rich history. learn more about newport on www.c-span.org. your watching "american history tv", all weekend, every weekend on c-span3. announcer: a panel of scholars talks about people who disliked and opposed abraham lincoln during his presidency, including members of his own cabinet. this discussion was part of the annual lincoln forum symposium in gettysburg, pennsylvania. it is about one hour and 15 minutes. frank: good morning, i am frank williams, chair of the lincoln forum. welcome to this panel of forum 22, relating to lincoln's enemies. i am so pleased to have a distinguished -- every time someone says "distinguished," i want to run to the merlot bar. [laughter] >> it is like saying, "with all

due respect," in my courtroom. [laughter] but we do have some great scholars with us this morning. stephen engle, the author of a great book about lincoln and the nation's governors. jonathan white, author of "midnight in america." and soon to be with us, a book, "our little monitor." and of course, catherine clinton, no stranger to us, author of many books. and walter, author of a great biography -- as well as on edwin stanton, called "stanton." he told me, and i hope i am not revealing any confidence, he has a glint in his eye.

good luck with that. [laughter] i am sure we will hear about secretary of the treasury salmon chase from professor clinton. so let me start with this. john barr, one of our members, wrote a great book but it is a door stopper, it is huge. it is called "loathing lincoln." he said in his introduction that william f. buckley, jr. once said americans shall not remember why lincoln was loved until we come to understand why he was hated. both emotions were shown after his assassination in 1865. even those who, as william petersen said, even those who

commemorated or tried to memorialize his death with crepe and bunting secretly harbored a wish for his demise. i think what we have is a thought on when this dislike of lincoln began. and i think it is true, even before he was elected president, and deep and throughout his administration. certainly, lincoln's political outlook, in contrast to slaveholders contributed to this, his reliance on thomas jefferson's declaration of independence, which he thought superseded the constitution -- or should at least be read together. and his acts as president,

clearly the republicans supported him, antiwar democrats called copperheads despised him, especially since they believed, as did the southerners, because he subverted the constitution. especially in the suspension of the writ of habeas corpus in the north. that is a general overview, which i think we all get and understand, even if we do not accept this dislike of our 16th president. what about particular enemies within and without his administration? what i have asked our panelist to do is to give a two or three minute overview of what they would like to discuss to get us going, especially for our questions and discussion among the panelists about what they

think is important to know about lincoln's specific enemies. we will start with stephen. stephen: in regards to the governors i studied, there are two categories -- i do not know if they would be called enemies. or perhaps just oppositionists. early in the war, john andrew and the radical republicans who were representatives of the various states, probably had come to regard lincoln in a frustrating way because the war as it turns out early on is a conciliatory war to maintain the border states within the union and john andrew and israel washburn becomes fairly exercised about the slow progression of the war, especially during the fall of 1861.

these governors began to find ways to move the administration along to advance the war quickly in order to end it quickly to maintain the volunteer spirit that they were struggling with back at home. early in the war, i would say the radical governors were oppositionists to lincoln's mentality about how to fight the war. in fact, andrew and washburn would be among the leading advocates for raising black troops. and they would write samuel cameron privately. about his influence with lincoln. of course, in the fall of 1861, this is a radical idea. but one in which they believed if the union had embraced this early on, it would have shortened the war. and the frustrations among the populace, it even though a fairly overwhelmingly conservative population, perhaps a shorter war would come about. as the war progresses, and they achieve some modest victories, with the confiscation acts, and

the militia act of 1862 and ultimately emancipation in 1863, then you find there is another opposition rank among the conservatives. and the people who lead that cadre of enemies would be horatio seymour, who was elected in 1862. and who, in fact, would believe that lincoln is moving the war too quickly because he is a tool of the radicals and it is not until seymour becomes governor, in 1863, recognizing the war has changed very quickly in two years. and so seymour comes to resent lincoln for expanding the war too quickly. he believes the culprits here are not lincoln himself but he has been moved and prodded by these radical political leaders to advance the war and to establish a the revolutionary -- to establish the

revolutionary nature of emancipation and national conscription and black troops. for most conservatives, this was a radically different war in 1863 than it was in 1861. especially in reaching out to the citizenry to mobilize and raise the troops necessary to meet the demands necessary for this rather new war that the governors -- there would be no border state governors elected. there were no elections in 1862 for those states. but in the states that had large populations to draw from -- new york in particular -- how would they be able to sell the war to a fairly conservative population that opposed emancipation and conscription, and a number of other acts? in the ways in which we see how states and governors react to the progression of the war, early on there is a frustration it is not moving fast enough. by 1863 there is a frustration it is moving way too quickly for

