Yeas—Messrs. Buckalew, Carlile, Cowan, Davis, Harris, Hicks, Johnson, Lane of Indiana, McDougall, Powell, Richardson, Riddle, Saulsbury, Ten Eyck, Trumbull, Van Winkle, Willey—17.
Nays—Messrs. Anthony, Brown, Chandler, Clark, Conness, Dixon, Fessenden, Foot, Grimes, Hale, Harlan, Howard, Howe, Lane of Kansas, Morgan, Morrill, Pomeroy, Ramsey, Sprague, Sumner, Wade, Wilson—22.
The bill then passed—yeas 27, nays 12, as follows:
Yeas—Messrs. Anthony, Brown, Chandler, Clark, Conness, Dixon, Fessenden, Foot, Grimes, Hale, Harlan, Harris, Hicks, Howard, Howe, Lane of Indiana, Lane of Kansas, Morgan, Morrill, Pomeroy, Ramsey, Sprague, Sumner, Ten Eyck, Trumbull, Wade, Wilson—27.
Nays—Messrs. Buckalew, Carlile, Cowan, Davis, Johnson, McDougall, Powell, Richardson, Riddle, Saulsbury, Van Winkle, Willey—12.
Abraham Lincoln, President, approved it, June 28, 1864.
Seward as Secretary of State.
Wm. H. Seward was a master in diplomacy and Statecraft, and to his skill the Unionists were indebted for all avoidance of serious foreign complications while the war was going on. The most notable case coming under his supervision was that of the capture of Mason and Slidell, by Commodore Wilkes, who, on the 8th of November, 1861, had intercepted the Trent with San Jacinto. The prisoners were Confederate agents on their way to St. James and St. Cloud. Both had been prominent Senators, early secessionists, and the popular impulse of the North was to hold and punish them. Both Lincoln and Seward wisely resisted the passions of the hour, and when Great Britain demanded their release under the treaty of Ghent, wherein the right of future search of vessels was disavowed, Seward yielded, and referring to the terms of the treaty, said:
“If I decide this case in favor of my own Government, I must disavow its most cherished principles, and reverse and forever abandon its essential policy. The country cannot afford the sacrifice. If I maintain those principles and adhere to that policy, I must surrender the case itself.”
The North, with high confidence in their President and Cabinet, readily conceded the wisdom of the argument, especially as it was clinched in the newspapers of the day by one of Lincoln’s homely remarks: “One war at a time.” A war with Great Britain was thus happily avoided.