USA > Washington DC > Washington DC > Washington : the capital city and its part in the history of the nation > Part 10
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There were, at the height of the war, twenty- one hospitals in and about Washington. One of those who took an earnest, systematic inter- est in the sick and wounded was the wife of the President. Mrs. Lincoln was a regular visi- tor to the various hospitals, and delighted to collect and distribute luxuries and comforts among the men who suffered by the casualties
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of war. Doubtless she found in these volun- tary ministrations a far greater measure of pleasure than attended the discharge of her duties as mistress of the White House, for Washington society was then a curious mixture of discordant elements. To many of its mem- bers the occupancy of the White House by a " Black Republican" President and his wife was a peculiarly hateful event, and caused both of them to be lampooned in a merciless manner. The ingenuity of malice did for a time seem to discredit the new régime, but the fact is now generally admitted that in birth, education, and character Mrs. Lincoln was the peer of any of the women who have presided over the White House. Mary Todd was a member of an old and honored Kentucky family, and had been carefully educated when, at the age of twenty- four, she became the wife of the future Presi- dent. The union was one of affection, and Mrs. Lincoln, a woman of wit. pride, and sterling sense, remained her husband's most trusted ad- viser until the end of his days. He had con- fidence in her judgment and good faith, and Herndon tells us that "her decision always ended the matter with Lincoln." She was well
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prepared to assume a leading part when they took up their residence in Washington, and one who speaks with the authority of intimate per- sonal association declares that no queen could have comported herself with more dignity than Mrs. Lincoln at all public functions. That the White House witnessed few festivities during the war, and that a certain class should have stigmatized its mistress without qualification for the high station to which she had been called, were " moral curiosities of a venomous time."
Secretaries Chase and Seward were conspicu- ous figures in most of the public gatherings of the war period, but the other members of the Cabinet were not much seen in Washington so- ciety. This was especially true of Secretary Welles, a mild-visaged man of gentle speech, not readily accessible to visitors, whose vener- able appearance and conservative methods af- forded excuse for many an amusing tale. One of these stories, put forth by a well-known humorist of the time, told how a dying sailor in one of the Washington hospitals expressed his desire to see his old grandmother before he died, and how the attendant at his bedside, having asked Secretary Welles if he would
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personate that relative, was told that the Sec- retary would do it with pleasure, but he was then busy examining a model of Noah's ark with a view to introducing it into the United States navy. Secretary Welles, it should be added, was most unpopular with writers for the press, though he continued to hold office until the close of Johnson's term.
President Lincoln's Cabinet, however, did not long retain its original form. Edwin M. Stanton at the end of nine months replaced Simon Cameron, who had proved a hopelessly incompetent Secretary of War; early in 1863 Caleb B. Smith, of Indiana, was succeeded as head of the Interior Department by John P. Usher, of the same State; later in the year Attorney-General Bates gave way to James Speed, of Kentucky, an old and tried friend of the President, and in 1864 Postmaster-Gen- eral Blair resigned, William Dennison, of Ohio, being appointed to the vacant post. Usher, Speed, and Dennison were all men of ability, and gave to the Cabinet a unity of effort that hitherto had been lacking, but none of them won or holds so large a place in history as their colleague, Stanton.
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The latter's appointment gave striking proof of the wisdom and magnanimity which gov- erned all of President Lincoln's public acts. Stanton was a man of masterful quality, and he had shown his resolute patriotism while a member of Buchanan's Cabinet, but in other days he had subjected Lincoln to insult, and he had been the latter's most scornful critic since his election. The President, however, knew him to be of iron will and heroic mould, and the times demanded a man of this sort at the head of the War Department. Stanton's appointment, in which Lincoln cheerfully sank all personal considerations, proved one of the decisive events of the war. The new Secretary, who to wonderful talent for administration added the rare gift of bending strong men to his aims, was controlled only by one purpose, and that was the utter overthrow of the re- bellion. He had no other, as a hundred anec- dotes bear witness. The Legislature of Indiana adjourned in 1862 without making appropria- tions to carry on the government. Governor Morton went to Stanton for advice, and the Secretary at once drew a warrant on the Treas- ury for a quarter of a million, payable to Mor-
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ton's order. "If the cause fails," said the governor, "you and I will be covered with prosecutions, imprisoned, driven from the coun- try." "If the cause fails," was Stanton's re- sponse, " I do not care to live."
