labored long over the petitions, and it was hard for him to deny appeals.

Lincoln was not easily moved in cases where the man condemned was a man of intelligence and influence. An interesting case was that of Louis A. Welton, a man justly sentenced to imprisonment in the summer of 1864, and who was able to secure the support of Senator Morgan, of New York, H. J. Raymond, of the New York Times, and Thurlow Weed. The appeal came to Lincoln at a time when he could not afford to lose any of his political support; and there were not in the country three men for whose support just then he cared more than for these three. New York seemed at that time practically certain to vote against Lincoln, and these three men, and Horace Greeley, had mighty influence in New York. Lincoln did not want to lose any strength which he had in so important a state. But not even for the good will of these men would he pardon a man whom he believed to be justly accused unless they would assume the responsibility. He required them to enter their request for the pardon on the very document in which he set forth his reasons for believing that it ought not to be granted. He would not argue the case nor invite them to argue it. If after they had read his review of the case they still would request the pardon, and write the request upon his statement of the case as he understood it, he would issue the pardon. This is a document of remarkable interest.*

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, August 31, 1864. Mr. Louis A. Welton came from the rebel lines into ours with a written contract to furnish large supplies to the rebels, was arrested with the contract in his possession, and has been sentenced to imprisonment for it. He, and his friends complain of this, on no substantial evidence whatever, but simply because his word, only given after his arrest, that he only took the contract

*So far as I am aware this has never been published. I am permitted to use it by Mr. Oliver R. Barrett, in whose collection it is.

as a means of escaping from the rebel lines, was not accepted as a full defense-He perceives that if this had been true he would have destroyed the contract so soon as it had served his purpose in getting him across the lines; but not having done this and being caught with the paper on him, he tells this other absurd story that he kept the paper in the belief that our government would join him in taking the profit of fulfilling the contract. This is my understanding of the case; and I can not conceive of a case of a man found in possession of a contract to furnish rebel supplies, who can not escape, if this be held a sufficient-ground of escape-It is simply for the accused to escape by telling a very absurd and improbable story. Now, if Senator Morgan, and Mr. Weed, and Mr. Raymond, will not argue with me that I ought to discharge this man, but will, in writing on this sheet, simply request me to do it, I will do it solely in deference to their wishes.

The following endorsements appear on this letter:

We respectfully request the President to pardon the within. named Louis A. Welton, now at Fort Delaware.

Thurlow Weed

I have read Mr. Welton's statement and if it is true, (and I know no reason for distrusting it,) his pardon would be an act of justice. I concur in Mr. Weed's request.

H. J. Raymond.

While Lincoln could be and often was very stubborn in dealing with trying situations, he sometimes displayed great shrewdness in evading a decision where he preferred not to assume responsibility which did not fairly belong to him. One of his assistant secretaries, William O. Stoddard, gives in detail the narrative of an effort that was made on behalf of a guerrilla for whose pardon Lincoln received a long petition followed by the personal appeal of an influential delegation. Lincoln knew the man was guilty, for he had sent for the papers in the case and had satisfied himself not only that the man deserved to die, but that the

region where the crime had been committed was one which needed the lesson. The sentence stood until the morning of the execution. Then a large and eminent delegation came to the White House and brought to bear upon the president a very considerable pressure. Lincoln, however, would take no action without reviewing again the papers in the case. He instructed Stoddard to look for the papers. Stoddard did so, and could not find them. Lincoln suggested to the delegation to go to the War Department. They went, but returned with the information that the papers were not at the War Department, they had been sent to the White House at the president's own request and had not been returned. Further search failed to disclose the documents, and the delegation went away sorrowful. Hardly had they left the White House when a telegram was handed to the president. Lincoln thus remarked:

"What did you say? A telegram? You don't tell me! Has that man been actually hung? It's a pity about his papers! It seems to me—well, yes, I remember now. I know where-well, if I did; I guess I wouldn't. Not now. But if they are ever called for again, and they won't be, they ought to be where they can be found. Certainly, certainly. But it is just as well that one murderer escaped being pardoned by Abraham Lincoln. Narrow escape, too. The merest piece of luck in all the world."

CHAPTER XIX

RADICALS AND COPPERHEADS

LIKE all men conservative by nature but committed by conviction to a polity of progress, Abraham Lincoln won severe criticism from two widely divergent groups. Politics proverbially makes strange bed-fellows. The administration of Lincoln produced a working coalition between some of the ultra anti-slavery men in the North and others who represented diametrically opposite political convictions.

Mention has already been made of the political reaction of 1862, in which the northern states quite generally receded from their whole-hearted allegiance to Lincoln, and sent to Congress a largely increased Democratic minority. Note has also been taken of the partial recovery, not in congressional representation, but in popular confidence in the administration, as shown in the results of the elections of those few states that chose governors in 1863. This increase in confidence did not mean that the people were less weary of the war, or that the men in the North who opposed the war were less bitter in their opposition.

In various northern states, and especially in southern Ohio, Indiana and Illinois, were organized societies known as the "Knights of the Golden Circle," "Sons of Liberty," "The Order of the Star," and the "Order of American Knights." These secret bodies enrolled large numbers of men, some of whom were thoroughly disloyal to the Union, and others of whom professed to be loyal to the government, but opposed to what they counted the tyranny or the radical abolition policy of Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln was not greatly disturbed by the so-called Copper

head movement. He treated it, according to his secretaries, Nicolay and Hay, with "good-humored contempt." "Nothing can make me believe," he said, "that one hundred thousand Indiana Democrats are disloyal."

In all probability he was right. Yet there were enough disloyal Indiana Democrats to make the Knights of the Golden Circle a formidable organization. Governor Morton, of Indiana, did not share Lincoln's complacent view, and Governor Richard Yates, of Illinois, was almost equally disturbed.

These Copperhead organizations had for their purpose the discouragement of enlistment and the encouragement of desertions, the impeding in every practicable way of measures in the North for the putting down of the rebellion, and in general the giving of aid and comfort to the Confederate Army. Plans were made for the capture of the prisons in the North where Confederate soldiers were confined, for the destruction of arsenals and armories, and for other bold and terrible deeds. These larger and more heroic exploits did not get beyond threat and rumor; but there was secret and active propaganda, hostile to the government, that manifested itself in literally thousands of communities, and the personal abuse which was heaped upon Abraham Lincoln seems at this day all but incredible.

In a number of cities an opposing secret organization called the Union League was established. This society had its permanent monument in some northern cities in Union League Clubs.

He

A part of this hostility to Lincoln was not without apparent cause. Those reckon without knowledge of his character who assume that Lincoln was only a mild and irresolute man. was by nature mild, and he was so cautious as to appear, and at times to have been, irresolute. But he was also a man of inflexible will. When he had definitely committed himself to a course, he could not only be consistently loyal to it, but very stubbornly earnest in his refusal to swerve.

Very early in the war Lincoln saw that some drastic measures