Lincoln's Secretary Research Articles

Introduction

Introduction MELVIN I. UROFSKY It is always our aim to provide our readers with a rich diversity of materials on the history of our nation's highest court, but I think this issue is one of the most diverse in my quarter-century as editor of the Journal. We have articles on legal strategy, the con­ stitutional validation of the Union victory in the Civil War, the maneuverings that took a little-known lawyer from the heartland to the Supreme Court, the end of one of the most important eras in the Court's history, and how environmental concerns made their way into the volumes of U.S. Reports. John Marshall, the great Chief Justice, is always ranked as one of the three most important persons to have sat on the high court, along with Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., and Louis Dembitz Brandeis. Scholars, myself included, consider the decisions handed down by Marshall in his thirty-four years on the bench to be the building blocks of our constitutional structure. Yet if one looks closely, the really important decisions took place in his first two decades, and of the opinions in his last years, the Cherokee cases stand almost alone. Professor William Da­ venport Mercer of the University of Ten­ nessee suggests that if we look closely at the last years of the Marshall Court, we will see that circumstances—both of a personal and political nature—had changed dramatically from the heyday of McCulloch and Gibbons. Two years ago the Society sponsored a lecture series on “Presidents and Their Cabinets,” and due to a variety of circum­ stances, we were unable to print all of the lectures in the same issue. We now have the last of those lectures, the one on Salmon P. Chase, who served as Lincoln's Secretary of the Treasury, and then became Chief Justice to succeed Roger Taney. Professor Cynthia L. Nieoletti of the University of Virginia Law School reminds us that Chase's famous comment, that “the Con­ stitution, in all its provisions, looks to an indestructible Union, composed of in­ destructible states,” which is now accepted as a foundational constitutional tenet, was not always so, especially in the years before Texas v. White (1869). In the history of the First Amendment's Speech Clause, most historians see the in­ famous case of Dennis v. United States (1951) as an unfortunate stumble by the Court on the road from Abrams v. United States (1919) to Brandenburg v. Ohio (1969). In fact, the Court reversed itself in just six years in the Yates case. Why and 134 JOURNAL OF SUPREME COURT HISTORY how this volte-face came about has been at­ tributed to a number of causes—changes in the political environment and personnel changes on the bench being the two most common reasons given. Hayden Thorne, a doctoral student at Victoria University in Wellington, New Zealand, suggests another reason: a significant shift in legal strategy, which appealed to the sitting judges in both the trial and appellate courts far more than the effort of the Dennis attorneys to make it a political trial. For environmentalists, no member of the Supreme Court is held in higher esteem than William O. Douglas, who made pro­ tecting our natural resources his chief ex­ trajudicial activity. Many legal scholars mocked him when in dissent he suggested that trees and rivers ought to have legal standing so that they could challenge the depredations visited upon them by devel­ opers. Although trees may not yet have standing, the courts have proven more friendly to groups like the Sierra Club who, in a way, speak for the trees. The Hon. M. Margaret McKeown, a judge on the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, takes a fresh look at the case that included the Douglas dissent, Sierra Club v. Morton (1972), and has come up with new and interesting findings. A number of years ago I had the priv­ ilege of interviewing Justice Harry A. Blackmun, and he rather self-deprecatingly referred to himself as “old number three,” meaning that he had been Richard Nixon's third choice to replace Abe Fortas, after the Senate turned down his first two...

Amiable Scoundrel: Simon Cameron, Lincoln's Scandalous Secretary of War

Amiable Scoundrel: Simon Cameron, Lincoln's Scandalous Secretary of War

The Civil War Diary of Gideon Welles, Lincoln's Secretary of the Navy

Journal Article The Civil War Diary of Gideon Welles, Lincoln's Secretary of the Navy Get access William E. Gienapp and Erica L. Gienapp. (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2014. xlvi, 825 pp. $45.00.) Journal of American History, Volume 102, Issue 2, September 2015, Pages 565–567, https://doi.org/10.1093/jahist/jav463 Published: 01 September 2015

The Civil War diary of Gideon Welles, Lincoln's secretary of the Navy: the original manuscript edition

