Mrs. Lincoln's Rival

by Jennifer Chiaverini

  Whether you shall remain at the head of the Treasury Department is a question which I will not allow myself to consider from any standpoint other than my judgment of the public service, and, in that view, I do not perceive occasion for a change.

  Yours truly,

  A. Lincoln

  The entire Chase household accepted the president’s decision with shock and muted relief. William alone seemed entirely reassured that Father retained Mr. Lincoln’s friendship and confidence along with his cabinet position, but Kate suspected that was because William did not fully comprehend the more dire implications of all that the circular had done and undone. Without Ohio behind him, Father had no chance to win the nomination, and long before the scandal broke, he had publicly expressed that if he did not gain the support of his home state, he would withdraw from the race.

  A week after receiving Mr. Lincoln’s letter, Father wrote a public letter to the influential Ohio state senator James C. Hall, a personal friend, solemnly declaring that since the legislature had vowed to support Mr. Lincoln instead of himself, “it becomes my duty, therefore, and I count it more a privilege than a duty, to ask that no further consideration be given to my name.” Ever patriotic and mindful of his loyalty to the Union cause, Father emphatically concluded, “It was never more important than now that all our efforts and energies should be devoted to the suppression of the rebellion, and to the restoration of order and prosperity on the solid and sure foundations of Union, freedom, and impartial justice, and I earnestly urge all with whom my counsels may have weight, to allow nothing to divide them while this great work—in comparison with which, persons and even parties are nothing—remains unaccomplished.”

  In the aftermath of Father’s withdrawal, Kate knew, Mr. Lincoln would surely claim the vast majority of Father’s supporters as his own, for Father had all but urged them to rally to his rival’s side.

  Father was profoundly disappointed, but Kate was devastated. His presidential aspirations had been resoundingly thwarted, and she knew that the only reason Mr. Lincoln allowed him to retain his post at the Treasury was because Mr. Lincoln wanted and needed him there.

  The moment the president believed he no longer did, Father would be peremptorily dismissed.

  • • •

  While Father’s star precipitously declined, Ulysses S. Grant’s was on the rise. On the same March day that Father wrote to Mr. Lincoln to confirm his withdrawal from the presidential race, he was among the witnesses at the White House ceremony in which Mr. Lincoln awarded the celebrated, taciturn officer a commission as lieutenant general. The next day, after the restless General Grant had already departed Washington to rejoin his troops, the president appointed him general in chief of the armies of the United States.

  At the end of March, when the transfer of his command in the West to General William Tecumseh Sherman was complete, General Grant returned to Washington accompanied by his wife, Julia. She was said to be a devoted mother of four, much beloved of her husband, and a pleasant conversationalist, though not much given to politics. Despite her preoccupation with her father’s troubles, Kate immediately recognized the Grants as people the Chases ought to know, and she successfully contended with the general’s resistant chief of staff to arrange for the general to call on her father. Kate found Mrs. Grant to be a pleasant, dark-haired woman in her late thirties, whose plain features were made prettier by her ready smile and unassuming, friendly manner. Mrs. Grant delighted in the attention and praise showered upon her husband, who seemed uncomfortable with the fuss and eager to return to the field. Before he could escape, he was obliged to make the rounds of Washington society, where he was cheered and serenaded and toasted with such fervor that Kate was not surprised to hear him whispered about as a potential presidential candidate. Kate hid her concerns behind a dazzling smile, was gracious to the matronly Mrs. Grant, and must have succeeded in charming the general, for although his dislike of music and dancing was well-known, on one occasion he took a few turns with her on the dance floor. “You made him look much less awkward than he usually does in such circumstances,” an officer who had known General Grant since his West Point days remarked.

  When the general departed Washington for his new headquarters near Culpeper, Virginia, Mrs. Grant remained at the Willard, but Kate had little opportunity to further their acquaintance. Stress about Father’s misfortunes and worry and lack of sleep had conspired to make her so desperately ill with various afflictions of the lungs that she required constant care. Since neither Father nor William had the time, ability, or inclination to nurse her properly, General McDowell and his wife invited her to convalesce at their home at Buttermilk Falls in Upstate New York. There, far from the strife of Washington and the incessant scenes of war’s terrible toll on its soldiers, Kate slowly regained her health, thanks to enforced rest and Mrs. McDowell’s adept ministrations.

  Father, William, and various friends kept Kate apprised of events in Washington, and so she was in her sickbed when she first learned of the shocking tales of improprieties in the Treasury Department.

  For several months, rumors had whispered of irregularities in business and immorality among the Treasury staff, but Father and Kate had dismissed them as the usual malicious gossip. Even Father’s political enemies considered him morally above reproach—in fact, some muttered that he would be more agreeable company if he were not so pious and righteous. Then one outraged citizen wrote to President Lincoln accusing Secretary Chase of speculation in stocks, gold, and cotton, an outrageous allegation that the president gave no credence whatsoever. That fuss had scarcely died down when complaints emerged that women employees of the Treasury Department were reportedly hired for their personal attractions rather than their skills. Several young ladies claimed that they were refused employment until they yielded to the passionate embraces of the superintendent of the Bureau of Engraving and Printing. More shocking yet, dozens of the department’s young, unmarried female employees were said to be with child.

