CHAPTER XXII.

SUMMER OF 1864.

THE political campaign for nominating candidates for the Presidency

began with the assembling of the Abolitionists and others at Cleveland. General Fremont was nominated. Wendell Phillips in an address said:

"The Administration I regard as a civil and military failure, and its avowed policy ruinous to the North in every point of view. Mr. Lincoln may wish the end peace and freedom, but he is wholly unwilling to use the means which can secure that end. If Mr. Lincoln is re-elected, I do not expect to see the Union reconstructed in my day, unless on terms more disastrous to liberty than ever disunion would be."

Mr. Phillips did not state what means the President could use. The Emancipation Proclamation had been issued; more than 100,000 negro soldiers were in the army. What more could be done?

Mr. Phillips also said:

"I see in General Fremont one whose thorough loyalty to democratic institutions without regard to race, whose earnest and decisive character, whose clear sighted statesmanship and rare military ability justify my confidence that in his hands all will be done to save the State that foresight, skill, decision, and statesmanship can do.”

Instead of showing rare military ability, General Fremont had utterly failed as a commander. The convention denounced corruption in office, yet one of its leading members, who had served on Fremont's staff, had been dismissed from military service on account of his dishonest transactions. It was a gathering of a handful of discontented men-less than four hundred.

Mr. Lincoln read the account of the proceedings, and laughed. It reminded him of a gathering in another age, and in another country. He took up 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."

The United States under the Presidency of Abraham Lincoln was not just like the Kingdom of Israel under Saul; neither was General Fremont the exact counterpart of David. But the four hundred gathered at Cleveland and the four hundred in the cave of Adullam were alike. discontented and opposed to those in authority. The President laughed heartily over the similarity. He respected and honored the earnest men who had nominated Fremont, but could not accept their views as to his duty in administering the affairs of the nation.

From the outbreak of the Rebellion the people had gradually come to see that it had been caused by slavery, and that there could be no lasting peace till it was wholly eradicated. President Lincoln issued his Proclamation of Emancipation as a war measure to cripple the enemy, but it did not wholly abolish slavery. Congress could not do it by an enactment. The people must act in their sovereign capacity and change the Constitution.

James M. Ashley, of Ohio; James F. Wilson, of Iowa; Senator Sumner, of Massachusetts, and Senator Henderson, of Missouri, had submitted resolutions for amending the Constitution, which were referred to a Joint Judiciary Committee, of which Senator Trumbull was chairman. The months were slipping away, summer approaching. The committee had taken no action. President Lincoln was solicitous that something should be done. The Emancipation Proclamation was of little effect, save as victories were won.

The National Convention of the Republican Party to nominate a candidate for the Presidency was to meet in Baltimore. It would be called to order by Edwin D. Morgan, chairman of the National Committee. "I would like you," said Mr. Lincoln to him, "in your address, when you call the convention to order, as its key-note, and to put into the platform, as its key-stone, the amendment to the Constitution abolishing and prohibiting slavery."

The day arrived (June 8, 1864). At the outset the delegates manifested their determination to take advanced ground for the maintenance of the Union.

The Army of the Potomac was at Cold Harbor. It had fought its way from the Wilderness to the vicinity of Richmond. It was so near the city that in the stillness of night the Union sentinels could hear the church bells toll the passing hours. The army commanded by Sherman had forced the Confederates under Johnston from Buzzard's Roost to Kenesaw. With victory upon their banners the soldiers of the Union would continue the struggle to the end.

As he called the convention to order, Mr. Morgan said:

"It is a little more than eight years since it was resolved to form a national party, to be conducted on the principles and policy of Washington and Jefferson. . . . In view of the dread realities of the past and what is passing at this moment, the fact that the bones of our soldiers are bleaching in every State of the Union, and with the further knowledge of the fact that this has all been caused by slavery, we shall fail of accomplishing our great mission unless we shall declare for such an amendment to the Constitution as will positively prohibit African slavery in the United States."

