CH. V] LINCOLN AND CHASE 191 Seward shall be requested to withdraw his resignation.' "Yes," from Lincoln. "I feel bound to say," then replied the Senator, "that as Mr. Seward has seen fit to resign, I should advise that his resignation be accepted." It was 1 A.M. when the senators left the White House.1 On this Saturday morning, December 20, the President sent for Chase, telling him on his arrival, "This matter is giving me great trouble." Chase replied that "painfully affected by the meeting last evening he had prepared his resignation of the office of Secretary of the Treasury. 'Where is it?' said the President quickly, his eye lighting up in a moment. 'I brought it with me,' said Chase, taking the paper from his pocket. 'I wrote it this morning.' 'Let me have it,' said the President, reaching his long arm and fingers toward Chase, who held on seemingly reluctant to part with the letter which was sealed and which he apparently hesitated to surrender. The President was eager... took and hastily opened the letter. 'This,' said he with a triumphal laugh, 'cuts the Gordian knot.. I can dispose of the subject now without difficulty; I see my way clear."" 2 Then Stanton, who was in the President's office with Chase, offered his resignation. "You may go to your Department," Lincoln replied, "I don't want yours. This," holding out Chase's letter, "is all I want; this relieves me; my way is clear; the trouble is ended; I will detain neither of you longer." 3 "3 Soon after Chase, Stanton and Welles (who was also present at the interview) had left, Lincoln, still holding Chase's letter in his hand said to Senator Harris who had called, "Now, I can ride; I have got a pumpkin in each end of my bag.' Lincoln's elation at having in his hands the resignation 1 Fessenden, I, 247. 2 Welles's Diary, I, 201. 3 Ibid., I, 202. 4 N. & H., VI, 271. 192 LINCOLN'S SAGACITY [1862 of the chief of the Radicals at the same time as that of the chief Conservative is easy to understand. The Radical Senators who had attacked Seward would have viewed with great displeasure the retirement of Chase, but they it was who had brought it to pass that both must go or both remain. “If I had yielded to that storm," said Lincoln nearly a year later, "and dismissed Seward, the thing would all have slumped over one way and we should have been left with a scanty handful of supporters. When Chase sent in his resignation, I saw that the game was in my own hands and I put it through." He declined both resignations and asked both men to resume the duties of their Departments, which Seward did cheerfully and Chase reluctantly. The Cabinet crisis was over.2 Lincoln had displayed rare political sagacity in retaining in the service of the State the men who could best serve it, notwithstanding the lack of harmony in the Cabinet and the knowledge Congress had of it. His decision that "the public interest does not admit" of the retirement of the State and Treasury secretaries is justified by a study of the existing crisis in the light of subsequent events. In the misfortune and dejection which had fallen upon the country, no voice could be slighted that would be raised for the continued prosecution of the war and, since Seward and Chase represented the diverse opinions of two large classes of men who were at least in concord on the one allimportant policy, it was desirable that they should remain in the Cabinet. The loss of either or both of them would have meant a subtraction from the popular support of the Administration that could in no other way be made good. 1 J. Hay, I, 114. 2 Welles's Diary, I; Fessenden, I; N. & H., VI; IV; J. Hay, I; Bancroft, II; Hart's Chase; Forbes, I. CH. V] SEWARD CHASE 193 There were also other reasons why the President did not wish to part with them. Since April, 1861, Seward had rendered him a loyal support; sinking his ambition for the Presidency, he had come to appreciate Lincoln's ability and to acknowledge in him the head of the Government in reality as in name. He had been an efficient minister. Although slavery in the Confederacy was a stumblingblock in the way of its recognition by England and France, and whilst the influence of Lincoln, Adams and Sumner in foreign relations was of great weight, much credit is still due the Secretary of State for managing the affairs of his Department in such a way as to avert the interference of Europe in our struggle. Chase was supreme in his own Department and wrote the financial part of the President's message of December 1, 1862. Lincoln had had no business training and, like many lawyers had little or no conception of the country's resources and sustainable outlay. Having no taste for the subject, he did not try to grasp the principles of finance, and being obliged to master, as a layman may, the arts of war and diplomacy, he was wise to attempt no more. But Lincoln though unversed in finance had a first-rate knowledge of men, and this it was that led him to retain as his Secretary of the Treasury one whose inflexible honesty and receptive mind justify the popular estimate of him as a strong finance minister. That the war had gone on for nearly two years with an immense expenditure of money, and that the Government could still buy all it needed of food and munitions of war and could pay its soldiers, was due primarily to the patriotism and devotion of the Northern people, but honor should also be given to the manager of the country's finances. The Secretary of the Treasury was probably not a pleas 194 LINCOLN CHASE [1862 ant man at the council board. Moreover, his temperament differed so essentially from the President's that sympathetic relations between the two men were impossible. Chase was handsome, of commanding presence, careful in dress, courtly in manner. A graduate of Dartmouth, he had a fair knowledge of Latin and Greek and the reverence for them of an educated lawyer. He was widely read, and even in his busy life as member of the Cabinet, found his recreation in improving his acquaintance with good English and French literature. He cared neither for cards nor for the theatre. A serious, thoughtful man in every walk of life, he brought to the business of his Department a well thoughtout method. Lincoln, plain and ungainly, gave no thought to the graces of life and lacked the accomplishments of a gentleman, as no one knew better than himself. He had no system in the disposition of his time or in the preparation of his work. During his term of office he confined his reading of books mainly to military treatises and to works which guided him in the solution of questions of constitutional and international law, although he occasionally snatched an hour to devote to his beloved Shakespeare and revealed in his state papers an undiminished knowledge of the Bible. He found recreation in the theatre and has left on record his pleasure at Hackett's impersonation of Falstaff. As Hamlet had a peculiar charm for him, Edwin Booth's presentation of the rôle must have afforded him a rare delight. Possessed of a keen sense of humor he was a capital storyteller and in this capacity must often have grated on the serious temper of his finance minister who had no humor in him and but little knowledge of men. Chase's private correspondence reveals him to our surprise in friendly communication with many cheap persons, CH. V] LINCOLN 195 mainly, it is true, political followers, on whose help he counted for obtaining the much-desired Presidency. This ambition, or rather the unseemly manifestations of it, became the greatest hindrance to his usefulness. His opinion of Lincoln's parts was not high, and could hardly have remained unperceived by the President, who in return made no attempt to conceal his judgment that Chase was a very able man. At this time the Secretary was by no means alone in his estimate of the President. In the minds of many senators and representatives existed a distrust of his ability and force of character, which had been created in those who met him frequently by his lack of dignity, his grotesque expression and manner and his jocular utterances when others were depressed. These eccentricities, when viewed in the damning light of military failure, could not but produce in certain quarters a painful impression. Of the interview between Lincoln, the Cabinet and the senators during the Cabinet crisis, Fessenden wrote sarcastically, "The President . . . related several anecdotes, most of which I had heard before." 1 While his popularity was waning, he was stronger with the country than with the men at Washington. The people did not come in personal contact with him, and judged him by his formal state papers and his acts. Posterity, having seen his ultimate success, judges him on the same ground and looks with admiration on the patience and determination with which he bore his burden during this gloomy winter. The hand that draws the grotesque traits of Lincoln may disappoint the hero-worshipper, but veracity in the narrative demands the inclusion of this touch which helps to explain the words of disparagement so freely applied to him, and serves as a justification 1 Fessenden, I, 245. |