Part 55 (1/2)

Stanton was in Savannah, Georgia, for a conference with Sherman when ”the rebel flag of Fort Fisher was delivered to [him].” Eager to see the battleground, he journeyed to North Carolina, where he spent the night with General Rufus Saxton and his wife. When he arrived, he warned his hosts that ”fatigue would compel him to retire early,” but, relaxing before the fire, surrounded by a collection of books, he revived. ”Ah, here are old friends,” he said, picking up a volume of Macauley's poetry from the table. He asked Mrs. Saxton to read ”Horatius at the Bridge,” which he followed with ”The Battle of Ivry.” Midnight found him still seated by the fire, ”repeating s.n.a.t.c.hes of poetry.” During his stay, Mrs. Saxton noted, ”the t.i.tan War Secretary was replaced by the genial companion, the man of letters, the lover of nature-the real Stanton.” For a few hours, Stanton allowed himself the distraction and the levity he had often decried in Lincoln.

Stanton had journeyed south to confer with Sherman, concerned by reports of the general's hostile behavior toward the black refugees who were arriving by the thousands into his lines. It was said that Sherman opposed their employment as soldiers, drove them from his camp even when they were starving, and manifested toward them ”an almost criminal dislike.” Sherman countered that the movement of his military columns was hindered ”by the crowds of helpless negroes that flock after our armies...clogging my roads, and eating up our substance.” Military success, he felt, had to take precedence over treatment of the Negroes.

In his conversations with Stanton, however, Sherman agreed to issue ”Special Field Orders, No. 15,” a temporary plan to allocate ”a plot of not more than forty acres of tillable ground” to help settle the tide of freed slaves along the coast of Georgia and on the neighboring islands. Stanton returned home feeling more at ease about the situation. In the weeks that followed, Congress followed up by creating a Freedmen's Bureau with authority to distribute lands and provide a.s.sistance to displaced refugees throughout the South.

NOTHING ON THE HOME FRONT in January engaged Lincoln with greater urgency than the pa.s.sage of the Thirteenth Amendment, abolis.h.i.+ng slavery. He had long feared that his Emanc.i.p.ation Proclamation would be discarded once the war came to an end. ”A question might be raised whether the proclamation was legally valid,” he said. ”It might be added that it only aided those who came into our lines...or that it would have no effect upon the children of the slaves born hereafter.” Pa.s.sage of a const.i.tutional amendment eradicating slavery once and for all would be ”a King's cure for all the evils.”

The previous spring, the Thirteenth Amendment had pa.s.sed in the Senate by two thirds but failed to garner the necessary two-thirds vote in the House, where Republicans had voted aye and Democrats nay along nearly unanimous party lines. In his annual message in December, Lincoln had urged Congress to reconsider the measure. He acknowledged that he was asking the same body to debate the same question, but he hoped the intervening election had altered the situation. Republican gains in November ensured that if he called a special session after March 4, the amendment would pa.s.s. Since it was ”only a question of time,” how much better it would be if this Congress could complete the job, if Democrats as well as Republicans could be brought to support its pa.s.sage in a show of bipartisan unity.

Congressman James M. Ashley of Ohio reintroduced the measure into the House on January 6, 1865. Lincoln set to work at once to sway the votes of moderate Democrats and border-state Unionists. He invited individual House members to his office, dealing gracefully and effectively with each one. ”I have sent for you as an old whig friend,” he told Missouri's James Rollins, ”that I might make an appeal to you to vote for this amendment. It is going to be very close, a few votes one way or the other will decide it.” He emphasized the importance of sending a signal to the South that the border states could no longer be relied upon to uphold slavery. This would ”bring the war,” he predicted, ”rapidly to a close.” When Rollins agreed to support the amendment, Lincoln jumped from his chair and grasped the congressman's hands, expressing his profound grat.i.tude. The two old Whigs then discussed the leanings of the various members of the Missouri delegation, determining which members might be persuaded. ”Tell them of my anxiety to have the measure pa.s.s,” Lincoln urged, ”and let me know the prospect of the border state vote.”

He a.s.signed two of his allies in the House to deliver the votes of two wavering members. When they asked how to proceed, he said, ”I am President of the United States, clothed with great power. The abolition of slavery by const.i.tutional provision settles the fate, for all coming time, not only of the millions now in bondage, but of unborn millions to come-a measure of such importance that those two votes must be procured. I leave it to you to determine how it shall be done; but remember that I am President of the United States, clothed with immense power, and I expect you to procure those votes.” It was clear to his emissaries that his powers extended to plum a.s.signments, pardons, campaign contributions, and government jobs for relatives and friends of faithful members. Brooklyn Democrat Moses F. Odell agreed to change his vote; when the session ended, he was given the lucrative post of navy agent in New York. Elizabeth Blair noted that her father had successfully joined in the lobbying effort, persuading several members.

