The Life and Writings of Abraham Lincoln (84 page)

Lincoln had been desperately seeking a prominent Southerner to serve in his Cabinet. He had seriously considered John A. Gilmer, Congressman from North Carolina, as his Secretary of the Treasury. He writes to him to explain his own position on slavery in the most conciliatory terms possible.

(
Strictly confidential
)

Springfield, Illinois, December 15, 1860

M
Y
D
EAR
S
IR
: Yours of the 10th is received. I am greatly disinclined to write a letter on the subject embraced in yours; and I would not do so, even privately as I do, were it not that I fear you might misconstrue my silence. Is it desired that I shall shift the ground upon which I have been elected? I cannot do it. You need only to acquaint yourself with that ground, and press it on the attention of the South. It is all in print and easy of access.

May I be pardoned if I ask whether even you have ever attempted to procure the reading of the Republican platform, or my speeches, by the Southern people? If not, what reason have I to expect that any additional production of mine would meet a better fate? It would make me appear as if I repented for the crime of having been elected, and was anxious to apologize and beg forgiveness. To so represent me would be the principal use made of any letter I might now thrust upon the public. My old record cannot be so used; and that is
precisely the reason that some new declaration is so much sought.

Now, my dear sir, be assured that I am not questioning your candor; I am only pointing out that while a new letter would hurt the cause which I think a just one, you can quite as well effect every patriotic object with the old record. Carefully read pages 18, 19, 74, 75, 88, 89, and 267 of the volume of joint debates between Senator Douglas and myself, with the Republican platform adopted at Chicago, and all your questions will be substantially answered. I have no thought of recommending the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia, nor the slave trade among the slave States, even on the conditions indicated; and if I were to make such recommendation, it is quite clear Congress would not follow it.

As to employing slaves in arsenals and dockyards, it is a thing I never thought of in my recollection, till I saw your letter; and I may say of it precisely as I have said of the two points above.

As to the use of patronage in the slave States, where there are few or no Republicans, I do not expect to inquire for the politics of the appointee, or whether he does or not own slaves. I intend in that matter to accommodate the people in the several localities, if they themselves will allow me to accommodate them. In one word, I never have been, am not now, and probably never shall be in a mood of harassing the people either North or South.

On the territorial question I am inflexible, as you see my position in the book.
²⁶
On that there is a difference between you and us; and it is the only substantial difference. You think slavery is right and ought to be extended; we think it is wrong and ought to be restricted. For this neither has any just occasion to be angry with the other.

As to the State laws, mentioned in your sixth question, I really know very little of them. I never have read one. If any
of them are in conflict with the fugitive-slave clause, or any other part of the Constitution, I certainly shall be glad of their repeal; but I could hardly be justified, as a citizen of Illinois, or as President of the United States, to recommend the repeal of a statute of Vermont or South Carolina.

Thurlow Weed was Seward’s political adviser and boss of the New York Republican machine. Lincoln writes to him to explain his own attitude on the matter of compromise. Weed arrived in Springfield on December 20 to discuss compromise in detail. On December 20, news of South Carolina’s secession reached Springfield. Nevertheless, Lincoln stood firm against any compromise that would permit slavery to be extended into new territory.

Springfield, Illinois, December 17, 1860

M
Y
D
EAR
S
IR
: Yours of the 11th was received two days ago. Should the convocation of governors of which you speak seem desirous to know my views on the present aspect of things tell them you judge from my speeches that I will be inflexible on the territorial question; that I probably think either the Missouri line exended, or Douglas’s and Eli Thayer’s popular sovereignty, would lose us everything we gain by the election; that filibustering for all south of us and making slave States of it would follow, in spite of us, in either case; also that I probably think all opposition, real and apparent, to the fugitive-slave clause of the Constitution ought to be withdrawn.

I believe you can pretend to find but little, if anything, in my speeches about secession. But my opinion is, that no State can in any way lawfully get out of the Union without the consent of the others; and that it is the duty of the President and other government functionaries to run the machine as it is.

When Weed left Springfield he took with him three resolutions on compromise which Lincoln had put down in his own handwriting. These resolutions, unfortunately, have been either lost or destroyed. Lincoln writes to Trumbull to inform him about his conference with Weed.

(
Confidential
)

Springfield, Illinois, December 21, 1860

M
Y
D
EAR
S
IR
: Thurlow Weed was with me nearly all day yesterday, and left last night with three short resolutions which I drew up, and which, or the substance of which, I think, would do much good if introduced and unanimously supported by our friends. They do not touch the territorial question. Mr. Weed goes to Washington with them; and says that he will first of all confer with you and Mr. Hamlin. I think it would be best for Mr. Seward to introduce them, and Mr. Weed will let him know that I think so. Show this to Mr. Hamlin, but beyond him do not let my name be known in the matter.

Lincoln writes to Alexander Stephens of Georgia who had been in Congress with him in 1848-49, and with whom he had, at that time, become very friendly. His letter, in essence, is the same as the one he wrote to Gilmer on December 15. Although Stephens in 1860 was still supporting the Union cause, as soon as the War was declared, he became Vice President of the Confederacy. On the day Lincoln wrote this letter, a rumor reached Springfield that Buchanan had given orders to surrender Fort Sumter it it was
attacked. Lincoln is reported to have said of this, “If that is true they ought to hang him!”

