A Man of the People Part 22

STEVENS

You have no chance! You have _already_ been weighed and found wanting! In the Congressional election, what happened?--your majorities were wiped out. Maine cut you down from nineteen thousand to four! The Democrats swept Ohio. Indiana deserted us. In Pennsylvania even, we lost by four thousand. New York elected Horatio Seymour against us. New Jersey turned you down. Wisconsin was a tie. In your own state of Illinois, the Democrats won by seventeen thousand----!

LINCOLN

Even so, Stevens--the ballots in _this_ election have not yet been counted! My faith in the ultimate good sense of the people is unshaken.

You can fool some of the people all the time. You can fool all of the people sometimes. But you can't fool all the people all the time!

STEVENS

That's why we ask you to get off the ticket! You are to-day the most unpopular man who ever sat in the Presidential chair. For the first time in our history the effigy of a living President--your effigy--has been publicly burned in the streets of American towns and cities, amid the curses and jeers of the men who elected you! Your administration is a failure--your conduct of the war a series of blunders----

LINCOLN

[_Brusquely._]

For example----

STEVENS

[_Furiously._]

For one thing--you have never yet chosen a successful General. The South has not changed Commanders since Jeff Davis appointed Robert E.

Lee. In thirty days of the last campaign in a series of ma.s.sacres, Lee has killed and wounded sixty-two thousand of our men--more than he himself commanded--and Grant has only reached the point where McClellan stood in 1862. He could have marched there by McClellan's old line without the loss of a man. Washington is piled with the wounded, the dying and the dead. Your mail is choked with letters demanding the removal of this butcher as our Commander, and you refuse--why?

LINCOLN

[_Smiling calmly._]

Well, now that you've _really_ let off steam, I think you'll feel better, Stevens----!

STEVENS

I demand, sir, an answer to my question--why have you not removed Grant?

LINCOLN

[_Quickly._]

Because I can't spare him! He is the one General we have developed who knows how to fight--his business is not to reach any particular spot where McClellan stood. McClellan was generally _standing_ somewhere--he was a great engineer--of the stationary type---- Grant is a fighter.

His business is to find and destroy Lee's army--and his sledge hammer blows are winning this war!

STEVENS

Winning--is he? And yet Lee sends a division under Jubal Early and reconquers the Valley of Virginia--invades Maryland and Pennsylvania, throws his sh.e.l.ls into Washington and burns the home of one of your Cabinet----

LINCOLN

And if old Jubal Early had been a little _earlier_, he would have burned Washington, too--but thank G.o.d, Grant got here in time--didn't he? What have you got to say to that?

STEVENS

That Lee's strategy has been superb, his moral victory complete! He holds Grant by the throat while he invades the North, and _sh.e.l.ls_ our Capitol--a feat that not one of your generals has yet done for Richmond in four years--and still you cling to Grant----!

LINCOLN

[_Angrily._]

Now, I'm going to talk plain English to you, Stevens. You're an Abolitionist, and you can't do Grant justice. Your crowd demanded his removal after the battle of Shiloh--and you made it so hot for me then, I had to appoint General Halleck his superior, to save him for the country. You can't forget that Grant is a Democrat, and therefore he may vote for McClellan against our party, in this election!

STEVENS

I've heard that he _is_ for McClellan.

LINCOLN

Exactly! And you can't forget that his wife is a Southern woman whose dowry was in Slaves, and therefore at this moment, Grant is constructively a slaveholder, whose slaves I have not freed----

STEVENS

I protest----

LINCOLN

It's no use--I know the process of your mind--I can see the wheels go round inside! You tell me that the star of Grant has set in a welter of blood before Lee's army. I do not believe it. I know that miles of hospital barracks are the witnesses of our agony. I know that every city, town and village is in mourning. From these stricken homes there has arisen a storm of protest against the new leader of the army. The word butcher is bandied from lip to lip. They tell me that Grant is merely a bulldog fighter--that he can win only as long as thousands are poured into his ranks to take the place of the dead--They tell me that he has no genius, no strategy, no skill. My reply to this is simple but unanswerable. We must fight to win. Grant is the ablest general we have developed. His losses are appalling--but the struggle is on now to the bitter end! Our resources are exhaustless. The South cannot replace _her_ fallen soldiers--and therefore _her_ losses are fatal! If we continue to fight, five millions cannot whip twenty millions--the end is certain--and we're now locked in the last death grapple before--VICTORY!

STEVENS

It's a waste of time to talk----!

LINCOLN

I've thought so from the first, but I've tried to be polite----

STEVENS

[_Trying to go._]

Good day, sir----!

LINCOLN

[_Cordially._]

Good day, Stevens----

[_Pauses._]