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A deep dive into the political history of the United States, hosted by President Shrimpo. In the West Wing with President Shrimpo is a deep dive into the political history of the United States. Each episode looks at the people and driving factors that created the country we live in today with special focus on the stories and voices least heard.
President Shrimpo
Hello, my name is President Shrimpo. And you're listening to in the West Wing of political history podcast brought to you by WKNC, 88.1. And in this week's episode, we're going to be covering the second half of the American Civil War. But actually, with this intro, I want to talk about something very briefly and do things a little bit differently. We're going to jump back in time for just a moment, more than 20 years before the Civil War, to 1838. In Springfield, Illinois, where a young lawyer by the name of Abraham Lincoln is delivering a speech to on the issue of politics. And in this speech, we can say some things, which I'm going to, quote, to some extent paraphrase to some extent here. But But essentially, what Lincoln says is, shall we expect some transatlantic giant to step across the ocean and crush us out of blow? Never, all of the armies of Europe and Asia combined, could not by force, take a drink from the Ohio River, or make a track across the Blue Ridge in a trial of 1000 years. Where then, can we expect the approach of danger? If destruction be our lot, we ourselves must be its author and finisher. As a nation of free men, we must live forever or die by suicide.
So as a quick preface, for this episode, I am recovering from a pretty nasty cold that I that I seemed to have caught while I was traveling abroad last month. So I apologize if my voice is a little bit more nasal than it normally is. That's just the way it goes. But without any further ado, we now will continue this, this second half of the House Divided here on in the West Wing. So where we left off. So up to this point. So we've we've passed the midterms of 1862. We're now entering 1863. And up to this point, the Union war effort has been fairly mixed. Most of the progress that has been made so far has been in the western theater out along the Mississippi, while you know, progress in sort of the east coast of the South, particularly up around Virginia has not been particularly fruitful up through this point. Additionally, the economy is not doing very well, it's still kind of struggling under the strain of wartime conditions, especially considering about half the country is broken away. And so that that, of course is going to be putting some economic strain on the country. And in the midterms, if 1862 we see that Republicans didn't do great in the House of Representatives, in particular, Republicans would lose 25 seats, and along with it, they're outright majority. However, an important thing to say is that no party controlled an outright majority. And so Republicans were then able to form a coalition sort of government in the House of Representatives with the Unionist Party, the Unionist Party is was sort of a collection of former wigs and pro war, former Democrats that were maybe alienated by their party. And so essentially, that's sort of the biggest loss for Republicans, but it's one that is sort of a warning sign of where things might be headed. As if, if the progression of the war does not speed up and improve in the near future. And so, what the midterms of 1862 show is that Republicans, up to this point, are still the most popular party, you know, the Democratic Party is still very much associated with the rebellion going on in the south. But voters are also unhappy with the progress that is being made. And so if Lincoln wants to succeed in sort of extending his mandate, through the Election of 1864. Lincoln needs to sort of start getting some wins the union that needs to start winning. And so that's that's sort of the position that we're starting at in this week's episode. So first, we need to take a look at sort of the biggest thing going on at this point, which is sort of the restructuring of military command out in the east in sort of in Virginia. So, after General George B. McClellan was removed from his command in Virginia. Leadership in the eastern theater was sort of uncertain. Initially, a certain General Ambrose Burnside would take over. But after a major union defeat at Fredericksburg, in December of 1862, Burnside would be replaced by General Joseph Hooker. Quick sidenote, Burnside is the namesake of sideburns. And General hooker is the namesake of well, hookers. Just just a fun little fact there. But so, at this point, the Union army had double the men of the Confederate Army in Northern Virginia. But consistently throughout this period, the union would seriously lose to General Lee in in Northern Virginia. And changing the leadership in the Union command was not alleviating this at all. And months into 1863. There was