The Civil War diary of Gideon Welles, Lincoln's secretary of the Navy: the original manuscript edition

The Civil War Diary of Gideon Welles, Lincoln's Secretary of the Navy: The Original Manuscript Edition

The Civil War Diary of Gideon Welles, Lincoln's Secretary of the Navy: The Original Manuscript Edition

Learning from Lincoln: Leadership Practices for School Success

Learning from Lincoln: Leadership Practices for School Success

Darkness at the Heart of Recent Italian Literature

Darkness at the Heart of Recent Italian Literature

Kate Chase, the "Sphere of Women's Work," and Her Influence upon Her Father's Dissent in Bradwell v. Illinois

Kate Chase, the "Sphere of Women's Work," and Her Influence upon Her Father's Dissent in Bradwell v. Illinois Richard L. Aynes (bio) I have always favored the enlargement of the sphere of women's work and the payment of just compensation for it. Salmon P. Chase, 1872 Kate Chase was said to be the most beautiful and the most intelligent woman of her age. Her father, Salmon P. Chase, is remembered today as Lincoln's secretary of the treasury and as a chief judge of the U. S. Supreme Court. In his own time, Chase was considered one of the nation's political giants; Abraham Lincoln described him as "one and a half times bigger than any other man" he had ever known.1 Carl Schurz's summary still echoes today: "More than anyone else he looked the great man. Tall, broad-shouldered, and proudly erect, … he was a picture of intelligence, strength, courage and dignity. He looked as you would wish a statesman to look."2 Throughout his political career, Chase sought ways to better the position of African Americans. A man of deep convictions, he publicly and consistently advocated voting rights for African Americans as early as 1845. While his political affiliations often shifted, to the end of his life he was consistent in his advocacy of universal male suffrage for African Americans. While his [End Page 31] lieutenants were negotiating for his election by the legislature to the U.S. Senate, Chase insisted that part of the "deal" would be the repeal of Ohio's Black Laws, which discriminated against African Americans.3 Chase devoted much of his legal talent to creating a nationwide legal strategy by which slavery would be divorced from the national government and be solely dependent upon local government. His policy was summed up in his antislavery slogan: "Freedom National, Slavery Local." As Harold Hyman noted, "for a tumultuous one-third of a century [Chase] was the antislavery crusaders' premier legal strategist."4 In spite of Chase's egalitarian sentiments on race that our stereotypes suggest would be a hindrance to his political career, he was twice elected governor of the State of Ohio, twice elected to the U.S. Senate, and served as secretary of the treasury under President Lincoln. As Les Benedict has observed, Chase was a serious and important contender for the nomination of president of the United States in every election from 1856 through 1872.5 As chief justice of the United States, Chase is chiefly remembered for his nationalistic opinion in Texas v. White and his dissent in the Legal Tender Cases.6 His judicial reputation no doubt suffered from Felix Frankfurter's conclusion that his commerce clause opinions were of no value to the modern era and the negative assessment of Chase's chief justiceship by Frankfurter student and protégé Charles Fairman.7 Modern biographers have offered a significantly more balanced assessment of Chase. [End Page 32] Chase participated in some of the most important constitutional cases of his times, including authoring majority opinions in seven of the court's major Reconstruction cases. This article explores the influence that Kate Chase may have had on her father's dissent without opinion in the Fourteenth Amendment case of Bradwell v. Illinois. Context: The Slaughter-House Cases Chief Justice Chase came to the Supreme Court in 1864 without any judicial experience. Lincoln's selection of him for chief justice has puzzled many. After all, Chase had been Lincoln's political rival in 1860 and in 1864. Because of his political ambition, Chase had been a politically faithless member of the cabinet as secretary of the treasury. Further, Lincoln was not without choices. Two of his own appointees, Justice Samuel Miller and Justice Noah Swayne, were aspirants for the chief justiceship. But Lincoln was concerned with results, not politics. In spite of Chase's lack of judicial experience, his view on a variety of issues concerning slavery, nationalism, states' rights, and use of the president's war powers were already a matter of public record. Lincoln's reflection on how to pick a chief justice led to his well-known conclusion: "We cannot ask a man what...

