Isaac N. Arnold

“ In a bold and fervid speech, and amidst the applause of the convention, he declared slavery to be "contrary to the spirit of the Christian religion, and incompatible with the natural rights of man," and he continued: "I fervently pray God that the day may come when throughout the whole land every man may be as free as you are, and as capable of enjoying regulated liberty." ”

“ Greeley was a prominent editor, and a man of the best and purest motives, Lincoln, with his usual sagacity, determined to convince him, not only of his own desire for peace, but to expose what he believed to be the deceptive character of these agents. In reply to Mr. Greeley, he said: "If you can find any person anywhere, professing to have any proposition of Jefferson Davis, in writing, for peace, embracing the restoration of the Union and abandonment of slavery, whatever else it embraces, say to him he may come to me with you." ”

“ With malice towards none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow and his orphans, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and a lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations. ”

“ Yes, and as Washington's name grows brighter with time, so it will be with Lincoln's. A century from to-day that inaugural will be read as one of the most sublime utterances ever spoken by man. Washington is the great man of the era of the Revolution. So will Lincoln be of this, but Lincoln will reach the higher position in history. ”

“ Any proposition which embraces the restoration of peace, the integrity of the whole Union, and the abandonment of slavery, and which comes by and with the authority that can control the armies now at war against the United States, will be received and considered by the Executive Government of the United States, and will be met by liberal terms on other substantial and collateral points, and the bearer or bearers thereof shall have safe conduct both ways. ”

“ Assuming that Grant is baffled and delayed in his efforts to take Richmond, will it not be better to accept peace on favorable terms, than to prolong the war? Have not nearly four years of war demonstrated that, as against a divided North, a united South can make a successful defence? The South is a unit, made so, it is conceded, by despotic power. We of the North cannot afford to secure unity by giving up our constitutional government; we cannot secure unity without despotism... The rebels will fill up their exhausted armies by three hundred thousand negroes ”

“ The national authority must be restored through all the states, and I will never recede from the position I have taken on the slavery question. The people have the courage, the self-denial, the persistence, to go through, and before another year goes by, it is reasonably certain, we shall bring all the rebel territory within our lines. We are neither exhausted nor in process of exhaustion. We are really stronger than when we began the war. The purpose of the people to maintain the integrity of the republic has never been shaken. ”

“ The Union armies will be very greatly reduced next year by the expiration of the term of service of many of the men. How will you fill up the ranks? The people are divided; one-third or more, as the election shows, are positively and unalterably for carrying it on until the rebellion is thoroughly subjugated; the remainder of the people, when the clouds gather black and threatening again, when another draft comes, and increased taxation, the peace men, and the timid, facile, doubtful men, will go over to the opposition, and make it a majority. ”

“ Hence the people--the brave, honest, self-denying people--the people who have furnished the men, and who are ready to pay the taxes necessary to crush the rebellion, and who are determined to establish national unity based on liberty--they are more wise, less factious, and more disinterested than the politicians. ”

“ All thoughtful observers know that in time of war, and especially civil war, the passions, prejudices, and convictions of men become strongly excited and difficult to control. The people are easily led to throw off the restraints of law, and to adopt questionable means to secure their ends. There was danger, grave danger, in this election.
The safety and triumph of law, order, and the Constitution were largely due to the forbearance, the patriotism, and the personal character of the President. ”

“ His majority of the popular vote was nearly half a million, a majority greater than has been given before or since for any presidential candidate. Those who feared the ordeal of a popular election amidst the excitement and passion of civil war, were compelled to acknowledge the calmness, the sobriety, the wisdom and dignity with which the people passed through the crisis.
As soon as the result was known, General Grant telegraphed from City Point his congratulations, and added that "the election having passed off quietly... is a victory worth more to the country than a battle won." ”

“ The success of the national armies, the undiminished ability of the government to carry on the war, and its unflinching determination to do so until its objects were fully accomplished, inspired a constantly increasing confidence in the loyal people, and the rebels became more and more desperate and disheartened. Loyal state governments, with constitutions securing freedom to all, had been organized in Arkansas and Louisiana, and movements in the same direction were in progress, and soon to be successful, in Missouri, Kentucky, and Tennessee. Maryland was at peace under a free government. ”

“ The great mass of the people stood firmly by him. They trusted him fully, and while the politicians, a majority of both Houses of Congress, and the great leaders of the press in the great cities, were not favorable to his re-election, the people, with the instinctive good sense which characterized them during the war, were almost universally in his favor. The prominent men who opposed him in Congress, and out of it, could get no following. ”

