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Sitting (left to right)-EDWIN M. STANTON, ABRAHAM LINCOLN, GIDEON WELLES, WILLIAM H. SEWARD, EDWARD BATES. Standing (left to right)-SALMON P. CHASE, CALEB B. SMITH, MONTGOMERY BLAIR.

minister of war history had recorded. Great as was the burden on Carnot, it was light compared to that which rested on Mr. Stanton from the time he entered Mr. Lincoln's cabinet until the close of the Civil War in 1865.

On his father's side Mr. Stanton was of Quaker descent. His father was an eminent physician and surgeon and his mother was of old Virginia stock. Young Stanton was born in an atmosphere that was hostile to slavery, but he ever favored non-intervention with the holding of slaves until the war forced on the country interference as a war measure to save the life of the nation. He began his political life as a Jacksonian Democrat, but became a "Free-Soiler" when he thought Mr. Van Buren had been unfairly defeated by the South in the convention of 1844. He nevertheless remained in the Democratic party and adhered to the extreme anti-slavery wing.

Dr. Stanton, the father of Edwin, died when his son was but thirteen years of age, leaving his family in straitened circumstances. The young lad was called upon to help in the maintenance of the family and entered as clerk in a book store at the salary of four dollars a month. This employment took him from school, but he gave his evenings to study. At the store he read much and always in a direction that aided him in his preparatory studies to enter college. In 1831, when seventeen years of age, he entered Kenyon College, at Gambier, Ohio, after his four years of service in the book store. For want of means he was unable to complete his course and left the college in 1833.

Leaving the college he again entered the employ of his former master, but this time in a store at Columbus, Ohio. This he did in hope he might save enough to complete his college course. Failing in this he abandoned the store and gave himself up earnestly to the study of law. He pursued his studies with great vigor and in 1836 was admitted to practice. He began his professional life at Cadiz, in his native state. He was immediately successful and within one year was elected prosecuting attorney. He rapidly built up a lucrative practice and at the close of his term as prosecuting attorney removed from Cadiz to Steubenville, Ohio, and later to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. This move was made necessary by his increasing practice in cases of great importance. He remained in Pittsburgh from 1847 until 1856, when he removed to Washington, District of Columbia, as much of his legal business was the argument of cases before the United States Supreme Court.

By this time his fame as a most successful lawyer had become broadcast and his practice and fees increased in proportion. In February, 1856, he was employed as special counsel for the United States in some of the most important litigation the government has ever been a party to. Not long after the acquisition of California a large number of claimants began to appear with grants of lands covering many thou

sands of square miles of territory received, or alleged to have been received, from the government of Mexico. Honorable Jeremiah Black was Attorney General and it was his duty to defend the interests of the government. At his instigation, Mr. Stanton was employed as special counsel and sent to California. Fabricated claims to lands worth one hundred and fifty million dollars were to be investigated. Some of the claims were seemingly so backed up by official documents as to make them impregnable, but the untiring energy and industry of Mr. Stanton soon unearthed evidence that all the papers were forged, and that a widespread conspiracy existed, in which some of the high officials of Mexico were parties, to defraud the United States government out of millions of acres. Mr. Stanton, in the course of his investigations, discovered and brought to light many large volumes of the Mexican archives which had been secreted, the archives containing abundance of evidence that the claims were fraudulent.

In December, 1860, when President Buchanan's cabinet was broken up on account of differences over the duties and powers of the government in connection with the attempted secession of some of the states, Mr. Stanton was nominated and confirmed as Attorney General in place of Mr. Black, who had been transferred to the State Department. The cabinet had been divided on the question as to whether the President could use the army and navy for the purpose of enforcing the laws in states claiming to have seceded from the Union. When the question was first put to Attorney General Black he had given it as his opinion the President had no such authority, but before he became Secretary of State he changed his views.

The immediate cause of the disruption of the cabinet was the action of Major Anderson, in command of Charleston Harbor, in transferring his force from Fort Moultrie to Fort Sumter. The Southern members of the cabinet demanded he should be ordered back to the former fort. General Cass, Secretary of State, demanded the forts be reinforced, and when the President declined to take the decisive step the Secretary tendered his resignation, Attorney General Black being transferred to the State Department. When Mr. Stanton became a member of the cabinet the question was the ordering of Major Anderson back to Fort Moultrie. Mr. Stanton, as Attorney General, was vehement in asserting that Major Anderson should be sustained by all the powers of the government. At his first meeting with the cabinet he administered a stern rebuke to Mr. Floyd, who was Secretary of War, and declared the whole people of the North would stand by the President in resisting the demands of the seceded states, and declared that Secretary Floyd was a criminal in suggesting the withdrawal of the troops from Charleston Harbor. At this rebuke Secretary Floyd tendered his resignation of the War Department, which was at once accepted.

