The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln
Chapter 108 : A. LINCOLN.TO JOSEPH HOLT, EXECUTIVE MANSION, SEPTEMBER 12, 1861 HON. JOSEPH HOLT.DEAR

A. LINCOLN.

TO JOSEPH HOLT,

EXECUTIVE MANSION, SEPTEMBER 12, 1861

HON. JOSEPH HOLT.

DEAR SIR:--Yours of this day in relation to the late proclamation of General Fremont is received yesterday I addressed a letter to him, by mail, on the same subject, and which is to be made public when he receives it. I herewith send you a copy of that letter, which perhaps shows my position as distinctly as any new one I could write. I will thank you not to make it public until General Fremont shall have had time to receive the original.

Your obedient servant,

A. LINCOLN.

TO GENERAL SCOTT

WAs.h.i.+NGTON, D.C., September 16, 1861.

DEAR SIR:--Since conversing with you I have concluded to request you to frame an order for recruiting North Carolinians at Fort Hatteras. I suggest it to be so framed as for us to accept a smaller force--even a company--if we cannot get a regiment or more. What is necessary to now say about officers you will judge. Governor Seward says he has a nephew (Clarence A. Seward, I believe) who would be willing to go and play colonel and a.s.sist in raising the force. Still it is to be considered whether the North Carolinians will not prefer officers of their own. I should expect they would.

Yours very truly,

A. LINCOLN.

TO SECRETARY CAMERON.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, September 18, 1861

HON. SECRETARY OF WAR. MY DEAR SIR:--To guard against misunderstanding, I think fit to say that the joint expedition of the army and navy agreed upon some time since, and in which General T. W. Sherman was and is to bear a conspicuous part, is in no wise to be abandoned, but must be ready to move by the 1st of, or very early in, October. Let all preparations go forward accordingly.

Yours truly,

A. LINCOLN.

TO GENERAL FREMONT,

WAs.h.i.+NGTON, SEPTEMBER 12, 1861

MAJOR-GENERAL FREMONT:

Governor Morton telegraphs as follows: "Colonel Lane, just arrived by special train, represents Owensborough, forty miles above Evansville, in possession of secessionists. Green River is navigable. Owensborough must be seized. We want a gunboat sent up from Paducah for that purpose." Send up the gunboat if, in your discretion, you think it right. Perhaps you had better order those in charge of the Ohio River to guard it vigilantly at all points.

A. LINCOLN.

To O. H. BROWNING.

(Private and Confidential)

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WAs.h.i.+NGTON SEPTEMBER 22, 1861

HON. O. H. BROWNING.

MY DEAR SIR:--Yours of the 17th is just received; and coming from you, I confess it astonishes me. That you should object to my adhering to a law which you had a.s.sisted in making and presenting to me less than a month before is odd enough. But this is a very small part. General Fremont's proclamation as to confiscation of property and the liberation of slaves is purely political and not within the range of military law or necessity.

If a commanding general finds a necessity to seize the farm of a private owner for a pasture, an encampment, or a fortification, he has the right to do so, and to so hold it as long as the necessity lasts; and this is within military law, because within military necessity. But to say the farm shall no longer belong to the owner, or his heirs forever, and this as well when the farm is not needed for military purposes as when it is, is purely political, without the savor of military law about it. And the same is true of slaves. If the general needs them, he can seize them and use them; but when the need is past, it is not for him to fix their permanent future condition. That must be settled according to laws made by law-makers, and not by military proclamations. The proclamation in the point in question is simply "dictators.h.i.+p." It a.s.sumes that the general may do anything he pleases confiscate the lands and free the slaves of loyal people, as well as of disloyal ones. And going the whole figure, I have no doubt, would be more popular with some thoughtless people than that which has been done, But I cannot a.s.sume this reckless position, nor allow others to a.s.sume it on my responsibility.

You speak of it as being the only means of saving the government. On the contrary, it is itself the surrender of the government. Can it be pretended that it is any longer the Government of the United States--any government of const.i.tution and laws wherein a general or a president may make permanent rules of property by proclamation? I do not say Congress might not with propriety pa.s.s a law on the point, just such as General Fremont proclaimed.

I do not say I might not, as a member of Congress, vote for it. What I object to is, that I, as President, shall expressly or impliedly seize and exercise the permanent legislative functions of the government.

So much as to principle. Now as to policy. No doubt the thing was popular in some quarters, and would have been more so if it had been a general declaration of emanc.i.p.ation. The Kentucky Legislature would not budge till that proclamation was modified; and General Anderson telegraphed me that on the news of General Fremont having actually issued deeds of manumission, a whole company of our volunteers threw down their arms and disbanded. I was so a.s.sured as to think it probable that the very arms we had furnished Kentucky would be turned against us. I think to lose Kentucky is nearly the same as to lose the whole game. Kentucky gone, we cannot hold Missouri, nor, as I think, Maryland. These all against us, and the job on our hands is too large for us. We would as well consent to separation at once, including the surrender of this Capital. On the contrary, if you will give up your restlessness for new positions, and back me manfully on the grounds upon which you and other kind friends gave me the election and have approved in my public doc.u.ments, we shall go through triumphantly. You must not understand I took my course on the proclamation because of Kentucky. I took the same ground in a private letter to General Fremont before I heard from Kentucky.

You think I am inconsistent because I did not also forbid General Fremont to shoot men under the proclamation. I understand that part to be within military law, but I also think, and so privately wrote General Fremont, that it is impolitic in this, that our adversaries have the power, and will certainly exercise it, to shoot as many of our men as we shoot of theirs. I did not say this in the public letter, because it is a subject I prefer not to discuss in the hearing of our enemies.

There has been no thought of removing General Fremont on any ground connected with his proclamation, and if there has been any wish for his removal on any ground, our mutual friend Sam. Glover can probably tell you what it was. I hope no real necessity for it exists on any ground.

Your friend, as ever,

A. LINCOLN.

MEMORANDUM FOR A PLAN OF CAMPAIGN

[OCTOBER 1?] 1861

On or about the 5th of October (the exact date to be determined hereafter) I wish a movement made to seize and hold a point on the railroad connecting Virginia and Tennessee near the mountain-pa.s.s called c.u.mberland Gap. That point is now guarded against us by Zollicoffer, with 6000 or 8000 rebels at Barboursville Ky.,--say twenty-five miles from the Gap, toward Lexington. We have a force of 5000 or 6000 under General Thomas, at Camp d.i.c.k Robinson, about twenty-five miles from Lexington and seventy-five from Zollicoffer's camp, On the road between the two. There is not a railroad anywhere between Lexington and the point to be seized, and along the whole length of which the Union sentiment among the people largely predominates. We have military possession of the railroad from Cincinnati to Lexington, and from Louisville to Lexington, and some home guards, under General Crittenden, are on the latter line. We have possession of the railroad from Louisville to Nashville, Tenn., so far as Muldraugh's Hill, about forty miles, and the rebels have possession of that road all south of there. At the Hill we have a force of 8000, under General Sherman, and about an equal force of rebels is a very short distance south, under General Buckner.

We have a large force at Paducah, and a smaller at Port Holt, both on the Kentucky side, with some at Bird's Point, Cairo, Mound City, Evansville, and New Albany, all on the other side, and all which, with the gunboats on the river, are perhaps sufficient to guard the Ohio from Louisville to its mouth.