the northerners and those who share the burden and labor of filling the ranks as these conscription acts move forward into the states. so -- frank: jonathan white, you did write a book, a very good book, on abraham lincoln and treason, relating to the merriment case, so i suppose it would be appropriate for you to discuss why this caused so many people to turn against lincoln. jonathan: steve lays out the grand narrative of the opposition to lincoln during the war very well. i hope you will forgive me for being anachronistic. as i was thinking about this i thought, if lincoln was on twitter, who would have trolled him? [laughter] there are some obvious candidates. you would have people like john merryman. steve mentioned some of these

governors, andrew on the republican side or seymour on the democratic side is -- as opposition. the millennials have a good term for this -- "frenemies." [laughter] >> i am not on twitter though. >> you should get on there. a frenemy is someone you associate with, even though you have an enmity towards them. you could see people like andrew or seymour within that camp. also, there are hundreds of thousands of ordinary democrats in the civilian population and the army who oppose lincoln. for the very same reasons steve was describing. they see his policies on civil liberties and habeas corpus, on confiscation and emancipation, they see his support for a 13th amendment in 1864. that pushes them to turn against lincoln. whereas they may have been moderate supporters of the war early on.

they see the changing nature of the war and they begin to see lincoln in a much darker light. during part of the discussion, that is what i will want to talk about. some of the civilians who opposed lincoln and some of the soldiers who are often seen as overwhelmingly supportive of lincoln. in my research, i found many soldiers who came to loathe lincoln, with great hatred. frank: thank you, jonathan. catherine clinton, i think it is appropriate for you to discuss the man about whom lincoln said to john, his assistant secretary, when he was to relieve general rosecrans -- i suppose he will, like the bluebottle fly, lay his eggs in every rotten spot he can find. [laughter] catherine: on the matter of

spreading the newer everywhere on the matter of spreading manure everywhere, i think salmon chase and his daughter were quite active in washington at the time. looking at him as a frenemy, lincoln certainly believed in keeping his friends close and enemies closer. we can see it really paid off, especially after his untimely death. on this matter, being invited to talk about lincoln's enemies -- what have i ever done? [laughter] some have suggested to me, since i worked on mrs. lincoln, that would be a start. i certainly hope someone read my book and disagreed. i was working on lincoln in new yorks, think to harold's kind invitation. i found this backbiting, and snarling among republicans. therefore, when i was first looking at the enmity between

chase and lincoln, i found it was a deep, intense sense of ambition, self-righteousness in salmon chase that led to his belief that he would make a better president. he had to assert himself that lincoln would see that with his every act. he also challenged lincoln. it was also, as you study this come you get a deeper appreciation of lincoln, who understood quite well the motivating force with chase. also, lincoln kindly recognized his wife's enmity with kate chase. she made a marriage to finance her butler's financial run for president, then found herself short-circuited. her charm spread around washington. so great, when lincoln finally did accept one of chase's many resignations, chase's reaction was great shock

-- how could lincoln ever live without him? lincoln had great plans for him. by cementing his role on the supreme court, he did not know what lay ahead. i know lincoln was not prescient enough to predict the exact timing of his death. but he did appoint him to the court later that year. he did have a place for him in s ownto cement lincoln' legacy. whatever he knew about his ambition, he knew about his self-righteousness and therefore chase did inadvertently make himself an ally of lincoln because while he was busy trying to cut lincoln down to size, he contributed later to lincoln's immortality. frank: thank you, catherine. walter, the thing that has

impressed me for many years is the plurality of lincoln's reelection in 1864. 2 million, 200,000 for him. he won the electoral votes in all but two states, new jersey, the home of his democratic opponent. george mcclellan. and i think, kentucky, the place of his birth. that is a great victory in the midst of war, where elections were allowed to be held, to lincoln's credit, but i have often wondered, what is making up this 1.8 million people who voted against him? they certainly were not friends of lincoln and his administration. walter: to measure the closeness of that election, we need to look -- i did not bring the numbers with me -- at lincoln's

own handwritten document in which he will predict the electoral vote. this occurs in october. he thinks he is going to lose new york and pennsylvania. those are the two most popular states with the most electoral votes. he thinks he is going to win by roughly four or five electoral votes, as narrow a margin as one can imagine. i think that was a very good prediction. when you look at, how did he win new york? i mentioned it last night, i think sending benjamin butler to new york city to keep democrats. butler sent a note, i think i have done a good job of discouraging the democrats of coming to the polls today. [laughter] i think that jonathan in his great book about the election talks about this. actually if it had been what we

talk about today in the third world as a free and fair election. there might have been even more votes against -- jonathan is nodding. there might have been even more votes against abraham lincoln in 1864. i think we should get to lincoln's enemies south of the mason-dixon line. and the attitude of jefferson davis and others toward lincoln. by the end of the war, they view him as a pirate operating outside the laws of war. i think we should talk about that at some point. >> let me follow-up up with walter. what a lot of people do not realize is that in early september of 1864, some new york journalists were very fearful of what might happen in the election. they decided to write every governor a private letter to

gain their sense of what their state's results might be. they would ask three questions, do you think lincoln could carry the state, was there a substitute, and with the -- and would the national union party win? the interesting thing is, the response among most governors, the election is a foregone conclusion. it is too late to pull lincoln out of the race. that would be a national, political calamity. the fallout would make the union look vulnerable. but there were a number of governors, andrew included, who would recommend chase as a possibility. and those who would not even recommend someone said lincoln was unfit but to pull out of the race would lose the credibility of the political process. there were very real questions about the opposition within the public sector.

