The Life of Abraham Lincoln (Arnold)/Chapter VI

The life of Lincoln had thus far been one of preparation. He had hardly begun his great work. He had become, by study and experience, fitted and armed for the great career upon which he was now about to enter. His life may be considered as divided into three distinct periods, which may be thus characterized. The first period, that of preparation, embraces his life from his birth in 1809, to 1849-50; the second covers the birth, growth, and triumph of the republican party from 1850 to 1860; the third includes his administration and re-election, his triumph in the abolition of slavery and the suppression of the rebellion, closing with his death in 1865. When he entered upon his life-work, he was, like Moses, the deliverer of the Jews, about forty years of age.

Before entering upon the narrative of the second period of his life, let us pause to consider his surroundings. To understand and fully appreciate his work, we must first sketch in brief outline, the history of African slavery in the republic. The antagonism between freedom and slavery has never been more strikingly exhibited than in the United States. From the beginning, slavery was the only serious cause of division in the republic. The people of our country were substantially one. They had to a great extent a common lineage, the same religion, literature, laws, and history. That portion of the earth known as the United States is adapted by its physical conformation to be the home of one great national family, and not of many. Without slavery the people would naturally have gravitated into one homogeneous nation. But the antagonism between free and slave labor produced a great conflict of ideas, growing more and more earnest and fierce, until it ended in a tremendous conflict of arms. Let us briefly sketch the history of this anomaly of slavery in a nation, which, in the words of Lincoln, was "conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal," and embodying in its Declaration of Independence, the great charter of human rights.

Slavery was introduced into the English Colonies in America, against the protests of the early settlers. As early as 1772, the Assembly of Virginia petitioned the British Government to stop the importation of slaves. To which petition the King replied that "upon pain of his highest displeasure, the importation of slaves should not be, in any respect, obstructed."

The fathers of the revolution tolerated slavery as a temporary evil, which they justly regarded as incompatible with the principles of liberty embraced in the Declaration of Independence, and the Constitution of the United States. They never intended that it should be a permanent institution, much less, that it should extend beyond the states in which it then existed. They confidently hoped that it would soon disappear before the moral agencies then operating against it. They believed that public opinion, finding expression through the press, public discussion, and religious organizations, would secure such state and national legislation, as would at an early day, secure liberty to all, throughout the republic.

At the first general Congress of the colonies, held in Philadelphia, in 1774, Jefferson presented a bill of rights, in which it is declared that "the abolition of slavery is the greatest object of desire of these colonies." In October, 1774, Congress declared: "We will neither import, not purchase any slave imported after the 1st of December next."

On the 14th of April, 1775, there was organized at the Sun Tavern, on Second Street, in Philadelphia, the first antislavery society ever formed. Patrick Henry, in a letter dated January 18th, 1773, and addressed to Robert Pleasant, afterwards president of the Virginia Abolition Society, says: "I believe a time will come when an opportunity will be offered to abolish this lamentable evil." General Washington, in a letter to Robert Morris, speaking of slavery, says: "There is not a man living, who wishes more sincerely than I do, to see a plan adopted for the abolition of it." In 1787, Benjamin Franklin and Benjamin Rush, both signers of the Declaration of Independence, were president and secretary of the Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Society. In 1787, a society was formed in New York, of which John Jay, who had presided over the Continental Congress, was president, "for promoting the manumission of slaves." Alexander Hamilton was a member, and afterwards president. The Maryland Society for the promotion of the abolition of slavery was formed in 1789, and in the same year a society for the same purpose was organized in Rhode Island. The Connecticut Society was organized in 1790, and of this, Dr. Ezra Stiles, president of Yale College, was president. The Virginia Society was formed in 1791, and that of New Jersey in 1792. The officers of these anti-slavery societies were the most eminent men of the time.

In 1780, Pennsylvania passed a law for gradual emancipation, Rhode Island and Connecticut did the same in 1784, and New York in 1799. In 1784, Mr. Jefferson drew up an ordinance for the government of the western territories, prohibiting slavery after 1800. Had this been adopted, there would have been no slave state added to the original thirteen, for there would have been no slave territories out of which to form new slave states. The original thirteen were, state after state, abolishing slavery. The institution was thus, in the language of Lincoln, in "the way of ultimate extinction."

