Chapter 100: The Election of 1864 Part 2 - The Ballot is Cast
Chapter 100: The Election of 1864 Part 2 - The Ballot is Cast
“When the platforms had been adopted by the fall, as was custom, none of the presidential hopefuls took to campaign trail to stump for themselves as was common at the time. McClellan, until the 4th of November, would remain in command at New York before tendering his resignation. Fremont, by contrast, had resigned from the army to take up the nomination, and would spend much of his time in Massachusetts entertaining well wishers while writing letters that would cross the continent. Lincoln meanwhile remained in Washington, trusting his agents to do the work needed as he would run the war effort.
Speeches, campaign drives, and outright corruption, were the typical mark of politics in the 1860s. The state party machines used the promise of patronage and control over various offices to help run the campaigns. Republican and Democratic agents had much more power than the completely new Radical Democracy Party, which depended on letters and speakers who traversed the nation on its behalf. This lack of existing political machinery meant that, effectively, the Radical Democracy advocates would only serve as spoilers and vote splitters in the campaign.
This explains why Democratic newspapers would often tout its influence, while Republican newspapers would only occasionally mention it. For instance, the Democratic New York World would devote nearly three dozen articles to the Radical Democracy party during the election, while the Republican leaning New York Times would devote a scant three.
However, this was not the only weapon the Democratic presses would use against the Republican Party, and by extension the Radical Democracy Party. The Democratic leaning presses of all stripes tended to launch into wild claims that Lincoln and Fremont support miscegenation to win the war. Lurid tales of plans to marry white women to black soldiers, or solve the racial problem by marrying immigrant women to freed slaves[1]. Though it is doubtful any but the most committed ideologues believed such talk, the scandalous claims were often enough to implant a moral panic to already existing fears of “millions of free negroes” coming north to take jobs from soldiers and other white men in an already struggling economy…” - The Era of Hard Feelings, William Avery, Random House, 1989
“That the election of 1864 was a referendum on the war itself cannot be overstated.
The nation, after first a civil war, then a trans-Atlantic war, was reeling after almost four years of conflict. The people were poorer than they had been in 1860. International trade, the lifeblood of the economy, had been ground to a halt for two years, beggaring sailors, ship builders and prosperous merchants. Hundreds of thousands of men had fought, died, or been crippled in fields from Virginia to Canada and Oregon. Taxes were higher than ever, and many families were made destitute.
Coupled with a series of stinging defeats across the summer and fall of 1864, the national mood was depressed. Many increasingly believed that, even if the war could be won, it could only be won by a new leader. Others who even wished to fight still believed that, after so much bloodletting, some attempt at a negotiated settlement should be made. The Democrats, divided still by peace and war, still believed that an effort at reunion should be made. Only the most avowed Copperheads seemed to believe the South should simply be let go.
Even so, the belief that peace might be given a chance, galled many in both camps. August Belmont, one of McClellan’s chief advocates and a War Democrat, had confided in McClellan that he believed if the nation sat down to negotiate, the war could not be started up again. Lincoln himself believed that to be true as well. In the infamous Blind Memorandum of August 1864 he had stated “” It was a sad indictment of what Lincoln believed the nation might choose after a year barren of meaningful victories…
Lincoln, through his supporters, was portrayed as the man who had fought hard to save the Union. He was willing to reunite the nation by any means necessary. He had fought to save the United States from its oldest enemy, and against treason within. The new Republican Party promised a new birth of freedom and victory over treason. The United States one and indivisible. Republicans portrayed McClellan as the man willing to bend the knee to traitors and someone who had “not shown a hint of military genius” in his fight against treason.
McClellan meanwhile, was the handsome martyr of the Democratic cause, on whose shoulders the whole nation (and not coincidentally the Democratic Party) rested. Young, well liked, and charismatic, it was hoped his previous war record would help support his bid. He had commanded the largest army the United States had put together, and it was insisted that only through Republican connivance that he had not saved the capital from the rebel siege.
Though his association with Copperhead politicians would cost him some support, his unflinching indictment of Richmond won him support in the patriotic press. Unfailingly correct in his language, and an opponent of secession, none could charge him as a traitor…
McClellan was portrayed as the only man wanting to save the Union[2]
Despite the pessimism, Lincoln and his administration would pull out every trick, legal or quasi-legal, to win the contest. Nevada was fast tracked to statehood, putting a secure two electoral votes in Lincoln’s camp. West Virginia was sure to vote Republican. Meanwhile a pro-Republican state government, admittedly under partial military rule, had been installed in Missouri, neutering any pro-Confederate sentiment. While Maryland remained equally divided between Democrats and Republicans, he could still count on voters in the rest of the nation to make an even vote.