The spirit revealed in these words governed his every act. He had no patience with the lag- gard or the dishonest man, and he wasted 110 time in tying or untying red tape. The grasp of his nervous hand on the lever was felt in every part of the vast war machine; he mas- tered not only the many-sided affairs of his department, but the details of military move- ments and strategy, and he knew how to choose the most efficient agent for the particular task in hand. A prominent Senator one day made his way into Stanton's presence, hot with anger against the quartermaster-general.
" Mr. Secretary," said he, "I wonder how a lawyer, as you are, can keep that man Meigs where he is. Why, he pays no regard to either law or justice! He is a disgrace to the army."
" Now, don't you say a word against Meigs," was the quiet reply. "He is the most useful man I have about me. True, he isn't a lawyer,
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and therefore he does many things that I wouldn't dare do."
" Then why in the name of heaven do you let him do them?" demanded the Senator.
" Somebody has to do them," was the an- swer, and the end also of the interview.
The human unit had small place in Stanton's plans. Men had suffered and died; more must do the same. The business in hand was to rain blows, to the last fibre of power, upon the armed foe. Yet he had always a willing and patient ear for the sick or wounded soldier, the plainly dressed woman, the aged of either sex; and he gave proof, on occasion, that beneath his grim and often forbidding exterior beat the tenderest of hearts. A wounded drummer- boy, sent from the front to a Washington hospital, was finally discharged for disability, but without the "descriptive papers" which would entitle him to his pay and transporta- tion home. He called daily for weeks at the medical head-quarters, only to be informed that the papers had not come, and that nothing could be done for him without them. A kindly citizen, to whom he told his story, advised him to apply personally to the Secretary of War. Il .- 14
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The ragged and shoeless lad accordingly pre- sented himself one morning at Stanton's house and rang the door-bell. The servant who an- swered refused either to admit him or to take a message to the Secretary, and the two were still engaged in an excited colloquy when Stanton came out of the house with a friend, on his way to the carriage that was to take him to the War Department. He stopped, heard the boy's story, and, turning to his companion, said,-
"Look at this poor child. He has been in this condition for weeks .. He has no money, no clothing; his health is broken down; he has been discharged from the service, and some mother in her distant home is now waiting for him. He says he can't get his pay, that he can't get transportation, and that he can't get away from this city. I will see why he cannot."
The Secretary's first impulse, noticing that the boy was shivering with cold, was to send him into the house by the fire, but fearing that he would be forgotten in the press of the day's business, he bade him follow the carriage to the War Office, at the same time ordering the coachman to drive more slowly than usual. Sec- retary and drummer-boy arrived at the entrance
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to the War Department at the same moment. Stanton, beckoning the child to follow him, en- tered the door of the first room that he came to, seated himself at a vacant desk, seized a pen, and wrote a peremptory order to have the drummer-boy's account ascertained from the best data at command, and then paid. This done, he rose from his seat, shook the little fellow's hand, and said,-
" Give my regards, my boy, to your mother and to all good mothers in her neighborhood who have their sons at the front. God bless you! Good-by !"
President Lincoln, coincident with his first call for volunteers, summoned Congress to con- vene in special session. When that body met on July 4, 1861, Stephen A. Douglas had been nearly a month in his grave. The last days of the great Democratic leader were the noblest of his entire career. He had, perhaps, done more than any other to hasten the conflict between the sections, but when it came he promptly arrayed himself on the side of the Union. " There can now," he declared, "be only patriots and trai- tors," and so saying, he placed himself beside his old antagonist, Lincoln, in defence of the
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government. His health, however, was broken past mending, and on June 3, 1861, he died in Chicago. His two sons were absent from his bedside when the end came, and his wife, lean- ing over her husband, asked if he had any word for them. Bracing himself for a final effort, he whispered. " Tell them to support the Con- stitution and obey the laws of their country." These were his last words. No political leader of his generation left behind him more devoted friends, and, had length of days been given him, he would have held a foremost place among the men who saved the Union.