The ordinance of 1787, by which freedom was forever secured to the Northwest, to the territory out of which were formed the important states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin, was by far the most important antislavery measure from the organization of the government down to the proclamation of emancipation by Abraham Lincoln. Its influence has been decisive, both on the moral and martial conflict which was then a thing of the future. Without the votes and influence of the Northwest, slavery would probably have triumphed. It is true, that the love of freedom nurtured by the free schools and literature of New England, beginning like the source of her great rivers among her granite hills, expanded like those rivers, until it became a mighty stream, but it was the broad and majestic torrent from the Northwest, which, like its own Mississippi, gave to the current of freedom, volume and power and irresistible strength, until it broke down all opposition and swept away all resistance.

While the principles of the Revolution seemed likely by peaceful agencies to destroy slavery, new elements entered into the conflict. The most important of these was the invention by Whitney of the cotton gin, and the rapid increase in the production of cotton, thereby making slave labor far more profitable. This was followed soon after, by a vast addition to the domain of the Union of new territory, adapted to the cultivation by negro labor of the cotton plant. Then there soon arose also a gigantic pecuniary interest which found rapidly acquired wealth in slave labor. A powerful cotton and slave aristocracy was with consummate skill soon organized, and, with an immense property invested in lands and negroes, soon dominated over the cotton states, and by and by in its arrogance proclaimed "Cotton is King." In sympathy with this, there grew up in the more northern slave states a powerful interest which sought wealth in rearing negroes for sale. And simultaneously with these, there grew up in the North a strong cotton manufacturing interest hostile to any interference with slavery. Knowing their own weakness, feeling the insecurity of property founded upon wrong and injustice, the slaveholders, relatively few in numbers, combined and united into a compact, active, bold, unscrupulous, and determined political power. They became skillful politicians. They selected their ablest men for leaders, and kept them in office and power. They carefully educated their most talented young men for public life. In the free states they bought up, and subsidised, by the rewards of official position, many of the most talented and ambitious public men. The masses of the people in the free states, absorbed in material pursuits, engrossed with the labor of subduing the forests, and in opening their farms, in building towns, cities, schools, churches, colleges, canals, and railways, were skillfully kept divided, and were for many years ruled by the more adroit and experienced politicians of the slave states.

A great change in public sentiment soon became apparent. The abolition societies, which not long after the organization of the government were very generally formed, and embraced among their members the most prominent and influential citizens, gradually disappeared, while the religious organizations ceased to protest against slavery, and many of them went so far as to give the institution their sanction and support.

The vigilant and sagacious leaders of the slave power began carefully and systematically to strengthen and entrench. In 1790, Congress accepted from North Carolina the territory now constituting the state of Tennessee, upon condition that so much of the ordinance of 1787 as forbade slavery should not be applied to it, and that no regulation should be made by Congress for the emancipation of slaves. This was followed, in 1796, by the admission of Tennessee into the Union as a slave state.

In 1790, the capital was located at Washington, in the District of Columbia, upon territory ceded for that purpose to the United States by Maryland and Virginia. All the laws of these two states relating to slavery were continued over this territory. Thus slavery was legalized in the capital of the republic, and in a district over which Congress had exclusive jurisdiction and control. The capital, which had been on free soil in Philadelphia and New York, was removed to slave territory, and this was a most important step in strengthening the slave aristocracy. The public opinion of the capital to some extent gave tone to national sentiment. This change secured for slavery the great and active influence of fashionable society. The power of Washington society and public opinion over the executive, judicial, and legislative departments of the government, has always been felt, and down to the advent of Lincoln as President was an ever present ally of slavery.