“ The union republican party declared for the most vigorous prosecution of the war to the complete suppression of the rebellion, the utter and complete extinction of slavery--approving of the anti-slavery measures of Congress and the Executive, and the pending anti-slavery amendment to the Constitution. The democratic convention denounced the action of Congress and the Executive, declared the war "a failure," and that peace should be sought through a national convention, or other feasible means. ”

“ I say this because I believe the radical Germans who support Fremont, who have done so much in this contest to sustain free institutions, cannot be induced by their enthusiasm for a man to desert or endanger the triumph of their principles.
"The hour is critical. We approach the very crisis of our fate as a nation. With union and harmony our success is certain.
"The Presidential election rapidly approaches. We cannot divert attention from it by postponing the convention. We cannot safely change our leaders in the midst of the storm raging around us. ”

“ Mr. Lincoln declared that the only ground on which he could rest the justice of war--either with his own people, or with foreign powers--was that it was not a war for conquest, for that the states had never been separated from the Union. Consequently, he could not recognize another government inside of the one of which he alone was President; nor admit the separate independence of states that were yet a part of the Union. 'That,' said he, 'would be doing what you have so long asked Europe to do in vain, and be resigning the only thing the armies of the Union have been fighting for.'
"Mr. ”

“ I repeat, we cannot safely or wisely change our leader in the midst of the great events which will not wait for conventions. Such is the instinctive, nearly universal judgment of the people. Let, then, the convention meet and ratify the choice which the people have already so clearly indicated. ”

“ Both read the same Bible, and pray to the same God, and each invokes His aid against the other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God's assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men's faces. ”

“ The minds of the people are fixed upon the great contest for national existence, and are impatient of quarrels and controversies among ourselves. The opposition to the President in our own party, talented, eloquent, zealous, and active as it is, has scarcely produced a ripple on the wave of public sentiment which is so strongly running in favor of Mr. Lincoln's re-election.
"There is no organization among the friends of the President, they are doing nothing ”

“ A few disappointed members of the party met at Cleveland, Ohio, and nominated General Fremont for President, but this nomination was so obviously without popular support that Fremont withdrew, and his friends generally voted for Lincoln. An attempt was made to bring out General Grant as a candidate, but the people saw that he was more useful at the head of their armies. General Grant himself, with the good sense, fidelity, and integrity which marked his career, refused to have his name used to divide the Union party. ”

“ The agents of Davis were also informed that Congress had, by a constitutional majority, adopted the joint resolution, submitting to the states the proposition to abolish slavery throughout the Union, and that there was every reason to believe it would be adopted by three-fourths of the states, so as to become a part of the Constitution. The rebel agents earnestly desired a temporary cessation of hostilities, and a postponement of the questions, but to this the President would not listen. ”

“ The people would not respond to their appeals. They said: "We know and trust Lincoln, and we will not change pilots in the midst of the storm." To use his own homely but expressive illustration, they said: "We will not swap horses while fording the stream."
The opposition to him was divided in its preferences. Some were for General Fremont, and more for Salmon P. Chase, the Secretary of the Treasury. He had been a trusted leader in the anti-slavery movement, a distinguished senator, an able secretary, but he had the fault of many great men; he was ambitious, he wished to be President. ”

“ Now, at the expiration of four years, during which public declarations have been constantly called forth on every point and phase of the great contest which still absorbs the attention and engrosses the energies of the nation, little that is new could be presented. ”

“ President, you do not realize how intensely the people desire any peace consistent with national integrity and honor." He begged Mr. Lincoln to extend safe conduct to certain rebel agents then at Niagara, that they might submit their propositions. ”

“ As an illustration of the opinion of Congress, the following incident is recalled. A prominent editor from the interior of Pennsylvania, a warm friend of the President, came to Washington in the winter of 1864, and, going to the Congressional leader, Mr. Thaddeus Stevens, said: "Introduce me to some member of Congress friendly to Mr. Lincoln's renomination." "Come with me," replied Stevens. They came to the seat of the member from the Chicago District in Illinois. Addressing him, Mr. Stevens said: "Here is a man who wants to find a Lincoln member of Congress. ”

“ And, as their cause became more and more dark and uncertain, schemes of desperation, involving the burning of Northern cities, murder, robbery, and assassination, were being discussed and organized by the desperate men who began to despair of success in civilized warfare. ”

“ Blair to Jefferson Davis. The visit of Mr. Blair resulted in the appointment by Davis, of Alexander H. Stephens, R.M.T. Hunter, and John A. Campbell, to confer with the President on the subject of peace, on the basis of his letter to Mr. Blair. When their arrival at the camp of General Grant was announced, Secretary Seward was charged by the President with representing the government at the proposed informal conference. With the frankness which was characteristic of Mr. Lincoln, he instructed Mr. ”