The cordial tone of the President toward the General, effectually neutralized the object of the meeting; and, when the Baltimore Convention met, on the eighth of June, there was no name but that of the President that found adherents. Many of the delegates had come instructed to vote for him, from the conventions which sent them. Rev. Robert J. Breckinridge of Kentucky, a stern and eloquent old Unionist, was chosen temporary chairman; and Hon. William Dennison of Ohio was elected to be the permanent president of the convention. On the following day, Mr. Henry J. Raymond of New York, as chairman of the committee on resolutions, presented the platform, which was adopted with warm approval, and with entire unanimity. It pledged the convention, and those it represented, to aid the government in quelling by force of arms the rebellion then raging against its authority; approved the determination of the government not to compromise with rebels in arms; indorsed the acts and proclamations against slavery, and advocated a constitutional amendment abolishing it; returned thanks to the soldiers of the Union armies, and declared that the nation owed a permanent provision for those disabled by the war; approved of the administration of Mr. Lincoln and the acts and measures which he had adopted for the preservation of the nation against its open and secret foes; declared that the government owed protection to all its soldiers, without distinction of color; affirmed that the national faith, pledged for the redemption of the public debt, must be kept inviolate; and expressed approval of the position taken by the government that the people of the United States can never regard with indifference the attempt of any European power to overthrow by force, or to supplant by fraud, the institutions of any republican government on the Western Continent.

After the adoption of the resolutions, came the ballot for a presidential candidate. At the first ballot, every vote was given for Mr. Lincoln, except the twenty-two from Missouri, which, under instructions, were given for General Grant; but the nomination was made unanimous on the motion of one of

the Missouri delegates. Mr. Hamlin, the incumbent of the vice-presidential office, though an able and excellent man, was, from motives of policy, not regarded by many as the best candidate for that office; and Andrew Johnson of Tennessee received the nomination.

A single resolution in the platform, to which no allusion is made in the foregoing summary of its leading features, covertly demanded a change in the cabinet. The words, "We deem it essential to the general welfare that harmony should prevail in our national councils, and we regard as worthy of confidence and official trust those only who cor dially indorse the principles proclaimed in these resolutions," were intended as an intimation that the convention would like to have the President dismiss the Postmaster-general, Montgomery Blair. The resolution was probably a concession to the Loyal Leagues, which, originally friendly to the nomina tion of Mr. Chase, took up the differences which were understood to exist between these two members of the cabinet, and demanded that Mr. Blair should retire. A committee consisting of John M. Ashley, John Covode and George S. Boutwell, waited upon the President, on one occasion, to urge Mr. Blair's dismissal; and on that occasion Mr. Lincoln said that, if he should be re-elected, he should probably make some changes in his cabinet-a reply which they took as an assent to their request, and so reported to the body that sent them.. When the resolution in question appeared in the plat form, Mr. Blair, understanding it, placed his resignation in the hands of the President, who delayed his acceptance of it until circumstances rendered the step desirable.

Washington was but a short distance from Baltimore; and Governor Dennison, the president of the convention, waited upon Mr. Lincoln, accompanied by a committee, to inform him of his nomination. After receiving the formal address of that gentleman, with a copy of the resolutions which had been adopted, Mr. Lincoln said:

"Having served four years in the depths of a great and yet unended national peril, I can view this call to a second term in nowise more flat

tering to myself than as an expression of the public judgment that I may better finish a difficult work, in which I have labored from the first, than could any one less severely schooled to the task. In this view, and with assured reliance on that Almighty Ruler who has so graciously sustained us thus far, and with increased gratitude to the generous people for their continued confidence, I accept the renewed trust, with its yet onerous and perplexing duties and responsibilities."

