with, and that he would have arranged it very differently. It was so with General Frémont, with General Hunter when I annulled his hasty proclamation, with General Butler when he was recalled from New Orleans. . . . I am entirely indifferent as to his success or failure in these schemes so long as he does his duty at the head of the Treasury Department." Now he acknowledged at once Chase's note of February 22, but deferred a full reply for a week, when he wrote a kind, considerate, and magnanimous letter, ending with, "Whether you shall remain at the head of the Treasury Department is a question which I will not allow myself to consider from any standpoint other than my judgment of the public service; and, in that view, I do not perceive occasion for a change."2

February 25 the Union members of the Ohio legislature held a caucus and declared for the renomination of Lincoln.3 March 5 Chase wrote to an Ohio friend that, owing to this action, "it becomes my duty.. to ask that no further consideration be given to my name." 4 If Chase had been as good and wise a man as Lincoln, the jarring between them would now have come to an end.

The declaration in Ohio was only one of many similar indications. By legislative caucuses, by letters, by political conventions, by declarations of the Union Leagues, the Union or Republican party pronounced in favor of the renomination of Lincoln.5 Admitting even all that was urged by his oppo

1 Diary of John Hay, Nicolay and Hay, vol. viii. p. 316. 2 Warden, p. 575; Nicolay and Hay, vol. viii. p. 322.

8 Appleton's Annual Cyclopædia, 1864, p. 783; Nicolay and Hay, vol. viii. p. 324. The Columbus, Ohio, correspondent of the N. Y. Tribune, which opposed the nomination of Lincoln, said, Feb. 26: "About 63 out of the 105 of the Union members of the Legislature met in caucus and passed a resolution saying that the people of Ohio and soldiers in the army demand the re-election of Abraham Lincoln. Before the adoption of the resolution nearly all the Chase men had left the hall, and there were not at the time a majority of Union members present."

4 Schuckers, p. 503.

5 Appleton's Annual Cyclopædia, 1864, p. 783; Nicolay and Hay, vol. viii. p. 324, vol. ix. p. 52 et seq.

nents of the manipulation by office-holders and politicians, there remains no doubt that the mass of citizens were lending aid to these movements. The President had gained the support of the plain people, of business men, and of a good part of the highest intelligence of the country. Nothing in the study of popular sentiment can be more gratifying than this oneness of thought between farmers, small shop-keepers, salesmen, clerks, mechanics, and the men who stood intellectually for the highest aspirations of the nation. Motley said in a private letter, "My respect for the character of the President increases every day." Lowell wrote in the North American Review: "History will rank Mr. Lincoln among the most prudent of statesmen and the most successful of rulers. If we wish to appreciate him, we have only to conceive the inevitable chaos in which we should now be weltering had a weak man or an unwise one been chosen in his stead." 2 Homely, honest, ungainly Lincoln," wrote Asa Gray to Darwin, "is the representative man of the country." 3

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In spite of these many and different manifestations of public opinion, those adverse to the President did not relinquish the hope of defeating his nomination. After the abortive

Pomeroy circular their action took the shape of an endeavor to postpone the national convention. Greeley, in a letter to the Independent, urged this plan, and in an article in the Tribune enunciated by indirection the opinion that Chase, Frémont, Butler, or Grant would make as good a President as Lincoln, and he added that the selection of any one of them would preserve "the salutary one-term principle." 5 It is lamentable that a leader of public sentiment should have rated Frémont or Butler as high as Lincoln, and while the Tribune

1 From Vienna, Dec. 29, 1863, Motley's Letters, vol. ii. p. 146.

2 Jan. 1864.

3 Feb. 16, Gray's Letters, vol. ii. p. 523.

4 Feb. 25.

5 Feb. 23. I have attributed this article to Greeley on internal evidence solely. The National Republican Committee met Feb. 22, and fixed June 7 as the day of the assembling of the convention.

had much less influence now than it had before the war, yet in this judgment it spoke undoubtedly for numbers of wellmeaning men. Frémont was strong in a certain popular estimation, and Butler even stronger. In January, 1865, after Lincoln had been chosen for his second term, Thaddeus Stevens, the leader of the Republicans in the House of Representatives, declared: "If the question could be put to the loyal people of the United States whom they would select for the next President, a majority of them would vote for General Butler." Henry Ward Beecher, in an article in the Independent, made unequivocal reference to the present administration in saying: "The country cannot afford to risk any second-rate committee chosen at hap-hazard to be its President and cabinet." A newspaper editor of prominence from the interior of Pennsylvania, who supported warmly the President, came to Washington during the winter of 1864, and said to Thaddeus Stevens: "Introduce me to some member of Congress friendly to Mr. Lincoln's renomination." "Come with me," was the reply, and, going to the seat of Arnold, who represented the Chicago district and was a personal friend of the President, Stevens broke forth: "Here is a man who wants to find a Lincoln member of Congress. You are the

only one I know, and I have come over to introduce my friend to you." 3 March 25 many "friends of the government and supporters of the present administration," men of character and political standing, with William Cullen Bryant at their head, wrote to the National Executive Committee of the Union and Republican parties, suggesting the postponement of the convention until September. Surely Greeley and the Trib

1 Arnold's Lincoln, p. 386, note; Globe, p. 400. I cite this as a remarkable statement of a political leader in touch with the people. Of course it was not true, but that Stevens should have thought so is a significant indication.