  Alarmed, Father brought in a detective from the War Department to investigate the allegations, and when the detective found outrage and scandal everywhere he looked, a special congressional committee began a formal inquiry. After hearing the testimony of a series of witnesses, including two young clerks who swore that they had been coerced into intimate encounters with their employer, the committee could not unanimously conclude whether the charges were true or false. The public preferred to believe the most scandalous, salacious version of events, and so even if the Department of the Treasury was not the “most extensive Whorehouse in the nation,” as one critic claimed, its reputation was tarnished—and Father’s was tarnished further, at a time when he was struggling to redeem himself in the eyes of the people.

  Certain political enemies were determined to see that he never did. Father had long been embroiled in a feud with the Blairs, a family of conservative Republicans that included Postmaster General Montgomery Blair. That winter his brother, Missouri congressman Francis Blair, denounced Father from the House floor in one of the most bitter and hateful verbal assaults ever delivered in the halls of Congress. For two hours he castigated Father’s character, charging him with corruption in high office, with treason, and with “grasping at all power and patronage for the purpose of providing a fund to carry on his war against the administration which gave him place.”

  The blistering litany of outlandish charges had gone on and on, and when Father had learned of them, he had been shocked and deeply offended. Mr. Blair had attacked his integrity and honor, which Father prized above all earthly possessions. He waited for his colleagues to defend him, and for President Lincoln to renounce Mr. Blair, and he grew ever more distressed and affronted when none rallied to his side.

  Father was still waiting in vain for satisfaction at the end of May when Kate recovered enough to return home. Still weakened from her long illness, she nevertheless tried to arbitrate her father’s latest poli
tical crisis. She arranged meetings between him and leading Republicans in an attempt to mend the ever-widening chasms dividing different factions within the party, and eventually a tentative truce was forged. Even so, Mr. Blair refused to withdraw his accusations, the Speaker of the House appointed a Committee of Nine to investigate the allegations, and Father remained outraged by the president’s refusal to discipline Mr. Blair.

  All was in a dreadful, tumultuous disarray, but before Kate could wrest control of the situation, William’s attempts to defend his father-in-law made everything worse. His loyalty to his father-in-law had set him at odds with other senators, especially the Radical Republicans, whom William felt had betrayed Father by abandoning him at his time of greatest crisis. One evening, while attempting to resolve their differences over dinner, they all drank far too much, and the evening deteriorated into an undignified drunken brawl.

  Kate was more upset about William’s drinking than the fight. “You swore to give it up,” she said, trembling with anger and distress.

  “Everyone was drinking,” he shouted back, though she stood within arm’s reach. Wincing, she turned away, but he grabbed her by the shoulders and forced her to face him. “You would unman me. You would have me say I cannot toast my fellow senators’ health because my wife forbids it!”

  “I would have you toast them with cider or water not because I demand it but because you know liquor is your weakness,” Kate snapped. “You’ve said yourself that it leads you to dissipation and bad decisions, as it very clearly did tonight, for you to come home with your face bruised and clothes torn as if you were a common street hoodlum!”

  He struck her hard across the face with the back of his hand, and she staggered back, reeling.

  “You are not the master here,” he said, quietly and with preternatural calm.

  Stunned, she pressed her cool palm to her hot, stinging cheek and groped for a chair. As she collapsed into it, she felt his gaze boring into her, but he said nothing, only stood watching her silently, radiating triumph. Then, without a word, he turned and strode unsteadily from the room.

  Kate sat alone in the foyer, listening to his footsteps fading and the blood rushing in her ears. That would be the last day William touched liquor, she told herself firmly as tears trickled down her face. They had argued furiously before, but he had never struck her. In the morning, when he was sober, the memory of what he had done would so horrify him that he would swear off alcohol forever. It was a terrible thing he had done, but a greater good would come of it.

  But the next morning, William greeted her pleasantly at breakfast as if nothing had happened, and if not for the faint bruise on her cheekbone and his bloodshot eyes, she might have convinced herself that she had dreamed the whole shameful incident. She ate slowly, waiting for an apology, for some sign of contrition, but he offered nothing to suggest he felt any remorse whatsoever. He did not want Father to know what had happened, she concluded uncertainly, and so she waited for him to find a more opportune moment; but although the day passed and chances to speak to her alone came and went, still he made no apology. It was as if he had no memory of striking her, or that striking her was not significant enough to remark upon.

  Weakened from her recent illness, distressed by the precipitous downturn in Father’s political fortunes, Kate found herself overwhelmed by a desperate need to escape Washington. The family had already arranged for Kate to pick up Nettie at the end of her last term at Miss Macaulay’s school and take her to Newport, Rhode Island, where William had rented a quiet, seaside retreat for the summer. After a week of barely speaking to her husband, Kate announced that she would be leaving the capital early, so that she might visit friends in New York City while Nettie completed her final exams.