really no major progress. And, and so it seemed that the Union war effort at the beginning of 1863, was just as stunted as it was before the midterms. So to make up for the losses that were that were being, you know, racked up over time, and to sort of reinforce Union troops, Congress would pass the Enrollment Act of 1863 passed that March. And what the enrolment Act was was essentially the first genuine conscription law enacted by the federal government up to this point, the the federal government's army was supplied through volunteers and state militias, and you know, sort of irregular troop sort of raising. So by having a sort of conscription, you know, a draft, that really sort of changes the math on on the number of men that can be recruited into the army. And so what this Enrollment Act required was that all men, ages 20 to 45, who were either citizens, or were immigrants who had filed for the citizenship had to be entered into the draft. And each state and congressional district within each state had their own specific draft quotas. This was sort of meant to sort of offset deficiencies from low volunteer enlistment. But if you were drafted, this was not sort of a sentence that you absolutely had to serve. Because the federal government sort of gave people out where if they really did not want to serve in the army, they didn't have to. And there were two ways they could do this, either through a system of called substitution in which you would finance and buy equipment for somebody else, to go and fight in your stead and sort of be your replacement. Or you could commute your the draft by play paying a $300 Fine, which doesn't sound like a ton. It's the equivalent of about $5,000 today. And I think the idea there was that if somebody genuinely did not want to serve, the government would essentially not force somebody to serve. Because that would mean they would be a bad soldier if they really were not committed to fighting. And so they figured, well shoot. If somebody really does not want to serve, they may as well pay us and that way, they can just get around it. But the ability to commute to the draft was an option that was really limited to those who were either upper middle class, or wealthy, which you have to consider was a fairly limited sliver of the population in the 1860s. And what this really served to do was just enrage the poor working class, who were forced to actually serve in the army when they were drafted, while their wealthy counterparts did not have to. And we see this sort of build up a lot of class based resentment that really boils over As we enter the summer of 1863, when, when the draft is actually being enforced, but we'll get to that in a bit. So, shifting perspectives a little bit, we're going to move over to focusing on Confederate army for just a moment. So in the beginning of 1863, we see that the Confederate military is not doing great in terms of supplies. And, you know, the number of men they had up to this point, but they had proven to be a fairly competent fighting force, at the very least, even under sort of disadvantageous conditions. And so General Robert E. Lee, commanding the Army of Northern Virginia, which was particularly low on supplies, considering it's sort of, on the frontier, and sort of very close to Union lines, and sort of, you know, both the capital of the Confederacy and the union
generally hopes to sort of use the momentum of a series of, of Confederate Confederate victories in the previous month, and sort of use that momentum to sort of snowball and take the war up north. If you recall, with the passage or the passage, I should say, with the release of the meditation proclamation that came on the heels of generally attempting to march north and being turned around in Maryland. And so what Lee is hoping, in sort of the late spring, early summer of of 1863, is to sort of recapture that energy. And basically, he genuinely believed that if he could deliver a decisive victory on Union soil, and and sort of capture supplies, for his army in the raid, it would really decimate the morale of northerners who maybe up to this point, we're okay with the war or who were somewhat supportive, but who hadn't maybe not had the war come to them. So the plan was essentially to cut to north into Pennsylvania, and capture sort of a major rail hub, and to threaten the major northern cities of Washington, Baltimore, and Philadelphia. And the idea was that this would sort of embolden the sort of anti war, Copperhead movement as as it as they were called. And and General Lee would write, describing this plan, in effect, saying, quote,
Robert E. Lee
If we can baffle them, and their various designs this year, and our people are true to our cause, our success will be certain. And next year, there will be a great change in public opinion at the north, the Republicans will be destroyed. And I think the Friends of peace will become so as strong as that the next administration will go in on that basis.
