USA > Illinois > The era of the Civil War, 1848-1870 > Part 39
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In the fiercely contested canvass, the advantage lay with the republicans who had set out to win. From Senator Trum- bull and Yates down the best campaigners entered the field. The full influence of the Union League organization was wielded for their candidates; the G. A. R. posts were sources of additional strength. When the democrats hurled at them the epithets of " nigger-equality party" and "miscegens," they replied with salvos against the "treason party " and "copper- heads." When the bitter contest came to an end in November it was found that the republicans had won a sweeping victory, involving over fifty thousand majority for Logan, ten out of the other thirteen congressmen, and a two-thirds majority of the legislature. Illinois, an old stronghold of the democracy, became a citadel of republican power.
45 Chester Picket Guard, September 12, 1866.
46 Aurora Beacon, August 16, 23, 1866; Joliet Signal, August 7, Septem- ber 18, 25, 1866; Illinois State Register, September 27, 1866; Rockford Register, August 18, 1866; Chicago Tribune, October 16, November 6, 1866.
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XIX. THE SPOILS AND THE SPOILERS, 1867-1870
D URING the Civil War the people of Illinois had given themselves over entirely to national political issues; after the election of 1866, however, they wearily yielded to a reaction which reflected their satisfaction that the sectional issue had passed the crisis. The political majority came to feel that, with no effective opposition at home, they would do well to intrust Andrew Johnson and the tedious reconstruction prob- lems to the care of the overwhelming republican majority in congress; the successive steps in the controversy between the president and the legislative department were mere journal- istic details which they could follow in the newspapers. It was becoming high time, they realized, that problems vital to the future of the state -too long neglected and sidetracked- should receive full and earnest consideration.
When the general assembly convened on January 7, 1867, the legislators first cleared the way for their new rôle by dis- posing of the election of the United States senator. The claim of Trumbull's supporters that the republican victory was a verdict in favor of his reelection was subtly challenged by rival candidates. The senator was criticized for "his lack of social qualities, his austerity of manners, his aristocratic sympathies and his natural tendencies toward conservatism."1 For, strangely enough, Trumbull, the leader of the radical forces of Illinois during the Civil War, was a true conservative; and he had now to encounter the censure of certain "radical" critics.2 General Logan, Governor Oglesby, and General Palmer, leagued together in common cause against Trumbull, were all ready to contest his claims. Palmer lay low for a time; but when Logan and Oglesby, in order to hold their
I Jacksonville Journal, January 8, 1867.
2 Trumbull might not have broken with Johnson had not the issue become so direct and personal. Chicago Post, March 9, 1866.
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own offices, transferred their claims to him he stepped out into the open. He fast gained strength for his election through the labors of the Grand Army of the Republic. Palmer's friends insisted that their favorite, and not Trumbull, had originated the civil rights act; Trumbull, however, succeeded in refuting this claim -indeed, as the people looked back upon his record in congress, they could not gainsay his title to reëlec- tion. The factional contest came to an end in the republican legislative caucus on the test vote to proceed to the nomination of a candidate by viva voce vote, for Palmer's followers failed decisively in their plans to secure a secret ballot; thereupon Trumbull was nominated by acclamation.3 The formal ballot- ing in joint session gave the veteran statesman his credentials for another six years in the senate.
Governor Oglesby in his message to the legislature recog- nized that the day had passed when it sufficed to drag civil war issues across the political arena; indeed, he bespoke the needs of the state in a way that even secured the approval of many political opponents. "War, with all its scourges, has fled from our land, and gentle peace returns to heal its wounds," he pointed out. "A new career now opens to our State It is our duty to hold constantly in view every interest of the commonwealth; to bravely meet every requirement necessary to the full development of our natural advantages; to cherish the arts and sciences ; to foster education, the soul of the State ; and, with charitable hands, to meet and lift up the unfortu- nate." 4
Before the assembly could consider the recommendations of the governor it found itself engulfed by demands for pri- vate legislation; lobbyists and logrolling forces were so active that just to meet their insistent demands would have more than consumed the forty-two days allotted by the constitution to the normal session. Batches of questionable private bills were forced through both houses without an adequate investigation of their contents; into one omnibus three hundred and twelve such items were bundled. A wave of criticism rose from
3 Illinois State Journal, January 14, 15, 1867; Chicago Tribune, January 12, 14, 15, 1867; Belleville Democrat, February 14, 1867; Cairo Democrat, Septem- ber 10, 1867.