Douglas's seat in the Senate was taken by Orville H. Browning, and other changes or additions brought to that body during the war period Lot M. Morrill, of Maine, William E. Sprague, of Rhode Island, Ira Harris and Ed- win D. Morgan, of New York, Edgar Cowan and Charles R. Buckalew, of Pennsylvania, John Sherman, of Ohio, Henry S. Lane and Thomas A. Hendricks, of Indiana, James M. Howard, of Michigan, Garrett Davis, of Kentucky, John B. Henderson and B. Gratz Brown, of Missouri, Timothy O. Howe, of Wisconsin, Alexander Ramsey, of Minnesota, William M. Stewart, of
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Nevada, and Milton S. Latham, of California. Four of the members of this group survive, but only one is now in public life. This is Stewart, of Nevada, who still serves his State in the Senate, a living link between the past and the present.
Stewart's colleague during his first years in the Senate was James W. Nye, a whilom New York politician whose gifts as a campaign ora- tor had made him governor of Nevada before its admission to Statehood. Nye was a Falstaff among legislators, overfond of late hours and the bottle, but his humor was seasoned with shrewd common sense, and his power for homely and telling illustration never failed him. Sum- ner once addressed the Senate in support of a bill to admit the Chinese to citizenship, and his carefully prepared speech made a deep impres- sion on his fellows. Nye followed him. "My good mother," said the latter, " was a frugal housewife, and excelled in the making of dough- nuts. There is something wrong about the boy who doesn't like doughnuts. I often watched my mother when she made the dough, and kneaded and shortened it until it was in fit con- dition. The result of my observation was that
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she always took a small piece of the dough and fried it in the fat before she risked the whole batch. She tried it first, and awaited results. Now, I know the Chinese at first-hand. They have nothing in common with us. They save their earnings, and then return, pigtail and all, to the Flowery Kingdom. You cannot make a citizen of a man who will not sacrifice his pigtail. I have listened with interest to the eloquent speech of my friend from Massachu- setts, but I suggest to him that it is far better and safer to follow my good mother's example. and fry a little piece of this suffrage dough before we risk the whole Chinese batch." Nye's two-minute speech demolished the labored argu- ment of Sumner, who could neither retort nor explain, and the bill failed of passage. All of Nye's speeches were full of droll illustrations like the doughnut simile; his wit was caustic yet delightful, and word that he was to speak always drew a crowd to the Senate gallery. His brilliant intellect was obscured, however, and he died utterly unconscious of who he was or what his victories had been.
Two other war-time Senators also abundantly endowed with humor were James W. Nesmith,
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of Oregon, and James A. McDougall, of Cali- fornia. Nesmith's wit was of the dryest sort, and he possessed, like Lincoln, a fund of anec- dote, which he had probably concocted in his own mind, as nobody had heard one of them until he told it. While standing one day in a group of Senators and Representatives who were ques- tioning him about his adventurous life,-he had been taken to Oregon when a child in arms, and had lived much in the wilderness,-Senator Wilson, of Massachusetts, said to him,-
"I understand, Mr. Nesmith, that you had never seen a railroad until you came East, and that everything of that sort in the way of mod- ern improvements was entirely new to you. Now, I am curious to know what struck you as being the most wonderful thing that met your observation on this side of the continent."
" Well," said Nesmith, putting on a quizzical expression, " I think that after the sensation of being here myself, what most excited my wonder was how so many other fools got here."
Nesmith was of the type of primitive border men who have now passed away, and he had the courage to write in the biographical notice which he contributed to the "Congressional
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Directory," " I received no education." His lan- guage, however, was never uncouth or his choice of words grotesque, and he proved a diligent and capable Senator. On the last day of his single term in the Senate, without bidding fare- well to any one, he walked from the Capitol to the railroad-station, carrying in his hand a plain carpet-bag that contained all his personal be- longings. Six years later he reappeared in Washington as a member of the House. He served his term and then went back to his farm in Oregon, never to return to the capital. Nes- mith's last days, like those of Nye, were passed in mental darkness.