for three new york journalists, to send a series of letters to every governor to gauge the on the ground sense, would lincoln carry their states, was a great indicator of how this election was to be. interestingly those letters go t the time that sherman is in atlanta and atlanta falls, which, if you read the news of the day, i think these responses were influenced to a large degree by what was happening militarily. it wasn't about lincoln, it was about winning the contest. moving the contest for that they felt they were winning in the field to create a political liability probably backfire and when the democrats the victory. >> do you think if the palmer ray circular had been a different point in time that the

proposition that lincoln was weakening the war effort and the party, that the party leaders were pushing chase, and chase says "yes yes, no no, i guess yes." it is interesting because we do look at political contingency theory. in this case he overplayed his sand. >> i said this yesterday, because of the way things turned out we forget just how unbelievably chaotic and how much opposition, real opposition, there was very for me, -- there was. for me, the real miracle is that there are elections taking place every year with overwhelming opposition bubbling up from a variety of places are a variety of regions. fore is a lot to be said the miracle of this election. >> much of that opposition was

not just based on failure on the battlefield, but the ongoing sincele that we have had the founding of national security versus civil liberties. walter, picking up on that, what did edwin stanton do to help the opposition? as far as enforcement of the draft and filling up what many opponents called the best deals of the north. illes of the north? ofhe creates a system provost marshals and every congressional district -- in every congressional district. they're given a broad authority

not just to enlist men for the draft, but to arrest those opposing the draft. and they energetic men take that to heart. hundreds of folks are arrested for interfering with the draft. as frank's question suggests, if a democratic strategist were writing for stanton what not to do -- what to do in order to help democrats get votes in the fall of 63 and 64, it would be almost a perfect script. a great the democrats argument, the constitution as it was, i key element is that lincoln and stanton are throwing editors and others into prison for opposing the draft. let's segue, then we will get to catherine's specific issues involving the secretary of the treasury.

jonathan, what about the law of war and the issues that confronted lincoln and the decisions he made? this issue of military arresting civilians, mark neely's ellis are prize-winning book shows that both of the civilians arrested were people who were doing things to materially hurt the union war effort or help the confederate war effort. his argument is that these are people who would've been arrested anyway. the reality is that the arrests that really got the attention of the american people and that continue to get our attention today are of the great political leaders. people like clement lending him lanningham, there was a judge and richard carmichael, these guys get great press headlines and it is vance is this narrative that lincoln is using claims of necessity to

go against the constitution and do whatever he wants to do. for the democratic perspective they argue that this is simply to silence their opposition. they argue that he is using the laws of war in a way to silence his political opponents. frome in's perspective -- lincoln's perspective he is doing what he needs to do. he writes in a famous letter that he could've arrested robert e lee and other great confederate leaders, he doesn't call them great, and if i had done that you all would have raised the howl of free speech, freeze the -- free press, and habeas corpus. he suggested that one day people ght think he should've arrested more people than he did very -- he did. >> today it is called preventative detention.

>> can i ask about the soldiers? as a teacher teaching civil war each semester, even in the summer school. we have devoted students, and we teach the script that for loading soldiers -- furloughing soldiers was a wider margin for lincoln. i have been to the lincoln memorial and read books that are contradicting the loyal soldier. i wonder if some of the other panelist to have done more research might comment. >> i published a book called "emancipation, lincoln army and the reelection of lincoln." i wanted to look about how soldiers viewed emancipation and lincoln. was that 80% of the soldiers voted for lincoln in 1864, that shows that they supported him and they supported

emancipation. i wanted to get behind that 80% number and see what it really meant. i found that many soldiers chose not to vote if the election, even though it was quite easy to vote at election. you just had to walk down the street to the polling place in your regiment. you didn't have to go to the next town over like if you were a farmer. why do these men choose not to vote? what i argue in the book is that there were a lot of democrats in the army who just didn't come around support emancipation. they didn't come around to support lincoln's war policies. they had enlisted because they believed in fighting for the union. in 1862 and 1863 the war policy changes, but their views don't necessarily change. i have chapters in the book on desertion and resignation, i've chapters on soldiers who were court-martialed for opposing

