A Political History of the State of New York Volume III Part 4

The fight of these able and conspicuous journals represented the fierceness with which emanc.i.p.ation was pushed and opposed throughout the State. Conservative men, therefore, realising the danger to which a bitter campaign along strict party lines would subject the Union cause, demanded that all parties rally to the support of the Government with a candidate for governor devoted to conservative principles and a vigorous prosecution of the war. Sentiment seemed to point to John A. Dix as such a man. Though not distinguished as a strategist or effective field officer, he possessed courage, caution, and a desire to crush the rebellion. The policy of this movement, embracing conservative Republicans and war Democrats, was urged by Thurlow Weed, sanctioned by Seward, and heartily approved by John Van Buren, who, since the beginning of hostilities, had avoided party councils. The Const.i.tutional Union party, composed of old line Whigs who opposed emanc.i.p.ation,[824] proposed to lead this movement at its convention, to be held at Troy on September 9, but at the appointed time James Brooks, by prearrangement, appeared with a file of instructed followers, captured the meeting, and gave Horatio Seymour 32 votes to 20 for Dix and 6 for Millard Fillmore. This unexpected result made Seymour the candidate of the Democratic State convention which met at Albany on the following day.

[Footnote 824: New York _Herald_, October 15, 1862.]

Seymour sincerely preferred another. Early in August he travelled from Utica to Buffalo to resist the friends.h.i.+p and the arguments of Dean Richmond. It cannot be said that he had outlived ambition. He possessed wealth, he was advancing in his political career, and he aspired to higher honours, but he did not desire to become governor again, even though the party indicated a willingness to follow his leaders.h.i.+p and give him free rein to inaugurate such a policy as his wisdom and conservatism might dictate. He clearly recognised the difficulties in the way. He had taken ultra ground against the Federal Administration, opposing emanc.i.p.ation, denouncing arbitrary arrests, and expressing the belief that the North could not subjugate the South; yet he would be powerless to give life to his own views, or to modify Lincoln's proposed conduct of the war. The President, having been elected to serve until March, 1865, would not tolerate interference with his plans and purposes, so that an opposition Governor, regardless of grievances or their cause, would be compelled to furnish troops and to keep the peace. Hatred of conscription would be no excuse for non-action in case of a draft riot, and indignation over summary arrests could in nowise limit the exercise of such arbitrary methods. To be governor under such conditions, therefore, meant constant embarra.s.sment, if not unceasing humiliation. These reasons were carefully presented to Richmond. Moreover, Seymour was conscious of inherent defects of temperament. He did not belong to the cla.s.s of politicians, described by Victor Hugo, who mistake a weather-c.o.c.k for a flag. He was a gentleman of culture, of public experience, and of moral purpose, representing the best quality of his party; but possessed of a sensitive and eager temper, he was too often influenced by the men immediately about him, and too often inclined to have about him men whose influence did not strengthen his own better judgment.

Richmond knew of this weakness and regretted it, but the man of iron, grasping the political situation with the shrewdness of a phenomenally successful business man, wanted a candidate who could win. It was plain to him that the Republican party, divided on the question of emanc.i.p.ation and weakened by arbitrary arrests, a policy that many people bitterly resented, could be beaten by a candidate who added exceptional popularity to a promised support of the war and a vigorous protest against government methods. Dix, he knew, would stand with the President; Seymour would criticise, and with sureness of aim arouse opposition. While Richmond, therefore, listened respectfully to Seymour's reasons for declining the nomination, he was deaf to all entreaty, insisting that as the party had honoured him when he wanted office, he must now honour the party when it needed him. Besides, he declared that Sanford E. Church, whom Seymour favoured, could not be elected.[825] Having gained the Oneidan's consent, Richmond exercised his adroit methods of packing conventions, and thus opened the way for Seymour's unanimous nomination by making the Const.i.tutional Union convention the voice of one crying in the wilderness.

