The patriotic conduct of Douglas earned for him the warm commendation of Northern newspapers, many of which had hitherto been incapable of ascribing honorable motives to him.^[964] No one who met him at the President's levees would have suspected that he had been one of his host's most relentless opponents. A correspondent of the New York Times described him as he appeared at one of these functions. "Here one minute, there the next—now congratulating the President, then complimenting Mrs. Lincoln, bowing and scraping, and shaking hands, and smiling, laughing, yarning and saluting the crowd of people whom he knew." More soberly, this same observer added, "He has already done a great deal of good to the administration."^[965] It is impossible to find the soured and discomfited rival in this picture.

The country was anxiously awaiting the development of the policy of the new Executive, for to eight out of every ten men, Lincoln was still an unknown man. Rumors were abroad that both Sumter and Pickens would be surrendered.^[966] Seward was known to be conciliatory on this point; and the man on the street never once doubted that Seward would be the master-mind in the cabinet. Those better informed knew—and Douglas was among them—that Seward's influence was menaced by an aggressive faction in the cabinet.^[967] Behind these official advisers, giving them active support, were those Republican senators who from the first had doubted the efficacy of compromise.

Believing the country should have assurances that President Lincoln did not meditate war,—did not, in short, propose to yield to the aggressive wing of his party,—Douglas sought to force a show of hands.^[968] On March 13th, he offered a resolution which was designed to draw the fire of Republican senators. The Secretary of War was requested to furnish information about the Southern forts now in possession of the Federal government; to state whether reinforcements were needed to retain them; whether under existing laws the government had the power and means to reinforce them, and whether it was wise to retain military possession of such forts and to recapture those that had been lost, except for the purpose of subjugating and occupying the States which had seceded; and finally, if such were the motives, to supply estimates of the military force required to reduce the seceding States and to protect the national capital.^[969] The wording of the resolution was purposely involved. Douglas hoped that it would precipitate a discussion which would disclose the covert wish of the aggressives, and force an authoritative announcement of President Lincoln's policy. Doubtless there was a political motive behind all this. Douglas was not averse to putting his bitter and implacable enemies in their true light, as foes of compromise even to the extent of disrupting the Union.^[970]

Not receiving any response, Douglas took the floor in defense of his resolution. He believed that the country should have the information which his resolution was designed to elicit. The people were apprehensive of civil war. He had put his construction upon the President's inaugural; but "the Republican side of the Chamber remains mute and silent, neither assenting nor dissenting." The answer which he believed the resolution would call forth, would demonstrate two points of prime importance: "First, that the President does not meditate war; and, secondly, that he has no means for prosecuting a warfare upon the seceding States, even if he desired."

With his wonted dialectic skill Douglas sought to establish his case. The existing laws made no provision for collecting the revenue on shipboard. It was admitted on all sides that collection at the port of entry in South Carolina was impossible. The President had no legal right to blockade the port of Charleston. He could not employ the army to enforce the laws in the seceded States, for the military could be used only to aid a civil process; and where was the marshal in South Carolina to execute a writ? The President must have known that he lacked these powers. He must have referred to the future action of Congress, then, when he said that he should execute the laws in all the States, unless the "requisite means were withheld." But Congress had not passed laws empowering the Executive to collect revenue or to gain possession of the forts. What, then, was the inference? Clearly this, that the Republican senators did not desire to confer these powers.

If this inference is not correct, if this interpretation of the inaugural address is faulty, urged Douglas, why preserve this impenetrable silence? Why not let the people know what the policy of the administration is? They have a right to know. "The President of the United States holds the destiny of this country in his hands. I believe he means peace, and war will be averted, unless he is overruled by the disunion portion of his party. We all know the irrepressible conflict is going on in their camp.... Then, throw aside this petty squabble about how you are to get along with your pledges before election; meet the issues as they are presented; do what duty, honor, and patriotism require, and appeal to the people to sustain you. Peace is the only policy that can save the country or save your party."^[971]

On the Republican side of the chamber, this appeal was bitterly resented. It met with no adequate response, because there was none to give; but Wilson roundly denounced it as a wicked, mischief-making utterance.^[972] Unhappily, Douglas allowed himself to be drawn into a personal altercation with Fessenden, in which he lost his temper and marred the effect of his patriotic appeal. There was probably some truth in Douglas's charge that both senators intended to be personally irritating.^[973] Under the circumstances, it was easier to indulge in personal disparagement of Douglas, than to meet his embarrassing questions.

