had fixed that idea in the public mind; but in truth they represented the noblest conservatism. They simply advocated a return to the policy of Washington, Jefferson, and Madison.

The North had spoken. In every man's mind rose unbidden the question, What would be the answer of the South? 3
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1 Life of H. W. Longfellow, S. Longfellow, vol. ii. p. 358.
2 Motley to his mother, Motley's Correspondence, vol. i. p. 355.
3 Besides authorities already named, I have, in this story of the campaign, consulted Life of Buchanan, Curtis; Twenty Years of Congress, Blaine; Life of Dix; Political Recollections, Julian; Life of Bowles, Merriam; De Bow’s Review, vol. xxix.; Life of Bryant, Godwin; Raymond and Journalism; Buchanan's Defence; Pike's First Blows of the Civil War.


Source: Rhodes, James Ford. History of the United States; from the compromise of 1850 to the final restoration of home rule at the south in 1877, v.2. New York: Macmillan, 1910 [c1892].