CHAPTER XV

RENOMINATION AND REËLECTION

AMONG the obstacles to Lincoln's renomination Secretary Chase reckoned himself a large one. He used his position as Secretary of the Treasury in every way he could to strengthen his own chances against those of the President. General Butler tells us that a friend of Chase offered him the nomination for vice-presidency on condition that Chase should win at the convention. The criticisms of the Secretary of the Treasury on the administration were unceasing and severe. His letters contain frank admissions that if the country shall look upon him as the ablest standard-bearer he will not dispute the choice. Senator Pomeroy brought matters to a head by issuing a circular calling for efforts by the friends of the Union who disapproved of the administration, to counteract the work being done. for Lincoln's renomination. The President's reelection was stated to be practically impossible as well as undesirable, among other reasons on account of Lincoln's "tendency toward compromises and temporary expedients of policy." The

document also stated that the friends of Chase had already established conventions in all the states. The circular soon got into the press, and Chase saw that his only course was to resign, which he did. Lincoln replied that he would not allow himself to consider the question from any standpoint other than his judgment of the public service, and in that view he saw no occasion for a change. To his friend Raymond, whose omission. of Chase's name hardly creates a doubt, he gave a rather more racy estimate of the situation:

"Raymond, you were brought up on a farm, were you not? Then you know what a chin-fly is. My brother and I were once ploughing corn on a farm, I driving the horse, and he holding plough. The horse was lazy, but on one occasion rushed across the fields so that I, with my long legs, could scarcely keep pace with him. On reaching the end of the furrow, I found an enormous chin-fly fastened upon him, and knocked him off. My brother asked me what I did that for. I told him I didn't want the old horse bitten in that way. 'Why,' said my brother, 'that's all that made him go.' Now, if Mr. has a presidential chin-fly biting him I am not going to knock him off, if it will only make his department go."

Chase's hopes came to an end in February, when his own state, Ohio, renominated Lincoln. That statesman's view of the result he has stated himself:

"Your views of policy coincide with my own, and had it seemed to be the will of the people that I should take the responsibilities of government I should not have refused, though I could not seek such a place. But, through the natural partialities of the people for the President, and the systematic operation of the Postmaster-General, and those holding office under him, a preference for the reëlection of Mr. Lincoln was created, to which I thought it my duty to bow cheerfully and unhesitatingly. It did not cost me a regret to do so. That, since then, I have been so maliciously pursued by the Blair family, is what was wholly unexpected. That their slanders have the apparent, though I am sure not the real, indorsement of the President, is a new source of pain to me. No good can, I think, come of the probable identification of the next administration with the family. The political future, in consequence of it, has already become clouded and doubtful."

The reference to the Blair family meant merely that Lincoln would not join in a feud between General Blair and Chase. The bad blood continued, especially as each wished to control the patronage connected with the Treasury Department. Finally, in June, Chase resigned, for the fourth time, it is said, and Lincoln accepted, frankly on the ground that their relations had become too strained for further work together. The President made a bad nomination, David Todd of Ohio, who declined, and then Senator Fessenden of Maine, chairman of the Committee

Chase

on Finance, an excellent choice, was with difficulty induced to accept. Chase, within a week after his retirement, said that he was then inclined to agree with Pomeroy, who would not support Lincoln, but he added that he was "not willing now to decide what duty may demand next fall." In September he visited Washington, saw Lincoln, and declared in his favor. Just after this Chief Justice Taney died. Sumner, Stanton, and others were in favor of giving Chase the place. Opponents of the move said he did not know enough law, as his life had been almost entirely political. Lincoln waited several weeks before acting, although his mind was probably made up. says in his diary that Lincoln told a friend of his June 30 that he intended to appoint Chase if a vacancy occurred in the chief justiceship, Taney then being ill. Warden, Chase's biographer, quotes Sumner as telling him that Lincoln proposed to Sumner the plan of sending for Chase, and frankly telling him that he would make the best chief justice we ever had if he could only get rid of his presidential ambition. Sumner thought that this course would lead to misinterpretation of Lincoln's motives, and also displease Chase, so the President made the appointment without exacting any pledge. As Chase was already removed from Lincoln's own way, the President's motive in wishing him out of politics

was doubtless mainly the genuine belief that dabbling in them would injure his work on the bench. To George S. Boutwell, however, Lincoln said, after Chase's nomination: "There are three reasons why he should be nominated, and one why he should not be. In the first place, he occupies a larger place in the public mind, with reference to the office, than any other person. Then we want a man who will sustain the Legal Tender Act and the Proclamation of Emancipation. We - cannot ask a candidate what he would do, and if we did and he should answer, we should only despise him for it. But he wants to be President, and if he does not give that up it will be a great injury to him and a great injury to me. He can

never be President."

Another seeker of the same prize was Fremont. Among his supporters the best known was Wendell Phillips, who said he should look upon Lincoln's reëlection as meaning the end of the Union, or reconstruction on terms worse than disunion. Other Fremont men described the President's "imbecile and vacillating policy." They got together in small numbers for a mass convention in May, and nominated their man. Lincoln, when told that the convention was so small, took up the Bible, and read from Samuel these lines, “And every one that was in distress, and every one that was discontented, gathered themselves unto him;