When a dispatch announced that Pennsylvania was indeed going heavily Republican, Lincoln appeared unusually sober, as if contemplating the prospect of another four years of heavy responsibility. He observed: “As goes Pennsylvania, so goes the Union, they say.”244 He then ordered the news conveyed to his wife, explaining that she was “more anxious than I.”
When Thomas T. Eckert of the telegraph office staff arrived, Lincoln asked why his pants were so mud-splattered. He had taken a tumble crossing the street, the major explained. That reminded Lincoln of something that happened to him six years earlier: “For such an awkward fellow, I am pretty sure-footed. It used to take a pretty dextrous man to throw me. I remember, the evening of the day in 1858, that decided the contest for the Senate between Mr Douglas and myself, was something like this, dark, rainy & gloomy. I had been reading the returns, and had ascertained that we had lost the Legislature and started to go home. The path had been worn hog-back was slippering. My foot slipped from under me, knocking the other one out of the way, but I recovered myself & lit square; and I said to myself, ‘It’s a slip and not a fall.’ ”245
Returns from the doubtful state of New York were slow to come in. A dispatch indicating that McClellan had carried it by 40,000 was regarded skeptically, for the state had been carefully canvassed and a close result was expected. When another dispatch proclaimed that the Republicans had won the state by 10,000, Lincoln scoffed: “I don’t believe that.” More plausible to him was a midnight wire from Greeley predicting a 4,000-vote Republican victory which, added to Pennsylvania, Maryland, New England, Michigan, and Wisconsin, seemed to clinch the election. When congratulated on that likely result, Lincoln responded calmly, saying “that he was free to confess that he felt relieved of suspense, and was glad that the verdict of the people was so likely to be clear, full and unmistakable, for it then appeared that his majority in the electoral college would be immense.”246
At that point, Eckert served supper with the help of Lincoln, who “went awkwardly and hospitably to work shovelling out the fried oysters.” Hay recorded that the president “was most agreeable and genial all the evening.”247 Lincoln still felt anxious about Illinois, which did not report good news till 1 A.M. An hour later, when a group of Pennsylvanians serenaded him, Lincoln replied with what Noah Brooks called “one of the happiest and noblest little speeches of his life.”248 He emphasized to his well-wishers the significance of the election: “I earnestly believe that the consequences of this day’s work … will be to the lasting advantage, if not to the very salvation, of the country.” All those “who have labored to-day in behalf of the Union organization, have wrought for the best interests of their country and the world, not only for the present, but for all future ages. I am thankful to God for this approval of the people.” Yet Lincoln would not gloat: though “deeply grateful for this mark of their confidence in me, if I know my heart, my gratitude is free from any taint of personal triumph. I do not impugn the motives of any one opposed to me. It is no pleasure to me to triumph over any one; but I give thanks to the Almighty for this evidence of the people’s resolution to stand by free government and the rights of humanity.”249 Hay thought the president spoke “with rather unusual dignity and effect.”250
Lincoln won 55.4 percent of the popular vote and carried all states save Kentucky, Delaware, and New Jersey. The lopsided electoral college vote was 212 to 21. This showing was slightly below the average that Republicans had received in 1863, when they won 56.6 percent of the vote in the sixteen Northern states where the two parties clashed. The recorded soldier vote (4 percent of the total) went 78 percent for the president as compared with 53 percent of the civilian vote. (This result was surprising, since over 40 percent of the troops had been Democrats or belonged to Democratic families in 1860.) As one Vermont trooper wrote: “Soldiers don’t generally believe in fighting to put down treason, and voting to let it live.”251 Colonel Charles Russell Lowell, a Massachusetts abolitionist and Harvard valedictorian, feared that if McClellan won, the nation would become “either half a dozen little republics, or one despotism,” leaving the United States “in the condition of the South American republics.”252 A less highly-educated private looked forward to giving “the rebel[l]ion another thump this fall by voting for old Abe. I cannot afford to give three years of my life to maintaining this nation and then giving them Rebles all they want.”253 A sergeant reported that “[in] this army (as it is with all others) ‘Old Abe’ has the preference, his majority will be large in the army. McClellan lost friends by accepting the nomination on such a platform as that Chicago convention got up.”254 On the eve of the election, an Illinois officer predicted that the army “will be overwhelmingly for ‘Old Abe.’ A large proportion feel that he can put down this rebellion much better than any other man, and none are for peace with armed rebels.”255
Though gratified to receive the soldier vote, Lincoln did not need it; in most states that he carried, the civilian vote sufficed. In New York and Connecticut, where no separate records of the soldier and the home votes were kept, the soldier vote may have made the difference. It also allowed several Republican congressional candidates to prevail.