From the very beginning of the discussion over the right of secession Mr. Stanton had taken a firm stand in favor of the Union. So

vehement was he in protesting against anything that looked like surrender, or an admission that a state had the right to secede, that in the cabinet meeting referred to he said it would be a crime, equal to the crime of Benedict Arnold, to make such an admission, and that all who participated in it ought to be hanged as Andre had been, and that a President of the United States who would make an order for the return of Major Anderson to Fort Moultrie, under the circumstances, or for the evacuation of the forts in Charleston Harbor, would be subject to impeachment as guilty of treason. Mr. Stanton at once became the dominating influence in the cabinet. Secretary Black, and Mr. Holt, Postmaster General, were equally in earnest, but were not so vehement as Mr. Stanton, and it was vehemence that counted in the crisis.

Mr. Stanton retired from the cabinet on the inauguration of President Lincoln, but in his letters, speeches and conversations with others he displayed the same intense loyalty to the Union, and although he was a Democrat he was frequently consulted by such Republicans as Senator Sumner and Representative Thaddeus Stevens, the two congressional leaders of the Union men.

President Lincoln's first selection for Secretary of War was Simon Cameron, senator from Pennsylvania, but Mr. Cameron lacked in the energy and virility required at so grave a crisis, and in January, 1862, he was induced to resign. During the months following Mr. Lincoln's induction into the office of chief magistrate Mr. Stanton had frequently given expression to opinions adverse, even hostile, to the President, and hence was greatly astonished when the President, without previous consultation, sent his name to the Senate as Secretary of War. His nomination was at once confirmed and on January 20, 1862, he entered upon the onerous task as head of the War Department.

He at once made his energy and intense loyalty felt in every branch of the service. It was a heavy load, for he was not only called upon to organize troops but to fight a horde of fraudulent and greedy contractors who had entrenched themselves in the work of supplying the armies with clothing and munitions of all kinds. These men found no mercy at the hands of the new Secretary. His energy was so untiring and his anxiety at times so intense that he frequently remained at his desk for thirty hours without rest. In the meetings of the cabinet he was always urgent for the most vigorous prosecution of the war and had no patience with any dilatory tactics. He was ever insistent that commanders in the field should use their forces to meet and defeat the enemy. He was frequently accused of grave injustice and of exercising arbitrary authority, and was subjected to the most bitter abuse by some of the newspapers, but nothing could swerve him from his course.

One example of his indomitable energy was displayed in 1863, when he moved twenty-three thousand men with all their artillery, horses

and camp equipage from Washington to Chattanooga in less than seven days. General Rosecrans was in a desperate situation after his defeat at Chickamauga and large reinforcements were necessary to save his army. Secretary Stanton took two whole army corps from the army of General Meade, brought them to Washington and put them. down at a point in communication with Chattanooga in less than seven days. They detrained at Chattanooga in such good condition that they could have gone at once into battle had it been necessary. While arranging for the transportation of these troops the Secretary did not leave his office for three days and nights.

The energy displayed by the Secretary in raising and equipping troops and in directing the vast operations by which they were furnished with the materials of war was fully equaled by that with which he caused them to be mustered out and sent to their homes when there was no further use for them in the field. General Lee had no sooner surrendered than Secretary Stanton began the work of relieving the country from the enormous burden of maintaining more than a million men in the service.

Secretary Stanton sustained President Lincoln in his contemplated issuance of a proclamation of emancipation and was among the first of the cabinet to urge the enlisting of colored men in the army. He also believed with the President that the seceded states should be brought back into the Union as quickly as possible, when loyal governments could be established therein, but favored holding such states under military government until such a time as the loyal citizens could number enough to maintain a civil government.

With the other members of the cabinet he was retained by President Johnson on his accession to the office of President after the assassination of Mr. Lincoln, but it was not long until differences between the President and the Secretary became acute. The Secretary sided with Congress on the question as to where the power of reconstructing the states rested, and to prevent the President from removing him from office Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act. The President did demand his resignation, which was refused. He then suspended him, appointing General Grant to act as Secretary ad interim. The Senate refused to consent to the suspension and Mr. Stanton once more took possession of the office. The President then issued an order removing him which Mr. Stanton refused to recognize. This attempted removal was the basis of the later impeachment proceedings against the President. When these proceedings failed Mr. Stanton resigned.

In September, 1869, when it was announced that Associate Justice Grier had resigned his seat on the Supreme Bench, President Grant at once sent to the Senate the name of Mr. Stanton as the successor of Justice Grier. The nomination was immediately confirmed without the usual reference to a committee. This was on December 20, but Mr. Stanton was then on his death bed. He died on the morning of Decem

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