McDougall was a native of New York, but had been a follower of Douglas in Illinois, from which State he was twice a Representative in Congress before his removal to California. A ripe scholar, especially learned in the classics, he was one of the most entertaining of speakers, and whenever he addressed the Senate com- mmanded close attention. McDougall's weak- ness was the bottle, and, though he was wont to declare that he " never got drunk above his hat-band." his bearing often belied his words. But, in liquor or out of it, his wit was ever
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uppermost, and he never missed an opportunity to coin a jest. When he left Washington at the close of his term a number of friends kept him company to the railroad-station. Bidding good-by to his clerk, he added, mournfully,- "I am going back to Albany, where I was born, to die."
" But if you are sick, Senator," said the clerk, why not remain here among your friends?"
"No, my son," was the reply, " I have rea- soned it all out, and Albany is the choice." Then, pausing for a moment to note the glance of inquiry for the reason, he added, "Because I feel in my heart that I can leave Albany with less regret than any place I ever saw."
Galusha A. Grow was Speaker of the first and Schuyler Colfax of the second war Con- gress. There were future Senators, Cabinet officials, and aspirants for the Presidency among the Representatives who found seats in the House during this period. These included George S. Boutwell, of Massachusetts, Thomas A. Jenckes, of Rhode Island, author of the first civil service act; James E. English, of Connec- ticut, Theodore M. Pomeroy and William A. Wheeler, of New York, William D. Kelley and
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Glenni W. Scofield, of Pennsylvania, Samuel Shellabarger and James M. Ashley, of Ohio, William S. Holman and Goodlove S. Orth, of Indiana, Daniel W. Voorhees, of the same State, whose career both in House and Senate proved his eloquence and his rugged partisanship; Wil- liam R. Morrison and Isaac N. Arnold, of Illi- nois, the latter Lincoln's trusted friend and biog- rapher ; James F. Wilson and John A. Kasson, of Iowa, William B. Allison, of the same State, now in length of service the oldest member of the Senate; William D. Washburn and Ignatius Donnelly, of Minnesota, and William Windom, of the same State, who afterwards was to serve a dozen years in the Senate and as Secretary of the Treasury under two Presidents.
Four other Representatives who came first into prominence during the war period demand de- tailed mention,-Roscoe Conkling, of New York, James G. Blaine, of Maine, James A. Garfield, of Ohio, and Samuel J. Randall, of Pennsylvania. Conkling sat eight years in the House and was then promoted to the Senate, of which he remained a member until his volun- tary retirement from public life. No abiding piece of legislation is identified with his name,
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and his final place in our history promises to be that of a resolute, imperious man, intense in his resentments and chivalric in his friendships, a partisan chief who was never so much at home as when in the thick of the fray. He was with- out creative genius, but he was an irresistible champion, and in the ability to vigorously set forth the ideals of his own party or to riddle with invective and sarcasm those of his adver- saries he was without an equal in his time. He was master of what Cicero called the apt, classic, and ornate style of oratory, and his brilliant, melodramatic career was mainly due to his use of it, a use which made him supreme in his ability to enforce his immediate purpose. Had some of his traits of character been as skilfully adjusted to his ambition as was his gift of speech his political end would not have been in sorrow.
Conkling was never popular with the masses. Blaine, on the other hand, early gained and maintained until the end a hold upon the affec- tions of the people surpassing that enjoyed by any other American statesman save Henry Clay. He was not the author during his eighteen years in Congress of any great or important measure,
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but he was the able opponent or defender of many; and at the same time he proved him- self master of all the arts of the consummate politician and a born leader of his fellows. He was, Colonel McClure tells us, " the most mag- netic man I have ever met." Personal qualities of this sort, combined with the equipment of a great popular orator, early brought Blaine into promi- nence, and made him for the better part of twenty years the most potential figure in his party. The animosities which attend upon long- continued leadership cost him the Presidency, for which he was a candidate in four national conventions, but never the foremost place ac- corded him by the rank and file of his party, and the memory of him that endures is that of one of the ablest, bravest, and mnost ardently beloved of our public men.
