Twenty Years of Congress, Vol. 1 / From Lincoln to Garfield, with a Review of the Events Which Led to the Political Revolution of 1860

by James Gillespie Blaine

In his report of December 6, 1864, Mr. Fessenden discussed the financial situation with comprehensive ability. He urged additional taxation, some plan for making the public lands available as a source of revenue, and arrangements for carrying out the laws for a sinking-fund. He opposed the suggestion of resorting to foreign loans for any part of the money needed. He said, "This nation has been able thus far to conduct a domestic war of unparalleled magnitude and cost without appealing for aid to any foreign people. It has chosen to demonstrate its power to put down insurrection by its own strength, and furnish no pretense for doubt of its entire ability to do so, either to domestic or foreign foes. The people of the United States have felt a just pride in this position before the world. In the judgment of the secretary it may well be doubted whether the national credit abroad has not been strengthened and sustained by the fact that foreign investments in our securities have not been sought by us, and whether we have not found a pecuniary advantage in self-reliance." Reciting the steps which he had taken for placing loans, he declared; "These negotiations have afforded satisfactory evidence not only of the ability of the people to furnish at a short notice such sums as may be required but of the entire confidence felt in the national securities. After nearly four years of a most expensive and wasting war, the means to continue it seem apparently undiminished, while the determination to prosecute it with vigor to the end is unabated."

Liberal response was made by Congress to Mr. Fessenden's request for enlarged power to borrow money. The internal revenue was made more stringent, the tariff was amended and made still more protective, and to facilitate the raising of troops the Conscription Act was made more severe and exacting. Congress proceeded as if the war were still to continue for years. Nothing was neglected, nothing relaxed. But every one could see that the Confederacy was tottering to its fall. Sherman's magnificent march across Georgia, to which the President referred as in progress when he sent his message to Congress, had been completed with entire success, with an éclat indeed which startled Europe as well as America. He had captured Savannah, and was marching North driving the army of General Joseph E. Johnston before him. General Grant meanwhile was tightening his hold on Richmond and on the army of General Lee. From his camp on the James he was directing military operations over an area of vast extent. The great victory which General Thomas had won over Hood's army in the preceding December at Nashville had effectually destroyed the military power of the Confederacy in the South-West, and when Congress adjourned on the day of Mr. Lincoln's second inauguration there was in the mind of the people everywhere a conviction that the end was near.

The President himself spoke guardedly in his Inaugural address. He simply said that "the progress of our armies is reasonably satisfactory and encouraging. With high hope for the future, no prediction in regard to it is ventured." The tone of the address, so far from being jubilant as the mass of his hearers felt, was ineffably sad. It seemed to bear the wail of an oppressed spirit. The thought and the language were as majestic as those of the ancient prophets. As if in agony of soul the President cried out: "Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondsman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid with another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said that the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether."

The fall of the military power of the rebellion was in the end more rapid and more complete than the most sanguine had dared to expect. The month of March was one of great activity with our military forces. Three weeks after his inauguration the President went to City Point, Virginia, partly to escape the pressure of duty at Washington and party to be near the scene of the final triumph to settle any important questions that might arise, if an offer of surrender should be made by the Confederate commander. On the day before his inauguration he had directed the Secretary of War to say to General Grant that he wished him to "have no conference with General Lee unless for the capitulation of his army or for some purely military matter." The President did "not wish General Grant to decide, discuss or confer upon any political question." He would not submit such questions "to military conferences or conventions." He returned to Washington on the 8th of April and on the succeeding day the Army of Lee surrendered to General Grant.

THE SURRENDER OF GENERAL LEE.

The rejoicing throughout the Loyal States cannot be pictured. Congratulation was universal. The end had come. Sympathy with the South in her exhausted and impoverished condition mingled largely with the exultant joy over a restored Union, a triumphant flag, an assured future of National progress. Admiration was not withheld from the soldiers of the Confederacy, who had borne their banner so bravely against every discouragement on a hundred fields of battle. The bearing of General Grant and General Lee at the final surrender was marked by a spirit of chivalric dignity which was an instructive lesson to all their countrymen—alike to the victor and to the vanquished.

General Grant's active service in the field closed with the surrender of Lee. All the commanders of Confederate forces followed the example of their General-in-Chief, and before the end of the month the armed enemies of the Union had practically ceased to exist. The fame of General Grant was full. He had entered the service with no factitious advantage, and his promotion, from the first to the last, had been based on merit alone,—without the aid of political influence, without the interposition of personal friends. Criticism of military skill is but idle chatter in the face of an unbroken career of victory. General Grant's campaigns were varied in their requirements and, but for the fertility of his resources and his unbending will, might often have ended in disaster. Courage is as contagious as fear, and General Grant possessed in the highest degree that faculty which is essential to all great commanders,— the faculty of imparting throughout the rank and file of his army the same determination to win with which he was himself always inspired.

One peculiarity of General Grant's military career was his constant readiness to fight. He wished for no long periods of preparation, lost no opportunity which promptness could turn to advantage. He always accepted, without cavil or question, the position to which he might be assigned. He never troubled the War Department with requests or complaints, and when injustice was inflicted upon him, he submitted silently, and did a soldier's duty. Few men in any service would have acquiesced so quietly as did General Grant, when at the close of the remarkable campaign beginning at Fort Henry and ending at Shiloh, he found himself superseded by General Halleck, and assigned to a subordinate command in an army whose glory was inseparably associated with his own name. Self-control is the first requisite for him who aims to control others. In that indispensable form of mental discipline General Grant exhibited perfection.

When he was appointed Lieutenant-General, and placed in command of all the armies of the Union, he exercised military control over a greater number of men than has any general since the invention of fire-arms. In the campaigns of 1864 and 1865, the armies of the Union contained in the aggregate not less than a million of men. The movements of all the vast forces were kept in harmony by his comprehensive mind, and in the grand consummation which insured Union and Liberty, his name became inseparably associated with the true glory of his country.

Six days after the surrender of Lee, the Nation was thrown into the deepest grief by the assassination of the President. The gloom which enshrouded the country was as thick darkness. The people had come, through many alterations of fear and hope, to repose the most absolute trust in Mr. Lincoln. They realized that he had seen clearly where they were blind, that he had known fully where they were ignorant. He had been patient, faithful, and far-seeing. Religious people regarded him as one divinely appointed, like the prophets of old, to a great work, and they found comfort in the parallel which they saw in his death with that of the leader of Israel. He too had reached the mountain's top, and had seen the land redeemed unto the utmost sea, and had then died.