  William agreed, perfectly amiable, smiling as he instructed her to indulge herself to her heart’s content at her favorite shops on Fifth Avenue. Less reluctantly than she had expected, Father conceded that she ought to go as soon as possible, before the worsening heat and humidity of summer damaged her still-fragile health. She knew that was not the only reason he wanted her away from the capital. In his scathing critiques of her father, Mr. Blair had hinted that Kate was implicated in his worst offenses, and ever since, Father had admonished her to avoid involvement in politics. He might as well have asked her to stop breathing, or to stop being his daughter.

  She left the next morning, wordlessly enduring William’s farewell kiss on the platform before boarding her train. She wondered if he realized that he had kissed the same cheek he had struck only a few days before.

  • • •

  Soon after Kate and Nettie arrived in Newport, moderate and conservative Republican delegates gathered in Baltimore to establish a party platform and to nominate candidates for the upcoming general election. The Radical Republicans did not attend; at the end of May, their faction had split off from the party proper, renamed themselves the Radical Democracy Party, and convened in Cleveland, where they had chosen General Frémont as their nominee. In response, the delegates in Baltimore renamed themselves the National Union Party—not only to distinguish themselves from the radicals, but also to appeal to disgruntled Democrats who supported the war and rejected the Peace Democrat platform, but could not bring themselves to vote for a Republican.

  Kate followed the proceedings in the papers with a heavy heart, knowing that if not for a few critical mistakes, her father’s trusted deputies would be in the middle of the convention fray, securing endorsements and gathering delegates around him. Instead, the Republicans and War Democrats united to nominate Mr. Lincoln on the National Union Party ticket. The nomination would have been unopposed but for a delegation of twenty-two Radical Republicans from Missouri, who first nominated General Grant before changing their votes so Mr. Lincoln’s nomination would be unanimous. Afterward, the delegates also established their party platform, which praised the president for his management of the war and called for, among other important measures, the pursuit of the war until the Confederacy surrendered unconditionally, a constitutional amendment to abolish slavery, assistance for disabled Union veterans, and the construction of a transcontinental railroad.

  Next the agenda turned to the selection of a vice-president. Previously Mr. Lincoln had expressed his desire to let the convention decide without his interference, and once the debate began, he stuck to his resolution. Father knew that Vice-President Hannibal Hamlin wanted to be renominated, but many delegates believed that they should select a War Democrat from a border state to broaden the appeal of the ticket. After much heated debate, they eventually chose Andrew Johnson, the Union military governor of Tennessee, a War Democrat and Southern Unionist.

  Mr. Lincoln’s nomination had been certain, but Kate was surprised by the choice of Mr. Johnson. She understood the desire to make the ticket more appealing to War Democrats, but she never would have chosen someone who had been so outspoken in the defense of slavery before the war, and so opposed to abolition after it. While serving as the military governor of Tennessee, Mr. Johnson had asked President Lincoln to exempt the state from the provision in the Emancipation Proclamation that freed slaves in areas under rebel control, and the president had complied. Kate hardly dared imagine what other schemes against people of color Mr. Johnson might encourage President Lincoln to enact, once emboldened by his new authority as the highest member of the cabinet.

  News from private letters offered Kate at least as much insight as the papers. William wrote to her at Newport, his letters warm and affectionate, which would have delighted her once but bewildered her then. More troublingly, scattered among his inexplicably tender declarations of love were hints that not all was well with Father. Kate knew that Father had clung to vain hopes that he would garner a respectable number of votes on the first ballot at the convention, but as soon as Mr. Lincoln had been nominated, Father had been forced to reconcile himself to his diminished status. Worsening matters, he was apparently embroiled
in yet another conflict with President Lincoln regarding appointments.

  Since Father wrote little about it, Kate was obliged to piece together her understanding of the situation from the incomplete stories each man offered in his letters. Shortly after the convention in Baltimore, the assistant treasurer of New York had resigned his post, and selecting his replacement was a matter fraught with the potential to offend important factions within the state Republican Party. Since the post fell within the jurisdiction of the Treasury Department, choosing a successor was Father’s responsibility, but Mr. Lincoln instructed him to consult with New York senator Edwin Morgan to be sure that all sides were satisfied with his nominee. Instead Father had submitted a formal nomination for his own favorite candidate, though well aware that Senator Morgan strongly disapproved of his choice. Soon thereafter, Mr. Lincoln informed Father that he could not make the appointment and asked him to try harder to find a nominee he and the senator could agree upon. Determined to press his case, Father requested an interview with the president, and when he received no response, he persuaded the outgoing assistant treasurer to remain in his post three months longer in order to buy time. Then, annoyed that the president had refused to meet with him and that he had been obliged yet again to assert his authority over his own department, he submitted his own resignation, certain that Mr. Lincoln would again refuse to accept it. “I cannot help feeling that my position here is not altogether agreeable to you,” he wrote, “and it is certainly too full of embarrassment and difficulty and painful responsibility to allow in me the least desire to retain it. I think it my duty therefore to enclose to you my resignation.”