[Footnote 825: The author is indebted to Henry A. Richmond, son of Dean Richmond, for this outline of Seymour's interview.]

To a majority of the Democratic party Seymour's selection appealed with something of historic pride. It recalled other days in the beginning of his career, and inspired the hope that the peace which reigned in the fifties, and the power that the Democracy then wielded, might, under his leaders.h.i.+p, again return to bless their party by checking a policy that was rapidly introducing a new order of things.

After his nomination, therefore, voices became hoa.r.s.e with long continued cheering. For a few minutes the a.s.sembly surrendered to the noise and confusion which characterise a more modern convention, and only the presence of the nominee and the announcement that he would speak brought men to order.

Seymour, as was his custom, came carefully prepared. In his party he now had no rival. Not since DeWitt Clinton crushed the Livingstons in 1807, and Martin Van Buren swept the State in 1828, did one man so completely dominate a political organisation, and in his arraignment of the Radicals he emulated the partisan rather than the patriot. He spoke respectfully of the President, insisting that he should "be treated with the respect due to his position as the representative of the dignity and honor of the American people," and declaring that "with all our powers of mind and person, we mean to support the Const.i.tution and uphold the Union;" but in his bitter denunciation of the Administration he confused the general policy of conducting a war with mistakes in awarding government contracts. To him an honest difference of opinion upon const.i.tutional questions was as corrupt and reprehensible as dishonest practices in the departments at Was.h.i.+ngton.

He condemned emanc.i.p.ation as "a proposal for the butchery of women and children, for scenes of l.u.s.t and rapine, and of arson and murder, which would invoke the interference of civilised Europe."[826]

[Footnote 826: Cook and Knox, _Public Record of Horatio Seymour_, pp.

45-58.]

The convention thought seriously of making this speech the party platform. But A.P. Laning, declining to surrender the prerogative of the resolutions committee, presented a brief statement of principles, "pledging the Democracy to continue united in its support of the Government, and to use all legitimate means to suppress rebellion, restore the Union as it was, and maintain the Const.i.tution as it is."

It also denounced "the illegal, unconst.i.tutional, and arbitrary arrests of citizens of the State as unjustifiable," declaring such arrests a usurpation and a crime, and insisting upon the liberty of speech and the freedom of the press.[827]

[Footnote 827: The ticket nominated was as follows: Governor, Horatio Seymour of Oneida; Lieutenant-Governor, David E. Floyd Jones of Queens; Ca.n.a.l Commissioner, William I. Skinner of Herkimer; Prison Inspector, g.a.y.l.o.r.d J. Clark of Niagara; Clerk of Appeals, Fred A.

Tallmadge of New York.]

The speech of Seymour, as displeasing to many War Democrats as it was satisfactory to the Peace faction, at once aroused conservative Republicans, and Weed and Raymond, backed by Seward, favored the policy of nominating John A. Dix. Seward had distinguished himself as one of the more conservative members of the Cabinet. After settling into the belief that Lincoln "is the best of us"[828] his ambition centered in the support of the President, and whatever aid he could render in helping the country to a better understanding of the Administration's aims and wishes was generously if not always adroitly performed. He did not oppose the abolition of slavery. On the contrary, his clear discernment exhibited its certain destruction if the rebellion continued; but he opposed blending emanc.i.p.ation with a prosecution of the war, preferring to meet the former as the necessity for it arose rather than precipitate an academic discussion which would divide Republicans and give the Democrats an issue.

[Footnote 828: Seward to his wife.--F.W. Seward, _Life of W.H. Seward_, Vol. 2, p. 590.]