4 Reports General Assembly, 1867, 1: 3, 4 ff .; Joliet Signal, January 15, 1867.
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voters throughout the state and from the organs of both par- ties, together with a demand for a revision of the constitution to secure a longer session and to prohibit the creation of pri- vate corporations by legislative enactment. "About ten or twelve millions of dollars [have been] voted into the pockets of corporations, contractors, and speculators," announced the Carthage Republican, March 7, 1867. Charges of corrupt rings and bargains and of direct bribery began to circulate to such a degree that finally a special senate committee was appointed to make an investigation.5
Public legislation had to be scrambled through in the closing days of the session. Proposals for railroad legislation and for a constitutional amendment establishing "impartial suffrage" in the state died of sheer neglect. Before dispersing the legis- lature passed bills for the erection of a new penitentiary in the southern part of the state, for the construction of a new statehouse at an estimated cost of three million dollars, and for the location of the industrial university; provision was made for the regulation of warehouses and for the inaugura- tion of a scheme of canal and river improvements, besides action submitting to the people the question of a constitutional convention.
Never had the adjournment of the general assembly met with such a widespread feeling of relief; democrats and repub- licans alike hailed the "blessed day" when "the most dis- graceful Legislative body that ever convened in the State" came to an end. Not only were the legislators lacking in dig- nity-even the senate being the scene of frequent disorder with members shying books and paper wads at each other and at the speaker; but, more important, they seemed lacking in that essential virtue of honesty." The shortcomings of the majority were admitted on both sides, by the democrats out
5 Chicago Post, February 25, 28, 1867; Ottawa Weekly Republican, Janu- ary 31, 1867; Chicago Tribune, February 18, 19, 1867; Joliet Signal, February 19, 1867; Cairo Democrat, February 26, 1867.
" Ibid., March 1, 1867. In such a scene, with the clerks vainly attempting to read the bills then passing, the speaker, wielding the gavel with the grace of a stone-cutter, declared the senate adjourned sine die. Chicago Tribune, March 1, 1867;Aurora Beacon, March 21, 1867. The Carthage Republican, March 7, declared it "the most corrupt and imbecile legislature which ever disgraced the commonwealth of Illinois."
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of partisanism, and by the republicans because in the contest for the spoils the party became divided into sectional groups and into "rings." Critics of both parties in Chicago and northern Illinois declared the statehouse and southern peni- tentiary legislation a "direct and open steal" engineered by an "industrial university-statehouse-penitentiary ring" which secured to Champaign the location of the agricultural college.7 Reënforced by the disappointed ambitions of other cities like Decatur, which had looked to a transfer of the capital, they launched an especially aggressive attack against the "swindle" of the new statehouse law. The constitutionality of the legis- lation was brought before the courts; and although for a six- month the odds seemed to favor its rejection, the supreme court ended the controversy by upholding the law.8 Spring- field forces, regardless of party withstanding the opposition ti.at came from every corner of the state, launched a counter attack against "the canal swindle" enacted by a "corrupt squadron " of northern Illinois interests. "A bigger steal upon the people of the State than is contemplated by its pet measure, the canal bill, can hardly be conceived," declared the State Journal. "What interests have the people of Central Illinois in widening the Michigan canal at an expense of twenty or thirty million dollars so as to make it navigable for boats ? What interest have the people of Southern Illinois in such a project? Not one cent's worth. Their business and commer- cial relations all lead in another direction." 9
In the midst of this confusing squabble Governor Oglesby whipped up the general assembly in two special sessions on June II and June 14 to adjust certain minor. matters and to amend the assessment laws of the state so as to make the shares of national bank stock liable for taxes. The confirmation of his nominees for canal commissioners and southern penitentiary commissioners the senate recalcitrantly voted to postpone until
7 Chicago Post, February 28, 1867; Chicago Tribune, March 6, 1867; St. Louis Democrat clipped in Cairo Democrat, March 3, 1867; Aurora Beacon, March 21, 1867.
