Page:The Reminiscences of Carl Schurz (Volume Two).djvu/268

 while Lincoln was speaking. I saw the withered form of Chief Justice Taney, the author of the famous Dred Scott decision, that judicial compend of the doctrine of slavery, administer the oath of office to the first President elected on a distinct anti-slavery platform. I saw, standing by, the outgoing President, James Buchanan, with his head slightly inclined on one side, and his winking eye, and his white neck-cloth—the man who had done more than any other to degrade an demoralize the National Government and to encourage the rebellion, now to retire to an unhonored obscurity, and to the dreary task of trying to make the world believe that he was a better patriot and statesman than he appeared to be. I heard every word pronounced by Abraham Lincoln's kindly voice, of that inaugural address which was to be a message of peace and good will, but the reception of which in the South as a proclamation of war showed clearly that no offer of compromise, indeed, that nothing short of complete acceptance of their scheme of an independent slave-holding empire would have satisfied the Southern leaders. Their answer to the inaugural was increased energy in the formation of the Confederate Government, and in agitating the cause of secession in the Southern States that had not yet seceded.

While these things were going on, I saw President Lincoln repeatedly, and he always received me with great cordiality. We spoke together as freely as we had before he was President. Our conversations turned upon questions of policy and upon the qualifications and claims of applicants for office whom I had recommended. My own case was never mentioned between us until he, with evident satisfaction, announced to me that I had been nominated for the position of Minister of the United States to Spain. The Senate confirmed my nomination without unusual delay. I was curious to know whether Senator