Team of Rivals (110 page)

A heartfelt note from Henry Ward Beecher helped to dispel Stanton’s disappointment at relinquishing his ambition. “The country cannot spare your services from your present place,” wrote the celebrated minister, “or I could wish that you might redeem Taney’s place and restore to that Court, the honor and trust of Marshall’s day…. I regard your administration of the War Department, from whatever point it is viewed, as one of the greatest features of this grand time. Your energy vitalizing industry, and fidelity, but above all,
Your moral vision…
are just as sure to give your name honor and fame…. If you were to die to-morrow you have done enough for your own fame already.”

In an emotional reply, Stanton told Beecher that he was deeply moved by his generous remarks. “Often, in dark hours, you have come before me, and I have longed to hear your voice, feeling that above all other men you could cheer, strengthen, guide, and uphold me in this great battle, where, by God’s providence, it has fallen upon me to hold a post and perform a duty beyond my own strength. But being a stranger I had no right to claim your confidence or ask for help…. Now, my dear Sir, your voice has reached me, and your hand is stretched forth as to a friend…. Already my heart feels renewed strength and is inspired with fresh hope.”

Montgomery Blair desired the post of Chief Justice even more fervently than Stanton. He had gracefully acceded to Lincoln’s request for his resignation, but the high appointment would certainly compensate for the remnant wound. His distinguished career as a lawyer had been defined by his eloquent representation of the slave Dred Scott in the case that had forever cast a blight on Justice Taney’s name. Monty had powerful backers, including Seward, Weed, and Welles, all of whom vastly preferred him to Chase. Welles told Lincoln that, of all the candidates, Blair “best conformed to these requirements—that the President knew the man, his ability, his truthfulness, honesty and courage.” Lincoln “expressed his concurrence…and spoke kindly and complimentarily of Mr. Blair but did not in any way commit himself, nor did I expect or suppose he would.”

Lincoln understood that the appointment mattered greatly, not only to Monty but to his father, who had taken his son’s forced resignation as a personal blow. A week after Taney died, the elder Blair wrote Lincoln an impassioned plea: “I beg you to indulge me with a little conference with you on paper about a thing which as involving a good deal of egotism, I am ashamed to talk about face to face.” He went on to describe the Blairs’ enduring loyalty to both the Union and the president. “Now I come,” he pressed, “to what I hope you will consider another & higher opportunity of serving you & the Republic by carrying your political principles & the support of your policy expressed in relation to the reconstruction of the Union & the support of the freedman’s proclamation, into the Supreme Court. I think Montgomery’s unswerving support of your administration in all its aspects coupled with his unfaltering attachment to you personally fits him to be your representative man at the head of that Bench.”

When Mary Lincoln warned Old Man Blair that “Chase and his friends are besieging my Husband for the Chief-Justiceship,” Blair discarded his embarrassment and requested a personal interview. Lincoln listened graciously as Monty’s father suggested that his son “had been tried as a Judge and not found wanting, that his practice in the West had made him conversant with our land law, Spanish law, as well as the common and civil law in which his university studies had grounded him, that his practice in the Supreme Court brought him into the circle of commercial and constitutional questions. That, besides on political issues he sustained him [the President] in every thing,” and “when Chase and every other member of [the] Cabinet declined to make war for Sumter, Montgomery stood by him.”

Lincoln agreed that Monty would admirably acquit himself as Chief Justice, but he was also aware that the nomination would produce a storm of criticism from his many enemies in the Congress. He had no desire to provoke unnecessary animosity among the radicals, who probably held sufficient power to deny confirmation. Nor did Lincoln trust where Monty Blair’s conservative philosophy would lead on issues surrounding Reconstruction and the integration of the country’s new black citizens.

The same objections most likely applied to Edward Bates. Believing the post would be “a crowning and retiring honor,” Bates had “personally solicited” Lincoln to consider his name. “If not overborne by others,” Lincoln told Bates, he would happily consider him for the post, but “Chase was turning every stone, to get it, and several others were urged, from different quarters.” Hearing this, Bates declared himself “happy in the feeling that the failure to get the place, will be no painful disappointment for my mind is made up to private life.”