When Lincoln, on July 22, 1862, announced to his Cabinet a determination to issue an emanc.i.p.ation proclamation, the Secretary questioned its expediency only as to the time of its publication. "The depression of the public mind consequent upon our repeated reverses,"

he said, "is so great that I fear the effect of so important a step.... I suggest, sir, that you postpone its issue until you can give it to the country supported by military success, instead of issuing it, as would be the case now, upon the greatest disasters of the war."[829] Seward's view was adopted, and in place of the proclamation appeared the Executive Order of July 22, the unenforcement of which Greeley had so fiercely criticised in his "Prayer of Twenty Millions." Thurlow Weed, who, in June, had returned from London heavily freighted with good results for the Union accomplished by his influence with leading Englishmen, held the opinion of Seward. Raymond had also made the _Times_ an able defender of the President's policy, and although not violent in its opposition to the att.i.tude of the Radicals, it never ceased its efforts to suppress agitation of the slavery question.

[Footnote 829: Frank B. Carpenter, _Six Months at the White House_, pp.

22, 23.]

In its purpose to nominate Dix the New York _Herald_ likewise bore a conspicuous part. It had urged his selection upon the Democrats, declaring him stronger than Seymour. It now urged him upon the Republicans, insisting that he was stronger than Wadsworth.[830] This was also the belief of Weed, whose sagacity as to the strength of political leaders was rarely at fault.[831] On the contrary, Governor Morgan expressed the opinion that "Wadsworth will be far more available than any one yet mentioned as my successor."[832] Wadsworth's service at the battle of Bull Run had been distinguished. "Gen.

McDowell told us on Monday," wrote Thurlow Weed, "that Major Wadsworth rendered him the most important service before, during, and after battle. From others we have learned that after resisting the stampede, earnestly but ineffectually, he remained to the last moment aiding the wounded and encouraging surgeons to remain on the field as many of them did."[833] Wadsworth's subsequent insistence that the Army of the Potomac, then commanded by McClellan, could easily crush the Confederates, who, in his opinion, did not number over 50,000[834], had again brought his name conspicuously before the country. Moreover, since the 8th of March he had commanded the forces in and about Was.h.i.+ngton, and had acted as Stanton's adviser in the conduct of the war.

[Footnote 830: New York _Herald_, September 19 and October 15, 1862.]

[Footnote 831: Albany _Evening Journal_, November 6, 1862.]

[Footnote 832: T.W. Barnes, _Life of Thurlow Weed_, Vol. 2, p. 413.]

[Footnote 833: Albany _Evening Journal_, July 31, 1861.]

[Footnote 834: "This estimate was afterward verified as correct."--New York _Tribune_, September 22, 1862.]

For twenty years Wadsworth had not been a stranger to the people of New York. His vigorous defence of Silas Wright gave him a warm place in the hearts of Barnburners, and his name, after the formation of the Republican party, became a household word among members of that young organisation. Besides, his neighbours had exploited his character for generosity. The story of the tenant who got a receipt for rent and one hundred dollars in money because the accidental killing of his oxen in the midst of harvest had diminished his earning capacity, seemed to be only one of many similar acts. In 1847 his farm had furnished a thousand bushels of corn to starving Ireland. Moreover, he had endowed inst.i.tutions of learning, founded school libraries, and turned the houses of tenants into homes of college students. But the Radicals'

real reason for making him their candidate was his "recognition of the truth that slavery is the implacable enemy of our National life, and that the Union can only be saved by grappling directly and boldly with its deadly foe."[835]

[Footnote 835: New York _Tribune_, September 22, 1862.]

Prompted by this motive his supporters used all the methods known to managing politicians to secure a majority of the delegates. Lincoln's emanc.i.p.ation proclamation, published on September 23, five days after the battle of Antietam, greatly strengthened them. They hailed the event as their victory. It gave substance, too, to the Wadsworth platform that "the Union must crush out slavery, or slavery will destroy the Union." Reinforced by such an unexpected ally, it was well understood before the day of the convention that in spite of the appeals of Weed and Raymond, and of the wishes of Seward and the President, the choice of the Radicals would be nominated. Wadsworth was not averse. He had an itching for public life. In 1856 his stubborn play for governor and his later contest for a seat in the United States Senate had characterised him as an office-seeker. But whether running for office himself, or helping some one else, he was a fighter whom an opponent had reason to fear.