President Shrimpo
Essentially, what Lee is saying is that he he truly believes if he can deliver a humiliating defeat in our northern soil, that it would make things so bad in the union, that it would cause Lincoln to lose re election and that a pro peace, Democrat would be be elected as the next president. His plan was maybe not the best thought out. And actually, the Confederate government didn't support the idea. They had tried repeatedly to try to get Lee to redeploy out to the western theater to counter union victories along the Mississippi. But But Lee, who was devoted to his his State of Virginia, his home state, refused. And this was probably not a good idea, he probably could have done quite well out west and actually turned around the war in certain theaters. Rather than just sitting around in in Northern Virginia and then doing a pointless raid on Northern soil. But either way, Lee was committed, and he would begin marching north with his army of Northern Virginia, in early June of 1863, with the Union troops, under the command of General hooker, slowly following behind. Now, hooker had sort of been cowed by Lee and really did not want to directly confront him. And actually, what hooker wanted to do was to turn around and march towards the undefended Confederate capital of Richmond. But President Lincoln really disagreed with Hooker and believed it was more important to counter the largest Confederate Army heading up into northern lines. And hooker basically threatened to resign over the issue. In which Lincoln called his bluff on, and so hooker would be replaced by the Union General George G. Meade at the end of June, right as as the Army of Northern Virginia was finally crossing the border from Maryland, into Pennsylvania. And so Union forces would finally catch up with Lee just outside of the town of Gettysburg, Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, which is sort of in southern Pennsylvania, right along the border of Maryland. And from July 1 to July 3, a battle would ensue. That was the bloodiest of the entire civil wars, with 46,000 to 51,000 casualties combined from both sides over the course of a three day battle. And while losses will be roughly even in terms of drawn numbers from both armies, it would be slightly heavier for the Confederates, and it would force Lee to begin a slow and painful retreat southwards back into Northern Virginia. And really, it ended any future plans made by any Confederates into bringing the war on to Northern soil. So while Gettysburg, the Battle of Gettysburg would be costly, it would be a major turning point for the union's morale with a New York die arrest by the name of George Templeton strong reacting to the battle by writing, quote,
George Templeton Strong
The results of this victory are priceless. The charm of Robert E Lee's invincibility is broken. The army of the Potomac has at last found a journal that can handle it and has stood nobly up to its terrible work, in spite of its long disheartening list of hard fought failures, copperheads or policies, and dumb for the moment, at least, government is strengthened fourfold at home and abroad.
President Shrimpo
So while Lee was able to escape, and you know, people were unhappy about this, it still made a big impact in the course of the war, and which is why I think Gettysburg is one of those few battles that even if you don't really know anything about the Civil War, is a name that you've heard of, at the very least. And I think it's sort of indicative of the sort of slow but steady shift of momentum in the war, from sort of Confederate momentum towards now, a sort of, it's just quiet momentum for the Union, but it is a momentum nonetheless. We're now going to jump ahead to a event that happens only a few days after the Battle of Gettysburg, starting on July 11, the Enrollment Act, the draft of that was the first draft was being drawn in Manhattan in New York City. And on the first day of the draft being drawn, on July 1, there was no incident. But on July 13, a full 10 days after the end of the battle of Gettysburg, the second draft was going to be drawn. People were very angry. And at 10am, a crowd of about 500 people marched to where the draft was being drawn. And that would begin a bloody four day riot that was the culmination of white working class rage in the city of New York. Now, for some context on these draft riots, New York City's economy had been deeply tied to the southern cotton industry since the 19. Since the 1820s, excuse me, roughly half of the city's exports were southern cotton. And at the start of the war, many citizens of New York City were southern sympathizers. Also, another big thing to note is that a vast portion of the city's working class population were Irish and German Catholic immigrants. By 1860, nearly a quarter of the entire city's population was born in a German state. And many were recent immigrants who spoke some to very little English if, if any at all. And so, you know, you've got this sort of massive immigrant working class population that's growing in the city, and just sort of redirect working class resentments towards their bad pay and bad working conditions and bad living conditions. sensationalist newspapers in the city would write up these really ugly caricatures of African Americans in the city and we tried to stoke racial fears fears of interracial men. carriage of African Americans stealing jobs from hard working white people in the city. And it really sort of built up this sort of very ugly animosity from within the sort of white working class population of the city.
