Chapter 14 Campaign for Congress - Abraham Lincoln Vol.1

CHAPTER XIV
CAMPAIGN FOR CONGRESS
 In the months that remained of his term, after the election of his successor, President Tyler pursued with much vigor his purpose of accomplishing the annexation of Texas, regarding it as the measure which was specially to illustrate his administration and to preserve it from oblivion. The state of affairs, when Congress came together in December, 1844, was propitious to the project. Dr. Anson Jones had been elected as President of Texas; the republic was in a more thriving condition than ever before. Its population was rapidly increasing under the stimulus of its probable change of flag; its budget presented a less unwholesome balance; its relations with Mexico, while they were no more friendly, had ceased to excite alarm. The Tyler government, having been baffled in the spring by the rejection of the treaty for annexation which they had submitted to the Senate, chose to proceed this winter in a different way. Early in the session a joint resolution providing for annexation was introduced in the House of Representatives, which, after considerable discussion and attempted amendment by the anti-slavery members, passed the House by a majority of twenty-two votes.
In the Senate it encountered more opposition, as might have been expected in a chamber which had overwhelmingly rejected the same scheme only a few months before. It was at last amended by inserting a section called the Walker amendment, providing that the President, if it were in his judgment advisable, should proceed by way of negotiation, instead of submitting the resolutions as an overture on the part of the United States to Texas. This amendment eased the conscience of a few shy supporters of the Administration who had committed themselves very strongly against the scheme, and saved them from the shame of open tergiversation. The President, however, treated this subterfuge with the contempt which it deserved, by utterly disregarding the Walker amendment, and by dispatching a messenger to Texas to bring about annexation on the basis of the resolutions, the moment he had signed them, when only a few hours of his official existence remained. The measures initiated by Tyler were, of course, carried out by Polk. The work was pushed forward with equal zeal at Washington and at Austin. A convention of Texans was called for the 4th of July to consider the American propositions; they were promptly accepted and ratified, and in the last days of 1845 Texas was formally admitted into the Union as a State.
Besides the general objections which the anti-slavery men of the North had to the project itself, there was something especially offensive to them in the pretense of fairness and compromise held out by the resolutions committing the Government to annexation. The third section provided that four new States might hereafter be formed out of the Territory of Texas; that such States as were formed out of the portion lying south of 36 degrees 30', the Missouri Compromise line, might be admitted with or without slavery, as the people might desire; and that slavery should be prohibited in such States as might be formed out of the portion lying north of that line. The opponents of slavery regarded this provision, with good reason, as derisive. Slavery already existed in the entire territory by the act of the early settlers from the South who had brought their slaves with them, and the State of Texas had no valid claim to an inch of ground north of the line of 36 degrees 30' nor anywhere near it; so that this clause, if it had any force whatever, would have authorized the establishment of slavery in a portion of New Mexico, where it did not exist, and where it had been expressly prohibited by the Mexican law. Another serious objection was that the resolutions were taken as committing the United States to the adoption and maintenance of the Rio Grande del Norte as the western boundary of Texas. All mention of this was avoided in the instrument, and it was expressly stated that the State was to be formed "subject to the adjustment by this Government of all questions of boundary that may arise with other governments," but the moment the resolutions were passed the Government assumed, as a matter beyond dispute, that all of the territory east of the Rio Grande was the rightful property of Texas, to be defended by the military power of the United States.
Even if Mexico had been inclined to submit to the annexation of Texas, it was nevertheless certain that the occupation of the left bank of the Rio Grande, without an attempt at an understanding, would bring about a collision. The country lying between the Nueces and the Rio Grande was then entirely uninhabited, and was thought uninhabitable, though subsequent years have shown the fallacy of that belief. The occupation of the country extended no farther than the Nueces, and the Mexican farmers cultivated their corn and cotton in peace in the fertile fields opposite Matamoras.