That only left the thorny problem of Kentucky.
Despite Grant having recaptured the state capital (and the Confederate pretender government with it), the state was, in essence, without any government. Burbridge’s rule extended only as far as his soldiers marched from Louisville, the government at the county level, where it existed at all, was sporadic in its ability to organize. Bragg’s decision to send Kirby Smith in through the Confederate lines, while attempting a pursuit of Grant through the Cumberland Gap, put another third of the state back directly under Confederate military control.
Even had it not been in Confederate hands, it was believed the state would vote Democrat. That there was no way to accurately assess the desires of many of the populace, situated as they were on the front lines or behind them. No one in Washington trusted the Confederate government to provide an accurate assessment of the vote in rebel territory. “Jefferson Davis would not tie the noose meant to hang him,” Stanton would declare in his own counsel to the President on what must be done with Kentucky.
Given that Grant’s forces were fighting across the breadth of the state, Lincoln would reluctantly declare: “Kentucky, being without organized government within, and a state of invasion from rebel held territory, is held to be in a state of insurrection. With no assurance the rebel armies will allow for a fair and unmolested vote, it is the reluctant decision of the President to declare Kentucky to be in a state of insurrection. The government shall do all it is able in order to faithfully attempt to assess the wishes of the people of the Commonwealth, and shall duly record votes received and the electoral ballots cast, but must invalidate them for the sake of the nation.”
Declaring the state in insurrection removed what was almost guaranteed to be 11 electoral votes for McClellan, and instead narrowed the number of electoral votes needed to win to 112 out of 223.
This would prompt outrage in the Democratic press, and amongst Unionists in Kentucky.
“In Maine, a state which must most assuredly vote for Mr. Lincoln, the Queen’s troops hold sway over twenty-thousand miles of territory and tens of thousands of voters. Is Maine then to be declared under occupation and her people deprived of their God given rights under the Constitution?” The New York World would ask. “Is Kentucky any less deserving of representation, or are her people to be treated like the slaves of Lincoln Africanus?” The Detroit Free Press would demand of its readers. The Kentucky papers were even more virulent in their outrage.
“Damn Lincoln,” a Kentucky Unionist would write his brother from the ranks. “He says we cannot vote for President, so we may as well vote for President Davis!”
While legal, many then and many now saw the move as one designed to undercut any lead McClellan may have been able to gain with the advantage in the powerful Democrat leaning states. And as the votes rolled in through early November, it seemed that such a move might pay off…” - The Decision: 1864, Amos Parnell, Boston University, 1994
“Barlow would receive a letter from an unlikely source which would ultimately change the outcome of the election. On the 29th of September, he took a letter delivered by a courier, with information he was assured was secret and ultimately to his benefactors' cause. The letter was short, but contained opening lines which would be impossible to ignore. “It being clear now that this war must be handled by a more capable master, I believe that General McClellan is the only man who may husband the nation to such a victory. To accomplish this, I propose to deliver the states of New York, Connecticut and Rhode Island into McClellan’s hands.”
In time it would be confirmed that this letter came from the commander of the Department of New England, General Benjamin Butler. Though this revelation was not fully known until half a century after the letter was penned, it was one of the most explosive pieces of correspondence ever to be written. How any piece survived can only be attributed to the lack of trust between the two parties proposing such a deal. Even then, these opening lines are only confirmed long after the fact in second hand sources, and one single apparent confirmation by Barlow himself before his death.
It can hardly be surprising that Butler had chosen to throw his lot in with the Democratic Party in 1864. Before the war he had cheerfully served the Whig, and then Democratic Party in Massachusetts politics. He had been against the abolition of slavery, and supported the Compromise of 1850 as a solution to the sectional crisis. In 1860 he had endorsed the Confederate Secretary of War, Kentuckian John C. Breckinridge, as the Democratic candidate. It was only in response to the secession that he had angled for a military command, stating “I was always a friend of southern rights but an enemy of southern wrongs.”[3]
During the war however, Butler had seemed to lean in the direction of the Republican Party. He had wholeheartedly supported taking “contrabands” as spoils of war, and during the war had been sparring in any criticism of the Lincoln administration. However, he had reserved his hottest rhetoric against Great Britain, and had spoken often of disappointment in the failed invasion of Canada. He was known to have angled to secure command of one portion of the Canadian expedition, but had been overlooked and instead relegated to the position commanding the Department of New England, where he had often been overshadowed by talented subordinates…
…that he was facing a Congressional investigation may have also played a role in his desire to secure the support of what he perceived to be an incoming investigation. During the blockade, his brother Andrew had run a blockade running cartel, using his brothers military powers to secure preferential treatment of his ships and, as often as not, using those ships to smuggle more profitable luxury goods over needed war supplies.
