in fact as i have driving up here today, i remembered the opening pages of my aunt anilla where her young hero looking across his home and thinking of nebraska, there's a lot of it. when congress adjourned on july 17th, 1862, in their inner most thoughts, i'm sure many of its members must have wondered if all their worked had been in vein. george mcclellan's campaign on the peninsula had fizzled tantalizingly close to richmond and soon confederate troops would invade the north in kentucky and maryland, the european powers were then on the verge of stepping into the dispute to force a mediation that would have recognized

southern independence. the republican grip on congress was threatened and with it the fate of this huge and historic agenda. how the union was saved from that low point is another story told in my forthcoming book. it's an astounding chain of events, but we haven't time for that now. instead i'm going to give the final word to charles sumner. perhaps the greatest figure of that tumultuous congress speaking of misunderstood individuals. our session has been busy, sumner wrote understatedly to a

friend after congress adjourned. but then he added with justified pride, i doubt if any legislative body ever acted on so many important questions. thank you very much. [ applause ] >> thank you. we do have some time for questions. i would ask you to come up to this microphone if you have a question you'd like to ask. anyone? others of you if you have questions, if you'll come up and be ready to ask your question. >> i was wondering, thomas

crowell and several other authors wrote about the problem of counterfeiting operations throughout the united states during the civil war. and i was wondering if during the process where the united states government was drafting the moral brand act and the homestead act of 1862, if they ever thought about the possibility of counterfeit operations being established in the midwest and in the northern great plains. and, if so, what were their plans in preventing such an event? >> i found no record of that being a concern for the treasury department, which particularly in 1862 was, if you read samson

chase's, the secretary treasury's diary, it becomes clear that he was running an endless effort simply to fund the next day's operations. or arguably the past week's operations. day after day he comes in to his office to find million of dollars of unpaid bills on his desk and he'll complain about the fact that he has no idea how to pay them. and if they had been paid in counterfeit money, i think that would have been fine with him. [ laughter ] most of the republican party was strongly opposed to the idea of fiat money, greenback money, to begin with.

chase and lincoln were really driven to the wall by the fact that they had no alternative way of funding the war. it's literally mind boggling to me at least when i see what happened to the federal budget from 1860 to the end of 1862. the entire federal budget of 1860 was $80 million. in 1862, they were spending roughly $50 million per week. another way to put this explosive growth of the federal government into terms that we can understand, the presidential

staff, i'm not talking about the residential white house staff, the buckler, the cooks and so forth. the president's executive staff when lincoln arrived in washington in 1861, was one. his budgeted staff was one secretary. that had been good enough for all the previous presidents. why wouldn't it be good enough for him? john nicolai had a place on his federal budget. his colleague john haye had to be put on the interior department budget. until lincoln could persuade the congress that he needed another person on his staff. eventually he got a third secretary by hiding him at the patent office. so while the issue you're raising is real and the devaluation of money was a huge problem for the north through the war, although infinitely larger problem for the south

where inflation by 1863 was running at vimar republic rates, it was an issue that just didn't rise to the top of their agenda that i can determine. the other story i like about the money is chase did not want to go to fiat money. he tried everything he could not to. but when he finally did, he never got over the fact that the republican party had made such a terrible mistake in 1860 in chicago by nominating abraham lynn cop instead of himself to be president.

and as doris kerns goodwin has said in team of rivals so nicely, a lot of people in the cabinet felt that way, but most of them got over it. chase never got over it and he was running for president constantly even as he was treasury secretary. so it donned on him in january after the currency law had been passed that there were going to be millions and millions of pieces of paper circulating across the united states into every wallet, symbols of prosperity and the future of the country and there ought to be a picture on there. so every denomination, every greenback printed during the civil war had chase's picture on it until he left as treasury

secretary. so any other questions? >> one quick question. i'm very encouraged by the 37th congress' accomplishments, but i'm also troubled by the prescription for their success and i was curious if there was anything that we could do other than asking our good friends from south of the mason dixon to kind of leave the session, which governor perry has indicated some desire to do, if there's any other success for relieving gridlock today? >> yes, that's an excellent question. hopefully we will not have such an extreme solution, but i think in the second of my points where i it talked about a compelling agenda this is where i tend to see a way forward. i would argue that part of the fact that we are at such a 50/50

in our country right now, election after election being decided by a handful of votes, and even the nearly unprecedented example in 2000 of the loser winning it in the popular vote, that one of the explanations for this is that neither of the parties really has a vision of the american future for the 21st century that a majority of americans find compelling. and so they work on wedge issues, they turn up the volume on this, turn down the heat on that, they're very personal campaigns, so on and so forth,

because net of them will look at what's going on in the republican party right now. they don't even have an agenda that they are galvanized around themselves. the democrats have arguably clearer agenda, but frequently they find that it doesn't speak to the middle of the country. so where i think the gridlock is ultimately going to be broken is when one of the two parties becomes a majority party. and if you look at the republican party, certainly not a majority party in 1860, you know, abraham lincoln received a smaller percentage of the vote in 1860 than any president in american history. he used to say when people asked him why he hadn't fired george mcclellan, he'd say i'm a minority president and he's a majority general.