How far Douglas still believed in the possibility of saving the Union through compromise, it is impossible to say. Publicly he continued to talk in an optimistic strain.^[974] On March 25th, he expressed his satisfaction in the Senate that only one danger-point remained; Fort Sumter, he understood, was to be evacuated.^[975] But among his friends no one looked into the future with more anxiety than he. Intimations from the South that citizens of the United States would probably be excluded from the courts of the Confederacy, wrung from him the admission that such action would be equivalent to war.^[976] He noted anxiously the evident purpose of the Confederated States to coerce Kentucky and Virginia into secession.^[977] Indeed, it is probable that before the Senate adjourned, his ultimate hope was to rally the Union men in the border States.^[978]

When President Lincoln at last determined to send supplies to Fort Sumter, the issue of peace or war rested with Jefferson Davis and his cabinet at Montgomery. Early on the morning of April 12th, a shell, fired from a battery in Charleston harbor, burst directly over Fort Sumter, proclaiming to anxious ears the close of an era.

FOOTNOTES:

CHAPTER XXToC

THE SUMMONS

The news of the capitulation of Fort Sumter reached Washington on Sunday morning, April 14th. At a momentous cabinet meeting, President Lincoln read the draft of a proclamation calling into service seventy-five thousand men, to suppress combinations obstructing the execution of the laws in the Southern States. The cabinet was now a unit. Now that the crisis had come, the administration had a policy. Would it approve itself to the anxious people of the North? Could it count upon the support of those who had counselled peace, peace at any cost?

Those who knew Senator Douglas well could not doubt his loyalty to the Union in this crisis; yet his friends knew that Union-loving men in the Democratic ranks would respond to the President's proclamation with a thousandfold greater enthusiasm, could they know that their leader stood by the administration. Moved by these considerations, Hon. George Ashmun of Massachusetts ventured to call upon Douglas on this Sunday evening, and to suggest the propriety of some public statement to strengthen the President's hands. Would he not call upon the President at once and give him the assurance of his support? Douglas demurred: he was not sure that Mr. Lincoln wanted his advice and aid. Mr. Ashmun assured him that the President would welcome any advances, and he spoke advisedly as a friend to both men. The peril of the country was grave; surely this was not a time when men should let personal and partisan considerations stand between them and service to their country. Mrs. Douglas added her entreaties, and Douglas finally yielded. Though the hour was late, the two men set off for the White House, and found there the hearty welcome which Ashmun had promised.^[979]

Of all the occurrences of this memorable day, this interview between Lincoln and Douglas strikes the imagination with most poignant suggestiveness. Had Douglas been a less generous opponent, he might have reminded the President that matters had come to just that pass which he had foreseen in 1858. Nothing of the sort passed Douglas's lips. The meeting of the rivals was most cordial and hearty. They held converse as men must when hearts are oppressed with a common burden. The President took up and read aloud the proclamation summoning the nation to arms. When he had done, Douglas said with deep earnestness, "Mr. President, I cordially concur in every word of that document, except that instead of the call for seventy-five thousand men, I would make it two hundred thousand. You do not know the dishonest purposes of those men as well as I do."^[980] Why has not some artist seized upon the dramatic moment when they rose and passed to the end of the room to examine a map which hung there? Douglas, with animated face and impetuous gesture, pointing out the strategic places in the coming contest; Lincoln, with the suggestion of brooding melancholy upon his careworn face, listening in rapt attention to the quick, penetrating observations of his life-long rival. But what no artist could put upon canvas was the dramatic absence of resentment and defeated ambition in the one, and the patient teachableness and self-mastery of the other. As they parted, a quick hearty grasp of hands symbolized this remarkable consecration to a common task.

As they left the executive mansion, Ashmun urged his companion to send an account of this interview to the press, that it might accompany the President's message on the morrow. Douglas then penned the following dispatch: "Senator Douglas called upon the President, and had an interesting conversation on the present condition of the country. The substance of it was, on the part of Mr. Douglas, that while he was unalterably opposed to the administration in all its political issues, he was prepared to fully sustain the President in the exercise of all his constitutional functions, to preserve the Union, maintain the government, and defend the Federal capital. A firm policy and prompt action was necessary. The capital was in danger, and must be defended at all hazards, and at any expense of men and money. He spoke of the present and future without any reference to the past."^[981] When the people of the North read the proclamation in the newspapers, on the following morning, a million men were cheered and sustained in their loyalty to the Union by the intelligence that their great leader had subordinated all lesser ends of party to the paramount duty of maintaining the Constitution of the fathers. To his friends in Washington, Douglas said unhesitatingly, "We must fight for our country and forget all differences. There can be but two parties—the party of patriots and the party of traitors. We belong to the first."^[982] And to friends in Missouri where disunion sentiment was rife, he telegraphed, "I deprecate war, but if it must come I am with my country, and for my country, under all circumstances and in every contingency. Individual policy must be subordinated to the public safety."^[983]