emancipation, and a chapter on the election itself. looking at how these soldiers behaved and how the union high command behaved and how lincoln treated the soldiers. what i argue is that the lincoln administration and the republicans in high projections -- positions of the union army worked diligently to silence the soldiers who opposed emancipation, to get them to not talk with their comrades about their views. in many cases these guys chose not to vote in 1864. about 21% of the soldiers who voted in 1864 voted against the lincoln. another 20% or more chose not to vote. i think a lot of them were intimidated or felt like they did not have a good choice in the election, they can vote for the democrats who are calling the war a failure, they can book for the republicans who are calling for a new 13th amendment, they don't want that, so they choose to stay home, in

their tent i suppose. their tenthome in because, bear in mind, and the election of 1864 there are still a number of states who require people to vote in person. regimentss that the that get to go home are the regiments that are thought of to be likely to vote for lincoln. there areis because enough comments in the democratic newspapers that it can't be merely accusations. >> i found letters where the republican kernel would call the men out, and say all who intend to vote for lincoln take a step forward, and if they were from a state that did not permit soldiers to vote in the field, those are the guys who got to go home. i found some democrats writing letters home and said they stepped forward and told them they would vote like a republican because they wanted

to go home. there were all sorts of different intimidations going on. we know this is the first time soldiers were allowed to vote in any election. the first time. you are right, walter, some states like indiana did not permit soldiers. it was not a secret ballot either. when you got to the box, even in civil life, utica ballot that everyone could see what slate you are using to vote. >> to build off that point, because i love telling this to my students. it was their mind how different it was. in those days, the parties printed their own ballot. you would go to your party operative to pick up the bow at your polling place, and each party would use distinctive colors. everyone knows. you then walk through a crowd of people who are going to see you carrying your distinctively colored ballot, then you drop it

into the ballot box which is glass. [laughter] >> from the moment you get the ballot to the moment you deposit it, everybody knows. politicians these day would kill for that sort of information. >> catherine, can you say a word about the crises in december of 1862? through brilliant political maneuvering, turned it in his favor -- about the crises cabinetber of 1862 -- crisis in december of 1862? how lincoln, through brilliant political maneuvering, turned it in his favor? the battle in december of 62 there was a huge outcry

that lincoln has to do something. republican senators are up in arms. the entire republican senate caucus. failure on at a battlefield would lead to a call for the resignation of the secretary of war, but instead it angered -- the anger is pointed at steward who is allegedly leading lincoln to a soft war policy. the title of one of the chapters of my steward book is" remove -- "remove him." the republican senators tell lincoln and this bizarre meeting that they want steward's head. lincoln is reluctant to remove him. going back to the point of keeping your enemies close. he knows that stewart is an ambitious guy. he knows that stewart is doing

good work on foreign policy. engineers that chase tenders and resignation. must grab the resignation letter from chase and says this is what i need, he now has the letters from both steward and chase. lincoln then writes a wonderful letter saying i don't want your resignations, i want you to keep working. , stewartnd chase graciously and chase less graciously, continued working. it is a great example of lincoln's masterful dealings with the senators, with the cap that members -- cabinet members. you could name a lot of folks in this picture, stewart, chase, sumner, who are in the category es, but lincoln is

managing to keep all of them marching forward for the union. >> he is balancing the egos too. each one of them feeling more indispensable than the other. by pitting them against one another, who was more abolitionist? steward does not have family support the way chase does. chase is out there with his daughter working overtime to engineer things. lincoln, always aware of the egos involved. i am struck with the way lincoln was charmed by chase and use that to his advantage -- use that to his advantage by showing .p at her wedding mrs. lincoln refused to go. she was always one to be aware and presentation and

was probably not willing to be outdone by a bride. lincoln very clearly saw that this recognition of chase and his daughter, and making a presidential visit to the wedding, and standing for two hours. i could see the smoke coming out of the white house waiting for him. it would have been interesting to be a fly on the wall when he got back -- >> it would have been interesting to be a fly on the wall when he got back. >> she was so right in so many cases. shewas right about people thought were taking advantage of his very good nature. he was willing to be taken advantage of, because lincoln was the union, he was moving forward, he was always for conciliation. the notion that he was a per is quite offensive.