but by the end of that war, the republican party was definitely a majority party and was for the next 30 years because in large part they had articulated an agenda that americans were ready to get behind. >> you raised spectrum of corruption. it was legal to bribe congressmen until 1853, after which time it was legal to pay them consulting fees to do things. which is interesting. so i wondered in relation to the money you were talking about, was it consulting fees some i know it's stocks. you mentioned that. if you could comment a bit more. >> a huge amount -- question if anyone could not hear is what

was the legal status of the money the lp&w was throwing around in congress. a huge amount of what they were doing is offering land which they had not yet fully stolen from the indians but were going to and that land was of questionable value, but if it had the transcontinental value going through it, it would be of great value. it was certainly scandalous. the reason we know so much about the extent of their bribery is that in 1876, how did this thing get done in the first place.

scandal which was the biggest washington scandal of the late 19th century. went all the way up to the speaker of the house, the aforementioned james blaine, ewing's cousin who lied his way through the process by saying that he didn't get any money. but the lp&w had been kind enough to future historians to keep detailed records of all the bribing they had done because they were throwing so much money around that they were losing track of who they had bribed, who they still had to bribe, how much they had promised here and there. since this is a room full of scholars and historians, i will

say it got cut from my book, but i did find the smoking gun in the course of my research. for this book, there is actually a letter from james blaine to thomas using in the using family papers written just after congress adjourned in which he said, oh, by the way, at the last minute i had to promise this guy at the navy department who is a friend of william thesenden some money so he would keep his mouth shut. a complicated deal. but he then says so i'll pay him out of my share unless you want me to -- unless you're willing to do it. so blaine, who claimed not to have been involved at all was up to his hips. and it was hugely scandalous, but problem for grant at the end of his second term. >> i was wondering what

convinced the europeans to stop moving for a negotiated settlement. >> yes. the europeans were right at the door and ultimately what happened -- i would say it was threefold, their decision to stay out. number one, france very much wanted to interview because the emperor of france louis napoleon was trying to reestablish a french empire in north america. he had troops in new mexico. he was about to install a puppet ruler of mexico. and the confederacy was promising we could do a lot of nice things together. we can make beautiful music together here in the southern

half of north america. but he didn't want to get in unless the british were going to get in, too, and make it a joint project. you probably know what the prospects historically have been for successful joint operations by france and england. that one was kind of starting out under a doomed ill fated start. so those tensions first. and the idea of an even larger pan european intervention was being knocked down primarily by russia. rush yabthose days saw the united states as its best friend of the world. they were the two rising new powers. they had europe bracketed on each side and russia very much wanted to see the power of the united states sustained.

then there was an arc of the war and 1862 kind of runs like this. it starts at a very low point. lincoln on january 2nd actually talks to his friend, john dahlgren, about what dahlgren talks about the bare possibility of our being two nations. first time lincoln had ever entertained the possibility that he might not be able to save the union. that's his mood on the first day. in february, the store clerk from illinois, ulysses grant, with 12,000 men, goes into tennessee and strikes the fastest most efficient, most dramatic blow against the south of the entire war. he captures the cumberland and

tennessee rivers in the space of a week and the entire western line of the confederate army is shattered. so the mood goes clear up here. and by the end of april, they've captured new orleans which was according to the great winfield scott, that was the key to winning the war was to capture new orleans. and at that point, lincoln is having william seward write letters proposing the exact opposite kind of solution, where the europeans withdraw their recognition of belligerent rights from the south because they're about to lose anyway and that will get the cotton moving. so they're up at this height. and then, bam, right back into the depths symbolized by the

second battle at manassas where the union military leadership actually turns on each other to lose a battle within ear shot of the white house and the confederates invade kentucky and maryland and at that point both in paris and in england the leaders of both countries are talking about this is the time to intervene. fortunately europeans love their summer vacations. this is a key point of american history. they all went on vacation and said we'll deal with this when we get back in october. by october, the united states had won the battle of antietam and the confederates had been

pushed out of kentucky and maryland, lincoln had issued the preliminary emancipation proclamation and the whole face of the war changed. the anti-slavery movement in england particularly was a very important political force. and as long as lincoln seemed to be shilly-shallowing about slavery, the pro confederate forces could say slavery's not an issue here, but now lincoln had put it front and center and now england would be intervening on behalf of the slave power against freedom and that was unsustainable. so that political calculation second. and then the third one which was more important than some of the histories suggest is that palmerston was a very old man by this time and he loved to fight wars.