In the end, Lincoln returned to his first impulse upon learning of Roger Taney’s illness—Salmon P. Chase. “Of Mr. Chase’s ability and of his soundness on the general issues of the war there is, of course, no question,” he told Chase’s friend Henry Wilson. “I have only one doubt about his appointment. He is a man of unbounded ambition, and has been working all his life to become President. That he can never be; and I fear that if I make him chief-justice he will simply become more restless and uneasy and neglect the place in his strife and intrigue to make himself President. If I were sure that he would go on the bench and give up his aspirations and do nothing but make himself a great judge, I would not hesitate a moment.” He made a similar comment when Schuyler Colfax gave his word that Chase “would dedicate the remainder of his life to the Bench.”

When supporters of other candidates reminded the president of Chase’s myriad intrigues against him, Lincoln responded, “Now, I know meaner things about Governor Chase than any of those men can tell me,” but “we have stood together in the time of trial, and I should despise myself if I allowed personal differences to affect my judgment of his fitness for the office.”

Chase remained in Ohio throughout this tumult, confident that the nomination would be his. Oblivious to Stanton’s own hopes, he told the war secretary two days after Taney’s death that “within the last three or four months I have been assured that it was the Presidents intention, to offer the place to me in case of a vacancy. I think I should accept it if offered: for I am weary of political life & work.” However, when weeks passed with no word from the president, Chase anxiously decided to come to Washington. Fessenden and Sumner assured him that the appointment would be made as soon as the elections were over, but Lincoln waited until December 6 to announce his choice.

That morning, Chase’s friend John Alley of Massachusetts had called on the president. “I have something to tell you that will make you happy,” Lincoln announced. “I have just sent Mr. Chase word that he is to be appointed Chief-Justice, and you are the first man I have told of it.” Alley enthusiastically replied, “Mr. President, this is an exhibition of magnanimity and patriotism that could hardly be expected of any one. After what he has said against your administration, which has undoubtedly been reported to you, it was hardly to be expected that you would bestow the most important office within your gift on such a man.”

“To have done otherwise I should have been recreant to my convictions of duty to the Republican party and to the country,” Lincoln answered. “As to his talk about me, I do not mind that. Chase is, on the whole, a pretty good fellow and a very able man. His only trouble is that he has ‘the White House fever’ a little too bad, but I hope this may cure him and that he will be satisfied.”

Lincoln later told Senator Chandler that personally he “would rather have swallowed his buckhorn chair than to have nominated Chase,” but the decision was right for the country. “Probably no other man than Lincoln,” Nicolay wrote to Therena, “would have had, in this age of the world, the degree of magnanimity to thus forgive and exalt a rival who had so deeply and so unjustifiably intrigued against him. It is however only another most marked illustration of the greatness of the President.”

Chase got the official word from Kate when he arrived home that night. He immediately sat down to write the president. “I cannot sleep before I thank [you] for this mark of your confidence…. Be assured that I prize your confidence & good will more than nomination or office.”

On December 15, the Supreme Court was “overflowing with an immense throng of dignitaries of various degrees, ladies, congressmen, foreign ministers, and others who wished to view the simple but impressive ceremony of swearing in the chief judicial officer of the republic.” Kate Sprague and her sister, Nettie, were there, “gorgeously dressed,” according to Noah Brooks. Secretary Seward was also present, along with Nathaniel Banks, Ben Wade, Reverdy Johnson, and Charles Sumner, whose “handsome features plainly showed his inward glow of gratification.” At the usher’s solemn announcement, everyone stood as the robed justices entered the room. The senior justice, James W. Wayne, administered the oath, which Chase “read in a clear but tremulous voice.” When he finished, Chase “lifted his right hand, looked upward to the beautiful dome of the court-room, and with deep feeling added, ‘So help me God.’”

“I hope the President may have no occasion to regret his selection,” Gideon Welles confided in his diary, sharing Lincoln’s apprehension that Chase would “use the place for political advancement and thereby endanger confidence in the court.” Still, Lincoln believed the risk worth taking. He trusted that Chase would help secure the rights of the black man, for which he had fought throughout his career, a belief that outweighed concerns about Chase’s restless temperament.

