Jr. Thomas Dixon

“ Lincoln
Tell me one thing—is the man who has this appointment at eight the traitor whom Raymond's Committee is trying to put in your place——?
Lincoln
No! Yet—if there is anywhere a better man who can render the country a greater service than I can, he ought to be in my place——
Mrs. Lincoln
But don't you see that it isn't really the man who can give the greater service who will win in such a treacherous fight? It's the liar and the hypocrite who may win.
Lincoln
I have no right in such an hour to think of my own ambitions. ”

“ Stanton
That draft will be all right, Stevens! Now all together!
[Stanton leads and all sing.]
[Lincoln listens with bowed head.]
We are coming, Father Abraham, three hundred thousand more,
From Mississippi's winding stream and from New England's shore;
We leave our plows and workshop, our wives and children dear,
With hearts too full for utterance, with but a single tear,
We dare not look behind us but steadfastly before,
We are coming, Father Abraham, three hundred thousand more!
Chorus
We are coming, we are coming, our Union to restore! ”

“ Davis
My friend, the South stands for a principle—their equal rights under the Constitution which their fathers created. This country has always been a Republic of Republics—not an Empire. We are fighting for the right of local self-government which we won from the tyrants of the old world. The states of the Union have always been sovereign. We never paused to figure on success or failure, sir. Five million Southern freemen drew their sword against twenty millions because their rights had been invaded. ”

“ First Negro
Yes, sir——
[The ebony faces with their cream white teeth showing in smiles and their wide rolling eyes make a striking contrast to the rugged face and poise of the President.]
Lincoln
Your race is suffering, in my judgment, the greatest wrong inflicted on any people. But even when you cease to be slaves, you are yet far removed from being placed on an equality with the white race. On this broad continent, not a single man of your race is made the equal of a single man of ours——
First Negro
It's so—yes, it's so——! ”

“ Lincoln
[Tenderly.]
But, come now, my son, put yourself in my place! I'm here to save the Union for which you are fighting—for which you have poured out your blood. I've armed two million men and we are spending four millions a day, to fight the South for trying to secede. My opponents, taking advantage of our sorrow, harangue the people and elect hostile legislatures in the Northern states. They were about to pass ordinances of Secession and establish a Northwestern Confederacy! Shall I fight Secession in the South and merely argue with it here? ”

“ I know that miles of hospital barracks are the witnesses of our agony. I know that every city, town and village is in mourning. From these stricken homes there has arisen a storm of protest against the new leader of the army. The word butcher is bandied from lip to lip. They tell me that Grant is merely a bulldog fighter—that he can win only as long as thousands are poured into his ranks to take the place of the dead—They tell me that he has no genius, no strategy, no skill. ”

“ With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to 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 orphan—to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and all nations.
[Fade out with the light on Lincoln's face as he utters the last word.] ”

“ And you will not interfere to give these accused men a trial?
Lincoln
I dare not interfere! The civil law must be suspended for the moment—as the law of life is suspended while the surgeon cuts a cancer out of bleeding flesh! I cannot shoot one soldier for desertion if I allow the man to go free who causes him to desert——
[He pauses, and puts his hands on Vaughan's shoulders.] ”

“ Stevens
We denounce first your policy of reconstruction in the South as weak and vacillating—a civil and military failure. As the army advances, the South should be held as conquered soil, its civilization torn up by the roots, the property of the Southern white people confiscated and given to the negroes. The ballot must be taken from the whites and given to their slaves. We demand this just vengeance and we will be content with nothing less! ”

“ I have been praying for you, day and night, and I've come this morning to bring you this message—Be strong and courageous, and God will bring the Nation through!
Lincoln
You say this to me—standing beside the grave of your son?
The Woman
And beside the cot of my other boy of sixteen who was dangerously wounded in General Grant's last battle. I am proud of two such sons to lay on the altar of my country. I had to tell you that I'm praying for you. ”