Growing up with Books: Fanny Seward's Book Collecting, Reading, and Writing in Mid-Nineteenth-Century New York State

During her short life (1844–66) Fanny Seward, daughter of Lincoln's secretary of state, William Henry Seward, spent considerable time and energy on her personal library, her diaries, and her creative writing. Fanny Seward's reading was, she suggests in her writing, her dearest pleasure. In her diaries she included lists of books acquired and read, critical remarks on them, and fragments of prose and poetry reflecting her deepening knowledge of literature. This case study of a privileged girl in New York State during the American Civil War years explores interconnections among the many bookish strands in her life and social circle.

Kate Chase and William Sprague: Politics and Gender in a Civil War Marriage (review)

Reviewed by: Kate Chase and William Sprague: Politics and Gender in a Civil War Marriage Karen Fisher Younger Kate Chase and William Sprague: Politics and Gender in a Civil War Marriage. By Peg A. Lamphier. (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2003. Pp. 315. Cloth, $55.00.) Although Kate Chase has not been entirely neglected by biographers, she has received somewhat less than full justice. Biographies have represented her as overwrought with ambition, aggressive, and self-absorbed. Peg Lamphier reinterprets this conventional view in three ways. First, she argues that Kate must be regarded as a political actor as the daughter and wife of politicians. Like other feminist scholars, Lamphier believes that too much women's political history has concentrated solely on women's rights and allied movements. She argues that historians must broaden their understanding of mid-nineteenth century politics to include both formal and informal kinds of influence and authority as the basis for political power. When the parameters of "political" are changed, it becomes apparent that Kate was a committed and passionate partisan woman who "placed her imprint directly upon the manly form of traditional politics" (5). [End Page 331] Lamphier's second, and more problematic claim, is that it was Kate's search for love and acceptance that consumed her life and motivated her political involvement. Curiously leaning on the findings of modern psychiatry, Lamphier writes, "Politics functioned as a way to gain approval from her father, and when she found she had great talent for governmental intrigue, politics set her apart from other women, made her special and notable…. Her union with William . . . did not fail because she did not love him, but because she loved him too well. . . . The tragedy of Kate's life is not that it ended in poverty and obscurity but that Kate suffered from too little love in her life" (241, 243). Finally, the book interprets Kate's life in the context of her marriage with William Sprague. It traces the tension between the ideals and realities of their marriage and how these tensions destroyed their union. The result is engaging but sobering, as the reader is forced to confront the tragedy of abuse, scandal, and broken relationships. Lamphier begins with a discussion of the details of Kate and William's years before they met, noting that "the first decades of Kate's and William's lives created young adults eminently suited to each other" (41). William was on the cusp of fame, politically ambitious and economically successful. Kate was equipped with the tools of brilliance and beauty, and was the social hostess and political confidant of Salmon Chase, Lincoln's secretary of the treasury and her father. It was not long before a budding romance blossomed into engagement and marriage. Lamphier's discussion of their courtship centers on the wealth of letters from William wherein he negotiated the tenets of romantic love. Her point here is to show how William and Kate were part of the larger cultural transition toward a new ethos of romantic love that placed new demands upon their relationship, including high expectations of intimacy and companionship. According to Lamphier, rather than empower women by displacing domestic patriarchy, as some historians have argued, in the Chase-Sprague marriage the companionate ideal actually limited Kate's power. This is because theirs was a disharmonious marriage. "The companionate model . . . encouraged mutual affection as a replacement for male authority. . . . But what of Kate and William's relationship, where marital affection consistently failed" (86)? The answer, according to Lamphier, is that Kate found that she had no real power to influence meaningful change or to procure what she yearned for most in life: William's love. At the same time, Lamphier shows that while Kate had little influence in her marriage she possessed political sway with the Washington elite. As the daughter of a leading Radical Republican and the wife of a governor and senator, Kate embraced the ideology of the party and became a female party [End Page 332] regular who acted with and upon other members of the partisan community. She acted as hostess to the Washington's notable men and women who called on a regular basis. She...