we have to see him as someone who was willing to let his ego those whor to assuage found themselves in positions of pettiness. one of the things is let's find lincoln's pettiness. i think we will have a difficult time because he was so willing to cede and the apathetic. we looking for empathy in our leaders. he was empathetic and that is how he managed crisis after crisis with his particular group. he was willing to put chase in a position of lasting power. >> it took three resignations to get chase out. >> the third time is the charm. you are right about the ego. it takes a lincoln to appoint this man chase to keep him in

the as long as he did. but then to choose him as the successor to roger tawney, this chief justice of the united states, that takes a great deal of leadership and self-confidence. >> really intellectually shifting. the signal was, if there was a person in washington who didn't know aboutchase -- chase's embarrassment of having a third resignation accepted. he knew hiss, abolitionist at heart -- abolitionist at heart was what he was looking for. he knew that having him on the court would make a difference and we would see that he was proposing a 13th amendment before the end of the board with other amendments to come, having

a constitutional force on the court was very important in a leader like him. >> he knew the civil rights legislation and the 13th amendment would be in good hands with chase. theas able to put aside bickering and appoint him which is an amazing feat i think. crisis -- cabinet crisis, i hate to come back to a. that is wrong, i love it. [laughter] >> this so the smarts to lincoln and his view of radical republicans, this is what he says after. we will get to the content of what actually happened. "if there was any worse hell than he had been in for the past two days he would like to know it. -- it." was that chaseed was in league and conspiring with radical republicans to get

rid of seward. seward was made the top, i think wrongly, and when the radical republicans came to lincoln to complain about seward, that he had to go, lincoln was apoplectic because of his alliance was seward and is believed and their collegiality on issues. what did he do as the president? he tells the radical republicans, come back the next day. he tells seward about this, and they knew what was going on. they had an idea that chase was in league with some of the radicals in congress. and convened the next day lincoln has the whole there, including chase, the perpetrator , but not seward. leave the andto lincoln wouldn't have any of it.

,adical republicans are there the perpetrator is there, and lincoln confronts them like the illinois lawyer he was. that chase was trying to make the radicals believe in was that lincoln did not have the submission cabinet meetings, that their voices were not heard by the president. lincoln went around to each cabinet and asked them --cabinet -- cabinet member and asked were meetings,nt did they express their views, and chase said the same thing. all over for chase. the radical republicans left and certainlyhead

with less credibility for the secretary of the treasury for pulling the stock. started chase research, one of the senators asked another "how could chase consent to that?" the other said "he lied." >> i think lincoln knew that in parlors,ered people may spread these rumors, got peopleosure, he on the record and chase is forced to tell the truth in a group. that was a great humiliation because he was a politician who wanted to advance his own cause. think, was someone who he saw as blocking his path way to 64, and why not maneuver him on the out. it was a bold move, which lincoln by shining the light, if

you have bacteria you can kill it with light. >> exactly right. >> that could be the title of your books, walter. [laughter] , john, we have been arrests,bout preventive detention, and there were many right? the national archives puts the number of u.s. citizens that were detained at around 14,000, am i right? >> and that is when he stopped counting. later counts -- >> later counts put it at 28,000, close to 30,000. people, because of the suspension of habeas corpus, detentionthere

checked by a magistrate, was there probable cause? nationwidethe suspension of the writ of habeas corpus. what factor do you think this played in the lincoln administration and those enemies who were opposed to him, the copperheads for the antiwar democrats? think that is a great question and it is something that informs lincoln's enemies during the war and since the war. if you look at the anti-lincoln tradition today, lincoln is depicted as a tirade because of his arrest spirit this is one -- arrests. this is one thing they cling to. democrats during the civil war, they see these arrests as politically motivated. from lincoln's perspective, these arrests are being done to try to preserve the union.

the reality is, lincoln did not want people like clement lannin gham arrested and tried before military church units for giving speeches against the lincoln administration. but those kind of arrests did happen. one of the things i love doing with my students showing them anti-lincoln cartoons from the civil war era. most of my students, if they think about lincoln at all, they think about that marble man and the lincoln memorial at the end of the mall in washington, d.c.. they don't think of him as a person, and they certainly don't think about him as someone who could have been hated in his lifetime. iny can't imagine that august of 1864 he thought he would lose reelection. he is our greatest president, of course he would be reelected. when you look at these anti-lincoln cartoons that circulated broadly in the north during the war, you see the hatred and the vitriol that was directed towards lincoln.

a lot of them depict him as a tyrant. they depict him burning the constitution and the declaration of independence. the feel for the fire is often habeas corpus, public credit, civil liberty, u.s. constitution and law, and that was the critique. they had a fair argument to make. the suspension of habeas corpus, that clause of the constitution is in article one. most americans presume that is a congressional power because article one is about the powers of congress. lincoln made the argument that the constitution was silent as to who can do suspension, it is written in passive voice, and as to where it can be done the constitution simply says the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion and the public safety may require it. he said i have a case of

rebellion, public safety requires it, the constitution doesn't say who can do it, and i can do it -- so i can do it. is a solid constitutional argument, but democrats weren't buying it. roger tawney, as chief justice, was not buying it. that becomes one of the chief issues that democrats cling to. it is not a winning issue for them. in 1864 when he runs for reelection, the democrats have this as a major part of their platform. they have had it as a part of their state platforms and in gubernatorial election. lincoln is elected and from his few he has these qualities that are controversial, people reelected him, and that was their statement of their acceptance of what he has done. if you have questions yourselves, please come up to the mic. i am not sure how many here understand the problem with