During the same day, the President was waited upon by a committee of the Union League, which came with a tender of the congratulations, and a pledge of the confidence and support, of that organization; and, in the evening, by the Ohio delegation in the convention. To both these deputations he addressed brief remarks, in the spirit of those quoted as addressed to the committee of the convention. Some days subsequently, he received the formal notification, by letter, of his nomination, to which, on the twenty-seventh of June, he replied as follows:

"Gentlemen:-Your letter of the fourteenth inst., formally notifying me that I have been nominated by the convention you represent for the Presidency of the United States, for four years from the fourth of March next, has been received. The nomination is gratefully accepted, as the resolutions of the convention, called the platform, are heartily approved. While the resolution in regard to the supplanting of republican governments upon the Western Continent is fully concurred in, there might be misunderstanding were I not to say that the position of the government in relation to the action of France in Mexico, as assumed through the State Department, and indorsed by the convention among the measures and acts of the Executive, will be faithfully maintained so long as the state of facts shall leave that position pertinent and applicable. I am especially gratified that the soldier and seaman were not forgotten by the convention, as they forever must and will be remembered by the grateful country, for whose salvation they devote their lives.

66

'Thanking you for the kind and complimentary terms in which you have communicated the nomination and other proceedings of the convention, I subscribe myself,

"Your obedient servant,

"ABRAHAM LINCOLN."

I was still more than two months before the assembling of the Democratic Convention, announced to be held at Chicago

on the twenty-ninth of August. This convention had been deferred, with the confident expectation, if not the hope, that the events of the war would prepare the people to accept s peace policy, and leave the party free to take direct issue with the administration. During this interval, a peculiar change came over the spirit of the friends of Mr. Lincoln. Opening the campaign with perfect confidence concerning the results, a feeling of distrust and doubt crept over them; and, without any apparent cause, the thought became prevalent that a mistake had been made in the nomination. This arose partly from the consciousness that the country was really tired of a war of which they saw neither the end nor the signs of its approach; and partly from the uncertainty which prevailed concerning the action of the Democratic Convention, which was pretty sure to be based upon the results of military movements in progress, and of dubious issue. It was one of those strange and unaccountable contagions of public feeling and opinion which start, no man knows where; lead, no man knows whither; and die, at last, by no man's hand. Men did not catch it from newspapers, did not contract it from speeches, did not imbibe or absorb it in facts; but, simultaneously and universally, the friends of the administration were affected with a distrust of the future and a doubt of the wis dom of their choice.

as an

There were still divisions in their ranks, but these were not formidable. Occasion was taken by the opposition press to magnify every mistake of the President and to condemn every doubtful measure. One Arguelles, convicted in Cuba of selling part of a cargo of negroes, illicitly landed, which, officer of the Spanish army, he had captured, was permitted to be taken from New York, and carried back to the island. This act-a thoroughly righteous one in the light of humanity and justice-was regarded by the opposition as a denial of the right of asylum; and a good deal of disturbance was created by it.

Early in July, Congress completed its action upon a plan of reconstruction, which it embodied in an elaborate bill. In

the preparation of this bill, Henry Winter Davis of Maryland and Benjamin F. Wade of Ohio were prominently active. A good deal of time and discussion had been expended upon it, but it was passed and sent to the President less than one hour before the close of the session. He failed to approve it, and, on the eighth of July, issued a proclamation on the subject. In this proclamation, the President declared that he was unprepared, by a formal approval of the bill, to commit himself to any single plan of reconstruction, or to set aside the free state governments already formed in Arkansas and Louisiana on other plans. At the same time, he was willing that the plan embodied in the bill should be recognized as one among others; and so promulgated the bill itself, as a part of his proclamation. To the people of any rebel state who should adopt the plan provided by the bill, he pledged the executive assistance. The action of the President in this matter exceedingly offended Messrs. Wade and Davis, who joined in a bitter manifesto against him, and published it in the New York Tribune of August fifth. "The President," they declared, "by preventing this bill from becoming a law, holds the electoral votes of the rebel states at the dictation of his personal ambition." Furthermore: "A more studied outrage on the legislative authority of the people, has never been perpetrated." In its attack upon Mr. Lincoln's motives, it was an offensive paper, and pained the friends of the administration no less than it rejoiced its enemies.

Mr. Lincoln, himself, never permitted attacks of this character to trouble him. If they were very bitter, he did not read them at all; and many men of mark who wrote things for his particular eye, failed of their object utterly by his refusal to read, or listen to, their fulminations. After the Wade and Davis manifesto was issued, it was, on one occasion, the subject of conversation between him and a number of gentlemen who had called at the White House. After all the gentlemen had retired, save one, who was an intimate personal friend, Mr. Lincoln turned to him, and said: "The Wade and Davis matter troubles me very little. Indeed, I