Book Reviews

Book Reviews

Duty, Honor, Country, and Skullduggery: Lincoln's Secretary of War Meddles at West Point

Duty, Honor, Country, and Skullduggery: Lincoln's Secretary of War Meddles at West Point

The Salmon P. Chase Papers: A Review Essay

The Salmon R Chase Papers: A Review Essay Fred Blue The publication of The Salmon P. Chase Papers, volume 5, Correspondence, 1865-1873 by the Kent State University Press brings to a conclusion a project begun more than ten years ago. It also coincides with the untimely passing of John Niven, the project's editor. The Chase Papers has already become of immense value to scholars and students of nineteenth-century American politics. Needless to say, its editor will be sorely missed by friends and colleagues. Salmon P. Chase was an enigma both to his contemporaries and to twentiethcentury historians. Both groups have pictured him as being caught between antislavery and egalitarian principle on the one hand and a relentless political ambition on the other. Not surprisingly, today there is no more consensus on which motivation was dominant than there was during Chase's lifetime. In 1 830, at the age of twenty-two, he settled in Cincinnati and sought his place in society as a rising young attorney. He quickly revealed both his desire for material gain and a sincere interest in humanitarian reform. As his law career blossomed, so did his concern for fugitive slaves; in fact, he was soon known to friends and foes alike as "the Attorney General for Runaway Negroes ." His genuine interest in the plight of fugitives also led him into politics, first on the third-party level as a Liberty and Free Soil leader; the latter party's bargaining power in the Ohio legislature gave him an opening to win a controversial election to the U.S. Senate in 1 849. Yet to critics, he had placed his own electoral success above Free Soil principle and had sacrificed the party's independence for his own selfish ambition. Helping to found the Republican party, he immediately became an aspiring presidential contender. Election as Ohio's first Republican governor in 1 855 was for Chase little more than what he hoped would be a stepping stone to the White House. ' The Salmon P. Chase Papers, volumes 1 through 4, edited by John Niven and published by the Kent State University Press (1993-97), include: Journals: 1829-1872, Correspondence: 18231857 , Correspondence: 1858-March 1863, and Correspondence: 1863-1864. 1 Chase's motivation has long intrigued historians. The most recent effort to deal with his sometimes contradictory and sometimes consistent motives is that of Stephen E. Maizlish in "Salmon P. Civil War History, Vol. xliv No. 4 © 1998 by The Kent State University Press 286CIVIL WAR HISTORY The rest of Chase's career is better known to students of the Civil War era. As presidential contender, Abraham Lincoln's secretary of the Treasury, and chief justice during the Reconstruction era he continued to display the conflicting goals of reform and personal political power. Yet for Chase the two concepts were thoroughly compatible and in fact could be achieved simultaneously. Due to his cold and aloof personality and his unremitting ambition to be president, Chase developed few close personal friendships. Yet no one, critic or defender alike, could deny his achievements. Never winning the office he most desired, he nevertheless helped push a cautiousAbraham Lincoln toward emancipation and a measure ofracial equality forAfricanAmericans. Earlier in Ohio he had used his election to the Senate as a way to bring a partial repeal of the state's infamous black laws. Despite his determined drive for the White House, as secretary oftheTreasury he was responsible for significant reform in the nation's financial affairs, and as chiefjustice he helped restore prestige to the Supreme Court and personally created ajudicial record ofindependence and impartiality. Chase's life was thus one of achievement as well as political ambition. Because of the multifaceted aspects of Chase's forty years in politics and reform his career provides an important window on the events of the critical middle decades of the nineteenth century. Thus the publication of his papers allows scholars in the field as well as those with a more casual interest in these years to watch politics unfold through the eyes of one of its most important players and his many correspondents. Niven and his editorial staff sorted through thousands of Chase letters...

