My Memories of Eighty Years Part 3

The incident is entirely forgotten, no one remembers who the hero was, what were his deeds, nor the spot where he rests."

Years afterwards, when the State was building a new capitol and I was one of the commissioners, in excavating the grounds a skeleton was found. It was undoubtedly the forgotten hero of Governor Seymour's story.

When my term was about expiring with the year 1865 I decided to leave public life and resume the practice of my profession.

I was at the crossroads of a political or a professional career.

So, while there was a general a.s.sent to my renomination, I emphatically stated the conclusion at which I had arrived.

The Republican convention nominated for my successor as secretary of state General Francis C. Barlow, a very brilliant soldier in the Civil War. The Democratic convention adopted a patriotic platform of advanced and progressive views, and nominated at the head of their ticket for secretary of state General Henry W. Sloc.u.m.

General Sloc.u.m had been a corps commander in General Sherman's army, and came out of the war among the first in reputation and achievement of the great commanders. It was a master stroke on the part of the Democratic leaders to place him at the head of their ticket. He was the greatest soldier of our State and very popular with the people. In addition to being a great commander, he had a charming personality, which fitted him for success in public life.

The Democrats also on the same ticket nominated for attorney-general John Van Buren. He was a son of President Van Buren and a man of genius. Although he was very erratic, his ability was so great that when serious he captured not only the attention but the judgment of people. He was an eloquent speaker and had a faculty of entrancing the crowd with his wit and of characterization of his opponent which was fatal. I have seen crowds, when he was elaborately explaining details necessary for the vindication of his position, or that of his party which did not interest them, to remain with close attention, hoping for what was certain to come, namely, one of those sallies of wit, which made a speech of Van Buren a memorable thing to have listened to.

Van Buren was noted for a reckless disregard of the confidences of private conversation. Once I was with him on the train for several hours, and in the intimacy which exists among political opponents who know and trust each other we exchanged views in regard to public measures and especially public men. I was very indiscreet in talking with him in my criticism of the leaders of my own party, and he equally frank and delightful in flaying alive the leaders of his party, especially Governor Seymour.

A few days afterwards he made a speech in which he detailed what I had said, causing me the greatest embarra.s.sment and trouble.

In retaliation I wrote a letter to the public, stating what he had said about Governor Seymour. The Democratic ticket was beaten by fifteen thousand in a very heavy vote, and Van Buren always charged it to the resentment of Governor Seymour and his friends.

In our country public life is a most uncertain career for a young man. Its duties and activities remove him from his profession or business and impose habits of work and thought which unfit him for ordinary pursuits, especially if he remains long in public service. With a change of administration or of party popularity, he may be at any time dropped and left hopelessly stranded.

On the other hand, if his party is in power he has in it a position of influence and popularity. He has a host of friends, with many people dependent upon him for their own places, and it is no easy thing for him to retire.

When I had decided not to remain any longer in public life and return home, the convention of my old district, which I had represented in the legislature, renominated me for the old position with such earnestness and affection that it was very difficult to refuse and to persuade them that it was absolutely necessary for me to resume actively my profession.

Our village of Peekskill, which has since grown into the largest village in the State, with many manufacturing and other interests, was then comparatively small. A large number of people gathered at the post-office every morning. On one occasion when I arrived I found them studying a large envelope addressed to me, which the postmaster had pa.s.sed around. It was a letter from William H. Seward, secretary of state, announcing that the president had appointed me United States minister to j.a.pan, and that the appointment had been sent to the Senate and confirmed by that body, and directing that I appear at the earliest possible moment at his office to receive instructions and go to my post. A few days afterwards I received a beautiful letter from Henry J. Raymond, then in Congress, urging my acceptance.

On arriving in Washington I went to see Mr. Seward, who said to me: "I have special reasons for securing your appointment from the president. He is rewarding friends of his by putting them in diplomatic positions for which they are wholly unfit. I regard the opening of j.a.pan to commerce and our relations to that new and promising country so important, that I asked the privilege to select one whom I thought fitted for the position. Your youth, familiarity with public life, and ability seem to me ideal for this position, and I have no doubt you will accept."

I stated to him how necessary it was that after long neglect in public life of my private affairs I should return to my profession, if I was to make a career, but Mr. Seward brushed that aside by reciting his own success, notwithstanding his long service in our State and in Washington. "However," he continued, "I feared that this might be your att.i.tude, so I have made an appointment for you to see Mr. Burlingame, who has been our minister to China, and is now here at the head of a mission from China to the different nations of the world."

Anson Burlingame's career had been most picturesque and had attracted the attention of not only the United States but of Europe. As a member of the House of Representatives he had accepted the challenge of a "fire-eater," who had sent it under the general view that no Northern man would fight. As minister to China he had so gained the confidence of the Chinese Government that he persuaded them to open diplomatic relations with the Western world, and at their request he had resigned his position from the United States and accepted the place of amba.s.sador to the great powers, and was at the head of a large delegation, composed of the most important, influential, and representative mandarins of the old empire.

