Mr. Lincoln was to assume the dictatorship. A dictatorship could be maintained only by the power of the army.

McClellan was at the head of the army of the East, and that army was devoted to his person and his leadership.

At the moment of the tender of his services he well knew that if Mr. Lincoln accepted his advice as to the dictatorship he must also accept his services as the head of the army. As the army was then constituted it would have been impossible for Mr. Lincoln to assume absolute power and at the same time supersede McClellan as commander-in-chief.

In fine, the commander-in-chief of the army would have been the real dictator. If any natural interpretation is given to the language used by McClellan his letter was in itself an admission that the government had ceased to exist, and that a military usurpation was the only possible means by which it could be restored.

Happily for the country Mr. Lincoln was undismayed by the disasters of the Peninsula. He did not attempt to direct the whole course of national affairs; he did not accept McClellan's tender of support and promise of fidelity and subordination; and he continued to hold in his own hand the power to destroy slavery as a means of suppressing the Rebellion.

If to any this criticism of McClellan's letter shall appear unjust, the way is open for them to tender an explanation of his language that is consistent either with wisdom in judgment, or patriotism in duty.

When Mr. Lincoln issued the monitory proclamation of the 22d of September, 1862, McClellan was at the head of the army. The particular thing against which he had advised in his letter of the 7th of July had now been done, or so inaugurated that its accomplishment was an accepted fact in the South and in the North.

By a general order, dated the 7th of October, Gen. McClellan announced the proclamation to the army. He counseled obedience and moderation of temper in discussion, and he declared that "the remedy for political errors, if any are committed, is to be found only in the action of the people at the polls." Time, reflection, and, perhaps, more than all, the battle of Antietam, had enabled him to recover himself from the delusion or from the unpatriotic thought that he could create a dictator and dictate his policy.

As Gen. McClellan was nominated by the Democratic party for the office of President some responsibility for his opinions was assumed necessarily, by that party.

If he is held to a literal construction of the language used by him, then his advice to the President was unpatriotic, if not treasonable. If he is excusable upon the ground that he did not appreciate the scope and force of the language that he employed, then, manifestly, he was not fit for the position he occupied.

In November, 1863, the Supreme Court of the State of Pennsylvania pronounced the act of March 3, 1863, entitled "An Act for Enrolling and calling out the National Forces and for other purposes," unconstitutional.

Judge Woodward was the Democratic candidate for the office of Governor, and he was a member of the court and of the majority. He was not an obscure man. Independently of this opinion, he was well and generally known as an avowed supporter of extreme State rights doctrines. The opinion which he and his associates gave, and which was for a time the law of Pennsylvania, if it had been accepted generally by the judicial tribunals of the country, would have ended the contest and established the Rebellion as an accomplished fact. In that dark period of the country's history the war could not have been prosecuted under the volunteer system, even when supported by large bounties.

Judge Woodward and his associates of the majority asserted and maintained the doctrine that the regular army of the United States could be recruited only by volunteers, and that in case of invasion or rebellion the only other military resource was in the militia of the several States.

This force, when called into the service of the United States, must be summoned and employed under the State organizations, and subject to the command of the officers appointed or elected by virtue of State laws.

Such was the opinion of the Supreme Court of the State of Pennsylvania, an opinion which denied to the national government the right to command the services of its own citizens and to employ them in its own ways in defense of its own existence. The doctrine of State rights, which concedes to the Union the power to protect itself in its existence, its rights, and its honor, and by its own methods, and independently of the will of States, and which concedes to States the power to administer their domestic affairs in their own way, is a healthful and constitutional doctrine; and no other doctrine would have been advocated or even announced except for the earlyformed purpose to defend the institution of slavery at any and every

sacrifice, whether of honor, of constitutional obligations, or of national existence.

The opinion of the court was given in November, and while the case was pending and during the canvass for Governor, Gen. McClellan held a conference with Judge Woodward, and thereupon he announced himself a supporter of Judge Woodward's candidacy, in a letter dated October 12, 1863.

The circumstance that the Philadelphia Press had stated that Gen. McClellan favored the election of Gov. Curtin was the occasion for the letter.

Gen. McClellan said that it had been his earnest endeavor to avoid participation in party politics, but as he could no 'longer maintain silence under such misrepresentations," he proceeded to say that he had had a conference with Judge Woodward, that they agreed in their views, and that in his opinion the election of Judge Woodward was called for by the interests of the nation.

If there were any reason to assume that Judge Woodward did not disclose his opinions fully in that interview, all doubt must disappear in presence of the statements made by Gen. McClellan. He says, "I understand Judge Woodward to be in favor of the prosecution of the war with all the means at the command of the loyal States, until the military power of the Rebellion is destroyed. I understood him to be of opinion that while the war is waged with all possible decision and energy, the policy directing it should be in consonance with the principles of humanity and civilization, working no injury to private rights and property not demanded by military necessity and recognized by military law among civilized nations.

