Williams, chair of the Lincoln Forum, and welcome to this panel of forum 22, relating to lincolns enemies. And im so pleased to have it distinguished, every time someone says distinguished i want to run to the merlot bar. Its like saying with all due respect in my courtroom. But we do have some great scholars with us this morning. Stephen engle, the author of a great book about lincoln, and the nations governors. Jonathan white, author of midnight in america, and soon to be with us, the book our little monitor. And of course catherine clinton, no stranger to us, author of mrs. Lincoln, a life, and many other books. And walter stolzier, as well as lincolns secretary of war Edwin Stanton, called stanton, and he told me and i hope im not revealing any confidence, he has a glint in his eye for sammen chase. Good luck with that. Because im sure we will hear about secretary of the treasury sammen chase from professor clinton. So let me start with this. John barre, who is one of our Lincoln Forum members, wrote a great book, but its a doorstoper. Its huge. Called loathing lincoln. And he says in his introduction that william f. Buckley jr. Once said that americans shall not remember why lincoln was loved until we come to understand why he was hated. And both emotions were certainly displayed after his assassination on april 14, 1865. Even those who, as William Peterson said, Merril Peterson in his great book, even those who commemorated, or tried to memorialize his death with crepe and bunting secretly harbored a wish for his demise. So i think what we have is a thought on when this dislike of lincoln began. And i think i think its true, or it occurred even before he was elected president , and deep and throughout his administration. Certainly lincolns political outlook in contrast to slave holders contributed to this, his reliance on Thomas Jeffersons declaration of independence which he thought was even superceded and was superior to the constitution, or at least had to be read together. And of course his acts as president clearly, the republicans supported him. Antiwar democrats called copperheads despised him, especially since they believed, as did southerners, because he subverted the constitution, especially in a suspension of the writ of habeas corpus across the north. Well, thats a general overview, which i think we all get and understand. Even if we do not accept this dislike of our 16th president. But what about what about particular enemies within his within and without his administration . So what ive asked our panelists to do is to give a two or threeminute overview of what they would like to discuss to get us going, especially with questions among the panelists about what they think is important to know about lincolns specific enemies. Well start with stephen engle. Thanks, frank. Well, with regard to the governors that i studied, there are two sort of categories of i dont know whether they would be called enemies or perhaps just oppositionists. Early in the war john andrew and the radical republicans who were representatives of the various states would probably come to regard lincoln in a frustrating way because the war, as it turns out early on, is a conciliatory war to maintain the border states within the union. And john andrew and israel wash burn in particular become fairly exercised about the slow, slow progression of the war, especially during the fall of 1861. And so these governors begin to find ways to move the administration along to advance the war quickly, in order to end it quickly, to maintain the volunteer spirit that they were struggling with back home. Early in the war, i would say that the radical governors were really oppositionists to lincolns mentality about how to fight the war. And, in fact, andrew and washburn would be among the leading advocates among black troops and would write to salmon of course in the fall of 1861, this is a fairly radical idea, but one in which they believed if the union had embraced this early on, it would shorten the war, end the sort of frustrations among the populus, even the overwhelmingly small population, the war would as the war progresses they achieved modest victories with confiscation acts and militia acts in 1862 and emancipation in 1863, then you find theres another sort of opposition rank among the conservatives. The people who lead that sort of cadre of enemies would be Horatio Seymour whos elected in 1862, and who, in fact, would believe that lincoln is moving the war too quickly because hes a sort of tool of the radicals, and its not until seymour becomes governor in 1863, recognizing that the war has changed very quickly within two years. And so seymour comes to resent lincoln for expanding the war too quickly. And he believes that the culprits here are not necessarily lincoln himself, but hes been moved or prodded by these radical governors, or these radical political leaders to advance the war into establishing the revolutionary nature of confiscation, emancipation. And National Conscription and black troops, which as you can imagine for most conservatives was, you know, a radically different war in 1863 than it was in 1861, especially in trying to reach out to the citizenry to mobilize and raise the troops necessary to meet the demands for this rather new war that the governors would be no border state governors elected, no elections in 1862 for those states, but in the states that had large populations to draw from, new york in particular, how would they be how would they be able to sell the war to a fairly conservative population that opposed, vehemently, emancipation and conscription and a number of other acts. In the ways in which we see how states and governors react to the progression of the war early on theres a frustration that its not moving fast enough, and by 1863, theres a frustration that its moving way too quickly for the rest of the northerners who will share the burden and labor of filling the ranks as these conscription acts move forward into the states. Okay. Jonathan white, you did write a book, a very good book, on Abraham