8 Chicago Post, February 25, March 15, 1867; Chicago Tribune, July 1, . 8, 11, 13, 16, 18, 19, 1867; Rockford Register, February 23, 1867; Illinois State Register, October 29, 1867; Jonesboro Gazette, February 23, 1867; Jacksonville Journal, February 12, 27, March 2, 1867.
9 Illinois State Journal, May 4, 14, 18, 1867.
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the next session.10 As a result two of the most important pieces of legislation practically became a dead letter. The statehouse appropriation was finally saved from destruction, and the location of the university at Urbana survived the opposition; a warehouse regulation act was the only import- ant measure which was put through without a barrage of criticism.
These legislative developments are indicative of a period of serious party disintegration, especially in the ranks of the republican majority in Illinois. Side issues crept into the local and county elections of the year and often enabled the demo- crats to make important gains; republican majorities were reversed in Peoria, Fulton, Mason, and certain other counties. Illinois republicans, surveying these losses in the light of the approaching presidential campaign, promptly connected them- selves with the movement for Grant's nomination, which they expected would draw out the full strength of the party. The democrats, alarmed at the republican enthusiasm for a man who had always been considered a democrat, now pointed out that Grant's candidacy was an indication of the fears of their opponents, who were willing to sacrifice principle for the sake of success. Sophisticated republican politicians, indeed, while conceding Grant's strength with the people and the Grand Army of the Republic, often had "serious doubts as to his fitness for a civil administration." 11 But as a fellow citizen, as a man with slight interest in partisan politics, and as a mod- erate on reconstruction, General Grant seemed on the score of availability to possess the formidable strength now imperative to the party.
Grant was not, moreover, a figure who would accentuate a line of cleavage in the republican ranks that had appeared during the impeachment proceeding against President John- son; for, although the hatred of the president had reached such proportions as to suggest the desirability of his removal, all could not concede the honesty of such a course. Many Illinois republicans had been loud in their demand for impeach-
10 Aurora Beacon, June 27, 1867; Champaign County Union and Gazette, July 10, 1867.
11 Koerner, Memoirs, 2: 480; Ottawa Free Trader, November 2, 1867.
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ment, and Governor Oglesby had sent a formal demand to Washington for action.12 When finally proceedings were instituted, John A. Logan took an active part as one of the managers in the prosecution. Some republicans, however, agreed with the democrats who characterized the impeach- ment as a partisan attack and the trial a farce; not many republicans were willing to acknowledge this, but the Jackson- ville Journal admitted that it was a case of "the bluffer bluffed." "The impeachment trial of the president is a neces- sity, because he cannot be removed in any other way, but it must necessarily be, in some measure, a farce." 13 The Chicago Tribune, which admitted that the indictment was in part a political attack, insisted that Johnson be convicted only if found guilty as charged; 14 on the other hand, certain repub- licans flatly demanded a conviction. The Tribune received advance information of the probable acquittal of the presi- dent, which was borne out when Senator Trumbull and six other republicans, including erstwhile radicals, voted with the democrats to defeat conviction. Although Trumbull's vote was in line with his entire course on reconstruction, it fell like a blow upon many of his constituents, and a bitter attack was launched upon him.
Certain republicans reconciled themselves to the failure of the impeachment trial on the score that it would save the party in the midst of the presidential contest from another internecine war on the tariff question-a serious question for the Illinois branch of the party. They had yielded the prin- ciple of protection in 1860, but under the heavy demand for revenue the Civil War tariffs had carried the duties to a point where they threatened to strangle the agricultural and produc- ing interests of the Mississippi valley. "We are being con- sumed by the good of New England and Pennsylvania," announced Dr. C. H. Ray. "If matters are not regulated and on a fairer and juster principle, the west will be badly injured before five years have elapsed. When will men see that legislative interference in trade as in religion or morals