From this day on, Douglas was in frequent consultation with the President. The sorely tried and distressed Lincoln was unutterably grateful for the firm grip which this first of "War Democrats" kept upon the progress of public opinion in the irresolute border States. It was during one of these interviews, after the attack upon the Sixth Massachusetts Regiment in the streets of Baltimore, that Douglas urged upon the President the possibility of bringing troops by water to Annapolis, thence to Washington, thus avoiding further conflict in the disaffected districts of Maryland.^[984] Eventually the Eighth Massachusetts and the Seventh New York reached Washington by this route, to the immense relief of the President and his cabinet.

Before this succor came to the alarmed capital, Douglas had left the city for the West. He had received intimations that Egypt in his own State showed marked symptoms of disaffection. The old ties of blood and kinship of the people of southern Illinois with their neighbors in the border States were proving stronger than Northern affiliations. Douglas wielded an influence in these southern, Democratic counties, such as no other man possessed. Could he not best serve the administration by bearding disunionism in its den? Believing that Cairo, at the confluence of the Mississippi and the Ohio, was destined to be a strategic point of immense importance in the coming struggle, and that the fate of the whole valley depended upon the unwavering loyalty of Illinois, Douglas laid the matter before Lincoln. He would go or stay in Washington, wherever Lincoln thought he could do the most good. Probably neither then realized the tremendous nature of the struggle upon which the country had entered; yet both knew that the Northwest would be the makeweight in the balance for the Union; and that every nerve must be strained to hold the border States of Kentucky and Missouri. Who could rouse the latent Unionism of the Northwest and of the border States like Douglas? Lincoln advised him to go. There was a quick hand-grasp, a hurried farewell, and they parted never to meet again.^[985]

Rumor gave strange shapes to this "mission" which carried Douglas in such haste to the Northwest. Most persistent of all is the tradition that he was authorized to raise a huge army in the States of the upper Mississippi Valley, and to undertake that vast flanking movement which subsequently fell to Grant and Sherman to execute. Such a project would have been thoroughly consonant with Douglas's conviction of the inevitable unity and importance of the great valley; but evidence is wanting to corroborate this legend.^[986] Its frequent repetition, then and now, must rather be taken as a popular recognition of the complete accord between the President and the greatest of War Democrats. Colonel Forney, who stood very near to Douglas, afterward stated "by authority," that President Lincoln would eventually have called Douglas into the administration or have placed him in one of the highest military commands.^[987] Such importance may be given to this testimony as belongs to statements which have passed unconfirmed and unchallenged for half a century.

On his way to Illinois, Douglas missed a train and was detained half a day in the little town of Bellaire, Ohio, a few miles below Wheeling in Virginia.^[988] It was a happy accident, for just across the river the people of northwestern Virginia were meditating resistance to the secession movement, which under the guidance of Governor Letcher threatened to sever them from the Union-loving population of Ohio and Pennsylvania. It was precisely in this region, nearly a hundred years before, that popular sovereignty had almost succeeded in forming a fourteenth State of the Confederacy. There had always been a disparity between the people of these transmontane counties and the tide-water region. The intelligence that Douglas was in Bellaire speedily brought a throng about the hotel in which he was resting. There were clamors for a speech. In the afternoon he yielded to their importunities. By this time the countryside was aroused. People came across the river from Virginia and many came down by train from Wheeling,^[989] Men who were torn by a conflict of sentiments, not knowing where their paramount allegiance lay, hung upon his words.

Douglas spoke soberly and thoughtfully, not as a Democrat, not as a Northern man, but simply and directly as a lover of the Union. "If we recognize the right of secession in one case, we give our assent to it in all cases; and if the few States upon the Gulf are now to separate themselves from us, and erect a barrier across the mouth of that great river of which the Ohio is a tributary, how long will it be before New York may come to the conclusion that she may set up for herself, and levy taxes upon every dollar's worth of goods imported and consumed in the Northwest, and taxes upon every bushel of wheat, and every pound of pork, or beef, or other productions that may be sent from the Northwest to the Atlantic in search of a market?" Secession meant endless division and sub-division, the formation of petty confederacies, appeals to the sword and the bayonet instead of to the ballot.

