The Life and Work of James A. Garfield, Twentieth President of the United States / Embracing an Account of the Scenes and Incidents of His Boyhood; the Struggles of His Youth; the Might of His Early Manhood; His Valor As a Soldier; His Career As a Statesman; His Election to the Presidency; and the Tragic Story of His Death.

by John Clark Ridpath

“Suppose the policy of the gentleman were adopted to-day. Let the order go forth; sound the ‘recall’ on your bugles, and let it ring from Texas to the far Atlantic, and tell the armies to come back. Call the victorious legions back over the battle-field of blood forever now disgraced. Call them back over the territory which they have conquered. Call them back, and let the minions of secession chase them with derision and jeers as they come. And then tell them that the man across the aisle, from the free State of Ohio, gave birth to the monstrous proposition.

“Mr. Chairman, if such a word should be sent forth through the armies of the Union, the wave of terrible vengeance that would sweep back over this land could never find a parallel in the records of history. Almost in the moment of final victory, the ‘recall’ is sounded by a craven people not desiring freedom. We ought, every man, to be made a slave should we sanction such a sentiment.

“The gentleman has told us there is no such thing as coercion justifiable under the Constitution. I ask him for one moment to reflect, that no statute ever was enforced without coercion. It is the basis of every law in the universe,—God’s law as well as man’s. A law is no law without coercion behind it. When a man has murdered his brother, coercion takes the murderer, tries him, and hangs him. When you levy your taxes, coercion secures their collection; it follows the shadow of the thief and brings him to justice; it accompanies your diplomacy to foreign courts, and backs a declaration of the nation’s right by a pledge of the nation’s power. Again, he tells us that oaths taken under the amnesty proclamation are good for nothing. The oath of Galileo was not binding upon him. I am reminded of another oath that was taken; but perhaps it was an oath on the lips alone to which the heart made no response.

“I remember to have stood in a line of nineteen men on that carpet yonder on the first day of the session, and I remember that another oath was passed round and each member signed it as provided by law, utterly repudiating the rebellion and its pretenses. Does that gentleman not blush to speak of Galileo’s oath? Was not his own its counterpart?

“He says that the Union can never be restored because of the terrible hatred engendered by the war. To prove it, he quotes what some Southern man said a few years ago, that he knew no hatred between people in the world like that between the North and the South. And yet that North and South have been one nation for eighty-eight years!

“Have we seen in this contest any thing more bitter than the wars of the Scottish border? Have we seen any thing more bitter than those terrible feuds in the days of Edward, when England and Scotland were the deadliest foes on earth? And yet for centuries those countries have been cemented in an indissoluble union that has made the British nation one of the proudest of the earth!

“I said a little while ago that I accepted the proposition of the gentleman that rebels had a right of revolution; and the decisive issue between us and the rebellion is, whether they shall revolutionize and destroy, or we shall subdue and preserve. We take the latter ground. We take the common weapons of war to meet them; and if these be not sufficient, I would take any element which will overwhelm and destroy; I would sacrifice the dearest and best beloved; I would take all the old sanctions of law and the Constitution and fling them to the winds, if necessary, rather than let the nation be broken in pieces and its people destroyed with endless ruin.

“What is the Constitution that these gentlemen are perpetually flinging in our faces whenever we desire to strike hard blows against the rebellion? It is the production of the American people. They made it; and the creator is mightier than the creature. The power which made the Constitution can also make other instruments to do its great work in the day of dire necessity.”

The Presidential campaign of 1864 involved, in its tremendous issues, the fate of a Republic. All the forces which had ever antagonized the war for the Union were arrayed on the one side; those which demanded that the war be vigorously pursued until rebellion was forever put down, withstood them on the other side. It was a hand-to-hand struggle. Garfield took the stump and ably advocated the Republican cause. He traveled nearly eight thousand miles, and made sixty-five speeches. Late in the season his constituents met to nominate a Congressman. Garfield was very popular in the district, which had been pleased with his ability and the patriotic spirit of his conduct.

But, after the adjournment of Congress, an incident occurred which caused trouble in the Republican ranks, and seemed likely to drive him out of the field. The subject of the readmission of conquered Southern States to the full enjoyment of their political rights, had occupied the attention of the Thirty-Eighth Congress; and that body, on the day of its adjournment, had passed and sent for the President’s approval, a bill providing for the government of such States. Mr. Lincoln had let the bill go over unsigned till after adjournment; and soon issued a proclamation referring to the subject, which offended many of the friends of the bill. Among these were Ben. Wade and Winter Davis, who issued to the public a reply to Mr. Lincoln, censuring him in very severe language. The President was therein charged with favoring a policy subversive of human liberty, unjust to the friends of the administration, and dangerous to the Republic. This Wade-Davis manifesto caused a great furore of excitement. Wade and Davis were denounced; the people would hear nothing against Mr. Lincoln.