The Republican Union convention, as it was called, a.s.sembled at Syracuse on September 25. Henry J. Raymond became its president, and with characteristic directness made a vigorous reply to Seymour, declaring that "Jefferson Davis himself could not have planned a speech better calculated, under all the circ.u.mstances of the case, to promote his end to embarra.s.s the Government of the United States and strengthen the hands of those who are striving for its overthrow."[836]

Then William Curtis Noyes read a letter from Governor Morgan declining renomination.[837] The Governor had made a creditable executive, winning the respect of conservatives in both parties, and although the rule against a third term had become firmly established in a State that had tolerated it but once since the days of Tompkins and DeWitt Clinton, the propriety of making a further exception appealed to the public with manifest approval. "But this," Weed said, "did not suit the _Tribune_ and a cla.s.s of politicians with whom it sympathised.

They demanded a candidate with whom abolition is the paramount consideration."[838] Morgan's letter created a ripple of applause, after which the presentation of Wadsworth's name aroused an enthusiasm of longer duration than had existed at Albany. Nevertheless, Charles G. Myers of St. Lawrence did not hesitate to speak for "a more available candidate at the present time." Then, raising his voice above the whisperings of dissent, he named John A. Dix, "who, while Seymour was howling for peace and compromise," said the speaker, "ordered the first man shot that hauled down the American flag."

Raymond, in his speech earlier in the afternoon, had quoted the historic despatch in a well-balanced sentence, with the accent and inflection of a trained orator; but in giving it an idiomatic, thrilling ring in contrast with Seymour's record, Myers suddenly threw the convention into wild, continued cheering, until it seemed as if the noise of a moment before would be exceeded by the genuine and involuntary outburst of patriotic emotion. A single ballot, however, giving Wadsworth an overwhelming majority, showed that the Radicals owned the convention.[839]

[Footnote 836: New York _Times_, September 25, 1862.]

[Footnote 837: "Though we met Governor Morgan repeatedly during the summer, he never hinted that he expected or desired to be again a candidate."--New York _Tribune_, December 12, 1862.]

[Footnote 838: Albany _Evening Journal_, December 10, 1862.]

[Footnote 839: The vote resulted as follows: Wadsworth, 234; Dix, 110; Lyman Tremaine, 33; d.i.c.kinson, 2.

The ticket was as follows: Governor, James S. Wadsworth of Genesee; Lieutenant-Governor, Lyman Tremaine of Albany; Ca.n.a.l Commissioner, Oliver Ladue of Herkimer; Prison Inspector, Andreas Willman of New York; Clerk of Appeals, Charles Hughes of Was.h.i.+ngton.]

Parke G.o.dwin of Queens, from the committee on resolutions, presented the platform. Among other issues it urged the most vigorous prosecution of the war; hailed, with the profoundest satisfaction, the emanc.i.p.ation proclamation; and expressed pride in the knowledge that the Republic's only enemies "are the savages of the West, the rebels of the South, their sympathisers and supporters of the North, and the despots of Europe."

The campaign opened with unexampled bitterness. Seymour's convention speech inflamed the Republican party, and its press, recalling his address at the Peace convention in January, 1861, seemed to uncork its pent-up indignation. The _Tribune_ p.r.o.nounced him a "consummate demagogue," "radically dishonest," and the author of sentiments that "will be read throughout the rebel States with unalloyed delight,"

since "their whole drift tends to encourage treason and paralyse the arm of those who strike for the Union."[840] It disclosed Seymour's intimate relations with "Vallandigham and the school of Democrats who do not disguise their sympathy with traitors nor their hostility to war," and predicted "that, if elected, Jeff Davis will regard his success as a triumph."[841] Odious comparisons also became frequent.