Salmon P. Chase: A Biography (review)

72CIVIL WAR HISTORY Henry's autobiography provides an excellent firsthand description of the difficulties ofbeing a black preacher in the American South in the decades prior to the Civil War. Reverend Henry had to worry about being mistaken for an escaped slave, making sure he obeyed the laws governing those conditions under which free African Americans could be ministered to, whether or not he would be paid by his Conference, and where he would be able to preach. Often Henry had to help build the church or assist the congregation in raising funds to buy the buildings where they worshiped. It clearly was an arduous Ufe. Despite his conservative philosophy, Henry was recommended to John Brown as a possible supporter. In the historical essay that foUows the autobiography , Libby details the unsuccessful attempt by John Brown to meet with Henry. After the attack on Harpers Ferry, the authorities found Henry's name on a Ust ofpeople to be contacted, prompting him to leave for Pennsylvania, where he waited out the war years. After the Civil War he returned to Maryland to continue his ministry. Both the introduction and historical essay are helpful in understanding the historical circumstances of the Ufe ofReverend Henry. The only problem I have with either is Libby's description ofthis autobiography as "Afrocentric." It may have to do with definitions, but clearly the center of Henry's world was God, and African Americans were simply the vessels through which Henry did His work. Given the opportunity, Henry would also minister to white parishioners with the same fervor he employed for African Americans. But this is a minor flaw. For those interested in knowing more about the early A.M.E. Church in the South and its ministers, I would recommend the Reverend Henry's autobiography . Kenneth W. Goings University of Memphis Salmon P. Chase: A Biography. By John Niven. (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995. Pp. xü, 546. $35.00.) For years American historians complained that there was no modern biography of Salmon P. Chase, the antislavery politician who became Abraham Lincoln's secretary of the treasury in 1 861 and chiefjustice of the United States Supreme Court in 1864. There were two laudatory contemporary biographies and a scholarly biography published by Albert Bushneil Hart in 1 899. There were also articles on various aspects of Chase's career and accounts of Chase in studies devoted to other subjects. But for most of the twentieth-century, biographers avoided Chase. They were daunted by the task of mastering the extensive collections ofhis papers. They were repulsed by perceptions ofhis personaUty. Chase appeared to have been an insufferable but bumbling egoist who mouthed moral platitudes while seeking to advance himself poUtically at the expense of wiser men. BOOK REVIEWS73 Lack of interest in Chase no longer exists. Since 1970, when Eric Foner recognized Chase's pivotal role in formulating the antebellum Republican party's antislavery interpretation of the Constitution, Chase has enjoyed a renaissance among American historians. In 1978 Peter F. Walker included a biographical sketch of Chase in his study of how individual Americans made the risky choice to advocate the aboUtion of slavery. In 1987 Frederick J. Blue published the first biography—albeit a strictly pohtical biography—ofChase in nearly ninety years, and in 1993 John Niven began publishing a multivolume edition of Chase's papers. Now there is Niven's Salmon P. Chase, which is by far the most detailed account of Chase's life yet written. Niven is an experienced biographer of nineteenth-century American politicians . As editor of Chase's papers, he has achieved an extraordinary grasp of primary sources of information about Chase. Niven does especially well in describing Chase's private life. He presents the events of Chase's youth and early manhood in New Hampshire, Ohio, and Washington, D.C. He develops Chase's often-tragic relations with his family and wives—all of the latter died within a few years of their marriage—was well as with his friends and associates . These accounts help to humanize a figure that Niven himself regards as pompous and distant. Niven's is also by far the most expansive treatment of Chase's...

The American Pacific—From the Old China Trade to the Present. By Arthur Power Dudden. New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992. xx, 314 pp. $27.95.