It is true that Texas claimed the eastern bank of the Rio Grande from its source to its mouth; and while the Texans held Santa Anna prisoner, under duress of arms and the stronger pressure of his own conscience, which assured him that he deserved death as a murderer, "he solemnly sanctioned, acknowledged, and ratified" their independence with whatever boundaries they chose to claim; but the Bustamente administration lost no time in repudiating this treaty, and at once renewed the war, which had been carried on in a fitful way ever since.
[Illustration:   HENRY CLAY.]
[Sidenote: August 23, 1843.]
But leaving out of view this special subject of admitted dispute, the Mexican Government had warned our own in sufficiently formal terms that annexation could not be peacefully effected. When A. P. Upshur first began his negotiations with Texas, the Mexican Minister of Foreign Affairs, at his earliest rumors of what was afoot, addressed a note to Waddy Thompson, our Minister in Mexico, referring to the reported intention of Texas to seek admission, to the Union, and formally protesting against it as "an aggression unprecedented in the annals of the world," and adding "if it be indispensable for the Mexican nation to seek security for its rights at the expense of the disasters of war, it will call upon God, and rely on its own efforts for the defense of its just cause." A little while later General Almonte renewed this notification at Washington, saying in so many words that the annexation of Texas would terminate his mission, and that Mexico would declare war as soon as it received intimation of such an act. In June, 1845, Mr. Donelson, in charge of the American Legation in Mexico, assured the Secretary of State that war was inevitable, though he adopted the fiction of Mr. Calhoun, that it was the result of the abolitionist intrigues of Great Britain, which he credited with the intention "of depriving both Texas and the United States of all claim to the country between the Nueces and the Rio Grande."
No one, therefore, doubted that war would follow, and it soon came. General Zachary Taylor had been sent during the summer to Corpus Christi, where a considerable portion of the small army of the United States was placed under his command. It was generally understood to be the desire of the Administration that hostilities should begin without orders, by a species of spontaneous combustion; but the coolness and prudence of General Taylor made futile any such hopes, if they were entertained, and it required a positive order to induce him, in March, 1846, to advance towards the Rio Grande and to cross the disputed territory. He arrived at a point opposite Matamoras on the 28th of March, and immediately fortified himself, disregarding the summons of the Mexican commander, who warned him that such action would be considered as a declaration of war. In May, General Arista crossed the river and attacked General Taylor on the field of Palo Alto, where Taylor won the first of that remarkable series of victories, embracing Resaca de la Palma, Monterey, and Buena Vista, all gained over superior forces of the enemy, which made the American commander for the brief day that was left him the idol alike of soldiers and voters.
After Baker's election in 1844, it was generally taken as a matter of course in the district that Lincoln was to be the next candidate of the Whig party for Congress. It was charged at the time, and some recent writers have repeated the charge, that there was a bargain made in 1840 between Hardin, Baker, Lincoln, and Logan to succeed each other in the order named. This sort of fiction is the commonest known to American politics. Something like it is told, and more or less believed, in half the districts in the country at every election. It arises naturally from the fact that there are always more candidates than places, that any one who is a candidate twice is felt to be defrauding his neighbors, and that all candidates are too ready to assure their constituents that they only want one term, and too ready to forget these assurances when their terms are ending. There is not only no evidence of any such bargain among the men we have mentioned, but there is the clearest proof of the contrary. Two or more of them were candidates for the nomination at every election from the time when Stuart retired until the Whigs lost the district.
At the same time it is not to be denied that there was a tacit understanding among the Whigs of the district that whoever should, at each election, gain the honor of representing the one Whig constituency of the State, should hold himself satisfied with the privilege, and not be a candidate for reelection. The retiring member was not always convinced of the propriety of this arrangement. In the early part of January, 1846, Hardin was the only one whose name was mentioned in opposition to Lincoln. He was reasonably sure of his own county, and he tried to induce Lincoln to consent to an arrangement that all candidates should confine themselves to their own counties in the canvass; but Lincoln, who was very strong in the outlying counties of the district, declined the proposition, alleging, as a reason for refusing, that Hardin was so much better known than he, by reason of his service in Congress, that such a stipulation would give him a great advantage. There was fully as much courtesy as candor in this plea, and Lincoln's entire letter was extremely politic and civil. "I have always been in the habit," he says, "of acceding to almost any proposal that a friend would make, and I am truly sorry that I cannot to this." A month later Hardin saw that his candidacy was useless, and he published a card withdrawing from the contest, which was printed and commended in the kindest terms by papers friendly to Lincoln, and the two men remained on terms of cordial friendship.
