Next, on the civil war, a panel of historians and authors talks about factors that impacted lincoln Election Campaign in 1864. They explore lincolns expansion of president ial war powers and his relationship with both democratic and Republican Newspapers. They also debate whether the gettysburg address was the beginning of lincolns reElection Campaign and the impact of the soldiers vote. This hourlong event was part of the Lincoln Forums annual symposium in gettysburg, pennsylvania. Good morning. I welcome everybody. I am honored to be here and hosting this panel or moderating this panel on the election of 1864. We have a terrific group of scholars here. Im going to introduce them very briefly, because theyre very wellknown to you, as members of the forum. And also wellknown to the cspan audience. Then well get right into some questions that ill pose to the panelists and then well turn it open to the floor and have a round of q a from all of you as well. Let me just say this at the outset. I did a quick study of these figures. Frank williams, harold holzer, Jonathan White and Thomas Horrocks here. By my count, and you know, theres some margin of error here in my calculation. But youre looking at the equivalent of about 75 books. [laughter] authored, edited coedited. Now, i know that number is skewed somewhat. [laughter] lets just say, i mean, i have contributed two books. White and horrocks have done better than that. Ha but somewhere north of 60 accounts for the holzerwilliams combination. These two, apparently, they have day jobs as well. Let me just say a few words. Frank williams is wellknown to everybody, the retired chief justice of the Supreme Court of rhode island. A legend in the lincoln field. The founder of the forum, he has written and edited several books about lincoln, in particular his expertise is on lincoln as a lawyer and a politician. And he has done a remarkable job over the course of his career in framing the lincoln debate. In particular, developing ideas about the lincoln literature and hes a true bibliophile. Glad to have him. Harold holzer is the Senior Vice President for Public Affairs at the metropolitan museum of art in new york. Hes also chairman of the Abraham Lincoln bicentennial foundation. His latest book youve already heard about, lincoln and the power of the press. That has a particular relevance to the election of 1864, well drill down on that as well today. Next to harold is Jonathan White. Jon is professor of american studies at Christopher Newport university. Hes written a number of books and articles about Abraham Lincoln. But his latest in particular is a remarkable contribution to the election of 1864. The title is emancipation, the union army and the reelection of Abraham Lincoln. Its a revisionist study. Im really interested in asking him about this book, because it pretty much challenges everything ive been teaching about this election. [laughter] for the last 10, 15 years or so. So i need him to explain it to me, so i can help the 19yearolds of america get through it. Finally, at the end of the panel here, we have Thomas Horrocks, one of the great librarians in america, former director of the library. Hes worked at harvard in the Library System as well. And hes written an important book called lincolns Campaign Biographies. Its a really fascinating study about one of the core elements of 19th century campaigns, which is the printed campaign biography. Welcome to everybody. Let me say one thing at the outset. The election of 1864 is important. Im not sure people realize how important. I have to tell you, just as a confession, ever since i saw spielbergs lincoln, ive been disgruntled, because as powerful as that movie was and as interesting as the story of the passage of the 13th amendment is, i always felt like they missed this opportunity, because i think all those issues, particularly the tradeoff between emancipation and union actually mattered more during the election of 1864. And i want to talk about this with these panelists. I think that movie would have been great, august of 64 in the Lincoln White house. The choices lincoln made were defining for him, his presidency and the country. When eventually all worked out and nobody thought it would, he said we cannot have free government without elections. Its one of the most stirring statements, in affirmation of democracy. Were not here to celebrate the election of 1864. This panel is designed to study it. And we have the right people to do that. The first question, and i thought people here would appreciate it, because everybody here in this room are serious students. I wanted to ask about books that have been written about the election of 1864 to get us started. What book do you recommend . So frank, i want to put that to you first. I dont want you to hurt anybodys feelings. And i dont want you to think about the panelists. But [laughter] if there is a book by somebody off the panel that you would recommend for this election, you know, which one or two books would it be . Well, there are really two classics. The late david longs jewel of liberty. Its out of print but i think you can still get a copy at a used bookstore. And john laws reelected lincoln, the battle for the 1864 presidency. Theres a new one out, decided on the battlefield, grant, sherman, lincoln and the election of 1864 by david allen johnson. So those are the ones that i would look to. Okay. Good. I like david longs book as well. Its a powerful study. Johns book is totally readable. But i was curious to see if you would agree with this. I know im a little partisan. I was a student of david donalds. But i think youre going to look at a by graphical account of lincoln as a candidate, the account he offers is as good as any. It is. Its compelling. And he picks his subjects as to what depth hes going to cover, as you know, matt, because