he had sent the british navy all around the world intervening all over the place. he was happy to intervene in little wars. but he had learned some things about war and when he saw what had happened first at shiloh where in two days more americans were killed than in all the battles ever fought in north america try prior to that weekend, in one battle, and then what happened at malvern hill, at gains mill, and the incredible slaughter at antietam, the bloodiest single day in american history. he basically said those people are crazy. and he walked into the cabinet. his exact words were the 30 years war in germany was a joke compared to this. and if we think we're going to

sail over there and break them up, we're nuts. and lincoln and his secretary of state, william seward, were very keen to this. right at that time, seward sent a letter to charles francis adams, the ambassador in london. he said you let them know they're looking at a war of the world, he called it. not a world war. that hadn't been coined. but this is one of the earliest uses of this phrase, a war of the world if they try to come over here and get in the middle of this. and so those were the three factors i'd say. >> thank you very much. [ applause ] >> as you know, these folks know, you don't, we have a little memento. see, you can tell.

they lost all respect for this. anyway, a little memento of your being here. we hope you'll come back. >> awesome. thank you. >> thank you. as the presidential campaign enters its final months and the political parties prepare for their conventions, american history tv will air c-span's original series "the contenders" featuring 14 key political figures who ran for president and lost but impacted american political i will history. we'll air the series every weekend from june 3rd to september 2nd on sundays at 8:30 a.m., 7:30 p.m. and 10:30 p.m. eastern all here on american history tv on c-span3. and join us as historians preview the series on saturday, june 2nd at 10:00 a.m. eastern. next, a look at our recent

visit to oklahoma city, oklahoma, to learn about the city's rich history and literary culture. you're watching american history tv. all weekend, every weekend on c-span 3. >> and at high noon the guns fire and the canons go off and the flags go down and 50,000 people rush for free land. the land run was a unique waive opening the public lands. sint 1860s, congress had a policy on the books called the homestead act and the homestead act said anyone who had moved to the frontier onto public domain and would stay for five years and make improvements and satisfy all of those conditions they would receive title to the land. it was basically free land encouraged settlement. the west was virtually settled at least through the airiable lands. high plains, th southern plains through kansas and through new mexico and through arkansas and so argument the land around us is settled in the 1860s, 1870s

and into the 1880s. well all of this time oklahoma is withheld from settlement from the indian territory. start in the 18-teens congress and the president started moving tribes out of old southeast, out of the midwest, out of the atlantic coast states, and moving them to oklahoma, until we had 39 tribes here. it's one vast indian reservation as other reservations are aboishled and those lands are opened. here is this one last island. farm that can be farmed and ranch. and everyone wants it. well in 1889 there are no more tribes to bring in to the territory. but yet there is one parcel right in the middle of the indian territory that's unassigned.

it's about six count eaves oklahoma. not owned or settled by any other indian tribe. so congress decides, we are going to open this under the homestead act and let people claim the land. well, how do you do it? it's a small parcel of land. a lot of people wanting the land and so if you take the political philosophy of the time, laissez-faire government. government needs to step back into the shadows. keep your hands off of daily life. let the free enterprise system work. secondly, a social philosophy. darwinism, an evolution, survival of the fittist. the theory that the fastest and the smartest will survive. the dumbest and the slowest won't. so let's open it up by land run, keep the government out of it and let people run for it. first to get to 160 acres of rural land where a town lot in one of the towns claims it, defends it, stays on it for five

years, gets it for free. so congress sets a date for the land. the very first land run. april 22nd, 1829, high noon. on that day, 50,000 people line up around the borders of the territory and at high noon the canons go off, the guns fire, the flags go down. a variety of means. 50,000 people of rush for free land. about half go to 160-acre farps. the other half go to towns, such as stillwater in norman and guthrie which will be the territorial capital. oklahoma city, this little town and the bend in the north canadian river. that night, every part and parcel of the unassigned lands is claimed by somebody. these were towns born grown in one day. oklahoma city had 10,000 people that night. that morning only a handful. guthrie 10,000 people. and so the land run was this experiment in a way to settle the american west. was there cheating? yes. were there people who came in early? yes.

united states deputy marshals who took advantage of their opportunity? yes. were there court cases, yes, they would drag on for limits a decade. so the laissez-faire government didn't work too well and social darwinism only worked partially. yes, the fastest writers but generally would have been the cowboys who had the trained mustangs. driving cattle across the land. the farmers who may have been the pillars of their communities, if they were in a wagon, a family and encumbered by a lack of knowledge maybe they did not get land. so both of those philosophies of government and social evolution were only partially true. but nevertheless, that day and part of the american west was settled. well, after 1889 other parts of the indian territory were taken away from indian tribes and put in to the public domain. they call it the allotment process. so the for the government would