Another big factor in it during this period is the Tammany Hall sort of Democratic machine, which should have organized city politics, at least on the Democratic side. And this was a political machine that really heavily relied on Catholic immigrant votes. And so Tammany Hall would quickly work to enroll new immigrants into becoming US citizens to gain more voters essentially. But there was a catch recent immigrants who were enrolled to gain their citizenship, were not informed that this meant that they would have to enroll in the draft. And so there were all of these people who suddenly came to the US maybe they were just planning on doing work, they maybe weren't even planning on staying but who came were offered these good deals by Tammany Hall recruiters. They get enrolled to become citizens and then boom, they find out oh, they might have to go down south and fight and die in a war that they had no personal stake in. That's, that's how many of them felt. And so So this sort of sets the stage for a lot of resentment, and quite a bit of it directed towards the wrong people. And so, cutting back to the the mob that accumulates around the draft that morning, July 13 1863. This mob was primarily comprised of Irish immigrants to the city. And many of them were very resentful that they would have to be drafted, while the city's wealthy could pay the fee to commute their service. The rioters were also very angry that the city's black population was exempt from the draft. The reason that the African American population of the Union was exempt from the draft is because they were not fully considered legal citizens at this point in time, and the Union military command had been really hesitant to even enlist black soldiers because of deep seated racism and a belief that black soldiers would be inferior in some way in terms of their fighting capabilities. And additionally, black men were only allowed to serve in the Union Army in combat roles, beginning in January of that very year. So the idea of incorporating African Americans into the army, that was a very new concept and something that was not really considered when they were drafting this this Enrollment Act. So to discuss the events of the New York City draft riot, I'm going to need to include a content warning here. What followed was one of the most extreme examples of anti black mob violence in American history. For listener discretion, I will partially describe racially motivated murder, including violence against children. If you do not feel comfortable listening to this at this time, please feel free to skip ahead to the timestamp at the following time code 26:05. So the mob attacking the draft being drawn in upper Manhattan, quickly escalated in terms of the violence that they were doing. They would begin throwing bricks through windows, setting fire to nearby buildings, attacking dispatched firemen, cutting telegraph wires, and attacking innocent black civilians on the street. With New York State's militias being redirected to serve in Gettysburg, only the Metropolitan Police in the city were able to respond initially. And they were quickly overwhelmed by the rioters, which quickly grew in size as more and more people saw the violence and decided to participate including, I have to say some of the volunteer firemen and police in the area. The violent mob would tear through Manhattan and would attack pro Republican newspapers. Sacking businesses that catered to black customers. They set fire to the colored orphan news out asylum. The police were only able to hold the crowd back long enough for all 223 Orphans to escape to safety by blocking the mob from approaching and And the mob also murdered numerous black civilians. Set fire to black owned businesses attacked white women who were believed to be interracial relation relationships. With black citizens in the city. They set fire to churches, it really was a very ugly, dark moment in the city's history. The writing would only fully stop after four days on July 16, when state militias and several army units entered the city and confronted the remaining rioters in the street, with a outright gunfight in the streets, ending the conflict. In total, Around 120 people were killed in the riot, with 1000s more injured, millions of dollars in property damage. 11 black people were lynched over the course of the riot, with one of them being a seven year old boy. The draft would resume in August with no further incident. But the but it permanently shifted the city, the equivalent of nearly $90 million in property damage accumulated over the course of the riot. And it began a painful exodus of Manhattan's black population out of the city. By 1865, the black population of Manhattan dropped to below 10,000, which was the lowest it had been since before 1820. And what this really shows is that while you know military progress was improving, and all of this and you have the victory at Gettysburg. anti war sentiment in the country is still show incredibly strong and racist ideology and sentiments are are pervasive even in the north. And what this shows is that overcoming the sort of entrenched position of the sort of anti war Democrats is copperheads. By 1864, will be very difficult. And so we're now going to jump a little bit to the political front. So large portions of the Confederacy up to this point, we're now under Union control. The entire