Abraham Lincoln

by William Eleroy Curtis

Mr. Horace White, editor of the New York Evening Post, then connected with the Chicago Tribune, gives his recollections of Lincoln in the campaign: "I was Secretary of the Republican State Committee of Illinois during some years when he was in active campaign work. He was often present at meetings of the committee, and took part in the committee work. His judgment was very much deferred to in such matters. He was one of the shrewdest politicians in the State. Nobody had more experience in that way, nobody knew better than he what was passing in the minds of the people. Nobody knew better how to turn things to advantage politically, and nobody was readier to take such advantage, provided it did not involve dishonorable means. He could not cheat people out of their votes any more than he could out of their money. Mr. Lincoln never gave his assent, so far as my knowledge goes, to any plan or project for getting votes that would not have borne the full light of day.

"I never heard him express contempt for any man's honest errors, although he would sometimes make a droll remark or tell a funny story about them. Deference to other people's opinions was habitual to him. There was no calculation, no politics in it. It was part and parcel of his sense of equal rights. His democracy was of the unconscious kind—he did not know anything different from it."

In the fall of 1858 there was an election of the Illinois Legislature which would choose a successor to Senator Douglas, whose term of service was to expire March 3, 1859. The Republican party at that time was thoroughly organized and presented a united and enthusiastic front, with encouraging prospects of victory, and Lincoln was again its candidate for the United States Senate. The sympathy of his associates and the people generally over his defeat three years before, their appreciation of his services, their admiration for his ability, and their confidence in his integrity and judgment made him the unanimous choice, and for the first time in history the State Republican Convention passed a resolution to that effect. Then followed the most extraordinary canvass that has ever taken place in any of the States of the Union,—the joint debate between Lincoln and Douglas which is described in Chapter III., followed by Lincoln's second defeat for the Senate. Many of Lincoln's friends believed that he might have been elected but for the interference of Horace Greeley, Seward, Colfax, Burlingame, and other earnest Republicans and antislavery men of national prominence, who urged the people of Illinois to support Douglas because he had opposed the Buchanan administration and had been denounced by the slave-holders of the South. But, while Lincoln was deeply wounded by this betrayal of what he considered a vital political principle, he realized that the existing apportionment of the State made his election improbable because it had been based upon the census of 1850 and gave the southern and Democratic counties an excessive representation over the northern Republican counties, which had more rapidly increased in population. The Republican State officers were chosen by a considerable majority, but the Democrats had eight majority in the Legislature, and Mr. Douglas was elected.

Lincoln had passed through an intense canvass, equally trying to his physical and mental endurance, and his strength as well as his temper were sorely tried; but he was never more composed, patient, and philosophical, and to his friends he wrote hopeful and cheerful letters, taking greater satisfaction in the reputation he had made and the results he had accomplished than he would have felt in a commission as United States Senator. As he told many people, he was not trying to defeat Douglas for Senator so much as to prevent his election to the Presidency, and he succeeded in doing so. The attention of the entire country had been drawn to the canvass in Illinois, Lincoln's name had become known everywhere throughout the country, and, as a Chicago editor wrote him, "You have at once sprung from the position of a capital fellow and a leading lawyer of Illinois to a national reputation."

Another friend wrote him, "You have made a noble canvass, which, if unavailing in this State, has earned you a national reputation and made you friends everywhere."

Lincoln's own view of the case is expressed in a letter to a friend as follows: "I wished, but I did not much expect, a better result.... I am glad I made the late race. It gave me a hearing on the great and durable question of the age, which I could have had in no other way; and though I now sink out of view, and shall be forgotten, I believe I have made some marks which will tell for the cause of civil liberty long after I am gone."

The folly of the Eastern Republicans in encouraging the election of Douglas was demonstrated immediately after the election, when that gentleman started upon a tour through the South and made a series of speeches in which he endeavored to convince the slave-holders that he was their best friend and should be their candidate for the Presidency. At the same time Lincoln was invited to speak in the Eastern States, and, after his address in Cooper Institute, New York City, made a tour through New England, creating great interest and making many friends. He became a national character, and his advice was sought by national leaders, to whom his sagacity was immediately apparent. He spent a great deal of time and wrote many letters during the winter of 1858-59, harmonizing the Republican party, concentrating its efforts, and reconciling local prejudices and preferences which conflicted and imperilled its success at the next election. He seemed gifted with foresight that was almost prophetic, for he pointed out with extraordinary accuracy the probable policy which would be pursued by the Democrats, and his suggestions as to the best means for the Republicans to adopt were broad, wise, and statesmanlike. For example, referring to a provision adopted by Massachusetts to restrict naturalization, he wrote, "Massachusetts is a sovereign and independent State, and it is no privilege of mine to scold her for what she does. Still, if from what she has done an inference is sought to be drawn as to what I would do, I may, without impropriety, speak out. I say, then, that, as I understand the Massachusetts provision, I am against its adoption in Illinois, or in any other place where I have a right to oppose it. Understanding the spirit of our institutions to aid at the elevation of men, I am opposed to whatever tends to degrade them. I have some little notoriety for commiserating the oppressed condition of the negro; and I should be strangely inconsistent if I could favor any project for curtailing the existing rights of white men, even though born in different lands and speaking different languages from myself."

He wrote from Springfield to Schuyler Colfax (afterwards Vice-President of the United States), July 6, 1859, "Besides a strong desire to make your personal acquaintance, I was anxious to speak with you on politics a little more fully than I can well do in a letter. My main object in such conversation would be to hedge against divisions in the Republican ranks generally, and particularly for the contest of 1860. The point of danger is the temptation in different localities to 'platform' for something which will be popular just there, but which, nevertheless, will be a firebrand elsewhere, and especially in a national convention. As instances, the movement against foreigners in Massachusetts; in New Hampshire, to make obedience to the fugitive-slave law punishable as a crime; in Ohio, to repeal the fugitive-slave law; and squatter sovereignty in Kansas. In these things there is explosive matter enough to blow up half a dozen national conventions, if it gets into them; and what gets very rife outside of conventions is very likely to find its way into them."

The idea of making Lincoln a Presidential candidate seems to have occurred to a great many people at about the same time, and shortly after his inauguration a regiment might have been organized of the friends who first named him. There are, however, some letters preserved which show that the suggestion had been made to him early in 1859, long before the Cooper Institute address; indeed, immediately after the close of the Senatorial fight in 1858 an editorial friend in Illinois wrote him as follows: "I would like to have a talk with you on political matters, as to the policy of announcing your name for the Presidency, while you are in our city. My partner and myself are about addressing the Republican editors of the State on the subject of a simultaneous announcement of your name for the Presidency."

To this Lincoln replied, "As to the other matter you kindly mention, I must in candor say that I do not think myself fit for the Presidency. I certainly am flattered and gratified that some partial friends think of me in that connection; but I really think it best for our cause that no concerted effort, such as you suggest, should be made."