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William C. Harris - Two against Lincoln: Reverdy Johnson and Horatio Seymour, Champions of the Loyal Opposition

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Two against Lincoln: Reverdy Johnson and Horatio Seymour, Champions of the Loyal Opposition
Author:
William C Harris
Publisher:
University Press of Kansas
Genre:
Books / Politics
Year:
2017
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Reverdy Johnson (17961876), Maryland senator, and Horatio Seymour, Democratic governor of New York, were two influential opponents of Abraham Lincoln and the Republicans during the Civil War. But unlike the Copperheads, they staunchly supported the war to suppress the rebellion. The story of these two figures of the loyal opposition by Lincoln Prizewinning author William C. Harris provides a new way of understanding critical controversies relating to the purpose of the Civil War, its conduct, emancipation, white racial opinion, loyalty, military conscription, and civil liberties.

Johnson, a distinguished lawyer, former Whig, and conservative Unionist, did not believe that the secessionist states had left the Union, an idea with broad implications for post-war reconstruction. Like Seymour, he opposed Republican efforts in Washington to end slavery, assuming such a policy would backfire against the Union. However, Johnson in 1864 spoke in favor of the Thirteenth Amendment to abolish slavery. Before the war, Seymour supported Stephen Douglass popular sovereignty policies, allowing the territories to decide whether or not to permit slavery, and during the war he opposed any tampering with slavery. Two Against Lincoln explores how these two men negotiated issues of emancipation, reconstruction, and reconciliation, all while navigating the roiling currents of partisan politics. The book includes illuminating accounts of the framing of the Fourteenth Amendment in 1866, the ephemeral National Union (Democratic) Party of 1866, the role of Senator Johnson in the approval of the military reconstruction acts of 1867, the impeachment of President Andrew Johnson, and, finally, the presidential election of 1868 in which Seymour as the Democratic candidate did better than expected against war hero U. S. Grant.

Building on the authors award winning work on Lincoln and the border states, Two Against Lincoln illustrates the complexity of political divisions in the Union states, as embodied in two powerful, controversial leaders of the time.

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two against lincoln

Two against

Lincoln

Reverdy Johnson and Horatio Seymour,

Champions of the Loyal

Opposition

william c. harris

University Press of Kansas

2017 by the University Press of Kansas

Published by the University Press of Kansas (Lawrence, Kansas 66045 ), which was organized by the Kansas Board of Regents and is operated and funded by Emporia State University, Fort Hays State University, Kansas State University, Pittsburg State University, the University of Kansas, and Wichita State University

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Harris, William C. (William Charles), 1933 author.

Title: Two against Lincoln : Reverdy Johnson and Horatio Seymour, champions of the loyal opposition / William C. Harris.

Description: Lawrence, Kansas : University Press of Kansas, 2017 . | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2016047611

ISBN 9780700624126 (cloth : alk. paper)

ISBN 9780700624133 (ebook)

Subjects: LCSH: Johnson, Reverdy, 1796 1876 . | Seymour, Horatio, 1810 1886 . | Lincoln, Abraham, 1809 1865 Adversaries. | United StatesPolitics and government 1861 1865 . | United StatesHistoryCivil War, 1861 1865 Political aspects. | Democratic Party (U.S.) Biography. | Unionists (United States Civil War)Biography. | PoliticiansUnited States Biography.

Classification: LCC E 415.9 .J H 37 2017 | DDC 973.8 dc

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/ 2016047611 .

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data is available.

Printed in the United States of America

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

The paper used in this publication is recycled and contains percent postconsumer waste. It is acid free and meets the minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials z 39.48 - 1992 .

For the Greatest Generation,
may they ever be young in our memories

contents

acknowledgments

During my many years of research and writing on Abraham Lincoln and other Civil Warera subjects, many people have aided me. Some have simply shown an interest in my study and asked important questions that prompted my careful consideration. Others have given material assistance and read drafts of the manuscripts. During the last two decades, my dining partners and senior colleagues Alex De Grand, John Riddle, Jim Banker, Joe Mobley, and the late Joe Hobbs learned to tolerate my near obsession with Lincoln. They have provided encouragement and good humor for my research and writing. I owe a special word of thanks to John David Smith, a former colleague and now a distinguished member of the Department of History, University of North Carolina at Charlotte, for his generous help in all of my scholarly activities. I also would be remiss if I did not recognize the interest and support of the Department of History at North Carolina State University during my thirty-five years as a member of its faculty.