Chase quickly justified Lincoln’s confidence in this regard. Within hours of Chase’s accession to the Court, John Rock, a black lawyer from Massachusetts, wrote a hopeful letter to Charles Sumner. Rock had been seeking to practice before the Supreme Court for over a year, but his efforts had been denied on the basis of his race. “We now have a great and good man for our Chief Justice, and with him I think my color will not be a bar to my admission,” he wrote. Sumner immediately contacted Chase, who was delighted to pursue the cause of opening the Court to its first black barrister.

Six weeks later, Sumner stood before the Supreme Court as Rock’s sponsor: “May it please the Court, I move that John S. Rock, a member of the Supreme Court of the State of Massachusetts, be admitted to practice as a member of this Court.” Then, with Chase’s assent, Rock stepped forward for the oath that would allow him to practice before the highest court in the land. “This event,”
Harper’s Weekly
observed, represented an “extraordinary reversal” of the decision in the
Dred Scott
case. Rock’s admission,
Harper’s
predicted, would “be regarded by the future historian as a remarkable indication of the revolution which is going on in the sentiment of a great people.”

M
ARY
L
INCOLN TOOK
special satisfaction in her husband’s reelection. The White House “has been quite a
Mecca
of late,” she wrote to her friend Mercy Conkling. “We are surrounded, at all times, by a great deal of company,” and “it has been gratifying, from all quarters, to receive so many kind & congratulatory letters, so fraught, with good feeling.”

Mary’s pleasure in her husband’s victory reflected more than simple pride. During the fall election, she had been terrified that his defeat might signal merchants in New York and Philadelphia—to whom she still owed substantial sums—to call in her debt. “I owe altogether about twenty-seven thousand dollars,” she confided in Elizabeth Keckley. “Mr. Lincoln has but little idea of the expense of a woman’s wardrobe. He glances at my rich dresses, and is happy in the belief that the few hundred dollars that I obtain from him supply all my wants. I must dress in costly materials. The people scrutinize every article that I wear with critical curiosity. The very fact of having grown up in the West, subjects me to more searching observation. To keep up appearances, I must have money—more than Mr. Lincoln can spare for me. He is too honest to make a penny outside of his salary; consequently I had, and still have, no alternative but to run in debt.”

Although padded bills and attempts to trade upon her White House influence exposed her to serious scandal, Mary could not curtail her excessive spending habits. “Here is the carriage of Mrs Lincoln before a dry goods Store,” Judge Taft noted four weeks after the election, “her footman has gone into the Store. The Clerk is just going out to the carriage (where Mrs L is waiting) with some pieces of goods for her to choose from. I should rather think that she would have a better chance at the goods if she was to go into the Store but then she
might
get jostled and gazed at and that too would be doing just as the common people do. The footman holds the carriage door open. The driver sits on the box and hold[s] the horses. Mrs L. thumbs the goods and asks a great many questions.”

A week later, Mary journeyed to Philadelphia for another shopping trip. Not long afterward, she visited New York, where she purchased a new dress, expensive furs, and “300 pairs of kid gloves.” When the items she purchased did not measure up to her expectations, her manic sprees quickly gave way to depression and anger. “I can neither wear, or settle with you, for my bonnet without different inside flowers,” she threatened a milliner in New York. “I cannot retain or wear the bonnet, as it is—I am certainly taught a lesson, by your acting thus.”

Mary’s self-conscious attention to the details of her bonnet was not entirely misplaced. Newspaper reports of her evening receptions invariably commented on every piece of her apparel. At the first White House levee of the new winter season, the
National Republican
noted that she “was charmingly and elegantly attired…dressed in a rich, plain white silk, with heavy black lace flounce and black lace shawl, and upon her head was a coronet of white and purple flowers—a most tasteful decoration.” Her outfit at a state dinner a few weeks later drew equal praise. “Mrs. Lincoln was tastefully attired in a heavy black and white spotted silk, elegantly trimmed with black lace, her headdress and rich set of jewelry harmonizing throughout.”