Ashley learned that the Camden & Amboy Railroad could secure the vote of two New Jersey Democrats if Senator Sumner could be convinced to postpone a bill he had introduced to end the monopoly the railroad enjoyed. Unable to move Sumner, Ashley asked Lincoln to intervene. Lincoln regretfully replied that he could ”do nothing with Mr. Sumner in these matters,” and feared if he tried, Sumner ”would be all the more resolute.”

As the vote neared, pressure intensified. The leader of the opposition was McClellan's running mate, Democrat George Pendleton of Ohio. ”Though he had been defeated in the election,” observed Senator James Blaine, ”he returned to the House with increased prestige among his own political a.s.sociates.” Democrats who considered changing their vote were made to understand that dire consequences would follow if they failed to maintain the party line on an issue compromising the sanct.i.ty of states' rights and effecting a fundamental s.h.i.+ft in the Const.i.tution.

Both sides knew that the outcome would be decided by the thinnest of margins. ”We are like whalers,” Lincoln observed, ”who have been long on a chase: we have at last got the harpoon into the monster, but we must now look how we steer, or with one 'flop' of his tail he will send us all into eternity.” On the morning of the scheduled vote, Ashley feared that the entire effort would collapse. Rumors circulated that Confederate Peace Commissioners were on the way to Was.h.i.+ngton or had already arrived in the capital. ”If it is true,” Ashley urgently wrote to the president, ”I fear we shall [lose] the bill.” The Democratic leaders.h.i.+p would prevail upon wavering party members, arguing that the amendment would lead the commissioners to abort the peace talks. ”Please authorize me to contradict it, if not true,” Ashley entreated.

”So far as I know,” Lincoln promptly replied, ”there are no peace Commissioners in the City, or likely to be in it.” Ashley later learned that Lincoln, in fact, had been informed that three Peace Commissioners were en route to Fort Monroe, but he could honestly, if insincerely, claim that no commissioners were in the capital city. Without this cunning evasion, Ashley believed, ”the proposed amendment would have failed.”

As the debate opened, Ashley acknowledged that ”never before, and certain I am that never again, will I be seized with so strong a desire to give utterance to the thoughts and emotions which throbbed my heart and brain.” The amendment's pa.s.sage would signal ”the complete triumph of a cause, which at the beginning of my political life I had not hoped to live long enough to see.”

Ashley recalled, ”Every available foot of s.p.a.ce, both in the galleries and on the floor of the House, was crowded at an early hour, and many hundred could not get within hearing.” Chief Justice Chase and the members of the Supreme Court were present, along with Seward, Fessenden, and Dennison representing the cabinet. Dozens of senators had come to witness the historic debate, as had members of most foreign ministries.

Ashley wisely decided to yield his time to the small band of Democrats who would support the amendment but needed to justify their s.h.i.+ft to const.i.tuents. He called first on Archibald McAllister. The Pennsylvania congressman explained that he had changed his mind when he saw that the only way to achieve peace was to destroy ”the corner-stone of the Southern Confederacy.” His remarks brought forth applause from the galleries, as did those of his colleague Alexander Coffroth. ”If by my action to-day I dig my political grave,” the congressman from Somerset County proclaimed, ”I will descend into it without a murmur.”

After every Democrat who wanted to speak had been heard, the voting began. ”Hundreds of tally sheets had been distributed on the floor and in the galleries,” Ashley recorded. It appeared at first that the amendment had fallen two or three votes short of the requisite two-thirds margin. The floor was in tumult when Speaker Colfax stood to announce the final tally. His voice shaking, he said, ”On the pa.s.sage of the Joint Resolution to amend the Const.i.tution of the United States the ayes have 119, the noes 56. The const.i.tutional majority of two thirds having voted in the affirmative, the Joint Resolution has pa.s.sed.” Without the five Democrats who had changed their votes, the amendment would have lost.

”For a moment there was a pause of utter silence,” Noah Brooks reported, ”as if the voices of the dense ma.s.s of spectators were choked by strong emotion. Then there was an explosion, a storm of cheers, the like of which probably no Congress of the United States ever heard before.”

”Before the members left their seats,” Congressman Arnold recalled, ”the roar of artillery from Capitol Hill announced to the people of Was.h.i.+ngton that the amendment had pa.s.sed.” Ashley brought to the War Department a list of all those who had voted in favor. Stanton ordered three additional batteries to ”fire one hundred guns with their heaviest charges” while he slowly read each name aloud, proclaiming, ”History will embalm them in great honor.”