In 1802, Georgia ceded to the United States the country lying between her present western boundary and the Mississippi, providing that the ordinance of 1787 should be extended over it, carefully excepting the clause which prohibited slavery. From the territory thus ceded came the slave state of Mississippi, admitted into the Union in 1817, and the state of Alabama, admitted in 1819. In 1803, the United States purchased from France, for fifteen millions of dollars, the territory of Louisiana, where there were already forty thousand slaves. Louisiana territory was cut up into three states: Louisiana, admitted in 1812; Missouri, admitted in 1821, and Arkansas, admitted in 1836. In 1809, the United States purchased of Spain the territory of Florida, and Florida was admitted as a slave state in 1836.

Thus the slave aristocracy had secured four new slave states from the original territory of the United States, viz.: Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, and Mississippi, and from new territory purchased for its expansion it had secured four other states, to-wit: Louisiana, Missouri, Arkansas, and Florida. Not content with this, but eager for power and expansion, the slaveholders determined to extend the institution still further south, and as the first step, resolved to annex the immense territory of Texas. The leading slaveholding statesmen, shrewd and sagacious, now boldly declared that Texas would give them the control of the national government, and make slavery secure. "It will give a Gibraltar to slavery," said one of their leaders. This compact, well organized power now pursued its purpose with vigor and sagacity and relentless determination, striking down and politically sacrificing every statesman and every public man who dared to oppose its designs. Van Buren, Benton, and Wright, each of whom had been a trusted leader, were sacrificed because of their opposition to the annexation of Texas.

President Garfield, in Congress in 1865, speaking on the joint resolution to abolish and prohibit slavery forever throughout the republic, and alluding to the power of slavery, exclaimed: "Many mighty men have been slain by her, and many proud ones have humbled themselves at her feet. All along the coast of the political sea they lie like stranded wrecks, broken on the headlands of freedom."

Unable to accomplish the annexation by treaty, the leaders of the slavery party finally, in 1845, carried it by joint resolution of both houses of Congress. Thus slavery had secured nine slave states, and eighteen senators in the United States Senate, thereafter appropriately called the citadel of its power. The free states saw with uneasiness these vast accessions of territory in the hands of imperious slave holders, and murmurs, deep if not loud, began to be heard, but the cotton growing and manufacturing interests rebuked these murmurs, tried to stifle discussion, and cried peace to those who agitated for freedom.

A most determined resistance was made to the admission of Missouri as a slave state. The conflict over this question continued from 1819 to 1821, and was finally settled by what is known as the Missouri Compromise, carried through Congress largely by the personal influence of Henry Clay. By this compromise, Missouri was admitted as a slave state, with a law providing that all the western territory, north of the parallel of latitude of 36° 30', should be forever free. It was the first great and direct conflict between the free and the slave states, and was terminated by a victory for the slaveholders in the form of this compromise, which all parties for a long time considered sacred, and which afterwards, the author of its repeal, Douglas, declared that "no ruthless hand would ever be reckless enough to disturb."

Although the admission of Missouri as a slave state was opposed with the utmost vigor, yet the importance of the question was not at the time fully appreciated by the free states. Had Missouri come in as a free state, it would probably have been decisive, and have given the balance of power to the North, and perhaps might have saved the republic from the great Civil War. As a free state, the route of free labor, of pioneer colonization, would have passed up the valleys of the Mississippi, the Missouri, and the Arkansas, to all the West, and to Northern Texas. As a slave state, free labor was crowded far to the North and West. By this success, the slave holders secured in the great state of Missouri, a most commanding position in the very center of the republic. From that time until 1860, the control of slavery over the National Government was substantially absolute. Whatever the slave power seriously determined should be done, was done. It is true free labor triumphed in California and in Kansas, but it was over, and in spite of, the adverse influence of the Federal Government. From the Missouri struggle down to, and after, the Mexican war, the predominating influence of the slave power was marked and decided.