"Unite as a band of brothers," he pleaded, "and rescue your government and its capital and your country from the enemy who have been the authors of your calamity." His eye rested upon the great river. "Ah!" he exclaimed, a great wave of emotion checking his utterance, "This great valley must never be divided. The Almighty has so arranged the mountain and the plain, and the water-courses as to show that this valley in all time shall remain one and indissoluble. Let no man attempt to sunder what Divine Providence has rendered indivisible."^[990]

As he concluded, anxious questions were put to him, regarding the rumored retirement of General Scott from the army. "I saw him only Saturday," replied Douglas. "He was at his desk, pen in hand, writing his orders for the defense and safety of the American Capital." And as he repeated the words of General Scott declining the command of the forces of Virginia—"'I have served my country under the flag of the Union for more than fifty years, and as long as God permits me to live, I will defend that flag with my sword; even if my own State assails it,'"—the crowds around him broke into tumultuous cheers. Within thirty days the Unionists of western Virginia had rallied, organized, and begun that hardy campaign which brought West Virginia into the Union. On the very day that Douglas was making his fervent plea for the Union, Robert E. Lee cast in his lot with the South.

At Columbus, Douglas was again forced to break his journey; and again he was summoned to address the crowd that gathered below his window. It was already dark; the people had collected without concert; there were no such trappings, as had characterized public demonstrations in the late campaign. Douglas appeared half-dressed at his bedroom window, a dim object to all save to those who stood directly below him. Out of the darkness came his solemn, sonorous tones, bringing relief and assurance to all who listened, for in the throng were men of all parties, men who had followed him through all changes of political weather, and men who had been his persistent foes. There was little cheering. As Douglas pledged anew his hearty support to President Lincoln, "it was rather a deep 'Amen' that went up from the crowd," wrote one who had distrusted hitherto the mighty power of this great popular leader.^[991]

On the 25th of April, Douglas reached Springfield, where he purposed to make his great plea for the Union. He spoke at the Capitol to members of the legislature and to packed galleries. Friend and foe alike bear witness to the extraordinary effect wrought by his words. "I do not think that it is possible for a human being to produce a more prodigious effect with spoken words," wrote one who had formerly detested him.^[992] "Never in all my experience in public life, before or since," testified the then Speaker of the House, now high in the councils of the nation, "have I been so impressed by a speaker."^[993] Douglas himself was thrilled with his message. As he approached the climax, the veins of his neck and forehead were swollen with passion, and the perspiration ran down his face in streams. At times his clear and resonant voice reverberated through the chamber, until it seemed to shake the building.^[994] While he was in the midst of a passionate invective, a man rushed into the hall bearing an American flag. The trumpet tones of the speaker and the sight of the Stars and Stripes roused the audience to the wildest pitch of excitement.^[995] Men and women became hysterical with the divine madness of patriotism. "When hostile armies," he exclaimed with amazing force, "When hostile armies are marching under new and odious banners against the government of our country, the shortest way to peace is the most stupendous and unanimous preparation for war. We in the great valley of the Mississippi have peculiar interests and inducements in the struggle ... I ask every citizen in the great basin between the Rocky Mountains and the Alleghanies ... to tell me whether he is ever willing to sanction a line of policy that may isolate us from the markets of the world, and make us dependent provinces upon the powers that thus choose to isolate us?... Hence, if a war does come, it is a war of self-defense on our part. It is a war in defense of the Government which we have inherited as a priceless legacy from our patriotic fathers, in defense of those great rights of freedom of trade, commerce, transit and intercourse from the center to the circumference of our great continent."^[996]

The voice of the strong man, so little given to weak sentiment, broke, as he said, "I have struggled almost against hope to avert the calamities of war and to effect a reunion and reconciliation with our brethren in the South. I yet hope it may be done, but I am not able to point out how it may be. Nothing short of Providence can reveal to us the issues of this great struggle. Bloody—calamitous—I fear it will be. May we so conduct it, if a collision must come, that we will stand justified in the eyes of Him who knows our hearts, and who will justify our every act. We must not yield to resentments, nor to the spirit of vengeance, much less to the desire for conquest or ambition. I see no path of ambition open in a bloody struggle for triumphs over my countrymen. There is no path of ambition open for me in a divided country.... My friends, I can say no more. To discuss these topics is the most painful duty of my life. It is with a sad heart—with a grief I have never before experienced—that I have to contemplate this fearful struggle; but I believe in my conscience that it is a duty we owe to ourselves and to our children, and to our God, to protect this Government and that flag from every assailant, be he who he may."