length of the Mississippi was occupied New Orleans was occupied. The coast of North Carolina was occupied, the bulk of Tennessee was under the control of the Union. And Tennessee actually, finally had a governor again, that was in favor of union. No, it was a military governor. And this was a certain Andrew Johnson and sort of the sort of western most mountainous counties of Virginia had long held very pro union sentiments. And so it had been under Union control. And so these western counties that had long sort of felt separated from the State Capitol in Richmond, put up a vote, and decided to secede from the state of Virginia, and would form the new state of West Virginia in June of 1863. Now, on November 19 1863, President Lincoln was invited to deliver a few remarks at the opening of a graveyard national graveyard, for those killed the Battle of Gettysburg four months prior. And Lincoln would accept this invitation and would come having a he was feeling quite weak, sickly. He had a slight headache and a mild fever. And Lincoln would arrive at Gettysburg. At the time he didn't realize this, but he had the onset of a very mild case of smallpox and feeling quite tired. And unwell. Lincoln had written a fairly short speech, less than two minutes in length, and he would deliver this speech honoring the dead and sort of reaffirming the purpose of the Union war effort. And it would begin with a set of opening words that live on even today with President Lincoln saying, quote,
Abraham Lincoln
Four score and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
President Shrimpo
This gettysburg address at the time, had sort of a quiet reception. I think people were More focused on how sickly the President looked. But after it was circulated, after the fact, the Gettysburg Address is considered one of the most powerful speech speeches ever delivered up because it it sort of lays out this this vision of a free America and a purpose to this war, beyond keeping the Union together but but to save the soul of the nation, essentially. And and I think that sort of shows the power of Lincoln in, he's one of those few presidents that we've had where we remember what he said. That's something that I think, I think sort of speaks to His power as a leader, but also to how much he understood this sort of importance, sort of the spiritual transformation that the country was undergoing at this time. So as late as he laid out this, this vision of an America in which all men truly are created equal. We've seen the beginning of the effort to finally once and for all, destroy slavery as an institution. And we see this with the introduction of the 13th Amendment in sort of the end of 1863. So fearing that the scope of the Emancipation Proclamation was too limited, and that it could be easily overturned by a conservative Supreme Court, or by a pro slavery future president, abolitionists within the government hoped to draft an amendment that would permanently and definitively end American chattel slavery. And so multiple congressmen and senators would draft various versions of an amendment in the winter of 1863. It was meant to abolish slavery nationally, not just in the rebelling states but permanently across all states. And eventually, the various drafts would be compiled by Republican senator Lyman Trumbull into the succinct amendment stating, quote,
Lyman Trumbull
neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.
President Shrimpo
This amendment would pass in the Republican controlled Senate Senate by a commanding margin 38 to six, with two Democrats voting in favor on April 8 1864. However, this amendment would not pass in the divided House of Representatives, and would fail to meet the necessary three fourths margin that June. And with the Pat with failing to pass the 13th amendment that summer, that will become sort of one of the key political conflicts entering the election cycle of 1864. And President Lincoln will be caught in the crossfire of the factions both opposed and in favor of it. So, after commanding union victories in southeastern Tennessee, in the fall of 1863, two union commanders would make a name for themselves. Ulysses S. Grant, and William Tecumseh Sherman. In March of 1864, General grants would be promoted to the level of Lieutenant General and made commander of all Union armies. This was a position that was last held by George Washington. That's how much Abraham Lincoln really had faith in grants ability to lead and command the army. And Charmin was then placed in command of the entire western theater, and sort of had this plan to go and strike south and capture the major city of Atlanta, and in turn the vast bulk of the state of Georgia. Great hands and and Sherman favored a philosophy of war that some I think would describe as total war. It's what Sherman described as hard war. Essentially, the idea was rather than just targeting, you know, military targets, the army would begin attacking industry, infrastructure and enemy supply lines. The idea was that it would it would strangle the Confederacy. By limiting its ability to transport, you know, basic supplies through its arteries of infrastructure, and General Sherman would write to grant outlining their plan for victory, saying, quote,
William Tecumseh Sherman
If you can whip Lee and I can march the Atlantic, I think ol' uncle Abe will give us 20 days leave to see the young folks.