That power had a great advantage in the provision of the Constitution which gave representation to slaves. In the apportionment of members of Congress, and in the electoral college, a man owning five thousand slaves had a power equivalent to three thousand freemen, and practically far more, because the slaveholders, relatively few in number, and held together by a common interest, were a compact, vigilant, sagacious body. They constituted an aristocratic class, carefully educated for affairs and public life. Nearly all the brightest intellects of the South were absorbed in politics, while in the free states, they were engaged in all the varied pursuits of civilization. They were inventing labor-saving machinery, producing the steam engine, the cotton gin, the telegraph, the reaping machine, opening canals and constructing railways, rivaling the world in ship building, creating a national literature and schools of art, and competing successfully with Europe in the products of skilled labor, in learning, in science, and in the fine arts. During this period the slaveholders, though in a minority, largely monopolized the offices of power, profit, and influence under the government. And it must be admitted, that they furnished able statesmen to govern the country. They selected their best men, trained them for, and kept them permanently in public life, while in the North, a custom of rotation in office, kept many of the ablest men out of public life, and if elected, they did not remain long enough to acquire the practical skill and experience necessary to govern a great nation. Thus the slave power, united, wise, and watchful, seized and held the reins of government. The national capital became a slave mart. The noble old commonwealth of Virginia, with her stern motto "sic semper tyrannus," sought wealth, but found poverty and barbarism, in breeding slaves for sale to the Gulf States.

We have already stated the fact that this power, desiring Texas for the extension of slavery, made war on Mexico, and seized and appropriated the coveted territory. Governor Wise, of Virginia, boldly announced the determination that "slavery should pour itself abroad, and have no limit but the southern ocean."

This grasping spirit, as will be seen directly, overreached itself. Texas, and Mexican territory, was needed for the extension of slavery, and Mexico refusing to sell or cede, the territory was seized by force. On the 7th of July, 1845, Commodore Sloat, of the United States Navy, issued a proclamation declaring that California (then a Mexican province) "now belongs to the United States." The gallant and adventurous Fremont scaled the Rocky Mountains, and took possession of that land of gold. Scott and Taylor marched their armies at will through Mexico, and took possession of its capital. Mexico, unable to resist, yielded all of Texas; New Mexico and Upper and Lower California were also ceded, and now the slave power was more confident than ever of securing the ultimate control of the republic, and of the indefinite extension of the slave empire. But the end of the day of their supremacy was rapidly approaching.

When, in 1846, President Polk asked an appropriation of two millions, with which to negotiate peace, David Wilmot, member of Congress from Pennsylvania, moved what is known as the "Wilmot Proviso," which declared that it should be a condition to the acquisition of any territory from Mexico, "that neither slavery nor involuntary servitude should ever exist in any part thereof, except for crime, whereof the party should be duly convicted." This proviso was adopted by the House of Representatives, but was not at that session acted upon by the Senate. At the next session, President Polk asked an appropriation of three millions for the same purpose, and to that appropriation the same proviso was applied. It was adopted, after a fierce contest in the House, but rejected in the Senate, and the bill coming back to the House, was finally, after a long and passionate struggle, passed without the proviso. In the negotiations which followed, Mexico sought to make the prohibition of slavery a condition of cession, and this especially as slavery did not then exist in the territory in question. The United States minister peremptorily refused to treat on this basis, declaring that "if the whole territory was offered, increased ten fold in value, and covered a foot thick with pure gold, upon the single condition that slavery should be excluded therefrom, he would not entertain the idea, nor even think of communicating the proposition to Washington." Such was the animus of the Mexican War, and such the arrogance of the slave power. Mexico, weak and helpless, her capital and provinces held by the Federal troops, was compelled to accept such terms as were dictated to her. But these aggressions had at last aroused the free states, and brought on at last the "Irrepressible Conflict."

An anti-slavery party, independent of all existing ones, was about to be organized, and thereafter rapidly to increase in power. In December, 1833, a few zealous and determined men met in Philadelphia, and formed the American Anti-Slavery Society. The convention was composed of sixty-two delegates from ten states. John G. Whittier, the poet, was secretary. This, with other and similar local associations, formed the beginnings of the party which, twenty-seven years thereafter, elected the great statesman of Illinois to the presidency. These men planted the acorn of that oak which, in 1860, overshadowed the land. Garrison, Wendell Phillips, the Lovejoys, John Quincy Adams, Giddings, Garrett Smith, Dr. Channing, Cassius M. Clay, and many others were pioneers in the great cause of freedom. Differing widely in opinions and as to means, yet in various ways they exerted a powerful influence in arousing the public mind to the wrongs of slavery, and the dangerous encroachments of the slave power.