This had stepped on the toes of the local commander, Commodore Wilkes, the man who had helped start the war with Britain through the seizure of the Trent. He had lobbied Washington often on the “crooked conduct and enrichment of villains” he alleged the Butler’s had undertaken during the war. There were those in Congress who were angling to investigate him. Certainly the later Boston Ring would be found to have some of Butler’s fingerprints, but the “crooked dealings” during the war were never conclusively proven.
In the fall of 1864 Butler himself could not have known that, and so giving an olive branch to the incoming administration would certainly find a favorable reception…
Barlow eagerly accepted this offer, and discretely communicated it to McClellan. Though we have no record of McClellan’s reaction, the usually punctilious general declining to even write the matter to his wife or discuss it in his memoirs, the results perhaps speak for themselves.
While the War Department would lean heavily on the scales to furlough soldiers home to vote, which bore fruit in Indiana, Butler would use his own influence to ensure that only soldiers who were shown to be McClellanites would be allowed to vote. Judicious questioning of officers - and allegedly outright bribes - were applied to learn a regiments loyalties. If they proved friendly to Lincoln, furloughs were denied or some other duty invented elsewhere. If the regiment proved loyal to McClellan, it was allowed to vote. The single exception was shuttling of Massachusetts regiments who eagerly voted for Fremont, threatening to split the vote in that otherwise staunchly Republican state.
While future research would show that over 68% of soldiers voted for Lincoln, it may be assumed that a higher proportion would have without interference in New England. However, even if only 30% of soldiers voted for McClellan, it must be assumed that this showed not an inconsiderable number of men in uniform believed a change must be made in the war. How many wanted peace versus new leadership, is impossible to ascertain…” - The Era of Hard Feelings, William Avery, Random House, 1989
General Benjamin Butler
“As the votes were tallied, Lincoln seemed to be maintaining a comfortable lead. Though New York, New Jersey and Connecticut all declared for McClellan, these had been expected. Much of New England, even Massachusetts where Fremont came the closest to winning any state, still produced a slim lead for Lincoln’s party…” - The Decision: 1864, Amos Parnell, Boston University, 1994
“What spelled the doom of the Lincoln administration, was the wholesale bolting of the Pacific states from the Republican cause. Though the Republican Party had commanded a slim majority over its opponents in both Oregon and California in 1860, and secured Republican Governors in each state, the vote of 1864 would swing in the opposite direction.
Voters on the Pacific seemed to resonate with McClellan’s message of peace. The British invasions, while not particularly militarily devastating, had been economically ruinous and embarrassing to the Pacific coast. The Pacific Fleet destroyed, and the city of San Francisco occupied, it had put the local economy into extreme stress, and sent hundreds of men to early graves. The resumption of trade, and the ending of the war which sapped funds necessary for recovery in the West appealed to the majority of the population.
61,000 Californians and 10,000 Oregonians would cast their vote for McClellan, putting another eight votes in the Democratic tally…” - The Era of Hard Feelings, William Avery, Random House, 1989
“When the final ballots were counted, it was one of the closest elections in American history. McClellan had claimed 121 electoral votes to Lincoln’s 102. The popular vote tallies would give Lincoln 1.8 million votes to McClellan’s 1.9 million, with Fremont in a distant third with 300,000 votes…
The nation had decided on a new course for the war, and all willed, for the eventual peace.” - The Decision: 1864, Amos Parnell, Boston University, 1994
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1] Unfortunately real. It's vile stuff I am not going to reprint. The Democrats leaned heavily on racist campaigns slogans in their campaigns in the Civil War political sphere, and again during the Reconstruction era.
2] Honestly the political cartoons for this election are amazing. I had to restrict myself to one, and this one I chose.
3] Butler's historical political affiliations are pretty much historical.
