1864.]

THE HOPE OF THE CONFEDERATES.

477 the result of the Presidential election as a possible solution of the great question in their favor. John B. Jones, who was a clerk in the Confederate War Department, recorded in his published diary that Mr. Vallandigham, when banished to the South, had assured the officers of the Government at Richmond that "if we [the Confederates] can only hold out this year, the peace party of the North would sweep the Lincoln dynasty out of political existence." This was now their strongest hope, and it was common talk across the lines, between the pickets, that in the event of McClellan's election the Confederates expected a speedy cessation of hostilities and ultimately their independence. And such is the unaccountable elasticity of the human mind in dealing with facts and principles, that a large number of the bravest and most devoted soldiers in the National service, knowing this, were preparing to cast their ballots in a way to give the utmost assistance and encouragement to the very enemy into the muzzles of whose guns they were looking.

Whether General Frémont's arraignment of the Administration as politically, militarily, and financially a failure" was just or unjust, whether it was true or not that the triumph of General McClellan and his party would result in a final dis ruption of the country, before the canvass was over the land had settled down to the belief that the only way to secure the continuance of the war to a successful termination was to reëlect Mr. Lincoln, while a vote for General McClellan meant

478

THE REALITIES OF WAR.

[1864.

something else - nobody knew exactly what. The solemnity of the occasion appeared to be universally appreciated, and though a heavy vote was polled the election was the quietest that had ever been held. The citizens were dealing with a question that, in most of its aspects at least, they by this time thoroughly understood. When they sprang to arms in 1861, they did not know what war was; but now they had had three years of constant schooling to its burdens and its horrors. They had seen regiment after regiment march away to the music of drum and fife, with a thousand men in the ranks, and come back at the end of two years' service with perhaps two hundred bronzed veterans to be mustered out. They had read in their newspapers, after every great battle, the long lists of killed and wounded, which the telegraph was quick to report. Every city had its fair for the relief of the widows and orphans, every hamlet its two or three crippled soldiers hobbling about in their faded blue overcoats, almost every house its incurable sorrow. They had seen the wheel turning in the provost-marshal's office, in places where volunteering was not sufficiently rapid, and knew that their own names might be the next to be drawn for service at the front. They knew how many graves there were at Gettysburg, how many at Shiloh, how many at Stone River; they knew what was to be seen in the hospitals of every Northern city, and something of the unspeakable horrors of captivity. They saw the price of gold go beyond two hundred,

1884.]

THE ELECTION.

479

while the Government was spending between two and three millions of dollars a day, piling up a national debt in undreamed-of proportions, for which they were already heavily taxed, and which must some day be paid in solid coin.

Seeing and understanding all this, and having the privilege of a secret and unquestioned ballot, they quietly walked up to the polls and voted for a vigorous prosecution of the war, reëlecting Mr. Lincoln by a popular majority of more than four hundred thousand, and giving him the votes of all the States excepting Delaware, New Jersey, and Kentucky-two hundred and twelve against twenty-one. The vote of the soldiers in the field, so far as it could be counted separately (for in some States it was sent home sealed, and mingled with the other ballots in the boxes), showed about one hundred and nineteen thousand for Lincoln, and about thirty-four thousand for McClellan. The soldiers confined in some of the Confederate ⚫prisons held an election at the suggestion of their keepers, who were exceedingly curious to see how the prisoners would vote. Sergeant Robert H. Kellogg tells us that in the stockade at Florence, S. C., where he was confined, two empty bags were hung up, and the prisoners were furnished with black and white beans and marched past in single file, each depositing a black bean for Lincoln, or a white one for McClellan. The result was in the proportion of two and a half for Lincoln to one for McClellan. In the prison at Millen, Ga., Sergeant W. Goodyear tells us, the vote was

480

THE HEROISM OF IT.

[1864.

three thousand and fourteen for Lincoln, and one thousand and fifty for McClellan. In Congress the number of Republican members was increased from one hundred and six to one hundred and forty-three, and the number of Democratic members reduced from seventy-seven to forty-one.

Meanwhile, in October, Maryland had adopted a new constitution, in which slavery was prohibited. In answer to serenades after the election, Mr. Lincoln made some of his best impromptu speeches, saying in one: "While I am duly sensible to the high compliment of a reëlection, and duly grateful, as I trust, to Almighty God for having directed my countrymen to a right conclusion, as I think, for their good, it adds nothing to my satisfaction that any other man may be disappointed by the result. May I ask those who have not differed with me to join with me in this same spirit toward those who have?"

If there is any one act of the American people that above all others, in the sober pages of history, reflects credit upon them for correct judgment, determined purpose, courage in present difficulties, and care for future interests, that act, it seems to me, was the reëlection of President Lincoln.

CHAPTER XXX.

THE NATIONAL FINANCES.

WHEN President Lincoln came into office he found the treasury empty, and the public debt somewhat over seventy-six million dollars. In the last days

of President Buchanan's administration the Government had been borrowing money at twelve per cent. per annum. In December, 1860, Congress passed a bill for the issue of ten million dollars in Half of this amount was one-year treasury notes. advertised, and offers were received for a small portion, at rates of discount varying from twelve to thirty-six per cent. The twelve per cent. offers were accepted, and subsequently a syndicate of bankers took the remainder of the five millions at that figure. The other five millions were taken a month later at eleven per cent. discount. In February, 1861, Congress authorized a loan of twentyfive millions, to bear interest at six per cent., and to be paid in not less than ten nor more than twenty years. The Secretary succeeded in negotiating one third of the amount at rates from 90 to 96.

In Mr. Lincoln's Cabinet, Salmon P. Chase (formerly Governor of Ohio, and then United States Senator) was made Secretary of the Treasury. Under the existing acts he borrowed eight millions in March at 94 and upward-rejecting all offers