“ Lincoln
[Bending in sorrowful amazement and touching Vaughan's head.]
Why,—what's the matter, my boy——? I'm the only man to despair. You're just a Captain in the army. You have only to obey your superior officer. If to be the head of hell is as hard as what I've had to undergo here, I could find it in my heart to pity Satan himself. And if there's a man outside of perdition who suffers more than I do, I pity him——! ”

“ Lincoln
As Chief Magistrate of the people, I have been clothed with that power, Stanton——
Stanton
[Angrily.]
You have no right to exercise it under the present conditions! Discipline in our armies must be maintained. You are hamstringing me and every General in the field—by suspending the death penalty of our Courts-Martial. Men are deserting in thousands and we've got to put a stop to it.
Lincoln
That's what I say——! Bring to me the traitors who are causing them to desert, and see what I'll do to them!
Stanton
You can't evade the issue I'm making, sir! ”

“ Therefore in my Proclamation of Emancipation, I purposely did not raise the question of the right or wrong of slavery. If slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong. But the Constitution of the United States, which I have sworn to uphold in the border states of Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri, guarantees to their people the right to hold slaves if they choose. ”

“ Lincoln
[Paces the floor a moment and then faces the Committee.]
It surpasses human belief! Future generations will hold it incredible—that you, my party leaders, should heap this insult upon the man who led you to your first and only victory. That you should come here to-day to ask me to quit under fire, to sacrifice without a blow all I hold worth fighting for on this earth——! ”

“ I need two things to carry this election and save the Union—a single victory in the field to lift our people out of the dumps, and a word from Jefferson Davis that there can be no peace save in division! I know Davis. We were both born in Kentucky, on almost the same day. He holds that position. But the peace party of the North refuse to believe it. They say he will compromise. Now I've sent two men down there—Colonel Jacquess, a Methodist clergyman, of our hospital service, and John R. Gilmore of the Tribune, old Greeley's paper. They go as private citizens of the North, who desire peace. ”

“ First Negro
Let our great leader show us the way——
Lincoln
The Colony of Liberia is an old one, and it is open to you. I am now arranging to open another in Central America. You are intelligent and know that success does not so much depend on external help as on self-reliance. If you will engage in the enterprise I will spend the money Congress has entrusted to me for this purpose. I ask you to consider it seriously, not for yourselves merely, nor for your race and ours for the present time, BUT FOR THE GOOD OF MANKIND.
First Negro
We will, sir——! ”

“ The North was mad and blind and would not let us govern ourselves, and now it must go on until the last man of this generation falls in his tracks and their children seize their muskets and fight our battle—unless you acknowledge our right to self-government. We are not fighting for Slavery. We are fighting for independence and that or extermination we will have——
Jacquess
[Protesting.]
We have no wish to exterminate the South! But we must crush your armies. ”

“ The Army was behind you, to a man! I sounded the officers, I sounded the men. They were against me and with you. If the leaders had dared risk their necks on a revolution, they might have won and set up a Dictatorship!
McClellan
Just so!
Lincoln
This power over men which you possess, General McClellan, is a marvelous thing. It is a dangerous force. It can be used to create a Nation, or destroy one. Because you held this power over your men, I honestly believed you were the ablest General in sight, and I called you back to your high position. ”

“ If General Hood fails to hold Atlanta, Sherman can cut the South in two and my supplies fail. My men are living now on parched corn. If Sherman takes Atlanta, I cannot get the corn.
Davis
What is the spirit of your men at this moment, General?
Lee
A more formidable force was never set in motion than the army I command, sir. They are our stark fighters—men who individually or in the mass can be depended on for any feat of arms in the power of mortals to accomplish. I know them from experience. They will blanch at nothing—yet they must have food. ”