During the campaign Lincoln said, “I rely upon the religious sentiment of the country, which I am told is very largely for me.”256 Indeed, evangelical Protestant churches supported his candidacy enthusiastically.
On November 10, a huge crowd converged on the White House with banners, lanterns, transparencies, and bands blaring martial tunes. A booming cannon added to the din. Approximately one-third of the serenaders were black, prompting an aged citizen of the capital to observe: “The white men there would not have made up a very large assemblage.” Such a turnout of blacks was unprecedented.257 In addressing this crowd, Lincoln analyzed the importance of the election. He had written out his remarks, for, as Noah Brooks reported, “being well aware that the importance of the occasion would give it significance,” Lincoln “was not willing to run the risk of being betrayed by the excitement of the occasion into saying anything which would make him sorry when he saw it in print.” Upon appearing at the second story window, he was greeted with “a tremendous yell.”258 When the loud cheering finally died down, he began with a point he had made in his July 4, 1861, message to Congress: “It has long been a grave question whether any government, not too strong for the liberties of its people, can be strong enough to maintain its own existence, in great emergencies. On this point the present rebellion brought our republic to a severe test; and a presidential election occurring in regular course during the rebellion added not a little to the strain. If the loyal people, united, were put to the utmost of their strength by the rebellion, must they not fail when divided, and partially paralized, by a political war among themselves?”
Though the danger was great, it would not have justified suspending or canceling the election. In remarking on the bitter canvass, Lincoln added: “The strife of the election is but human-nature practically applied to the facts of the case. What has occurred in this case, must ever recur in similar cases. Human-nature will not change. In any future great national trial, compared with the men of this, we shall have as weak, and as strong; as silly and as wise; as bad and good. Let us, therefore, study the incidents of this, as philosophy to learn wisdom from, and none of them as wrongs to be revenged.”
Deplorable though the bitter campaign may have been, Lincoln insisted that it “has done good too,” for it “demonstrated that a people’s government can sustain a national election, in the midst of a great civil war. Until now it has not been known to the world that this was a possibility. It shows also how sound, and how strong we still are. It shows that, even among candidates of the same party, he who is most devoted to the Union, and most opposed to treason, can receive most of the people’s votes. It shows also, to the extent yet known, that we have more men now, than we had when the war began. Gold is good in its place; but living, brave, patriotic men, are better than gold.”
In closing, Lincoln urged his supporters to show magnanimity toward their defeated opponents: “now that the election is over, may not all, having a common interest, re-unite in a common effort, to save our common country? For my own part I have striven, and shall strive to avoid placing any obstacle in the way. So long as I have been here I have not willingly planted a thorn in any man’s bosom. While I am deeply sensible to the high compliment of a re-election; and duly grateful, as I trust, to Almighty God for having directed my countrymen to a right conclusion, as I think, for their own good, it adds nothing to my satisfaction that any other man may be disappointed or pained by the result. May I ask those who have not differed with me, to join with me, in this same spirit towards those who have?”259
After finishing, Lincoln stepped away from the window as the crowd gave him three enthusiastic cheers. He told John Hay: “Not very graceful, but I am growing old enough not to care much for the manner of doing things.”260 Hay thought more highly of the effort, calling it “one of the weightiest and wisest of all his discourses,” an opinion shared by the Washington correspondent of the London Times, who deemed it “one of the best speeches he has ever made.”261 Lydia Maria Child told a friend that it “charmed me exceedingly. A most beautiful spirit pervaded it.”262
Those remarks were hastily written, for Lincoln was then very busy. A week later he told a delegation of Marylanders that he had planned to prepare some remarks for them, but he had been unable to find the time and would therefore speak off the cuff. He said that he “thought the adoption of their free State constitution was a bigger thing than their part in the Presidential election. He could, any day, have stipulated to lose Maryland in the Presidential election to save its free constitution, because the Presidential election comes every four years and the adoption of the constitution, being a good thing, could not be undone. He therefore thought in that they had a victory for the right worth a great deal more than their part in the Presidential election, although he thought well of that.”263 Abolitionists rejoiced that his remarks were “thoroughly emancipation in tone” and that he had evidently abandoned any thought of gradual emancipation.264
Lincoln’s annual message to Congress in December also pleased Radicals. It eloquently summarized the lesson taught by the election: “The most reliable indication of public purpose in this country is derived through our popular elections. Judging by the recent canvass and its result, the purpose of the people, within the loyal States, to maintain the integrity of the Union, was never more firm, nor more nearly unanimous, than now. The extraordinary calmness and good order with which the millions of voters met and mingled at the polls, give strong assurance of this. Not only all those who supported the Union ticket, so called, but a great majority of the opposing party also, may be fairly claimed to entertain, and to be actuated by, the same purpose. It is an unanswerable argument to this effect, that no candidate for any office whatever, high or low, has ventured to seek votes on the avowal that he was for giving up the Union. There have been much impugning of motives, and much heated controversy as to the proper means and best mode of advancing the Union cause; but on the distinct issue of Union or no Union, the politicians have shown their instinctive knowledge that there is no diversity among the people. In affording the people the fair opportunity of showing, one to another and to the world, this firmness and unanimity of purpose, the election has been of vast value to the national cause.”265