When I sent up my card to his room at the hotel his answer was: "Come up immediately." He was shaving and had on the minimum of clothes permissible to receive a visitor. He was expecting me and started in at once with an eloquent description of the attractions and importance of the mission to j.a.pan. With the shaving brush in one hand and the razor in the other he delivered an oration.

In order to emphasize it and have time to think and enforce a new idea, he would apply the brush and the razor vigorously, then pause and resume. I cannot remember his exact words, but have a keen recollection of the general trend of his argument.

He said: "I am surprised that a young man like you, unmarried and with no social obligations, should hesitate for a moment to accept this most important and attractive position. If you think these people are barbarians, I can a.s.sure you that they had a civilization and a highly developed literature when our forefathers were painted savages. The western nations of Europe, in order to secure advantages in this newly opened country for commerce, have sent their ablest representatives. You will meet there with the diplomats of all the western nations, and your intimacy with them will be a university of the largest opportunity.

You will come in contact with the best minds of Europe. You can make a great reputation in the keen rivalry of this situation by securing the best of the trade of j.a.pan for your own country to its western coasts over the waters of the Pacific. You will be welcomed by the j.a.panese Government and the minister of foreign affairs will a.s.sign you a palace to live in, with a garden attached so perfectly appointed and kept as to have been the envy of Shenstone. You will be attended by hundreds of beautiful and accomplished j.a.panese maidens."

When I repeated to a large body of waiting office-seekers who had a.s.sembled in my room what Mr. Burlingame had said, they all became applicants for the place.

There is no more striking evidence of the wonderful advance in every way of the j.a.panese Empire and its people than the conditions existing at that time and now. Then it took six months to reach j.a.pan and a year for the round trip. Of course, there was no telegraphic or cable communication, and so it required a year for a message to be sent and answered. The j.a.panese army at that time was mostly clad in armor and its navy were junks.

In fifty years j.a.pan has become one of the most advanced nations of the world. It has adopted and a.s.similated all that is best of Western civilization, and acquired in half a century what required Europe one thousand years to achieve. Its army is unexcelled in equipment and discipline, and its navy and mercantile marine are advancing rapidly to a foremost place. It demonstrated its prowess in the war with Russia, and its diplomacy and power in the recent war.

j.a.pan has installed popular education, with common schools, academies, and universities, much on the American plan. It has adopted and installed every modern appliance developed by electricity--telegraph, cable, telephone, etc.

While I was greatly tempted to reverse my decision and go, my mother, who was in delicate health, felt that an absence so long and at such distance would be fatal, and so on her account I declined.

As I look back over the fifty years I can see plainly that four years, and probably eight, in that mission would have severed me entirely from all professional and business opportunities at home, and I might have of necessity become a place holder and a place seeker, with all its adventures and disappointments.

If I had seriously wanted an office and gone in pursuit of one, my pathway would have had the usual difficulties, but fickle fortune seemed determined to defeat my return to private life by tempting offers. The collectorship of the port of New York was vacant. It was a position of great political power because of its patronage. There being no civil service, the appointments were sufficiently numerous and important to largely control the party in the State of New York, and its political influence reached into other commonwealths. It was an office whose fees were enormous, and the emoluments far larger than those of any position in the country.

The party leaders had begun to doubt President Johnson, and they wanted in the collectorship a man in whom they had entire confidence, and so the governor and State officers, who were all Republicans, the Republican members of the legislature, the State committee, the two United States senators, and the Republican delegation of New York in the House of Representatives unanimously requested the president to appoint me.

President Johnson said to me: "No such recommendation and indors.e.m.e.nt has ever been presented to me before." However, the breach between him and the party was widening, and he could not come to a decision.

One day he suddenly sent for Senator Morgan, Henry J. Raymond, Thurlow Weed, and the secretary of the treasury for a consultation.

He said to them: "I have decided to appoint Mr. Depew." The appointment was made out by the secretary of the treasury, and the president instructed him to send it to the Senate the next morning.

There was great rejoicing among the Republicans, as this seemed to indicate a favorable turn in the president's mind. Days and weeks pa.s.sed, however, and when the veto of the Civil Rights Bill was overridden in the Senate and, with the help of the votes of the senators from New York, the breach between the president and his party became irreconcilable, the movement for his impeachment began, which ended in the most sensational and perilous trial in our political history.

On my way home to New York, after the vote of the New York senators had ended my hope for appointment, I had as a fellow traveller my friend, Professor Davies, from West Point. He was a brother of that eminent jurist, Henry E. Davies, a great lawyer and chief justice of our New York State Court of Appeals. Professor Davies said to me: "I think I must tell you why your nomination for collector was not sent to the Senate. I was in Washington to persuade the president, with whom I am quite intimate, to make another appointment. I was calling on Secretary Hugh McCulloch and his family in the evening of the day when the conference decided to appoint you. Secretary McCulloch said to me: 'The contest over the collectorship of the port of New York is settled, and Chauncey Depew's name will be sent to the Senate to-morrow morning.' I was at the White House," continued the professor, "the next morning before breakfast. The president received me at once because I said my mission was urgent and personal. I told him what the secretary of the treasury had told me and said: 'You are making a fatal mistake. You are going to break with your party and to have a party of your own. The collectorship of the port of New York is the key to your success. Depew is very capable and a partisan of his party. If you have any doubt, I beg of you to withhold the appointment until the question comes up in the Senate of sustaining or overriding of the veto of the Civil Rights Bill. The votes of the two New York senators will decide whether they are your friends or not.' The president thought that was reasonable, and you know the result."