'And, finally, I understood him to agree with me in the opinion that the sole great objects of this war are the restoration of the unity of the nation, the preservation of the constitution, and the supremacy of the laws of the country."

Three distinct propositions are deducible reasonably, from the language employed by Gen. McClellan.

(1.) The military force was that which should be furnished by the loyal States, that is, the State militia as distinguished from the army of the United States, whether composed of men who had enlisted voluntarily, or of men who had been enrolled and drafted into service by the exercise of supreme and exclusive authority on the part of the national government. Thus it appears that the agreement in opinion

by Gen. McClellan and Judge Woodward was that the mode of coercion provided in the act of March 3, 1863, was unconstitutional.

Unfortunately for Judge Woodward and Gen. McClellan, others, and among them Judge Davis, of the Supreme Court of the United States, maintained the constitutionality of the Enrollment Act.

(2.) Gen. McClellan and Judge Woodward agreed in opinion that property in slaves was as sacred as other property and that the institution of slavery was to survive the war.

(3.) That the constitution as it was should be preserved.

All three propositions were unsound and all their purposes failed; but upon the basis so established by these two men Gen. McClellan became the designated leader of the Democratic party in 1864.

The Democratic Convention assembled at Chicago the 29th day of August, 1864, and nominated Gen. McClellan for the office of President and George H. Pendleton for that of Vice-President of the United States.

The convention was called to order by August Belmont, Chairman of the National Committee. Gov. Bigler, of Pennsylvania, was appointed temporary chairman, and Gov. Seymour, of New York, was chosen to preside over the deliberations of the convention.

Mr. Belmont judged the past, condemned the present, prophesied concerning the future; and in all he was in error.

Addressing the convention, he said, "In your hands rests, under the ruling of an all-wise Providence, the future of the republic. Four years of misrule by a sectional, fanatical, and corrupt party, have brought our country to the very verge of ruin. The past and present are sufficient warnings of the disastrous consequences which would befall us if Mr. Lincoln's reëlection should be made possible by our want of patriotism and unity. The inevitable results of such a calamity would be the utter disintegration of our whole political and social system, amidst bloodshed and anarchy, with the great problems of liberal progress and self-government jeopardized for generations to

All these prophecies were falsified by events, and one only of his suggestions has become an historical fact.

Mr. Lincoln's reëlection was in part due to a want of patriotism in the Democratic party. The country was not then on the " very verge of ruin," nor did the reelection of Mr. Lincoln result in the disintegration of our whole political and social system, although it did result

in the destruction of so much of the social system as rested upon the institution of slavery.

Gov. Bigler charged the Republican party with the responsibility of dissolving the Union, and he asserted that its restoration could be effected only by the overthrow of the administration. His statement of fact was erroneous, and his prophecy was not fulfilled.

Gov. Seymour's address was more elevated in tone, but the pivotal thoughts were the same. He condemned the administration and declared that it could not then save the Union if it would. He asserted that its proclamations, its vindictive legislation, its hate and passion, were obstacles which it could not overcome. Of the Democratic party he said: "There are no hindrances in our pathways to union and to peace. We demand no conditions for the restoration of our Union: we are shackled with no hates, no prejudices, no passions. We wish for fraternal relationship with the people of the South. We demand for them what we demand for ourselves-the full recognition of the rights of States." It is manifest from the language employed that he treated the proclamation of emancipation as a nullity, and that he was prepared to receive the States of the South without inquiry and without terms. Slavery was to continue and all the obligations of the old constitution were to be recognized and enforced. He pleaded for an impossible policy.

The proclamation of emancipation and the war had so far undermined slavery that its overthrow was inevitable. Consequently, the restoration of the old Union was an impossibility. This Gov. Seymour did not comprehend. The proclamation had been in force more than two years, and the restoration of the Union was then possible only upon the basis of freedom. As Gov. Seymour and his associates could not comprehend existing facts, they were incapable, consequently, of devising a wise policy for the future.

Gov. Seymour's great error was the assumption that the Republican party was under the influence of passion, and that the Democratic party was free from passion. The Republican party was a party of principles. When it came to power it had only a choice of ways. When the war opened it was compelled either to abandon its principles or to prosecute the war for the preservation of the Union.

In the prosecution of the war the time came when it was compelled to abandon the cause of the Union and its doctrines of human liberty or to attack and overthrow the institution of slavery. The policy of the party was not dictated by passion but by necessity. The execu·