you helped as one of his students. And this is a particularly strong section. Okay. And is there any other biographer that you would recommend for politics and the election of 1864 in particular . I liked ron whites book too that came out in 09. Ron white is especially good in the way he crafts his public rhetoric. Let me just make a spielberg comment, if i may. Fair enough. The original script of spielbergs lincoln goes from the gettysburg address to the assassination. Ive only seen snippets of it, but it actually goes exactly into these issues. And its up to spielberg if he ever wants to circle around and release it for a miniseries or let someone else do it. Butdreamworks owns the script. Unlike a screenplay, which can be published and has been published, this longer version is forever in the vaults, which is rather sad, because it did get into this very issue. And i agree with you 100 that its an equally dramatic story. So, first of all, we can hope for a sequel to the lincoln movie. But is there a book that you would recommend that frank didnt mention yet . No. I think those are the books and i agree that donalds biography covers it well. All the biographies deal with it as the most important election in American History. Its a rather superlative description but i think it fits. Weve heard in every election in the last 20 years that it was also the most important election in American History. And the elections of today are supposed to be so earthshattering, through which we all manage to survive and move on to the next election are always compared to 1864. So i dont know if it needs a new study. It would be interesting if we all think it should be revived. The problem with our late friend, david long, and his book is that it was published by a small publisher. And my vote is that it be picked up by some current publisher, like siu press, if youre listening, and redone in a posthumous edition. I think it actually was reissued in paperback. But i might be wrong about that. The one thing i would add, part of the problem with the election of 1864, is the outcome seems so obvious. 55 of the popular vote, a huge Electoral College majority, and so there just havent been a lot of books done on the election of 1864, because i think scholars look at the campaign and the outcome and they just dont think theres something new to say. You know, i would let me put a plugin for somebody who is on this panel. If you had asked me, lets say six months ago, i would have agreed with what both frank and harold said about the two best books. And i would certainly think long is definitely one. John walls is also good. Its a good read. But i would replace wall. I would now say that the two best books for me, for the 64 election, would be david longs and my friend here, john whites, which i think i dont agree with everything that john says in there, but i think its a very important book, that if you want to understand the 64 election, particularly the soldiers vote, which everyone says, who has written about the 64 election, says its a critical element of that. You need to deal with johns book. So. All right. Let me ask john. Put the check in the mail. Its on its way. Let me ask john to just summarize again, for this group but also for the wider audience, what you think youve done new in your book that addresses something about the 1864 election that other scholars have missed. Sure. So my book makes really two arguments. The one has to do with lincoln and emancipation and how the Lincoln Administration sought to teach the Union Soldiers that they needed to fight in a war for emancipation. So i have two chapters in the book that look at that period from basically january through march 63. What i argue is that the Lincoln Administration very diligently worked to teach the soldiers that they needed to fight for emancipation. And it did so by courtmartialing soldiers or summarily dismissing soldiers and officers who spoke out against emancipation. And that this had a really effective it was a really effective approach in terms of teaching the union army that they needed to support lincolns war policies. Then what i do is transition to the election of 1864. Now, 7 78 of the soldiers voted for lincoln. Most scholars have said its very obvious that the soldiers supported lincoln, and since lincoln was running on a platform that pledged the 13th amendment, that they supported emancipation as well. What ive tried to do is dig a little bit deeper than just that basic statistic and look at what the election meant to soldiers. And i found a whole lot of things that scholars have never really looked at before. I found an incredible amount of intimidation and fraud in terms of how democrats in the army were dealt with during the campaign with numbers of democrats being courtmartialed for speaking out against emancipation or speaking out against lincolns election. I found dozens of officers dismissed from the army in 1864 because stanton saw them as democrats and wanted to get rid of them. And that had an effect. It caused other officers to realize, maybe i should keep my mouth shut about these political issues rather than speak out in favor of mcclellan. One thing i looked out was voter turnout in the election. In particular, i looked at what we might today call the offyear elections. The election calendar in the 19th century was very different from the way it is today. Most of our state and local and federal elections are all held on the same day. It didnt work that day in the 19th century. You had elections in september october, november. And so what i did was i looked at how soldiers voted and how civilians voted in the september, october and november elections and then compared it with how soldiers voted and how civilians voted in the president ial election. What i found was the home vote for both republicans and democrats