In 1784, the United States was scarcely more than a strip of seaports, inland towns, and farms along the Atlantic coast--and already the China trade had begun, as the Empress of China sailed into Canton. From this small beginning, an American empire in the Pacific grew until it engulfed Alaska, Hawaii, the Philippines, and hundreds of small islands. With World War II, U.S. power advanced further, into China, Japan, Korea, and Southeast Asia--where it was finally halted. Today American influence continues to ebb, as Japanese economic supremacy mounts and Manila forces the U.S. to dismantle its bases. In The American Pacific, Arthur Dudden provides a sweeping account of how the U.S. built (and lost) a vast empire in the ocean off our west coast. Opening with a fascinating account of the early China trade, Dudden provides a region-by-region history of the Pacific basin. What emerges is the story of how American commercial interests evolved into territorial ambitions, with the aquisitions of Alaska, Hawaii, and the Philippines, and finally into far-reaching efforts to project American power onto the shores of mainland Asia. Dudden's vivid narrative teems with the dynamic individuals who shaped events: William Seward, the Senator and Lincoln's Secretary of State who was driven by a vision of American dominion in the Pacific; Kamehameha I, the Hawaiian conqueror who tried to bring his kingdom into the modern world; William Howard Taft, who as the first governor-general of the Philippines built the institutions of American rule; Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, the architect of Japan's attacks on Pearl Harbor and Midway Island; and of course General Douglas MacArthur, whose immensely influential career spanned supreme command of the pre-war Philippine army, the Allied occupation forces in Japan, and the U.N. forces in Korea. Dudden brings the story up to date, reviewing the war in Vietnam, the aftermath of Tiananmen Square, the triumph of the Pacific rim economies, and the tremendous impact of Asian immigration on American society. Since the days when Commodore Perry sailed his black ships to open feudal Japan, the histories of the American republic and the peoples of the Pacific have been closely intertwined. Dudden seamlessly blends developments in domestic politics, military campaigns, commercial trends, and international relations, providing the first comprehensive overview of this critically important region.

Salmon P. Chase Critiques First Reading of the Emancipation Proclamation of President Lincoln

SALMON P. CHASE CRITIQUES FIRST READING OF THE EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION OF PRESIDENT LINCOLN Thomas F. Schwartz The Illinois State Historical Library recently purchased a large collection of nineteenth-century manuscripts relating to Abraham Lincoln's associates. Among the documents were several letters written by members of Lincoln's cabinet addressed to Derby and Miller Publishing Company. The letters endorsed Alexander H. Ritchie's engraving of Francis Bicknell Carpenter's painting First Reading of the Emancipation Proclamation of President Lincoln.1 Save for Salmon P. Chase's protean but entertaining letter of May 2, 1866, written directly to Carpenter, the letters reveal little that is startling. Taken as a whole, however, they help clarify when the Ritchie print was released for mass distribution and contrast sharply with Chase's response to Carpenter. The story of Carpenter's famous painting is well known.2 From February until July 1864 Carpenter set up shop in the White House as he went about sketching and painting Lincoln and his cabinet. The first viewing took place at the White House on July 22, 1864, although this public showing was largely limited to the president's family, cabinet members, and other interested parties. Carpenter exhibited the painting only for a short period after the July 1864 debut because he was unsatisfied with the result. Nevertheless, he signed a contract with Derby and ' Several thousand documents were purchased at the sale of the King V. Hostick Collection , Leslie Hindman Galleries on Saturday, Apr. 20, 1985, Chicago, Illinois. Four letters which directly comment on the Ritchie print areGideon Welles to F. B. Carpenter, Ma)' 15 and Sept. 24, 1866, F. W. Seward to Derby and Miller, May 19, 1866, and Salmon P. Chase to F. B. Carpenter, May 2, 1866. All are housed at the Illinois State Historical Library, Manuscripts Division. 2 Carpenter's own account is contained in Six Months at the White Housewith Abraham Lincoln: The Story of a Picture (London: Sampson Low, Son & Marston, 1866). Another account is found in Charles E. Fairman, Art andArtists of the Capitol of the United States of America (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1927), 305-9. Civil War History, Vol. XXXIII, No. 1, © 1987 by The Kent State University Press SALMON P. CHASE85 Miller, allowing them to make and distribute an engraving based upon his painting.3 Once the contract was finalized, subscription sheets were printed and distributed around the country. Derby and Miller offered the print at a variety of prices, ranging from fifty dollars for an artist's proof copy to ten dollars for a common print.4 President Lincoln was the first to subscribe for an artist's proof copy, followed by his cabinet members who also purchased artist's proof copies. Previous authorities have indicated that the print was issued sometime after the president and his cabinet subscribed, placing public sales in late 1864 or early 1865.5 The actual public distribution of the print, however, clearly occurred after Lincoln 's assassination, probably in May 1866. The revised estimate is based upon the assumption that Lincoln's widow and his cabinet surely would have received the first prints.6 To ensure better public sales, Derby and Miller solicited statements from Lincoln's cabinet members, as well as several other Lincoln associates . Excerpts were printed in both a promotional brochure and advertisements that appeared on the end pages in later editions of Carpenter's book, Six Months at the White House. The advertisements contain portions of a letter by Gideon Welles, Lincoln's secretary of the navy, while the letter of Frederick W. Seward—son of Lincoln's secretary of state, William H. Seward—was printed in its entirety. Welles praised the work as "well done," adding that "some feeling of sadness" came over him when he gazed at the portrait of "the great and good man [Lincoln] . . . whom we all loved." Frederick W. Seward claimed "the fidelity of its portraits enhances the historical interest derived from the subject of the picture." Distributing the picture as an engraving permitted it, as Seward exclaimed, "to be seen and appreciated everywhere throughout the world."7 Salmon P. Chase, Lincoln's troublesome secretary of the 3 See Mark...