Many library staffs and curators of manuscripts and illustrations have been helpful, none more so than that of the D. H. Hill Library at North Carolina State University. In addition, I have received marvelous assistance from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Duke University libraries. Both the Manuscript and the Prints and Photographic divisions of the Library of Congress have often rendered important aid for my publications. In numerous ways, the North Carolina State Division of Archives and History, Raleigh, has provided generous assistance for my research and writing on national as well as Old North State subjects.

Finally, my wife of many years, Betty Glenn Harris, has been an indispensable pillar of support for all of my research and writing. I continue to owe her a great deal.

Introduction

In writing about the Northern opposition to Abraham Lincoln and the Republicans during the Civil War, historians have usually focused on the Copperheads or antiwar wing of the Democratic Party. They have debated the question of the loyalty of the Copperheads and their importance. Reflecting the need to defend democracy and political dissent during the Cold War, several historians at that time refuted the traditional view that the Copperheads were conspirators against the Lincoln government and the state Republican governments in the West (todays Midwest). The most important of these revisionist scholars was Frank L. Klement whose Copperheads in the Middle West , published in 1960 , became the standard account of the interpretation that the Copperheads were mainly the product of Republican propaganda. According to Klement, they were loyal dissenters who felt threatened by Republican economic policies and by violations of civil liberties and states rights during the Civil War.

In 2006 , Professor Jennifer L. Weber in a splendid book, Copperheads: The Rise and Fall of Lincolns Opponents in the North , seriously challenged the Klement interpretation. She revealed that the antiwar Democrats were, as President Abraham Lincoln characterized them, a fire in the rear and a threat to the Union cause in the war. Other historians have contrasted these peace Democrats and obstructionists with the War Democrats who patriotically affiliated with the Republicans in the Union Party, as the coalition was called. The War Democrats, despite their traditional adherence to a strict construction of the Constitution, usually supported President Lincoln and Republican policies. Although some might have had misgivings, Democrats in the Union Party backed Lincolns Emancipation Proclamation, the suppression of antiwar dissent, confiscation of rebel property, federal military conscription, and the recruitment of black troops. War Democrats like Governor Oliver Perry Morton of Indiana and General Benjamin F. Butler of Massachusetts ultimately cast their lot with the radical wing of the Republican Party. A few prominent War Democrats, for example John A. Dix of New York, a political general, returned to the Democratic Party after the war.

Frequently neglected in the accounts of the Civil War have been those Democrats who remained faithful to the old party of Andrew Jackson, to its constitutional tenets, and also to the original Union purpose in the war, but opposed Lincoln, the Republicans, and the Union Party coalition. Horatio Seymour, who served as governor of New York from January 1863 to January 1865 , emerged as the leader of these loyal Democrats. Reverdy Johnson of Maryland, an old-line Whig conservative, often cooperated with the Democrats in supporting the war and opposing Lincoln and Republican policies. Johnson, reputedly Americas pre-eminent lawyer, not only helped to save his state for the Union, he also articulated valuable constitutional and political principles and arguments for conservatives and Democrats.

Although they might not have met or corresponded, Seymour and Johnson in speeches, pamphlets, and letters provided the loyal opposition with its most penetrating critique and political challenge to Lincoln and his party during the war. With remarkable consistency and often similarity in their views, the vigorous efforts of Seymour and Johnson against the Republicans continued after Lincolns death. Both men came to the conclusion that the Republicans represented a serious threat to civil liberties (for whites) and to the federal system of government created by the Founders. Furthermore, Seymour and Johnson increasingly doubted that the war could be won under Lincolns leadership and the hard war policies of the Republicans, including federal emancipation. Plainly, these two loyal opponents of Lincoln and the Republicans have not received the attention from scholars and students that they deserve in the history of the Civil War era.

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