increased by precisely between 8 and 9 , so there was a very small uptick in the number of voters when they were voting for statelevel and congressional candidates for both parties. The republican soldier vote increased by 37 . The democrat soldier vote increased by 97 . I think this shows you that the soldiers were not as tied to the Political Parties as most scholars have assumed that they were. But they were willing to vote for the candidate that they believed would save the union. So ultimately, i think these soldiers are voting for preservation of the union rather primarily than emancipation. And you can see that in the vast numbers who turn out for lincoln and who also, in smaller numbers, turn out for mcclellan rather than the lowerlevel people on those tickets, on the republican and democratic tickets. So you can see, easily, when john summarizes it, what is controversial and provocative about that. The question is, when lincoln says we cannot have free government without elections is that more rhetoric than reality if theres suppression and corruption in the election process. We have to challenge lincolns statement. Harold, youve also written a master piece of a book too about lincoln and the press. Do your findings in the 1864 election correlate with what john is finding in the War Department . Did the press have a free run in this campaign . Its a complicated question. On the one hand, lincoln admirably loosens or allows the loosening of some of the very tight press suppression that springs up around the country, not just in the border states where you would expect it to be more intense. Maryland and kentucky and missouri. Its everywhere. Its in indiana, in illinois, in new york. Its in rhode island. You werent there to stop it. Massachusetts, maine. I found it extraordinary that these outbursts never occurred in the midst of major Election Campaigns. Either in the offyear elections of 1862 with a runup to the state elections and the Congressional Elections that Montgomery Blair famously warned lincoln at the Cabinet Meeting of july 1862 the Republican Party would lose, as most president s lose some seats in offyear elections, the party in power, if the emancipation proclamation was issued that was issued in september. Certainly lost house seats govern seats, legislatures. But there wasnt major suppression of the press. It resumed in the name of protecting troop movements protecting aid and comfort to the enemy, other excuses and code words, code phrases. But, again, beginning in congregation season, which, for the republicans, is june 1864. For the democrats, quite stupidly, by the way talk about a tactical mistake they waited until august. Mcclellin is furious, saying i am not taking the nomination. He said lincoln is ahead of me and republicans are ahead of me in organizing. So there is, again, a relaxation in 64. So i take lincoln at his word. I think he proves his pointer, assume proves his point assuming he is a master puppeteer, even though his hand is not on it. Look, he signs an order suppressing the new york world and new york journal of commerce earlier, before hes renominated in 1864. The only time he ever authorized personally with his signature, the closing of a newspaper for, in this case, a peculiar and nonthreatening reason, the publication of a forged president ial proclamation that sent lincoln into a tizzy, i think, because he is actually writing such a proclamation in the white house and thought it was leaked. Okay. The new york world, one of the most virulent papers in the country, then resumes its attacks on lincoln, after the editor is liberated from the confines of general dicks office and resumes publication. Is world is brutal, accusing lincoln of race mixing, putting out cartoons that show that the Republican Party is having mixedrace dances. Its considered to be extremely shocking in 1864. Brutal, Brutal Campaign all the way through. Lincoln and is the administration do nothing to stop that kind of free expression. Horace greeley, who has done everything he can to thwart lincolns nomination, and after the nomination, to thwart his reelection for some bizarre reason, continuing to think there could be an alternative republican choice, when he finally comes back to the reservation, politically, and realizes that lincoln is and will remain the republican choice, he engages the stanton to create a special army office to make sure that only Republican Newspapers go to the army of the potomac. So in that soldiers vote area i concur with john. There is certainly an effort to keep the new york world, even the new york herald, the chicago times, away from the troops. So i mean, how do you get election . You can either chat about it or you can read the papers, which the papers are stirring up the civilian vote. Well, democratic soldiers in the army of the potomac certainly, are not getting the democratic papers. So its a mixed bag. Also, harold, theyre not getting a lot of the democratic pamphlets the also circulating. And this is a good point to make that you cannot, you cannot test the suppression such as it was, that harold described, by todays standards with the First Amendment because even though Civil Liberties were always an issue in our democracy, especially during the civil war, it was not as sacrosanct then as it has been since world war i when the growth for a First Amendment rights has already improved. But even having said that, harold was very judicious in his great book by saying that lincoln was discrete. And when things settled down he was easy on the reins. He let them go. And as he just described, his administration was not going to be so draconian. Also, the Republican Editors supported the shutdown of democratic papers. The competition is being shut down. Its fun. Harold and john raised a bunch of issues. But one of the Common Elements there in bot