Black Masters: A Free Family of Color in the Old South , and: No Chariot Let Down: Charleston's Free People of Color on the Eve of the Civil War (review)

BOOK REVIEWS285 But it clearly was not Lincoln's intention to establish any precedent for an "imperial presidency," one which would allow subsequent presidents to meddle in the internal affairs of other nations, under the pretext of saving the world. If Lincoln went beyond the law to save the national government, Oates posits, the Congress went with him, sanctioning his actions (121). This portrait of the tough Lincoln also extends to Reconstruction. Oates argues that Lincoln was prepared to reform and even to reshape the South's shattered society with the help of military force by 1865 (137). In his concluding essay, Oates presents a detailed reconstruction of Lincoln 's assassination and its aftermath. This is followed by a review of the theory that Edwin M. Stanton, Lincoln's secretary of war, was a ringleader in a conspiracy to assassinate the president. With justification , Oates crushes this with relish (176). In all fairness to the recent exoneration of Stanton among scholars, however, it must be said that the secretary of war was still responsible for the personal safety of the president. The buck must stop somewhere. Contrary to Oates's belief that he is offering much in new material, new ideas and insights (xiv), he is not plowing new ground. Instead, his sound interpretations and lucid style, combinded with a narrative which sweeps the Lincoln story from birth to death, effectively probes the galaxy of Lincoln myth and countermyth, giving the general audience an upto -date, living portrait of Lincoln. All in all, I think Mr. Lincoln would recognize himself and would be pleased. Ronald D. Rietveld California State University, Fullerton Black Masters: A Free Family of Color in the Old South. By Michael P. Johnson and James L. Roark. (New York: W. W. Norton & Company , 1984. Pp. 432. $22.50.) No Chariot Let Down: Charleston's Free People of Color on the Eve of the Civil War. Edited by Michael P. Johnson and James L. Roark. (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1984. Pp. xii, 174. $16.95.) Black Masters tells a fascinating story, and one equally improbable. In 1816 in upland South Carolina a young slave was freed by his master, who may also have been his father. This freedman, April Ellison, started out to make his way in the most densely slave of all the Southern states. Though surely a daunting task, Ellison had more than his freedom. He possessed indomitable determination along with a special talent: his former master had taught him the trade of making cotton gins. With new status and a new name, William Ellison, this former slave took his trade into the midst of a major plantation district. He moved to Stateburg along the Wateree River in Sumter District. There William Ellison succeeded, but as considerably more than a maker of cotton gins. 286CIVIL WAR HISTORY His gin business did prosper, and with his earnings he bought land, acquired a big house, and became a substantial slaveowner. By 1860 Ellison owned a prosperous gin shop, nearly nine hundred acres, and sixty-three slaves. Moreover he was a respected member of the Stateburg community. Ellison's home, Wisdom Hall, which he bought from Stephen D. Miller, a former governor and father of Mary Boykin Chesnut, was situated in the village amidst the houses of major white planters. Ellison even had a pew in Holy Cross Episcopal Church, the same church in which the white gentry worshipped. William Ellison's rise reads like an American classic, and it surely underscores the economic and social mobility possible in the antebellum South, even in an old state like South Carolina. All the touted virtues of hard work, thrift, and integrity Ellison had in abundance. He also made the right strategic moves to insure the station and future of his family—his children, like those of other successful midlands planters, married into the Charleston aristrocracy. But Ellison was different from all the others. He was black or, more precisely, mulatto, and in the antebellum South that was an important distinction. Even more impressive , Ellison accomplished his rise not in a city like Charleston or New Orleans, not even in the more tolerant racial environs of south Louisiana...