President Shrimpo
So now we're going to take a look at the election cycle of 1864. So despite Lincoln's popularity today, history reelection in 1864 was really pretty far from a sure thing. Republicans had faced really not inconsiderable losses in 1862. And the war progress so far had been slow and costly. And with incidents like the draft riots, it showed that there was really deep anti war sentiments that were still brewing in the country. And also, Lincoln's base of support was pretty seriously divided up because you had both Radical Republicans who believed that that Lincoln was not acting strongly enough to end the slavery, while you also had sort of more moderate sort of Unionist former Democrats, some of them were still Democrats, but who still supported Lincoln's war effort. That's sort of, you know, we're, you know, unhappy with some of the proposals made by the radicals. And so Lincoln is sort of had to balance the interests of both groups within his sort of coalition essentially. And so hoping to get to sort of bring together the disparate groups within his sort of support base, and sort of bring together those in favor of bringing the war to a conclusion as a Union victory. The Republican Party would merge with the faction of Democrats called War Democrats that really favored bringing the war to its proper conclusion. And along with the Unionist Party, former know nothings sort of wide range people that maybe were not Republicans in their own right, and brought them all together into this grand coalition called the National Union Party. It's within them this sort of big tent coalition that we see that the radicals within the Republican Party are unhappy with, with Abraham Lincoln's leadership, and they hope to sort of in some way, try to block his renomination. The sort of most serious attempt at this was by strict Secretary of the Treasury, Salmon P Chase. Chase was the only figure who was willing to openly try to contest the nomination, but Chase would fail. But a prop a month prior to the National Union convention, a group of breakaway radicals organized the radical Democracy Party, and at their convention, would nominate John C. Fremont as their presidential nominee. Fremont had been the Republican nominee in 1856. And he had served in the Union Army, not very well, but he had served as a general. And he believed that that Lincoln was not doing enough to end slavery. And so it's really, essentially what what Fremont and the radical Democracy Party was doing, was running a spoiler campaign that was being actively encouraged by Democrats that we're trying to sort of encourage these rifts within the Republican Party. So convening in Baltimore, which I want to note, was the largest slave market in the Union on June 7, and eighth, both radicals and Democrats hoped to extract concessions from Lincoln at the Republican National Convention that that summer. And so in an effort to sort of balance the ticket, Democrats within the coalition hoped to replace Republican Hannibal Hamlin with a democratic replacement. Among those who were considered as replacements were General Benjamin Butler, former senator from New York, Daniel Dickinson, and the eventual nominee for the vice presidency, Andrew Johnson, the military governor of Tennessee, and the most prominent of Southern Democrats to have remained loyal to the Union. So essentially, the idea was that it would balance the interests within the National Union and by having a Republican for the presidential nomination, a Democrat for the vice presidential nomination. And the radicals in the party ensured that adopting the 13th amendment would be in the party's platform. So so it was sort of it was would have a tightrope balancing act where Lincoln agrees to have a Democrat as his running mate, and then agrees to make sure that slavery is killed and ended once and for all, both under the same party banner. And so the National Union party's platform promised the following things, pursuit of the war until the Confederacy surrendered unconditionally, a constitutional amendment for the abolition of slavery, aid to disabled union veterans, continued European neutrality in the conflict and enforcement of the Monroe Doctrine and encouragement of immigration to the country and the construction of a transcontinental railroad. And essentially, through this entire convention, the main argument this has been laid out by Republicans is that you shouldn't switch horses midstream, that the people needed to let Abraham Lincoln bring the war to its conclusion. And so that's sort of the pitch that is being made by Republicans at this time. Now, switching over to the other major party in American politics at this point, the Democratic Party was in a very precarious position. The conduct of the war so far had been moderately unpopular. And there was this genuine belief that Abraham Lincoln might lose, he might be unseated from the presidency. But also the Democratic Party was deeply associated with the southern rebellion. And so it was this thing where there had to be sort of this tightrope of balancing the interests of the anti war copperheads, along with the interests of unionists, Democrats, who were opposed to the rebellion at all. Some, at the time thought that Horatio Seymour, who was the popular governor of New York might run for the