The return of Douglas to Chicago was the signal for a remarkable demonstration of regard. He had experienced many strange home-comings. His Democratic following, not always discriminating, had ever accorded him noisy homage. His political opponents had alternately execrated him and given him grudging praise. But never before had men of all parties, burying their differences, united to do him honor. On the evening of his arrival, he was escorted to the Wigwam, where hardly a year ago Lincoln had been nominated for the presidency. Before him were men who had participated jubilantly in the Republican campaign, with many a bitter gibe at the champion of "squatter sovereignty." Douglas could not conceal his gratification at this proof that, however men had differed from him on political questions, they had believed in his loyalty. And it was of loyalty, not of himself, that he spoke. He did not spare Southern feelings before this Chicago audience. He told his hearers unequivocally that the slavery question, the election of Lincoln, and the territorial question, were so many pretexts for dissolving the Union. "The present secession movement is the result of an enormous conspiracy formed more than a year since, formed by leaders in the Southern Confederacy more than twelve months ago." But this was no time to discuss pretexts and causes. "The conspiracy is now known. Armies have been raised, war is levied to accomplish it. There are only two sides to the question. Every man must be for the United States or against it. There can be no neutrals in this war; only patriots—or traitors."^[997] It was the first time he had used the ugly epithet.

Hardly had he summoned the people of Illinois to do battle, when again he touched that pathetic note that recurred again and again in his appeal at Springfield. Was it the memory of the mother of his boys that moved him to say, "But we must remember certain restraints on our action even in time of war. We are a Christian people, and the war must be prosecuted in a manner recognized by Christian nations. We must not invade Constitutional rights. The innocent must not suffer, nor women and children be the victims." Before him were some who felt toward the people of the South as Greek toward barbarian. But Douglas foresaw that the horrors of war must invade and desolate the homes of those whom he still held dear. There is no more lovable and admirable side of his personality than this tenderness for the helpless and innocent. Had he but lived to temper justice with mercy, what a power for good might he not have been in the days of reconstruction!

The summons had gone forth. Already doubts and misgivings had given way, and the North was now practically unanimous in its determination to stifle rebellion. There was a common belief that secession was the work of a minority, skillfully led by designing politicians, and that the loyal majority would rally with the North to defend the flag. Young men who responded jubilantly to the call to arms did not doubt, that the struggle would be brief. Douglas shared the common belief in the conspiracy theory of secession, but he indulged no illusion as to the nature of the war, if war should come. Months before the firing upon Fort Sumter, in a moment of depression, he had prophesied that if the cotton States should succeed in drawing the border States into their schemes of secession, the most fearful civil war the world had ever seen would follow, lasting for years. "Virginia," said he, pointing toward Arlington, "over yonder across the Potomac, will become a charnel-house.... Washington will become a city of hospitals, the churches will be used for the sick and wounded. This house 'Minnesota Block,' will be devoted to that purpose before the end of the war."^[998] He, at least, did not mistake the chivalry of the South. Not for an instant did he doubt the capacity of the Southern people to suffer and endure, as well as to do battle. And he knew—Ah! how well—the self-sacrifice and devotion of Southern women.

The days following the return of Douglas to Chicago were filled also with worries and anxieties of a private nature. The financial panic of 1857 had been accompanied by a depression of land values, which caused Douglas grave concern for his holdings in Chicago, and no little immediate distress. Unable and unwilling to sacrifice his investments, he had mortgaged nearly all of his property in Cook County, including the valuable "Grove Property" in South Chicago. Though he was always lax in pecuniary matters, and, with his buoyant generous nature, little disposed to take anxious thought for the morrow, these heavy financial obligations began now to press upon him with grievous weight. The prolonged strain of the previous twelve months had racked even his constitution. He had made heavy drafts on his bodily health, with all too little regard for the inevitable compensation which Nature demands. As in all other things, he had been prodigal with Nature's choicest gift.

Not long after his public address Douglas fell ill and developed symptoms that gave his physicians the gravest concern. Weeks of illness followed. The disease, baffling medical skill, ran its course. Yet never in his lucid moments did Douglas forget the ills of his country; and even when delirium clouded his mind, he was still battling for the Union. "Telegraph to the President and let the column move on," he cried, wrestling with his wasting fever. In his last hours his mind cleared. Early on the morning of June 3d, he seemed to rally, but only momentarily. It was evident to those about him that the great summons had come. Tenderly his devoted wife leaned over him to ask if he had any message for his boys, "Robbie" and "Stevie." With great effort, but clearly and emphatically, he replied, "Tell them to obey the laws and support the Constitution of the United States." Not long after, he grappled with the great Foe, and the soul of a great patriot passed on.