12 Illinois State Journal, January 8, 29, 1867; Belleville Democrat, Decem- ber 12, 1867, March 12, 1868.
13 Jacksonville Journal, March 5, 1868.
14 Chicago Tribune, March 3, May 15, 1868.
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is always mischievous ?" 15 Early in 1866 a group of Chicago republicans, including the publishers of the Chicago Tribune, had organized a league for the protection to home labor as against foreign trade which bent its energies toward prevent- ing increased duties. Joseph Medill, " the oracle of the Pro- tectionists in the West," together with Horace White and other friends, threw their strength against such increases in 1866 and in 1867; they condemned the "gang of greedy speculators [who] seem to have got hold of the House of Representatives and are running the whole protection question into the ground." 16
The party decided to bury its family quarrels in the love feasts of the Chicago convention, for Illinois was again hon- ored by the republicans in the selection of the lake city. There on May 20 and 21 it was agreed that, in view of the general situation and in view of the demand that the party be held together for an approval of the votes of the thirty-five repub- lican senators who held Johnson guilty as charged, no tariff plank should be inserted in the national platform.17 There, too, General Grant was proposed by John A. Logan and unan- imously nominated for the presidency, while Schuyler Colfax was selected as the party's other standard bearer. Grant was strong in the availability of a military hero, which more than covered his shortcomings as a partisan.
Illinois democrats had at first offered Sidney Breese, chief justice of the supreme court of Illinois, as their candidate for the presidency, but it became evident that this was largely a compliment to a favorite son; in the closing weeks of the pre- convention campaign they generally took up George H. Pen- dleton of Ohio as the western candidate, and the state con- vention formally instructed the Illinois delegates to support Pendleton. The national convention at New York, first mak- ing concessions to the western section of the party in the platform that was adopted, ran up the names of Horatio
15 C. H. Ray to Trumbull, January 15, 1866, Joseph Medill et al. to Trum- bull, February 7, 1866, Trumbull manuscripts; Chicago Tribune, May 16, 1868. 16 Joseph Medill to Trumbull, July 1, 1866, C. H. Ray to Trumbull, Feb- ruary 2, 1866, E. C. Larned to Trumbull, July 2, 1866, Horace White to Trumbull, July 5, 1866, Trumbull manuscripts; Chicago Tribune, February 5, 1867.
17 Proceedings of the National Union Republican Convention, 1868, p. 84-85 et seq.
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Seymour of New York and Francis P. Blair of Missouri. Illinois democrats were decidedly disappointed with the nomi- nation of Seymour, who represented the eastern point of view on the currency question, which was coming to have so much significance in the politics of the day. Illinois as a western state was strongly in favor of inflation; it looked with suspicion upon the eastern demand for the withdrawal of greenbacks from circulation in order to hasten the resumption of specie payments. Pendleton's strength in the west had in large part grown out of his pet scheme for the payment of bonds in greenbacks on an inflation policy, which was known as the "Ohio idea." W. J. Allen and the Illinois delegation had contended vigorously at the national convention in favor of Pendleton's position, and since the convention had incorpo- rated a greenback clause in its platform, the democrats decided to interpret the nomination of Seymour, though a hard-money man, in this light.18
In state politics the old democratic leaders seem to have become so discouraged as to refuse the use of their names; the democrats, therefore, selected John R. Eden of Moultrie county to head their ticket against John M. Palmer, the almost unanimous choice of the republicans; and their candidate to oppose Logan for congressman-at-large was an unknown, W. W. O'Brien of Peoria. Most of the republican nominees were military men: besides Palmer and Logan, they named General C. E. Lippincott for auditor, General E. N. Bates for treasurer, Brevet General Bushnell for attorney-general, and Colonel Dougherty for lieutenant governor, an old Breckinridge democrat in 1860 and an early opponent of the war. Here was a dish entirely to the liking of all brands of Civil War veterans. 19 In the campaign that followed the advantage lay decidedly with the republicans. In addition to their disappointment at the national outlook, the democrats were disheartened at their failure to secure a stronger state
18 Cairo Democrat, July 13, 1867, February 8, March 5, July 9, 16, 1868; Illinois State Register, July 12, 1867, February 11, 1868; Joliet Signal, July 16, 1867, February 8, 25, March 10, 1868; Belleville Democrat, July 25, 1867, July 16, 1868; Paxton Record, July 12, 1868; Carthage Republican, July 16, 1868.