Garfield, like Conkling, owed his political tri- umphs to his gifts as an orator, and to a per- severing industry which made him familiar with all the varied processes of legislation. He en- tered the House in 1863, and he served there until nominated and elected President. His contributions to its debates, in the years inter- vening between these events, excelled in volume
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and effectiveness those of any other member. Indeed, a collection of his speeches would furnish a complete epitome of the history of the stirring era of which he was a part. Those who heard him speak, either in Congress or on the stump, retain a vivid recollection of his oratory. A master of clear, condensed statement, " he gath- ered up at the climax of a speech," writes an old associate, " all the forces of statement and logic he had been marshalling, and hurled them upon his listeners with tremendous force," while " his gestures became so energetic and forcible that he seemed, at times, to be beating down oppo- sition with sledge-hammer blows, throwing his arguments forward like shot from a cannon."
Randall entered the House on the same day as Garfield, and he remained continuously a member until his death,-a period of twenty- seven years. Growing steadily into prominence, he was thrice called to the Speakership, and thereafter was for a decade the most power- ful individual member on the floor. A man of few words, he was seldom heard in debate, though, on occasion, he could prove himself a skilled disputant. The source of his influence lay in his integrity, his quiet industry, his close
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attention to public duties, and the knowledge of parliamentary practice, which the last-named quality combined with long service gave him. He was, besides, a man of unbending will, and nothing could swerve him from his convictions. Randall was greatest when leading a forlorn hope, and his fight against the Force bill of 1875, when for two days and nights he never left his post, remains one of the abiding traditions of Congress. He again proved his majestic cour- age by his course as Speaker during the excite- ment incident to the disputed Presidential elec- tion of 1876, when, by a quiet exercise of moral power such as has been seldom witnessed, he compelled his party followers in the House to abide by their own action, and peacefully acqui- esce in the decision of the Electoral Commission. The resolute foresight which he then displayed, had he performed no other public service, would alone entitle him to the lasting gratitude of his countrymen.
Randall, Garfield, and the rest, in 1861, had their legislative spurs yet to win. The major- ity's undisputed leader on the floor of the House, from the opening of the war until his death in 1868, was Thaddeus Stevens, of Pennsylvania.
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This uncommon man, though without graces of person, social standing, or moral character, by sheer force of intellectual power for seven years ruled the House with a rod of iron. His energy was fierce, his scorn withering, and he had no patience with men who wasted oil on troubled waters. Yet there was no malice in his nature, and his grim humor often made even those towards whom it was directed laugh. He threw off good things without apparent effort, and could dispose of a long speech in a single remark. When a member once abandoned him, on a railway committee, he rose and said,-
" While this House has slept the enemy has sown tares among our wheat. The corporations of this country, animated by the genius of evil, and perhaps by the power of argument alone, have stolen away from the majority of my com- mittee the member from Connecticut. The enemy are now in a majority of one. I move to increase the number of that committee to twelve."
The motion was granted, and Stevens retained control of his committee, nor did the member who had yielded to " the power of argument" appear in his seat for a week thereafter. A
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Southern member, on another occasion, deliv- ered a long speech defending Chief Justice Taney and upholding the Dred Scott decision. " Yes," answered Stevens, "that decision damned Chief Justice Taney to everlasting fame and I fear to everlasting fire." Stevens hated slavery and believed in human equality. When he died, his body was buried, at his command, in a cemetery where black as well as white were admitted.
A colossal task confronted Congress when it convened in special session on July 4, 1861. It did its work with thoroughness and despatch. All that the President and his Cabinet asked for was granted, and in the thirty-three days which the session lasted there were enacted many of the most important measures ever framed by Congress. The work thus begun was continued at the regular sessions that followed, and to the Thirty-seventh Congress belongs the credit for such vital measures as the Morrill tariff, the national banking system, the Homestead bill, and the legislation which made possible the first railway across the continent.
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