The societies thus organized boldly declared their resolution to exterminate slavery from the republic, but declared that this was to be done by moral influences. They encountered mobs and personal violence. Their printing presses were destroyed. The halls in which they met were burned, and some of them were murdered for boldly expressing, by voice and pen, their convictions. While in the free states, the outrages of mobs and the various persecutions to which the anti-slavery men were subjected, served only rapidly to add to their strength, in the slave states, liberty of the press and freedom of speech were subject to every outrage, and the laws furnished neither protection nor redress. Neither at the bar nor in the pulpit, neither from the newspaper nor from the stump, not in courts nor in legislative halls, was the voice of free debate permitted to be heard. Free negroes and fugitives from slavery were scourged, whipped, and tortured. The literature of the vernacular in school books, history, and poetry was expurgated, and the generous and manly utterances of liberty stricken from their pages. Such was the dark despotism which settled over a republic which had been constructed on the principles of the Declaration of Independence.

It was against this despotic power, many of whose representatives were vulgar, gross, licentious, cruel, and treacherous men, that the free spirit of the North now rose. The anti-slavery party, small in numbers, yet full of fiery zeal and ardor, and counting in its ranks much of the culture and intellect of the nation, grappled with a power which at that time controlled the national and nearly all the state governments, which dominated both the great parties, ruled the churches, the press, and the financial and business interests of the country; a power whose social influence was almost omnipotent. It held the press and the sword of the nation, and filled every office, from that of village postmaster to that of President. This small anti-slavery party, armed with truth and right, met this giant despotism, and ultimately triumphed over it. Although its first vote was so small as to be almost counted among the "scattering," in 1840 it had increased more than ten fold. The ability, eloquence, and genius displayed by its advocates in their speeches and publications, largely aided by the encroachments, cruelties, and arrogance of the slave power, prepared the way for the free soil party of 1848.

In that year the whig party nominated as its candidate for President, General Zachary Taylor. The democratic party nominated General Lewis Cass over Mr. Van Buren, who had opposed the annexation of Texas. Both of these great parties refused to take position against the extension of slavery. Then the liberty, or anti-slavery democrats, with the anti-slavery men of all parties, called the convention which met at Buffalo in June, 1848, and organized the free soil party. It was largely attended, both by delegates from all the free states, and by representatives from Maryland, The District of Columbia, Delaware, Virginia, Kentucky, and Missouri. Many very distinguished and able men were there, who had hitherto acted with the whig and democratic parties, and their presence indicated the breaking up of old party organizations. Among its leading members were Salmon P. Chase, Charles Sumner, Preston King, Charles Francis Adams, Benjamin F. Butler of New York, Joshua R. Giddings, and many others scarcely less distinguished.

This memorable convention, made up of many thousands of active, intelligent, zealous men, exerted a great influence in advancing the cause of freedom. Its declaration of principles was bold and independent. Disclaiming any power to interfere with slavery in the states, it declared that Congress possessed and should exercise the right of prohibiting slavery in all the territories. To the demand of the South for more slave states and more slave territory, its answer was clear and categorical, "No more slave states and no slave territory."

The leaders of this free soil party were made up of ardent, enthusiastic democrats and whigs, active and zealous against the encroachments of slavery; and of the "Old Guard" as they called themselves, who had organized and led the anti-slavery and liberty parties; and with these were many personal friends of Van Buren, indignant at, and determined to revenge his sacrifice by the slave power. They were determined by all means to defeat General Cass. The canvass against the old parties was conducted with a zeal, an eloquence, an ability of speech and of the pen, never surpassed. It was the romance and poetry of politics, the religion of patriotism.