2 Feb. 18. The N. Y. World (Feb. 19) stated that the article was evidently from the pen of Beecher.

3 Arnold's Lincoln, p. 385, note. This, again, was not exactly true, but significant. See the rest of the note quoted.

Appleton's Annual Cyclopædia, 1864, p. 785.

une, Bryant and the Evening Post, Beecher and the Independent, Stevens, Julian,1 and many other members of the House, a number of senators and those men besides who were devoted to the political fortunes of Chase, represented a formidable discontent; 2 but Lincoln was so confident of his hold on the people that all of this opposition did not greatly disturb him for any length of time. He read public sentiment with accuracy, and felt sure that he would receive the nomination of his party.3

The effort to bring Chase forward as a candidate and that to postpone the convention failed, and with this failure there was a diminishing quantity and strength of opposition to Lincoln, but there was still enough of it to call a convention and name a candidate. Three calls were issued, asking the people to assemble in Cleveland, May 31, "for consultation and concert of action in respect to the approaching presidential election." One came from a committee of radical Republicans, headed by B. Gratz Brown, of Missouri; a second emanated from New York, the first name on the list of signers being

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1 Political Recollections, p. 237. 2 Julian wrote: 66 Opposition to Mr. Lincoln, however, continued, and was secretly cherished by many of the ablest and most patriotic men in the party." - Ibid., p. 238. Riddle describes a visit to the White House of April 28: There were a number of people in the President's anteroom, and I very soon found that the President himself was undergoing a rude roasting at the hands of those who were waiting for admission to his presence. Even my amiable and excellent friend Worcester spoke ironically of him as that great and good man.' The one most loud and bitter was Henry Wilson, of Massachusetts. His open assaults were amazing. I withdrew to the President's desk to escape, but was annoyed by it even there, and I turned upon the senator in indignant surprise, asking why he did not assault him in the Senate, get a seat in the June convention, instead of opening on him in the streets and in the lobbies and offices of the Executive Mansion itself. He conceded what I asserted that the entire North stood with the President and would renominate him, and said that 'bad as that would be, the best must be made of it.'"- Recollections of War Times, p. 267.

3 In this study of public opinion, besides the authorities specifically quoted, I have been helped by Morse's Lincoln; Greeley's American Conflict; the files of the N. Y. Tribune, World, Times, Independent, Boston Advertiser, Chicago Tribune, and Columbus Crisis.

Lucius Robinson; while a third had the countenance of a number of abolitionists. A few hundred men gathered together at the appointed time and place, adopted a platform, and nominated Frémont for President and General John Cochrane, of New York, for Vice-President. A friend who related their proceedings to Lincoln said that instead of the many thousands expected in mass convention there were present only four hundred. Lincoln opened his Bible and read: “ And every one that was in distress, and every one that was in debt, and every one that was discontented gathered themselves unto him; and he became a captain over them: and there were with him about four hundred men."2 In such a spirit of derision was the work of this convention received by the Republican press, while the Democratic newspapers magnified its importance. The real danger of the movement will appear as the story goes on.

I have given an account of the military operations that preceded the National Union or Republican Convention which had been summoned for the 7th of June. The condition of the public mind during these exciting days when the tension was the greatest is also well worth a glance. Before the campaign in Virginia commenced, it was that of breathless suspense. "All eyes and hopes now centre on Grant," said Thurlow Weed, April 17, in a private letter. "If he wins in Virginia, it will brighten the horizon and make him President." 4 "My hopes under God," wrote Chase on the day that the Army of the Potomac was crossing the Rapidan, “are almost wholly in Grant and his soldiers." 5 Such outbursts of feeling imaged

1 Appleton's Annual Cyclopædia, 1864, p. 785 et seq. Two of the calls, the platform, and Frémont's letter of acceptance are printed in full; see also Nicolay and Hay, vol. ix. chap. ii.

2 1 Samuel xxii. 2; Nicolay and Hay, vol. ix. p. 40. The reference to the "political cave of Adullam" by John Bright in the House of Commons was not until 1866.

3 N. Y. Times, June 2; Boston Advertiser, June 3; Chicago Tribune, June 1; N. Y. World, June 2; Columbus Crisis, June 8.

4 Memoir of Weed, vol. ii. p. 443.

5 Warden, p. 584.