There was at least one satisfaction in the professor's amazingly frank revelation: it removed all doubt why I had lost a great office and, for my age and circ.u.mstances, a large fortune.

President Andrew Johnson differed radically from any President of the United States whom it has been my good fortune to know.

This refers to all from and including Mr. Lincoln to Mr. Harding.

A great deal must be forgiven and a great deal taken by way of explanation when we consider his early environment and opportunities.

In the interviews I had with him he impressed me as a man of vigorous mentality, of obstinate wilfulness, and overwhelming confidence in his own judgment and the courage of his convictions.

His weakness was alcoholism. He made a fearful exhibition of himself at the time of his inauguration and during the presidency, and especially during his famous trip "around the circle" he was in a bad way.

He was of humble origin and, in fact, very poor. It is said of him that he could neither read nor write until his wife taught him.

He made a great career both as a member of the House of Representatives and a senator, and was of unquestionable influence in each branch.

With reckless disregard for his life, he kept east Tennessee in the Union during the Civil War.

General Grant told me a story of his own experience with him.

Johnson, he said, had always been treated with such contempt and ignored socially by the members of the old families and slave aristocracy of the South that his resentment against them was vindictive, and so after the surrender at Appomattox he was constantly proclaiming "Treason is odious and must be punished."

He also wanted and, in fact, insisted upon ignoring Grant's parole to the Confederate officers, in order that they might be tried for treason. On this question of maintaining his parole and his military honor General Grant was inflexible, and said he would appeal not only to Congress but to the country.

One day a delegation, consisting of the most eminent, politically, socially, and in family descent, of the Southern leaders, went to the White House. They said: "Mr. President, we have never recognized you, as you belong to an entirely different cla.s.s from ourselves, but it is the rule of all countries and in all ages that supreme power vested in the individual raises him, no matter what his origin, to supreme leadership. You are now President of the United States, and by virtue of your office our leader, and we recognize you as such." Then followed attention from these people whom he admired and envied, as well as hated, of hospitality and deference, of which they were past masters.

It captivated him and changed his whole att.i.tude towards them.

He sent for General Grant and said to him: "The war is over and there should be forgiveness and reconciliation. I propose to call upon all of the States recently in rebellion to send to Washington their United States senators and members of the House, the same as they did before the war. If the present Congress will not admit them, a Congress can be formed of these Southern senators and members of the House and of such Northern senators and representatives as will believe that I am right and acting under the Const.i.tution. As President of the United States, I will recognize that Congress and communicate with them as such.

As general of the army I want your support." General Grant replied: "That will create civil war, because the North will undoubtedly recognize the Congress as it now exists, and that Congress will a.s.sert itself in every way possible." "In that case," said the president, "I want the to support the const.i.tutional Congress which I am recognizing." General Grant said: "On the contrary, so far as my authority goes, the army will support the Congress as it is now and disperse the other." President Johnson then ordered General Grant to Mexico on a mission, and as he had no power to send a general of the army out of the United States, Grant refused to go.

Shortly afterwards Grant received a very confidential communication from General Sherman, stating that he had been ordered to Washington to take command of the army, and wanted to know what it meant.

General Grant explained the situation, whereupon General Sherman announced to the president that he would take exactly the same position as General Grant had. The president then dropped the whole subject.

III. ABRAHAM LINCOLN

The secretaryship of the State of New York is a very delightful office. Its varied duties are agreeable, and the inc.u.mbent is brought in close contact with the State administration, the legislature, and the people.

We had in the secretary of state's office at the time I held the office, about fifty-eight years ago, very interesting archives.

The office had been the repository of these doc.u.ments since the organization of the government. Many years afterwards they were removed to the State Library. Among these doc.u.ments were ten volumes of autograph letters from General Washington to Governor Clinton and others, covering the campaign on the Hudson in the effort by the enemy to capture West Point, the treason of Arnold and nearly the whole of the Revolutionary War. In the course of years before these papers were removed to the State Library, a large part of them disappeared. It was not the fault of the administration succeeding me, but it was because the legislature, in its effort to economize, refused to make appropriation for the proper care of these invaluable historic papers. Most of Washington's letters were written entirely in his own hand, and one wonders at the phenomenal industry which enabled him to do so much writing while continuously and laboriously engaged in active campaigning.

In view of the approaching presidential election, the legislature pa.s.sed a law, which was signed by the governor, providing machinery for the soldiers' vote. New York had at that time between three and four hundred thousand soldiers in the field, who were scattered in companies, regiments, brigades, and divisions all over the South.

This law made it the duty of the secretary of state to provide ballots, to see that they reached every unit of a company, to gather the votes and transmit them to the home of each soldier. The State government had no machinery by which this work could be done.