presidency, Seymour was sort of a moderate in in terms of the issue of ending the war, he believed that the war needed to be ended with a negotiated peace deal. But he also really was opposed to southern secession. So it was some idea that he could kind of bring together the different factions of the party, but ultimately see more would decline to run for the presidency. This really only left candidates who were on opposite ends of the spectrum. This left Thomas Seymour, who, as far as I'm aware, had no relation to Horatio Seymour, Thomas Seymour, the former governor of Connecticut, who was a Copperhead, who was really truly believed the idea that the entire war had been a total failure. And he promised to essentially let the Confederacy leave the union. And on the opposite end was then General George B. McClellan. McClellan had been the former Commanding General, who had really squabbled with Lincoln had had sort of a very personal feud with with the current president. But But above all, McClellan was a war Democrat. And he he really genuinely wanted to bring the war to its conclusion through a continuation of it, essentially. The Democratic National Convention of 1864, was hosted in Chicago on August 29, through the 31st. And the party really hoped to bridge the divide between the war and peace Democrats. And ultimately, the popular general McClellan would be nominated for the presidency. But along with him to balance the ticket would be a prominent Copperhead, Congressman George Pendleton, as for the vice presidency, so So what we have then is a Democratic ticket that on the top of the ticket is a pro war Democrat who's in favor of bringing it to its full, total conclusion. And the bottom of the ticket is a piece Democrat that wants to end the war no matter what. And the convention would eventually adopt a pro peace platform, which McClellan rejected. So you have this weird situation where the party is advocating for one thing, but their own nominee is rejecting what the Party is calling for. And so it really, it was this very weird political situation to be in. So breaking away just a moment for all that from electoral politics back to the war. We see, General Grant has been in command in Virginia now for some time. But his progress with what is now called the overland campaign has been fairly slow and had, you know, fairly limited progress really kind of grinding the army against Lee's army with limited success. And Lincoln's popularity was not seeming like He was improving. And and so there was some late into the summer into the beginning of the fall, there was some genuine concern that Lincoln was in a bad spot for re election. That was until news reached to the north, that General William Tecumseh Sherman had finally captured Atlanta on September 2. And additionally,
Fremont who was running as a on under the ticket of the radical Democracy Party, was appalled by the Democratic Party's platform. And he genuinely believed that if he assisted the Democrats in winning the presidency, it would mean slavery would exist for FAR, much for Far, far longer. And so, Fremont comes to Lincoln and he offers a deal. Fremont will drop out of the race and endorse Lincoln. If Lincoln would fire his Postmaster General, Montgomery Blair. Blair was a moderate Republican who constantly was in speaking out in favor of trying to reconcile with the Confederacy. And that's because he had a relationship with quite a few politicians from the South who were serving in the government in the Confederacy. And so Blair was really hated by radicals within the party. And so at the end of September, Lincoln would agree, Fremont would drop out of the race, and Blair would be relieved of duty. And this really would bolster Lincoln's chances at reelection, suddenly, there was no no longer the splinter candidate that was running sort of a spoiler campaign. Along with this, you've got massive mail in ballot initiatives from soldiers all across the front, who were very, very much in favor of Lincoln. And this was the first time we see mail in ballots being used in a presidential election, which is really noteworthy, I think. And so, come election date, November 8 1864, Abraham Lincoln would win every state except Kentucky, New Jersey, and Delaware, and the Republicans would expand their majority in the Senate and capture an outright majority in the House. With this new commanding electoral mandate, Grant and Sherman would act to quickly conclude the war decisively. And Lincoln would set forth to end slavery once and for all. It was during this time that general took William Tecumseh Sherman would begin his infamous marched to the sea, burning through Georgia, leaving Atlanta in ruins, and making a beeline straight for the Atlantic coast to cut the Confederate States down the middle. Sherman would later recall the beginning of his merch to see from the beginning of November to late December, in his memoir, having written quote,
William Tecumseh Sherman
behind us lay Atlanta smoldering and in ruins, the black smoke rising high and air and hanging like a pall over the ruined city, some band by accident struck up the anthem of John Brown's body, the men caught up the strain and never before or since have I heard the chorus of Glory, glory, hallelujah, done with more spirit or in better harmony of time and place.