19 Cairo Democrat, May 12, 1868; Champaign County Union and Gazette, May 13, 1868; Ottawa Free Trader, May 30, 1868.
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ticket. On most issues the democrats had to take the offensive, while the republicans could contentedly trust to past accom- plishments. With little ardor the democrats took up the task, but duty drove them on. They began a campaign "to end the reign of the bond holders by paying off these bonds in the same kind of money which the law compels the farmer, the mechanic and the laborer to take for the proceeds of their honest toil;" 20 they asked the people of the state if they were willing " to swallow the negro-suffrage pill prepared for them" by the Chicago convention and asserted that it was "the holy mission of Democracy to restore political power exclusively to the Caucasian race." 21 The people were called upon to behold the "radical platform" with its "praises of the negro and promises to him but not a word from which the overburdened white toiler can derive any comfort;" it was the work of "a gathering of selfish and corrupt politicians, whose only object is to scheme for office and to devise means whereby they may be enabled to filch from the National Treasury the money which is wrung from the sweat and toil of the laboring white men of the nation." 22 The real issue, they proclaimed, was aristocracy versus democ- racy : "We have also an aristocratic class of citizens endowed with peculiar privileges, a bonded aristocracy, whose wealth is exempt from taxation for the support of Government, and who demand the interest due on their bonds paid in gold, while the laborer and the mechanic must take a depreciated currency for his labor." The new régime which would push on radical reconstruction at a terrific expense to the already overburdened taxpayer of the west would be " a regime of force,
introduced by a shoulder-strapped President, to culminate in the long cherished hope of an empire." 23
Seymour, on the other hand, would reduce the expenses of the government; would redeem the bonds in currency; would simplify the revenue laws, and cut down taxation; would modify the tariff laws, with a view to revenue, and not with a view to protection; and would make capital instead of labor
20 Carthage Republican, July 23, 1868.
21 Rushville Times, July 2, 1868.
22 Belleville Democrat, June 25, 1868.
23 Rushville Times, July 30, 1868; Illinois State Register, July 29, 1868.
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bear the burdens of taxation. He would cut down the army and navy to a peace standard and put honest and efficient men in office. 24
All these pleas fell on deaf ears. The republicans knew their strength and proceeded to consolidate it, taking their stand on past achievements. The Chicago Tribune of August 4 acknowledged that there were shortcomings within their party but proclaimed the policy: "In the present contest, the Repub- licans unite in demanding peace upon the basis of accomplished facts, and in consonance with lawfully-enacted statutes, and in requiring the payment of the public debt with ' the utmost good faith' to all: while the Democracy sound the tocsin of insurrec- tion and threaten repudiation in one form or another. He who prefers a pacific and an honorable national policy will vote for Grant and Colfax: he who prefers internecine war and bank- ruptcy will vote for Seymour and Blair."
On this ground the republicans stood like adamant; they continued the canvass calmly and confidently, though some attempt was made to give the campaign the éclat which usually attached to a military hero candidate. Grant clubs were formed and uniformed companies of "tanners," recalling the former occupation of the general, and the torchlight processions of 1860 were repeated. These were popular movements which in bringing recruits further aroused the spite of the opposition. Democratic journals declared that Grant and his father had carried on another business during the war-that of trading in cotton; why not, they suggested, a cotton club with mem- bers clothed in cotton batting? Moreover, they asked was a man with " Grant's fondness for fast-horses, pup dogs, Havana cigars and Bourbon whiskey" a fit candidate for the chief magistracy ? 25
The republicans met these aspersions by pointing out that former members of the democratic party had forsaken their old associates to support Grant; not only did Thomas J. Turner of Freeport, whom the democrats had run for congress two years ago, return to his old allegiance, but such lifelong
24 Carthage Republican, July 30, 1868.
25 Ibid., June 11, 1868; Illinois State Register, July 30, August 10, 13, 1868; Chicago Tribune, September 8, October 31, 1868.
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democrats as Colonel I. N. Morris and Adolph Moses of Quincy, O. Pool of Shawneetown, Judge Quimby of Monmouth were listed as new republican recruits.26 It was not strange, therefore, that the republicans not only swept the state for Grant with over fifty thousand majority but also turned the state government over to General Palmer and their state ticket to cooperate with a strongly republican legislature.
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