The delegates clapped their hands, rose as one man, and made the hall ring with cheers. It was significant of their determination to carry on the work they had begun till that which caused the war should be eradicated from the Constitution.

Rev. Robert J. Breckinridge, of Kentucky, renowned as preacher and scholar, was appointed temporary chairman.(') He was uncle to John C. Breckinridge, Vice-president under Buchanan, for whom the slave-holders had voted in 1860, and who was a lieutenant-general in the Confederate army. Though many of his friends and relatives had given their sympathies to the Confederacy, and were fighting against the Government, Robert J. Breckinridge was true to the Union. He believed President Lincoln had been chosen by Almighty God to save the nation from ruin. "This nation," he said to the delegates in convention, "shall not be destroyed. The only enduring and imperishable cement of all free institutions has been the blood of traitors. . . . We must use all power to exterminate the institution of slavery, which has raised the sword against the Union.”

The convention adopted a resolution demanding an amendment to the Constitution prohibiting slavery, as had been suggested by President Lincoln and announced by Mr. Morgan. Again the hall rang with loud and prolonged cheers. Mr. Lincoln was renominated by acclamation. Andrew Johnson, of Tennessee, was selected as candidate for

Vice-president.

The committee chosen to inform Mr. Lincoln of his renomination visited the White House.

"I cannot," said the President, "conceal my gratification nor restrain the expression of my gratitude that the Union people, through their convention, in their continued effort to save and advance the nation, have deemed me not unworthy to remain in my present position. ... I approve the declaration in favor of so amending the Constitution as to prohibit slavery throughout the nation. Such an amendment is a necessary conclusion to the final success of the Union cause."

Baltimore being so near the capital, many delegations called upon the President among others, members of the Philadelphia Union League.

"I do not allow myself," said Mr. Lincoln, in response to the address of its president, "to suppose that either the convention or the league have concluded that I am the greatest or best man in America, but rather that it is not best to swap horses while crossing the river,

and that I am not so poor a horse but that they might make a botch of it in trying to swap." (")

"Allow me," said a gentleman, "to introduce my friend. He is an artist, and has painted a beautiful portrait of yourself and presented it to the league."

"A beautiful portrait, did you say? I think, sir," said the President, addressing the artist, "that you must have taken your idea not from my person, but from my principles." (")

William Lloyd Garrison, who had severely criticised Mr. Lincoln for setting aside Fremont's and Hunter's proclamations, visited the White House, and was warmly welcomed.

"I have just come from Baltimore," said Mr. Garrison. "I have been searching for the old jail which I once had the honor of occupying, but have not been able to find it."

"Well," said Mr. Lincoln, "times have changed. Then you couldn't get out, now you can't get in." (*)

The National Democratic Convention was to meet in Chicago, July 4th. The committee having matters in charge selected the anniversary of national independence, hoping that the choice of such a day would awaken the enthusiasm of those who believed the war was a failure, who said the South never could be conquered, and who demanded peace, no matter what terms Jefferson Davis might demand.

As narrated, Mr. Vallandigham, of Ohio, had been sent to the Confederate lines by President Lincoln. After a brief stay in Richmond, he made his way to Canada. (*) He located himself near Windsor, opposite Detroit, and was in constant communication with his friends in Ohio. He was counselling with Jacob Thompson and Clement C. Clay, Confederate agents at Toronto and Montreal.

At an early period of the Rebellion a secret society had been formed in Southern Indiana by men who favored the Confederacy. The organization at first was known as the "Knights of the Golden Circle." In 1863 it became the "Sons of Liberty." Its members were bitterly opposed to the war. The calls of President Lincoln for more troops and the ordering of the draft intensified their opposition. They were in communication with the Confederates. If the Union were to be restored at all, they desired it to be as it was before the war, with slavery unharmed. They did not comprehend that slavery was being swept from the land by the victories of the Union armies. The members of the society were most numerous in Indiana, Illinois, Missouri,