President Shrimpo
And I think that sort of strikes a interesting image of of a union army that is going out and doing this hard war campaign, that is that is leaving a city in ruins, and cutting through the countryside of the South. And finally, there is this the sense that the war is coming to a close and there is this, this jubilation and this this desire to sing among the men and I find that striking. And it was during this time that General Sherman would act to free enslaved people that his armies encountered with a caravan of 1000s of freed people trailing along the army marching through Georgia. And it was during this sort of period of that ideas of land redistribution would spring up. And it's, it's from this we then have the birth of the idea of redistributing to every freed slave 40 acres of land and a mule. That's something we will discuss in more detail on the next episode. Jumping back to the political theater for a moment, Lincoln really hoped to pass the 13th amendment through Congress before the next session. Be Gailen in the following spring, This was despite the fact that it had failed to pass earlier that past summer with the current sitting Congress. And why well, why is this you might ask? This is because Lincoln believed it was inevitable. He said as much saying, quote,
Abraham Lincoln
There is only a question of time as to when the proposed amendment will go to the states for their action. And as it is to so go at all events, may we not agree that the sooner the better.
President Shrimpo
Additionally, there's sort of, I think, a symbolic element to this. It's it's symbolic of the transformation that the entire country was undergoing, that even a Congress that had once been opposed to abolition could change itself and and still end slavery outright. And so, after a long, arduous period of political jockeying in Congress, the amendment would finally meet the two thirds threshold necessary and pass on January 31 1865. And then the following month, it would be ratified by the states made official on December 6 1865, with the 27th out of 36 states ratifying the amendment. Now, it was during this period, that General Grant would doggedly pursue General Lee through Virginia. And while the overland campaign had been really a very slow, arduous slog, his fortunes had improved. And his determination really worn General Lee's army of Northern Virginia very thin, and grant would decisively beat Lee at the Battle of Five forks on April 1 1865, cutting Lee off from the rest of the Confederacy and Richmond would fall shortly thereafter, generally would surrender to grant at Appomattox Courthouse on April 9, which is by many considered the end of the war. However, fighting did continue in some areas for some time after the last land battle of the Civil War, would be fought may 13. In Texas, and the last enslaved people, freed by the order of the Emancipation Proclamation would be freed on June 19 in Texas, which is honored today as Juneteenth. Several days after General Lee's surrender at Appomattox Courthouse, President Lincoln would attend a production of the play Our American Cousin at Ford's Theatre with the First Lady and two guests. On the night of April 14. Lincoln as far as I'm aware, was enjoying himself at the play. When Confederate sympathizer and well known stage actor John Wilkes Booth would sneak up behind Lincoln was watching the play from the Presidential theater box and shoot the President in the back of the head. Booth would escape being a two week long manhunt that would end in his death. And President Lincoln would die the following morning from his injuries and at that moment, Vice President Andrew Johnson would become the new President of the United States. And American history would be changed forever. As always, I've been your host, President Shrimpo. And thank you for listening to in the West Wing WKNC 88.1 Special thanks to those who helped give history a voice in this week's episode of In the West Wing, with Caitlin Carroll as Robert E. Lee Erie Mitchell as George Templeton strong. Zach Bradley is Abraham Lincoln, Andrew Mayo as Lyman Trumbull and Elsie Howard as William Tecumseh Sherman. The intro music used on in the West Wing, the Star Spangled Banner by the United States Marine Band, and our Outro Song is Libertad by Iriarte and Pesoa
Transcribed by https://otter.ai