clement, who was running for governor of ohio, a former congressman, very outspoken critic of the lincoln administration, the draft, the first draft in american history, and the department commander in was, and i have to disclose this, was ambrose burnside from rhode island. -- someone said to me if you didn't have nathanael greene as george washington's right-hand general you would be stuck with ambrose burnside. burnside issues this general order, prohibiting anti-administration speech. clearly a first amendment issue. ndingham is making all of the speeches against the draft,

brothers andging parents at other soldiers to desert and not answer the call for the draft. that is what precipitates vallandingham's arrest. he is sentenced to imprisonment for the duration of the war. >> at hard labor. >> at hard labor, lincoln is embarrassed by this. and --usses it with his but he felt het had to support his general and the administration. ngham to thevallandi confederacy, they did not one of either. he gets on a steamer and winds -- inwindsor, ontario windsor to campaign for his

opponent. this is not the end to get there is an outraged by many in the country, including a group in albany, new york headed by arrest this corning -- erasmus corning. ,nother way of brilliance lincoln writes a letter in response to corning that he expects to be published everywhere. and it is. the republican party reprinted letterds of this corning as it is called where lincoln gives his defense for suspending the writ of habeas corpus and for arresting vallandingham. , ii spent a lot of time ngham's if vallandi

speeches are being widely reported and may burnside has a reason for arresting him. i could not find any reporting speechesdingham's outside of tiny papers in rural ohio. the blunder of arresting him was even worse, because he was not yet in a formal campaign for governor and he was not a member of congress. he was just kind of in a political wilderness and was not getting any national attention. vallandingham was trying to win the democratic nomination and he was their first choice, he thought maybe it he became a martyr he could get the choice. normally speeches of the very widely reproduced. a dozen detectives and, somewhat telling -- some military officers and some civilian, to watch his speeches

and write down a no pass what he said and then bring them back. that is how we got the evidence. >> we are sorry to the rhode island. >> wire you apologizing to me? -- why are you apologizing to me? i agree with you. tocoln agreed with you because he was regretful that this happened over this incendiary speech. the lawyer and politician that lincoln was, he turns it and twists it, arguing against draft draft or enticing peopleo have their soldier boys, and he makes the compelling emotional argument that that is compelling. >> it's interesting.

in contrast to current presidents, lincoln is not out or inevery day on twitter press releases. it is one of the few lengthy public statements. he knows this is an important issue. >> and he turns into a political issue. why are you opposing the administration, you should be supporting the war efforts. and then we will take some questions. talk that has probably public, it is one of the most important state documents in our state history.

defending why he did all these things that he did after the firing on fort sumter, including suspending the writ of habeas corpus. the clearing a blockade. theeasing the size of regular army and navy without congressional approval on any of them. he never violated -- he said throughout the war he never violated the constitution. yes, henry. >> in walter's opening remarks, you said jefferson davis and confederate leaders accused him of violating law. that.that you get to

the only international law issue that comes to my mind is blockading the southern ports, which the supreme court upheld. >> people are all looking at me. the southerners view the enlistment of blacks is the violation of the laws of war they viewed these people as slaves. the confederates did. the other way in which the confederates viewed lincoln and stanton as having violated the laws of war, the raid on richmond, this failed confederate raid and these papers are captured, we are going to take richmond.

those are printed in richmond papers throughout the south and the southern leaders say, look, this has crossed between him an legitimate warfare to pi. lincoln and the other leaders, they attribute this to not just some kernel, i think they are right to think that if dahlgren said that, that he did so after conversations with lincoln. they view this as lincoln has pulled off the gloves. i am an agnostic on whether the confederates had any role in the assassination. if they did, they did because they believed lincoln had broken the laws of war.

frank: there is a back story to vallanigham, too. when lincoln was assassinated, one of the greatest mourners was vallanigham. are we right, john, on that story? him and jonathan: i know he did begin to change his views on race and go from being an ardent racist to moving away from those views. frank: that is true. it is very ironic. before we take jim's question, i cannot resist to tell you, he was an excellent trial lawyer and he was a criminal trial lawyer. postwar, he is trying someone charged with murder, with

homicide, and he has the weapon in evidence and he is playing with it and he is showing the jury. he proceeds to discharge, killing him. jim? >> in all fairness, maybe you sound like burnside. [laughter] frank: for just telling that back story? >> when i first saw the title of this panel, one of the first him names that jumped into my mind was a guy who i thought was one of the most consequential enemies of lincoln, and i have not heard his name mentioned. you have come close a few times when you mentioned the radical republicans. benjamin wade, his role as the heart and soul of the joint

committee on the conduct of the war was constantly undermining lincoln's role as commander-in-chief by constantly undermining or attacking all the generals who lost all those early battles. as he witnessed the battle of bull run, he created the joint committee. i thought he was the most destructive, the most important role lincoln was playing was as commander-in-chief. frank: i think the panel would agree and that is why catherine mentioned the pomeroy circular. it was a pro salmon chase bid for the presidency. wade was instrumental in publishing this publication which was damning to lincoln.