Autobiography of Rear Admiral Charles Wilkes, U.S. Navy 1798-1877 (review)

BOOK REVIEWS187 who were temperamentally disenchanted with conventional Unitarianism but unable because of their theological liberalism to join the evangelical mainstream. Unfortunately, however, this thesis is not pursued very deeply into the thought and consciousness of the principals. There is an account of the moderate antislavery persuasion of William Ellery Channing which has similar limitations. We fail to learn enough about Channing's broader world view to make his "philosophical " brand of antislavery fully comprehensible. In general, therefore, the book provides an adequate description of "patterns" of Unitarian antislavery but offers only a few glimpses into the intellectual, social, or psychological sources of the range ofattitudes and convictions surveyed. The study makes little contribution to the major effort historians are now making to reinterpret the antislavery movement in terms of a more sophisticated understanding of midVictorian religion and culture. The bibliography contains no titles published since 1970, and hence Stange is unable to draw on the new and highly relevant insights of such historians as Lewis Perry and Ronald Walters. If the work makes a useful contribution, therefore, it is more to the history of Unitarianism than to that of antislavery. George M. Fredrickson Northwestern University Autobiography of Rear Admiral Charles Wilkes, U.S. Navy 1798-1877. Introduction by Rear Admiral John D. H. Kane, Jr., USN (Ret.) Edited by William James Morgan, etal. (Washington: Department of the Navy, 1978. Pp. xxii, 944. $13.50.) This is an exasperating yet fascinating work because it is the autobiography of an exasperating but fascinating man, Admiral Charles Wilkes. Gideon Welles, Lincoln's Secretary of the Navy, has perhaps best described Wilkes as a "trouble-some man of a good deal of ability, of great leisure, and who is not delicate as regards means." Characteristically, Wilkes described his superior, the Secretary of the Navy, "as truly ignorant and unfit to do the duties incumbent on him to perform . . ." Of course, he would have had a different opinion of Welles had he written of him when the Secretary promoted Wilkes from Captain to Commodore and then acting Rear Admiral commanding the West Indies Squadron, all within a time span of forty days, a spectacular recognition of his abilities. Although the Autobiography was compiled years after the persons or events described, it is presented as if it were a diary or journal and written in the present tense. Thus, it is an exasperating work for anyone who may wish to use it as a primary source, or even a reasonably reliable account of the man's life and times. The reader of Wilkes' memoirs must be constantly on guard, must always remind himself that these are the 188CIVIL WAR HISTORY recollections of an old man, and a very opininated, arrogant old man at that. He will then, one hopes, excuse the errors, the misconceptions, the distortions of fact, and find much that is interesting, insightful, and incisive in some 925 pages of text. Wilkes' two trips to the ante-bellum South, for instance, describe in colorful detail life in a slave society. Again, his strictures on the North Carolinians, whom he finds grasping, illiterate and unpleasant on the whole, should be taken with a grain of salt. He had business reverses in North Carolina which typically colored his narrative. But his eye for the physical setting of the ante-bellum South, this reviewer found both compelling and persuasive. His description of his career in the "Old Navy," a career that went back to 1818, is written with a dramatic flair. His discussion of the three year exploring expedition in the Antarctic, the mid-Pacific, and the Pacific North West is properly brief because he had already published his account in six volumes. In fact the reader who wants a balanced treatment in depth of the Wilkes' expedition, should consult David Tyler's The Wilkes Expedition or William Stanton's The Great United States Exploring Expedition, not the Admiral's Autobiography. There is no doubt that Wilkes was a talented individual. As a meteorologist, as a student of winds and tides, he had no equal in the nation at the time. He was also an exceptionally fine shiphandler, perhaps the best in a Navy, whose officers...

Gideon Welles: Lincoln's Secretary of the Navy

Gideon Welles: Lincoln's Secretary of the Navy

Gideon Welles, Lincoln's Secretary of the Navy.

Gideon Welles, Lincoln's Secretary of the Navy.