“ Lincoln
[Angrily.]
And I'm going to say something to you now. I thought this morning that you would treat those scoundrels with the contempt they deserve when they dared to ask you to sacrifice yourself and the cause of the Union to the ambitions of some traitor behind them.
Lincoln
No! No! They're honest in what they say——
Mrs. Lincoln
[Furious.]
You're too good and simple for this world! Don't you know that some schemer is behind all this——?
Lincoln
Maybe—— It's not a crime, Mother, for a man to aspire to high office, if the bee's in his bonnet. ”

“ And if old Jubal Early had been a little earlier, he would have burned Washington, too—but thank God, Grant got here in time—didn't he? What have you got to say to that?
Stevens
That Lee's strategy has been superb, his moral victory complete! He holds Grant by the throat while he invades the North, and shells our Capitol—a feat that not one of your generals has yet done for Richmond in four years—and still you cling to Grant——!
Lincoln
[Angrily.]
Now, I'm going to talk plain English to you, Stevens. You're an Abolitionist, and you can't do Grant justice. ”

“ The Constitution of the Republic guarantees to every freeman the right to trial in open court, confronted by his accusers——
Lincoln
[Passionately.]
But we are fighting a war for the life of the Constitution itself! I did not begin it. Once begun it must be fought to the end and the Nation saved. We must prove now that among freemen there can be no successful appeal from the ballot to the bayonet. ”

“ Virginia
Yes—loyal—with all my heart—to Virginia!
[The trembling little fingers hand the pass back as the tears roll down her cheeks. Lincoln looks away to hide from her his own emotion, stoops and takes her hand in his. His voice is low and tender and full of feeling.] ”

“ Betty
[Chokes.]
If he ever comes out!
Lincoln
Oh! He'll come out——
[He stops and listens at the telegraph instrument again, and sighs in disappointment.]
He'll come out somewhere—It's a habit Uncle Billy has——
Betty
[Hopelessly.]
They've no news at the War Department either.
Lincoln
No news is generally good news from Sherman.
[Betty turns away to hide her tears and Lincoln follows her with tender pleading.]
Come, come, my dear—these tears won't do! You've got to help me now!
[Betty brushes the tears away.]
I may have sent your lover to his death. I know that! ”

“ Davis
The States are sovereign, General Lee—for this principle we are fighting.
Lee
Then I think it may be time to ask ourselves, heart to heart, the question whether the Confederacy, as organized, does not carry within its own body the seeds of death? The rights of a state must somewhere yield to the supreme power of a nation. The Negro will make a brave soldier, and he can save the South. ”

“ For one thing—you have never yet chosen a successful General. The South has not changed Commanders since Jeff Davis appointed Robert E. Lee. In thirty days of the last campaign in a series of massacres, Lee has killed and wounded sixty-two thousand of our men—more than he himself commanded—and Grant has only reached the point where McClellan stood in 1862. He could have marched there by McClellan's old line without the loss of a man. Washington is piled with the wounded, the dying and the dead. ”

“ Raymond
Your plan to colonize the Negro race as expressed in your Proclamation of Emancipation and in the bill which you have had passed through Congress has hurt your best friends——
Lincoln
And why should it? My views on that subject were known to all men before you nominated me first in Chicago, four years ago. I said then that I believed there is a sharp physical difference between the white and black races, and I have always linked colonization with freedom. The Negro cannot remain in a free democracy unless we absorb him into our social and political life. ”

“ I saw that you were absolutely fearless and absolutely honest, that your nerves were made of steel and your capacity for work was boundless. Even in your passions and hatreds, you showed a loyalty to the Union that rose above the parties and creeds of a lifetime. I like men of your strong personality. They stand between a nation and hell. ”

“ We must fight to win. Grant is the ablest general we have developed. His losses are appalling—but the struggle is on now to the bitter end! Our resources are exhaustless. The South cannot replace her fallen soldiers—and therefore her losses are fatal! If we continue to fight, five millions cannot whip twenty millions—the end is certain—and we're now locked in the last death grapple before—VICTORY! ”