>> wade is one of the last holdouts. they issue this manifesto where they were furious with lincoln after vetoing the wade davis bill. because of his reputation, if andrew johnson would have been impeached, he would have become president. people had those sort of things in mind. frank: thank you very much. yes, please. >> my husband is from rhode island. we have a sign by ambrose burnside hanging in our house. frank: he was very popular in rhode island. he became governor and then a united states senator. >> my question is, i have been

reading the book on lincoln and the press, i am only a third of the way through. one of the things absolutely clear, the papers -- >> not neutral. >> they were not impartial. there were democratic papers and republican papers. i assume at the time of the war, it was the same thing. how much did the democratic papers influence the election? or try to influence the election? frank: good question. >> there was vehement democratic press against lincoln and the way the war was going on and these papers were being circulated in the camps, which i think is often forgotten, the

him influence of the press and how it was being used, especially in 1862 and 1863. as the copperhead movement rises, you see these newspapers were designed, a lot of the articles and editorials were designed to confront soldiers. they were very effective vehicles for telling people what they needed to believe in the ranks. this is what your citizens leave at home. in some cases, try to circulate opposition newspapers among the soldiers or restrict the circulation of other newspapers as much as they could. they are very, very important in shaping how people thought about politics, intensive -- emancipation, what is going on in washington.

catherine: i think the you republican newspapers -- one has an idea that you will read the democrats -- the republican papers, i was having my students read republican papers and they could not believe that the editors were in any way supporters of lincoln. therefore, you really do show how his frenemies were trying to undermine him. the language was worse than the things i was reading in the south. they were openly racist, frightened the new yorkers.

as >> in connecticut, barnum ran an advertisement because so many secessionists had been locked up, he could not find any to be in the act for the circus. they were all in jail. governors had to get involved. frank: we just have a couple of minutes left. >> lincoln needed chase as an anchor, a bridge to the radicals. when lincoln sent over people to suggest ideas, the union was unable to pay its soldiers and suppliers, and he sent people to suggest ideas on how to solve this problem. chase kept saying, that is unconstitutional. lincoln said, i have the constitution right here and you do not need to worry about that. we need to look at chase's financial incompetence.

a lot of things that need to be aa lot of things that need to be looked at if you are going to look at chase. a will frank: i am sure walter will look at it in his new biography. thank you. you and >> i cannot believe we you >> i cannot believe we have made it this far without maccallum's name coming up. -- mclellan's name coming up. frank: i think that is the reason because it is mcclelland. [laughter] >> do we have any record of how he responded, reacted to losing

to lincoln? i wanted to comment, professor engle, you always read how the soldiers really loved mcclelland. frank: the last question first. the soldier votes did not really make a numerical difference in electing lincoln. connecticut and new york, i think, were the two states where the count of the soldier ballots led the state to go for abraham lincoln. that is counting the votes. as far as mcclellan's -- the soldiers' love of mcclellan,

little mac, and why they did not stick with him, anyone want to comment? >> to the other part of the question about his reaction, i think he felt relieved, which is maybe unusual. he said the people have voted with their eyes wide open, he wrote that to his wife, and he got out of the country for a while. which was kind of overdue. frank: he disagreed with the peace platform of the democratic party. that did not help either. yes? >> this is for catherine and it has to do with lincoln's emotional intelligence. if it were not for mary lincoln, lincoln never would have been president. he would have ended up as a territorial governor of

washington. catherine: he would have accepted that appointment had she be willing to go. >> in all seriousness, we do not underestimate her contribution to his legacy and presidency. this is a pointed question. did life with her prepare him for salmon chase? [laughter] -- for samuel chase and the rest of them? [laughter] catherine: mary always had strong opinions and her opinions were not always based on the same moral values her husband had. he could see quite clearly that coming from the kentucky bluegrass family and being raised among ambassadors and senators and politicians that she had a remarkable memory. she kept grudges from sitting in the illinois balcony counting the votes, watching her husband lose the election, to when he was appointing his cabinet, writing dictatorship letters back to everyone.