(
For your own eye only
)

Springfield, Illinois, December 22, 1860

M
Y
D
EAR
S
IR
: Your obliging answer to my short note is just received, and for which please accept my thanks. I fully appreciate the present peril the country is in, and the weight of responsibility on me. Do the people of the South really entertain fears that a Republican administration would, directly or indirectly, interfere with the slaves, or with them about the slaves? If they do, I wish to assure you, as once a friend, and still, I hope, not an enemy, that there is no cause for such fears. The South would be in no more danger in this respect than it was in the days of Washington. I suppose, however, this does not meet the case. You think slavery is right and ought to be extended, while we think it is wrong and ought to be restricted. That, I suppose, is the rub. It certainly is the only substantial difference between us.

Duff Green was an elderly Kentucky politician who had been associated with Jackson during the nullification controversy. He had come to Springfield to get a letter from Lincoln giving his stand on a proposed amendment to the Constitution which would legalize slavery forever. Lincoln did not give him a letter but sent the letter printed here to Trumbull in Washington to pass on to Green or not, as he saw fit. Lincoln took the second clause of this letter directly from the Republican platform. Trumbull evidently felt that it would be inexpedient to pass the letter on to Green, so it was never published.

Springfield, Illinois, December 28, 1860

M
Y
D
EAR
S
IR
: I do not desire any amendment of the Constitution. Recognizing, however, that questions of such amendment rightfully belong to the American people, I should not feel justified nor inclined to withhold from them, if I could, a fair opportunity of expressing their will thereon through either of the modes prescribed in the instrument.

In addition I declare that the maintenance inviolate of the rights of the States, and especially the right of each State to order and control its own domestic institutions according to its own judgment exclusively, is essential to that balance of powers on which the perfection and endurance of our political fabric depend; and I denounce the lawless invasion by armed force of the soil of any State or Territory, no matter under what pretext, as the gravest of crimes.

I am greatly averse to writing anything for the public at this time; and I consent to the publication of this only upon the condition that six of the twelve United States Senators for the States of Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Florida, and Texas shall sign their names to what is written on this sheet below my name, and allow the whole to be published together.

Yours truly,   

A. L
INCOLN

We recommend to the people of the States we represent respectively, to suspend all action for dismemberment of the Union, at least until some act deemed to be violative of our rights shall be done by the incoming administration.

Although Abraham Lincoln had clearly been elected President of the United States, according to the country’s laws his election was not official until the electoral vote had been counted by the
President of the Senate in the presence of both Houses of Congress. This ceremony, which is ordinarily only a ceremony and nothing more, in his case offered great possibilities for trouble, as he explains in this letter to Seward. As the letter indicates, he was also still uncertain of the composition of his Cabinet, still trying to get some representation from the South. On this very day he wrote to Cameron trying to get out of his promise to take him into the Cabinet.

(
Private
)

Springfield, Illinois, January 3, 1861

M
Y
D
EAR
S
IR
: Yours without signature was received last night. I have been considering your suggestions as to my reaching Washington somewhat earlier than is usual. It seems to me the inauguration is not the most dangerous point for us. Our adversaries have us now clearly at disadvantage. On the second Wednesday of February, when the votes should be officially counted, if the two Houses refuse to meet at all, or meet without a quorum of each, where shall we be? I do not think that this counting is constitutionally essential to the election; but how are we to proceed in absence of it?

In view of this, I think it best for me not to attempt appearing in Washington till the result of that ceremony is known. It certainly would be of some advantage if you could know who are to be at the heads of the War and Navy departments; but until I can ascertain definitely whether I can get any suitable men from the South, and who, and how many, I cannot well decide.…

In this, and in the next letter to Seward, Lincoln makes clear his belief that the acquisition of new territory was the real cause of the
dispute over slavery, since the slaveholders would unceasingly try to extend their power to such new territory as fast as it was acquired.

(
Confidential
)

Springfield, Illinois, January 11, 1861

M
Y
D
EAR
S
IR
: Yours of the 6th is received. I answer it only because I fear you would misconstrue my silence. What is our present condition? We have just carried an election on principles fairly stated to the people. Now we are told in advance the Government shall be broken up unless we surrender to those we have beaten, before we take the offices. In this they are either attempting to play upon us or they are in dead earnest. Either way, if we surrender, it is the end of us and of the Government. They will repeat the experiment upon us
ad libitum.
A year will not pass till we shall have to take Cuba as a condition upon which they will stay in the Union. They now have the Constitution under which we have lived over seventy years, and acts of Congress of their own framing, with no prospect of their being changed; and they can never have a more shallow pretext for breaking up the Government, or extorting a compromise, than now. There is in my judgment but one compromise which would really settle the slavery question, and that would be a prohibition against acquiring any more territory.

As soon as Lincoln returned to Springfield from his visit to his stepmother, Sarah Bush Lincoln, he wrote to Seward, again stating his position on the matter of not permitting slavery to be extended. The letters of this period make clear why Lincoln set himself inflexibly against any further compromise with the South.

(
Private and confidential
)

Springfield, Illinois, February 1, 1861

M
Y
D
EAR
S
IR
:… I say now … as I have all the while said, that on the territorial question—that is, the question of extending slavery under the national auspices—I am inflexible. I am for no compromise which assists or permits the extension of the institution on soil owned by the nation. And any trick by which the nation is to acquire territory, and then allow some local authority to spread slavery over it, is as obnoxious as any other. I take it that to effect some such result as this, and to put us again on the highroad to a slave empire, is the object of all these proposed compromises. I am against it. As to fugitive slaves, District of Columbia, slave trade among the slave States, and whatever springs of necessity from the fact that the institution is amongst us, I care but little, so that what is done be comely and not altogether outrageous. Nor do I care much about New Mexico, if further extension were hedged against.