[Sidenote: Lincoln to James, Nov. 24, 1845. Unpublished MS.]
[Sidenote: Lincoln to James, Jan. 14, 1846. Unpublished MS.]
[Sidenote: Ibid.]
It is not to be said that Lincoln relied entirely upon his own merits and the sentiment of the constituents to procure him this nomination. Like other politicians of the time, he used all proper means to attain his object. A package of letters, written during the preliminary canvass, which have recently come into our hands, show how intelligent and how straightforward he was in the ways of politics. He had no fear of Baker; all his efforts were directed to making so strong a show of force as to warn Hardin off the field. He countenanced no attack upon his competitor; he approved a movement--not entirely disinterested-- looking to his nomination for Grovernor. He kept up an extensive correspondence with the captains of tens throughout the district; he suggested and revised the utterances of country editors; he kept his friends aware of his wishes as to conventions and delegates. He was never overconfident; so late as the middle of January, he did not share the belief of his supporters that he was to be nominated without a contest. "Hardin," he wrote, "is a man of desperate energy and perseverance, and one that never backs out; and, I fear, to think otherwise is to be deceived.... I would rejoice to be spared the labor of a contest, 'but being in' I shall go it thoroughly...." His knowledge of the district was curiously minute, though he underestimated his own popularity. He wrote: "As to my being able to make a break in the lower counties, ... I can possibly get Cass, but I do not think I will. Morgan and Scott are beyond my reach, Menard is safe to me; Mason, neck and neck; Logan is mine. To make the matter sure your entire senatorial district must be secured. Of this I suppose Tazewell is safe, and I have much done in both the other counties. In Woodford I have Davenport, Simms, Willard, Braken, Perry, Travis, Dr. Hazzard, and the Clarks, and some others, all specially committed. At Lacon, in Marshall, the very most active friend I have in the district (if I except yourself) is at work. Through him I have procured the names and written to three or four of the most active Whigs in each precinct of the county. Still, I wish you all in Tazewell to keep your eyes continually on Woodford and Marshall. Let no opportunity of making a mark escape. When they shall be safe, all will be safe--I think." His constitutional caution suggests those final words. He did not relax his vigilance for a moment until after Hardin withdrew. He warned his correspondents day by day of every move on the board; advised his supporters at every point, and kept every wire in perfect working order.
The convention was held at Petersburg on the 1st of May. Judge Logan placed the name of Lincoln before it, and he was nominated unanimously. The Springfield "Journal," giving the news the week after, said: "This nomination was of course anticipated, there being no other candidate in the field. Mr. Lincoln, we all know, is a good Whig, a good man, an able speaker, and richly deserves, as he enjoys, the confidence of the Whigs of this district and of the State."
The Democrats gave Mr. Lincoln a singular competitor--the famous Methodist preacher, Peter Cartwright. It was not the first time they had met in the field of politics. When Lincoln ran for the Legislature on his return from the. Black Hawk war, in 1832, one of the successful candidates of that year was this indefatigable circuit-rider. He was now over sixty years of age, in the height of his popularity, and in all respects an adversary not to be despised. His career as a preacher began at the beginning of the century and continued for seventy years. He was the son of one of the pioneers of the West, and grew up in the rudest regions of the border land between Tennessee and Kentucky. He represents himself, with the usual inverted pride of a class-leader, as having been a wild, vicious youth; but the catalogue of his crimes embraces nothing less venial than card-playing, horse-racing, and dancing, and it is hard to see what different amusements could have been found in southern Kentucky in 1801.