i think he listened to her but he was aware that she could have manifest all the pettiness, which he did not. she was a sounding board of what the social people might think. he knew that she had his best interest at heart and she was someone who was always advocating on his behalf. many of the things she advocated in the white house was keeping him in a straightforward way because he got lost in the war, got lost in grief. people making demands for something that i think she was

quite stringent about. she found the society that she was thrown into a great trial. >> i neglected to answer the second part of the previous question. catherine: go ahead. >> a lot of these soldiers still loved mcclelland but they said he did not like the company he kept. they worried that if he died in office, a copperhead would rise to the presidency. frank: lois? >> from oregon we think here was our first territorial governor. frank: speak into the microphone. >> talking about lincoln's e.q.,

did he think of his enemies with disdain? did he leave that to mary? how did he feel about douglas and chase and those other guys that were against him. catherine: i think he was good at putting letters in drawers. that was a great lesson. david donald always said, write it all out. do not push send. today we are in a twittering world. revenge is best served cold. frank: let me read this quote attributed to lincoln about concerns in missouri, a civil war within a civil war. there was general schofield who took a very strident view of those in disagreement with the

administration policies. they want schofield out. he says, in a time of war, blood grows hot and blood spills, confidence dies. each man feels an attempt to kill his neighbor, lest he be first killed by him. revenge and retaliation follow. every foul bird comes abroad and every dirty reptile rises up. lincoln refused to dismiss general schofield. this is a view of the contentiousness that he was mired in. last question. >> when succession happened, -- secession happened, people in

the armies and civil servants -- during the civil war, this was done in a very courteous way. people were allowed to make their decisions and if they were in pennsylvania, they were allowed to go to the south. it was very gentlemanly. my question is, robert e. lee made the decision to go with virginia. lincoln knew how important lee was. what would have happened if lincoln had said, you are under house arrest, you just committed treason?

lee would never have gotten to the top. -- to the south. frank: was not going to happen. anyone want to comment on that? even though lincoln thought lee was a traitor. >> they offered him the army of the potomac. catherine: mercy was something he always thought about. redemption. when his favorite brother-in-law was going to join the confederacy, lincoln had a vision of reunion. he said there could not be a secession, a separation. taking the position you cannot dissolve it, that was his decision, just like his mercy him and against soldiers who fell asleep. each of us comes to saying what we think might have been the reason. the actual legal interpretation, perhaps it is shrewdness. >> the moment -- we think of the civil war as having been declared, the firing on fort

sumter. lincoln did not go to congress and ask for a declaration of war. i think lincoln would have been on very shaky ground in arresting robert e. lee when he resigned his army commission. frank: one more comment from each before we hear from our administrator. stephen, you have one sentence. steve: are we still on topic? we need to think of the american civil war in the context of a whole.

it is hard to divide politics and military. the war is just politics by another means. the nature of how this plays out, his hand is visible in everything. i think the evolution of how we think -- how we think about the evolution of this war is so important in how we remember it. trying not to always think about how to divorce politics and military but to think of them together at the national and the state level. from the ground up point of view.

that is very instructive in how we see the relationships formed. frank: thank you. jonathan? jonathan: i thought of the wisconsin address that lincoln gave in 1859 when i was asked to be on this panel. when i think about lincoln and his talk about friendship and enemies, i help to think about the end of the first inaugural address. he wanted the nation to be a community of friends, to avoid being enemies and to maintain a national friendship. frank: catherine? catherine: the idea that it is a never-ending war. as we continue to discuss

questions of memorialization, of monuments, of how we will think about this, i want everyone to keep in mind what would mr. lincoln think about our current debates and battles. he would want us to hear the other side and to enjoy turkey together at thanksgiving. frank: thank you very much. walter? walter: we are not enemies. we must be friends. [applause] frank: excellent. let me close in the same spirit and which are great panelists have allocuted right now. our friend asked, why does lincoln loom so large overall cultural landscape?

great authors by barry schwartz and others have answered that abraham lincoln is much more than a symbol, more than an idea. abraham lincoln is a living force who has always been a lamp illuminating the ideals of the american people as well as a mirror reflecting their interest. with that, we will conclude this. thank you so much for your attendance. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2018] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] this weekend the c-span city tour takes you to rhode island. eastern, we will visit to redwood library. and then author peter karen on his book.

>> it has become our central nervous system. when it prospers the whole economy prospers. it creates sort of a barbell effect. a few people get really rich. the key sort of position. >> here about newport history. >> newport in the colony of rhode island would become not only the most active port in british north america, it became the most active slave port. merchants in rhode

island were responsible for nearly 1000 slaves from rhode island to the west african coast. they transported about 100,000 africans. >> watch city tour of newport rhode island. working for cable of pharaoh -- cable affiliates as we explore america. his book, the three lives of james madison. >> the constitution is all around you. the way people speak to each other. all of that is madison's monument.

if you seek his monument, look around you. if you seek madison's monument, look around you, we will see it everywhere. >> each week, american artifacts visits museums, archives, and historic places. in 2014, 5 u.s. secretaries of state and secretary john kerry are in a groundbreaking ceremony. curator katie -- >> the diplomacy center is the museum and education center currently under development at the department of state. it will be a multimedia,