Lincoln and treason, relating to the merriman case. So i suppose it would be appropriate for you to discuss why this caused so many people to turn against lincoln. Sure. And i think that steve lays out the sort of grand narrative of the opposition to lincoln during the war very well. I hope you all will forgive me for being inback if lincoln was on twitter, who would have trolled him . Theres obvious candidates. You would have people like john merriman, ca lent valaningham. Steve mentioned andrew on the republican side or seymour on the democratic side as opposition. The millennials have a very good term for this. Frenemies. Would you accept that . Yes, absolutely. Im not on twitter though. Oh, you should get on there. A frenemy is someone with whom you associate even though you have enmity towards them. So i think that you could see people like andrew or seymour within that camp. But then theres also hundreds of thousands of ordinary democrats in the civilian population, in the army who oppose lincoln for the very same reasons steve was describing. They see his policies on Civil Liberties and habeas corpus. They see his support for a 13th amendment in 1864. And that pushes them to turn against lincoln. Whereas they may have been moderate supporters of the war early on, they see the changing nature of the war, and they begin to see lincoln in a much darker light. So during part of the discussion, thats some of the civilians who opposed lincoln and also some of the soldiers who are often seen as being overwhelmingly supportive of lincoln. In my research i found many soldiers who came to loathe lincoln with graet hatred. Thank you, jonathan. And catherine clinton, i think its appropriate for you to discuss the man about whom lincoln said to john hay, his assistant secretary, when he was to relieve general rosekranz, i suppose he will like the blue bottle fly lay his eggs in every rotten spot he can find. On the matter of spreading manure everywhere, i do think that sammen chase and his daughter were quite active in washington at the time. But i think looking at this question of the frenemy that lincoln certainly believed in keeping his friends close, his enemies closer, and his big tent philosophy i think is when we can see that really paid off. Especially after his untimely death. And i do want to say that on this matter of being invited to talk about lincolns enemies, what have i ever done to some have suggested to me that since i work on mrs. Lincoln, maybe that would be a start. But i certainly hope some would read my book and disagree. I was working on lincoln in new york, thanks to harolds kind invitation, and found this back biting snarling among, of course, republicans. Therefore, when i was first looking at the enmity between chase and lincoln, i found that it was a deep, intense sense of ambition and selfrighteousness in sammen chase that led to his belief that he would, of course, make a better president and he had to assert himself so that lincoln would see that with his every act. And he also challenged lincoln. But it was also, as you study this, you get a deeper appreciation of lincoln, who understood quite well this motivating force with chase. And also, lincoln quite kindly recognized his wifes enmity with chase sprag, who made a marriage to finance her fathers financial run for president. And then felt herself very short circuited, and her charms spread around washington were so great that when lincoln finally did accept one of chases many resignations, the wonderful thing was chases reaction was great shock. How could lincoln ever live without him . But lincoln had great plans for him. And by cementing his role on the Supreme Court as Doris Kerns Goodwin reminded us he didnt know what lay ahead, and i know lincoln wasnt pressient enough to predict the exact timing of tommys death, but he did appoint him to that court later in the year. He did have a place for him in mind to cement lincolns own legacy. Whatever he knew about his ambition, he also knew about his selftryi self trying righteousness. He cut lyndon down to size, but contributed later to lincolns immortality. Thank you. The thing that has impressed me many years, walter, is the plurality of lincolns reelection in 1864, 2,200,000 for him, and 1,800,000 against him. He won the electoral votes in all but two states, new jersey, the home of his democratic opponent, George Brenton mclel lan, and i think kentucky, the place of his birth. Thats a great victory in the midst of war, where elections were allowed to be held to lincolns credit. But ive often wondered, whats making up this 1. 8 Million People who voted against him . They certainly werent friends of lincoln and his administration. Right. I think to measure the closeness of that election we need to look, and im sorry i didnt bring the numbers with me, at lincolns own handwritten document in which he sort of predicts the electoral vote, th this is kers in october, he thinks hes going to lose new york and pennsylvania, the two most populist states. Hes going to win with as narrow a margin as one can imagine. That was a very good prediction actually. When you look at how did he win new york . I mentioned it last night, i think that send Benjamin Butler to new york city to keep democrats, butler sent a note to stanton saying i think ive done a good job of discouraging the democrats from coming to the polls today. So i think that actually, and jonathan in his great book on that election also talks about this, that actually if it had been what we would talk about today in the third world as a free and fair election, that there might have been even more votes against jonathans nodding here, there might have been even more votes against andrew sorry, Abraham Lincoln in 64. I think we should also at some point get to how to put it, lincolns enemies south of the mason dixon line, and the attitude of Jefferson Davis and others towards lincoln. By the end of the war they view him roughly as a pirate, operating outside the laws of war. And i think we should talk about that at some point. Let me just follow