Lincoln's friends raced to the White House to share the news. ”The pa.s.sage of the resolution,” recalled Arnold, ”filled his heart with joy. He saw in it the complete consummation of his own great work, the emanc.i.p.ation proclamation.” The following evening, Lincoln spoke to celebrants gathered at the White House. ”The occasion was one of congratulation to the country and to the whole world,” he said. ”But there is a task yet before us-to go forward and consummate by the votes of the States that which Congress so n.o.bly began.” The audience responded with cheers. ”They will do it” was the confident cry. And, indeed, the legislatures in twenty states acted almost immediately. Before the year 1865 was out, the requisite three quarters had spoken putting a dramatic end to the slavery issue that had disturbed the nation's tranquillity from its earliest days.

No praise must have been more welcome to Lincoln than that of his old critic, the fiery abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison. ”And to whom is the country more immediately indebted for this vital and saving amendment of the Const.i.tution than, perhaps, to any other man?” Garrison asked a cheering crowd at the Boston Music Hall. ”I believe I may confidently answer-to the humble railsplitter of Illinois-to the Presidential chain-breaker for millions of the oppressed-to Abraham Lincoln!”

THE STORY OF the Peace Commissioners, whose presence had almost derailed the vote on the new amendment, had begun with Francis Preston Blair. Lincoln's reelection had convinced the old editor that another attempt at peace might be successful. Lincoln remained unconvinced that talks at this juncture would be effective, but Blair was so anxious to try that Lincoln gave him a pa.s.s for Richmond. It was understood, however, that he was proceeding on his own, without authority to speak for the president.

After leaving Lincoln, Blair wrote two letters to Jefferson Davis. The first, designed for public consumption, requested simply ”the privilege of visiting Richmond” to inquire about the papers Blair had lost when General Early's troops took possession of his Silver Spring house. The second revealed that his ”main purpose” in coming was to discuss ”the state of the affairs of our country.” He promised to ”unbosom [his] heart frankly & without reserve,” hopeful that some good might result.

On January 11, 1865, the seventy-three-year-old Blair arrived in Richmond, where he was greeted warmly by numerous old friends. Jefferson Davis's wife, Varina, ”threw her arms around him” and said, ”Oh you Rascal, I am overjoyed to see you.” Seated with President Davis in the library of the Confederate White House, Blair conceded his proposal ”might be the dreams of an old man,” but he was confident of Davis's ”practical good sense” and ”utmost frankness.” He reminded Davis of his own deep attachment to the South. ”Every drop” of his own blood and his children's sprang from ”a Southern source.” Davis responded with equal warmth, a.s.suring Blair that he ”would never forget” the many ”kindnesses” exhibited by the Blairs toward the Davis family, and that ”even when dying they would be remembered in his prayers.”

Blair presented his proposal, which would essentially postpone the war between the North and the South while the armies allied against the French, who had invaded Mexico and installed a puppet regime in violation of the Monroe Doctrine. Davis agreed that nothing would better heal the raw emotions on both sides ”than to see the arms of our countrymen from the North and the South united in a war upon a Foreign Power.” The specifics of this improbable and unauthorized plan, reminiscent of Seward's proposal four years earlier, were not discussed, though Davis agreed to send Peace Commissioners to Was.h.i.+ngton ”with a view to secure peace to the two Countries.”

Though tired from his arduous journey back to Was.h.i.+ngton by carriage, train, and steamer, Blair rushed to the White House and delivered the Davis letter to the president. Lincoln consulted Stanton, who pointedly noted: ”There are not two countries...and there never will be two countries. Tell Davis that if you treat for peace, it will be for this one country; negotiations on any other basis are impossible.” Lincoln immediately agreed. ”You may say to him,” Lincoln directed Blair, ”that I have constantly been, am now, and shall continue, ready to receive any agent...with the view of securing peace to the people of our one common country.”

Blair returned straightaway to Richmond with Lincoln's response, and Davis called a cabinet meeting at his home to discuss his next move. His advisers recognized the irreconcilable conflict between the concepts of ”two countries” and ”one common country,” but the insistent clamor for peace had convinced Davis to send three commissioners to Fort Monroe-Vice President Alexander Stephens, former United States senator R. M. T. Hunter, and former Supreme Court Justice John A. Campbell.

On Sunday, January 29, a flag of truce flown at Petersburg announced the arrival of the commissioners. ”By common consent all picket firing was suspended,” the New York Herald reported, ”and the lines of both armies presented the appearance of a gala day.” Viewed as ”harbingers of peace,” the three gentlemen elicited ”prolonged and enthusiastic” applause from both sides, revealing the depth of the soldiers' desire to end the fighting and return to their families and homes. One reporter noted that when rival songs were played by Southern and Northern bands-”Dixie” and ”Yankee Doodle Dandy”-each side responded only to its own patriotic air, ”but when the band struck up 'Home Sweet Home,' the opposing camps forgot their hostility, and united in vociferous tribute to the common sentiment.”