This course of dissipation did not continue long, as he was "converted and united with the Ebenezer Methodist Episcopal Church" in June of that year, when only sixteen years old, and immediately developed such zeal and power in exhortation that less than a year later he was licensed to "exercise his gifts as an exhorter so long as his practice is agreeable to the gospel." He became a deacon at twenty-one, an elder at twenty-three, a presiding elder at twenty-seven, and from that time his life is the history of his church in the West for sixty years. He died in 1872, eighty-seven years of age, having baptized twelve thousand persons and preached fifteen thousand sermons. He was, and will always remain, the type of the backwoods preacher. Even in his lifetime the simple story of his life became so overgrown with a net-work of fable that there is little resemblance between the simple, courageous, prejudiced itinerant of his "Autobiography" and the fighting, brawling, half-civilized, Protestant Friar Tuck of bar-room newspaper legend.
It is true that he did not always discard the weapons of the flesh in his combats with the ungodly, and he felt more than once compelled to leave the pulpit to do carnal execution upon the disturbers of the peace of the sanctuary; but two or three incidents of this sort in three-quarters of a century do not turn a parson into a pugilist. He was a fluent, self-confident speaker, who, after the habit of his time, addressed his discourses more to the emotions than to the reason of his hearers. His system of future rewards and punishments was of the most simple and concrete character, and formed the staple of his sermons. He had no patience with the refinements and reticences of modern theology, and in his later years observed with scorn and sorrow the progress of education and scholarly training in his own communion. After listening one day to a prayer from a young minister which shone more by its correctness than its unction, he could not refrain from saying, "Brother--, three prayers like that would freeze hell over!"-- a consummation which did not commend itself to him as desirable. He often visited the cities of the Atlantic coast, but saw little in them to admire. His chief pleasure on his return was to sit in a circle of his friends and pour out the phials of his sarcasm upon all the refinements of life that he had witnessed in New York or Philadelphia, which he believed, or affected to believe, were tenanted by a species of beings altogether inferior to the manhood that filled the cabins of Kentucky and Illinois. An apocryphal story of one of these visits was often told of him, which pleased him so that he never contradicted it: that becoming bewildered in the vastness of a New York hotel, he procured a hatchet, and in pioneer fashion "blazed" his way along the mahogany staircases and painted corridors from the office to his room. With all his eccentricities, he was a devout man, conscientious and brave. He lived in domestic peace and honor all his days, and dying, he and his wife, whom he had married almost in childhood, left a posterity of 129 direct descendants to mourn them. [Transcriber's Note: Lengthy footnote (1) relocated to chapter end.]
With all his devotion to the cause of his church, Peter Cartwright was an ardent Jackson politician, with probably a larger acquaintance throughout the district than any other man in it, and with a personal following which, beginning with his own children and grandchildren and extending through every precinct, made it no holiday task to defeat him in a popular contest. But Lincoln and his friends went energetically into the canvass, and before it closed he was able to foresee a certain victory.
An incident is related to show how accurately Lincoln could calculate political results in advance--a faculty which remained with him all his life. A friend, who was a Democrat, had come to him early in the canvass and had told him he wanted to see him elected, but did not like to vote against his party; still he would vote for him, if the contest was to be so close that every vote was needed. A short time before the election Lincoln said to him: "I have got the preacher, and I don't want your vote."
The election was held in August, and the Whig candidate's majority was very large--1511 in the district, where Clay's majority had been only 914, and where Taylor's, two years later, with all the glamour of victory about him, was ten less. Lincoln's majority in Sangamon County was 690, which, in view of the standing of his competitor, was the most remarkable proof which could be given of his personal popularity; [Transcriber's Note: Lengthy footnote (2) relocated to chapter end.] it was the highest majority ever given to any candidate in the county during the entire period of Whig ascendancy until Yates's triumphant campaign of 1852.