up with walter. Sure. I think what a lot of people dont realize is that in Early September of 1864, some new york journalists were very fearful of what might happen in the election of 1864. And they decided to write every governor sort of a private letter to gain their sense of what their states results might be. Would they they asked them three questions, do they think lincoln can carry the state, was there a substitute, or would the National Union party win . The interesting thing is the response among most governors is that the election is a foregone conclusion, its too late to pull lincoln out of the race, that would be a national, political calamity, the fallout would make the union look vulnerable. But there were a number of governors, andrew included, who would recommend chase as a possibility. And those who wouldnt even recommend someone said that lincoln was unfit, but, in fact, the to pull out of the race would probably lose the credibility of the political process. So there were very real questions about this opposition within the public sector. But for three new york journalists, very highbrow journalists to send a series of letters to every governor to sort of gauge the on the ground sense of would there would lincoln carry their states . Was, i think, a great indicator of just how close this election was to be. And interestingly enough, those letters go out about the time that sherman is in atlanta, and atlanta falls, which really, if you read the sort of news of the day, i think these responses were influenced to a large degree by what was happening militarily that it wasnt about lincoln, it was about winning the contest, moving the contest forward that they thought they were winning in the field and that to create a political liability would probably backfire, and land the democrats the victory. Do you think, steve, maybe, if the pomeroy circumstanlar han a different point in time. That the proposition that lincoln was weakening the war effort and the party, that the Party Leaders were pushing chase, and chase was oh, no, no, yes yes, therefore, its interesting because we do look at contingency theory, and political contingency theory. Its almost as if chase overplayed his hand. I said this yesterday just to follow up. Because of the way things turned out we forget just how unbelievably, you know, chaotic, and how much opposition, real opposition there was. So for me the miracle is that these elections were taking place every year, and that this incredible election takes place in this year with overwhelming opposition, bubbling up from a variety places for a variety of reasons. There was a lot to be said of the miracle of this election. Much of that opposition was not just based on failures on the battlefield, or failure or victory, but the ongoing struggle that weve had since our founding of National Security versus Civil Liberties. So walter, picking up on that, what did Edwin Stanton do to help the opposition in as far as enforcement of the draft, and filling up what many opponents called the bastiles of the north. How to put it, as i said last night, stanton underlooped lincolns supervision, he creates a system of provost marshalls in every congressional district. And they are given a Broad Authority not just to sort of enlist men for the draft, but to arrest those opposing the draft. And these are energetic men and they take that to heart. And so hundreds of folks are arrested for interfering with the draft. And as franks question suggests, this is almost if a democratic strategist were writing for stanton, whatnot what to do in order to help democrats get votes in the fall of 63 and the fall of 64, it would be almost a perfect script. It gives the democrats a great argument, you know, that the constitution, as it was, and a key element is that lincoln and stanton are throwing editors and others into prison for opposing the draft. And lets segue, and then well get to catherine on specific issues involving the secretary of treasury. But jonathan, what about the law of war and the issues that confronted lincoln and the decisions he made . Yeah. And, you know, on this issue of military arrest of civilians, mark kneely dish either materially hurt the Union War Effort or help the confederate war effort. His argument is these are people who would have been arrested anyway. The reality is that the arrest that really got the attention of the American People, and that continue to get our attention today are of the great political leaders, people like clemeant vlaningham, another congressman named henry may who was arrested, these guys get great press headlines. The narrative that lincoln is using necessity to go against the constitution and do whatever he wants to do. From the democratic perspective they argue that this is simply to silence their opposition. Hes using the laws of war in a way that he can silence his political opponents. From lincolns perspective, hes doing what he needs to do to help win the war. And lincoln writes very famously in his corning letter in june of 1863, he says, you know, i could have arrested robert e. Lee and other great confederate leaders, he doesnt call them great, but in the beginning of the war in april 1861. If i had done that, you all would have raised the howl of free speech and free press and habeas corpus, and constitutional rights. He suggests that maybe one day people will look back and say he should have arrested more people than he did. Now, i dont know quite how persuasive that is, if we would necessarily think that today. Well, think today. Its called preventative detention. There you go. And how we would feel about that in our culture. Yeah. And what about can i ask about the soldiers though, just as a teacher teachingville war, each semester, even in the Summer School for those of you who havent been to san antonio in the summer. We teach the script that furloughing the soldiers going back, when a wider margin for line con. Now ive been to the Lincoln Forum, and ive read recent books that are contradicting the loyal soldier. I wonder if some of the other pa