Wadsworth at Bull Run was contrasted with Seymour's prediction that the Union's foes could not be subdued.[842] Seymour's supporters, it was said, believed in recognising the independence of the South, or in a restored Union with slavery conserved, while Wadsworth's champions thought rebellion a wicked and wanton conspiracy against human liberty, to be crushed by the most effective measures.[843] Raymond declared that "every vote given for Wadsworth is a vote for loyalty, and every vote given for Seymour is a vote for treason."[844]

[Footnote 840: New York _Tribune_, September 17, 1862.]

[Footnote 841: New York _Tribune_, Oct. 8, 1862.]

[Footnote 842: _Ibid._, Oct. 9.]

[Footnote 843: _Ibid._, Oct. 24.]

[Footnote 844: New York _Herald_, Oct. 9, 1862.]

To these thrusts the Democratic press replied with no less acrimony, speaking of Wadsworth as "a malignant, abolition disorganiser," whose service in the field was "very brief," whose command in Was.h.i.+ngton was "behind fortifications," and whose capacity was "limited to attacks upon his superior officers."[845] The _Herald_ declared him "as arrant an aristocrat as any Southern rebel. The slave-holder," it said, "lives upon his plantation, which his ancestors begged, cheated, or stole from the Indians. Wadsworth lives upon his immense Genesee farms, which his ancestors obtained from the Indians in precisely the same way. The slave-holder has a number of negroes who raise crops for him, and whom he clothes, feeds, and lodges. Wadsworth has a number of labourers on his farms, who support him by raising his crops or paying him rent. The slave-holder, having an independent fortune and nothing to do, joins the army, or runs for office. Wadsworth, in exactly the same circ.u.mstances, does exactly the same thing. Wadsworth, therefore, is quite as much an aristocrat as the slave-holder, and cares quite as much for himself and quite as little for the people."[846] Democrats everywhere endeavoured to limit the issue to the two opposing candidates, claiming that Seymour, in conjunction with all conservative men, stood for a vigorous prosecution of the war to save the Union, while Wadsworth, desiring its prosecution for the destruction of slavery, believed the Union of secondary consideration.

[Footnote 845: _Ibid._, Sept. 26.]

[Footnote 846: _Ibid._, Oct. 1.]

Campaign oratory, no longer softened by the absence of strict party lines, throbbed feverishly with pa.s.sion and ugly epithet. The strategical advantage lay with Seymour, who made two speeches. Dean Richmond, alarmed at the growing strength of the war spirit, urged him to put more "powder" into his Brooklyn address than he used at the ratification meeting, held in New York City on October 13; but he declined to cater "to war Democrats," contenting himself with an amplification of his convention speech. "G.o.d knows I love my country,"

he said; "I would count my life as nothing, if I could but save the nation's life." He resented with much feeling Raymond's electioneering statement that a vote for him was one for treason.[847] "Recognising at this moment as we do," he continued, "that the destinies, the honour, and the glory of our country hang poised upon the conflict in the battlefield, we tender to the Government no conditional support" to put down "this wicked and mighty rebellion." Once, briefly, and without bitterness, he referred to the emanc.i.p.ation proclamation, but he again bitterly arraigned the Administration for its infractions of the Const.i.tution, its deception as to the strength of the South, and the corruption in its departments.

[Footnote 847: New York _Herald_, October 8 and 9, 1862.]

Seymour's admirers manifested his tendencies more emphatically than he did himself, until denunciation of treason and insistence upon a vigorous prosecution of the war yielded to an indictment of the Radicals. The s.h.i.+bboleth of these declaimers was arbitrary arrests.

Two days after the edict of emanc.i.p.ation (September 24) the President issued a proclamation ordering the arrest, without benefit of _habeas corpus_, of all who "discouraged enlistments," or were guilty of "any disloyal practice" which afforded "aid and comfort to the rebels."[848]