Harper’s Weekly agreed with the president’s assessment, calling the election result “the proclamation of the American people that they are not conquered; that the rebellion is not successful; and that, deeply as they deplore war and its inevitable suffering and loss, yet they have no choice between war and national ruin, and must therefore fight on.” Lincoln’s reelection demonstrated “that the people are conscious of the power and force of their own Government” and vindicated “the American system of free popular government. No system in history was ever exposed to such a strain directly along the fibre as that which ours has endured in the war and the political campaign, and no other could possibly have endured it successfully. The result is due to the general intelligence of the people, and to the security of perfectly free discussion.” The United States had showed itself to be “a nation which comprehends its priceless importance to human progress and civilization, and which recognizes that law is the indispensable condition of Liberty.”266
More succinctly, General John W. Geary told his wife that it “is now certain that the United States must be all free or all slave, and the momentous question has been decided in favor of freedom by the edict of the people in November.”267 Charles Eliot Norton predicted that November 8, 1864, “will always be esteemed as one of our great historic days. Never before was a people called upon for a decision involving more vital interests not only to itself but to the progress of mankind, and never did any people show itself so worthy to be entrusted with freedom and power.”268
Some Confederates recognized that Lincoln’s victory spelled their doom. A Rebel prisoner told a Union soldier that if the president were reelected, “we are gone up but … if you elect McC[lellan]D we are all right yet and will whip you yet.” Many of this fellow’s comrades shared his view.269 Colonel Robert G. H. Kean, chief of the Confederate bureau of war, recorded in his journal that the “Yankee election was evidently a damper on the spirits of many of our people, and is said to have depressed the army a good deal. Lincoln’s triumph was more complete than most of us expected. Most judicious persons … hoped that it would be closely contested, possibly attended with violence.”270 Lee’s chief of ordnance lamented that “our subjugation is popular at the north.”271 From Atlanta, a Union general reported that the “rebs here are much chapfallen at the disaster to their political friends in the north. They seem to consider it worse than a disaster in the field, and a death blow to their dearest hopes of success.”272 Jefferson Davis, however, did not take that view and determined to fight on to the bitter end, needlessly prolonging an unwinnable war.
Lincoln savored his victory, though the possibility of defeat held few terrors for him. As he told Noah Brooks the day after the election: “Being only mortal, after all, I should have been a little mortified if I had been beaten in this canvass before the people; but the sting would have been more than compensated by the thought that the people had notified me that my official responsibilities were soon to be lifted off my back.”273 To another journalist he said that the cares of his office were “so oppressive” that “he felt as though the moment when he could relinquish the burden and retire to private life would be the sweetest he could possibly experience.”274 Still, Lincoln acknowledged to a committee of Marylanders that he “would not attempt to conceal from them the fact that he was gratified at the results of the Presidential election, and he would assure them that he had kept as near as he could to the exercise of his best judgment, for the promotion of the interests of the whole country; and now, to have the seal of approbation marked on the course he had pursued was exceedingly gratifying to his feelings.”275
To Noah Brooks, the president modestly confessed his need of divine assistance: “I should be the veriest shallow and self-conceited blockhead upon the footstool if, in my discharge of the duties which are put upon me in this place, I should hope to get along without the wisdom which comes from God, and not from men.”276 This modest sensibility led him to reject Brooks’s suggestion that he share the good electoral news with his old friend Anson G. Henry in Oregon: “I don’t think it would look well for a message from me to go travelling around the country blowing my own horn. You sign the message and I will send it.”277
Democratic blunders and Union military success did not alone account for Lincoln’s reelection, important though they were. It is hard to say precisely how significant a role his character and personality played, but it was a big one. The perceptive journalist E. L. Godkin informed readers of the London Daily News that men in rural America showed little concern about the president�
�s sartorial taste or his manners. Instead “his logic and his English, his jokes, his plain common sense, his shrewdness, his unbounded reliance on their honesty and straightforwardness, go right to their hearts.” They “are in earnest in a way the like of which the world never saw before, silently, calmly, but deliberately in earnest; and they will fight on, in my opinion, as long as they have men, muskets, powder, and corn and wool, and would fight on, though the grass were growing in Wall Street, and there was not a gold dollar on this side of the Atlantic.”278 This strong resolve was partly inspired by Lincoln’s own indomitable will.
Abraham Lincoln: A Life, Volume 2 Page 130
