Page:History of the Supreme court of the United States (IA historyofsupreme00myeriala).pdf/487



Taney's successor was Salmon P. Chase, Secretary of the Treasury. It was maintained then, and the statement has been uniformly repeated in many memoirs and biographical works, that President Lincoln's motive in appointing Chase Chief Justice of the Supreme Court was to rid himself of a too-ambitious competitive aspirant for the Presidential nomination. In both the years 1856 and 1860 Chase had aimed to get that nomination; and as a member of Lincoln's Cabinet he in nowise lessened his efforts and intrigues. Of these Lincoln was well aware, contemplating them with vexation and uneasiness. Some politicians of the period, like Senator Henderson, even hold, in their memoirs, that Chase gave no teal help to Lincoln during the Civil War, but busied himself, whenever the opportunity presented, with seeking to undermine Lincoln's chances for renomination, and with promoting his own.

Indeed, in a review of Chase's career, published shortly after his death, in the October, 1873, issue of Bench and Bar (a periodical devoted to the legal profession) President Lincoln was quoted as saying to a "distinguished and prominent statesman" who assured him that if Chase were appointed Chief Justice he (Chase) would withdraw from politics and devote himself exclusively to judicial functions, "I will nominate him, because it seems the public wish, but you are mistaken, He will be a candidate for President every four years as tong as he lives, and never be elected."

For many years Chase had been an active and conspicuous