John Van Buren, the son of the late President, then in the meridian of his power, canvassed most of the free states, and brought into the discussion an indignant personal feeling towards those who had "done his father to death." He possessed a fiery eloquence, a scathing wit and sarcasm, which rendered him a great popular favorite and secured for him a most brilliant national reputation. Each free state had its great popular leaders, and the people turned out in vast numbers to listen to eloquence, inspired by all the fervor and poetry of liberty, and the wrongs and cruelties of slavery. John P. Hale, Charles Sumner, Henry Wilson in New England, Benjamin F. Butler, William C. Bryant, Preston King and John A. Dix in New York, Salmon P. Chase and Joshua R. Giddings of Ohio, and David Wilmot of Pennsylvania, were among the most active and ardent in the contest. Although the ticket carried no electoral vote, it received a very large popular support, especially in New England, New York, Ohio, and the Northwest, and it defeated the election of Cass. General Taylor received the support of many earnest anti-slavery whigs. Among them were William H. Seward, Horace Greeley, and he who was, by and by, to lead the anti-slavery party to victory-- Abraham Lincoln.

Meanwhile the whig and democratic leaders, alarmed by the rapid growth of this new and vigorous party, undertook again to settle the slavery question by compromise. When Congress met in December, 1849, the slavery issue confronted its members. The United States had acquired from Mexico, Upper and Lower California and New Mexico. The Wilmot proviso excluding slavery had twice passed the House of Representatives, but had been as often rejected by the Senate. The slave power had secured a cession of the territory, but the extension of slavery into it was not yet secure. Fourteen free states had adopted resolutions protesting against its extension. The slaveholders, fearing the result of a struggle in Congress, attempted to frustrate Congressional action by sending out emissaries to California to organize a slave state. After the inauguration of General Taylor, in March, 1849, Thomas Butler King, a whig, and a warm advocate of slavery, and Senator Gwynne, of Mississippi, representing the democratic party, went to California and sought to get up a state constitution which should secure and protect slavery. Slaves were already there. Mr. King declared: "We can not settle this question on the other side of the Rocky Mountains. We look to you to settle it by becoming a state."

The friends of freedom on the eastern side of the continent had not much hope of success in the Constitutional Convention of California. They rather expected to be compelled to make the fight in Congress on the admission of that territory as a slave state. There was then no telegraph spanning the continent, and no railroad to the Pacific, and mails were slow and tedious. Few more thrilling messages from that distant shore were ever received than that which told that the new constitution excluded slavery. It was the prelude, heralding the death of the system. The miners and laborers of California, who had flocked there in great numbers, would not tolerate the competition of the slaveholder with his gang of slaves, and they, uniting with those who were opposed to slavery from conviction, secured by constitutional provision the exclusion of slavery, and now, with her free constitution, California presented herself at the capital for admission into the Union.

This was a surprise to the slaveholders, and they, who would have welcomed her as a slave state, now wheeled about and refused her admission. Thus another issue was added to the grave questions growing out of slavery. After long debate, Mr. Clay, who had carried through Congress the Missouri Compromise, reported a series of measures by which he and his associates hoped to settle the slavery agitation. California was to be admitted as a free state. Territorial governments were to be established in New Mexico and Utah, without attaching to them the proviso excluding slavery. The claim of Texas to nearly ninety thousand square miles of territory north of 36°, 30', and thus made free by the Missouri Compromise, was to be recognized, and slavery extended over it. Ten millions of dollars were to be paid to Texas for her relinquishment of New Mexico. The slave trade was to be abolished at the national capital, but a new fugitive slave law, cruel and stringent in its provisions, was to be enacted.

These measures, by a combination of the leaders of both great parties, were finally forced through Congress. Mr. Webster made them the occasion of his celebrated 7th of March speech, and now the leaders said: "There shall be no more agitation, these measures are a finality, and we will have peace," and they drew up and signed a paper declaring this, and pledging one another to oppose any man who should not so regard them. But they soon learned that the conflict between slavery and freedom was irrepressible, inevitable, and must go on until one or the other should triumph. In this Lincoln was wiser than Webster, and more sagacious than Clay, who in early life had been his great leader.