Owen Lovejoy and Abraham Lincoln During the Civil War

Some thirty years ago, Edward Magdol, in his excellent biography of Owen Lovejoy, stated that the relations between Abraham Lincoln and Owen Lovejoy certainly called into question the old idea of the great antagonism between the radical Republicans and the Great Emancipator. 'The two men influenced each other and developed mutual trust and respect over almost ten years of political collaboration,' he wrote. 'This friendship between the radical abolitionist and the former Whig seriously calls into question estimates of Lincoln's relations with the radical Republicans. Insult, vituperation, disrespect, and a host of other sins have been attributed to the radical Republicans in their dealing with the President, and the cliché of 'Lincoln versus the radicals' has persisted until recent years. Rather early in my research for this book ... I found reason to dispute the cliché.'1Ever since the appearance of Magdol's book, the question he raised in connection with Lovejoy and Lincoln—an issue that had already been debated some years before—has become one of the most disputed problems facing Lincoln scholars. For many years, T. Harry Williams' Lincoln and the Radicals, which sought to show an unbridgeable gap between the Great Emancipator and the ultras, whom he called Jacobins, was the standard interpretation, and other authors followed his paradigm.2 But in 1956, David Donald, in his Lincoln Reconsidered, questioned this approach, and since that time, any number of studies have done the same.3 In 1964, Grady McWhiney edited a discussion of the problem in Grant, Lee, Lincoln and the Radicals; in 1967, Harold M. Hyman published The RadicalRepublicans and Reconstruction, 1861-1870; in 1969, Herman Belz published Reconstructing the Union, and I published The Radical Republicans: Lincoln's Vanguard for Racial Justice; and in 1981, LaWanda Cox wrote the excellent Lincoln and Black Freedom. In addition, the appearance of any number of biographies of Civil War figures took the same approach, and although William Harris, in his book, With Charity for All: Abraham Lincoln and Reconstruction, has attempted partially to revive the old tale of antagonism, historical research during the intervening decades has more or less borne Magdol out.4The argument was further complicated by controversies concerning Lincoln's attitude toward slavery and blacks. While there have always been those who credit the wartime president with the emancipation of some four million slaves, ever since the l960s a number of authors have questioned the Emancipator's sincerity. In an article in the 1968 edition of Ebony magazine, Lerone Bennett not only accused Lincoln of racism but charged that he was merely opposed to slavery expansion, not to slavery itself.5 Obviously, if that was the case, there was indeed a great rift between Lincoln and the radicals. But the study of the relations between the Civil War president and the great Princeton abolitionist certainly shows the falsity of this point of view and corroborates Mr. Magdol's contention.The interaction between Lincoln and Lovejoy can easily be cited to prove that the relationship between President Lincoln and the radicals was not innately hostile. Many radicals, it is true, tended to criticize the President, some furiously so, but the Princeton fighter against human bondage never followed suit. Appreciating his fellow Illinoisan as he did, he always referred to him in respectful terms, defended him against attacks, and supported him in Congress. As Moses Odell, the New York War Democrat, said in his eulogy of the Princetonian, 'I am authorized to say that the Executive had in our departed associate at all times a warm supporter of every measure which had for its aim the restoration of the Government.'6 No wonder the editor of The Biographical Record of Bureau, Marshall and Putnam Counties, Illinois, was able to write, 'On the breaking out of the rebellion, Mr. Lovejoy became one of President Lincoln's strongest supporters, and the aid rendered the martyred president was gratefully acknowledged by him.'7 And Frank Carpenter, the painter of the famous illustration of the first reading of the Emancipation Proclamation, claimed that after Lovejoy's death Lincoln said, 'Lovejoy was the best friend I had in Congress.'8Nevertheless it is beyond question that the radicals, including Lovejoy, tended to be in advance of Lincoln in furthering emancipation. Ceaselessly agitating for antislavery measures, incessantly questioning the dedication to their war aims of conservative or Democratic generals, they often took issue with the White House, which was constrained by considerations of political necessity. After all, Lincoln was elected by only 39 percent of the electorate; the Democrats bitterly opposed any interference with the 'peculiar institution,' and the border states, naturally committed to the maintenance of their social system, had to be kept loyal. As Lincoln was supposed to have remarked, he hoped he had God on his side, but he must have Kentucky. Thus he held back any measures to interfere with slavery until he felt the time was ripe, at times going so far as to revoke his generals' emancipation orders, much to the radicals' displeasure.9The secret of Lincoln's actions was that he had an excellent sense of timing. Using the radicals to spur him on and yielding to the conservatives when necessary, he moved ahead gradually, but ahead nonetheless. And to do so, he needed the radicals' exhortations. That he welcomed these was not always clear at the time, but there is very little doubt that he was always, and had always been, a convinced opponent of the institution of slavery. If the radicals' main aim during the Civil War was the extirpation of the 'peculiar institution,' Lincoln, too, believed, as he wrote to Albert G. Hodges in 1864, that 'If slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong.'10 Thus the difference between him and the radicals was not as large as it appeared at first sight.Owen Lovejoy, of course, had impeccable antislavery credentials. Ever since the murder of his brother Elijah by an anti-abolitionist mob in Alton, when he had knelt beside Elijah's body and sworn never to forsake the cause that had been sprinkled with his brother's blood, he had been devoted to the cause of eradicating human bondage in America. Energetically working with the American Anti-Slavery Society, he was a most dedicated member of the Underground Railroad, even putting an advertisement for a 'Canada Line of Stages' for 'ladies and gentlemen of color of the South' into the Lowell and Chicago Western Citizen. He was equally active in the Liberty party, the Illinois legislature, and in congressional debates, and had long made use of every opportunity to fight against the institution that he believed disgraced the country. Thus he was one of the original organizers of the Republican party in Illinois, and if he was unable in the beginning to secure Lincoln's support for the new organization, it did not take too long until the two men found themselves working for the same political party.11In fact Lovejoy represents a peculiar link between the radicals and Lincoln, anxious to bridge the apparent gap between them by always maintaining his principles, but never attacking the President and showing remarkable understanding for the executive's problems.It is of course true that Lincoln was more moderate than Lovejoy, but his devotion to antislavery was unquestioned. 'Not even you are more anxious to prevent the extension of slavery than I ...', he wrote to the Princeton minister in l855.12 And though he felt constrained by the Constitution not to attempt to interfere with slavery in the states, he made no secret of his dislike for the 'peculiar institution.' As early as 1837, he was one of the only two members of the legislature of Illinois to protest against pro-slavery In he developed a for the of slavery in the of and as he said in his famous in 'This but as I must for the of I but I it of the of slavery He to human bondage in his and he of course his concerning the and that a against not and he was that it to be And he never his the was Lincoln accused of have on he made in in his with at and he stated that he was not in of by on he had little if he to the as LaWanda Cox has he never to the of his But as even some of his have Lincoln had the to And he had in the tended to be in the only did he a friendship with the famous abolitionist but by he a most at the most radicals had every reason to be with with the Republican and the to into any that the extension of he as he did that the very idea of was if after a of a the Lovejoy and to him at on the of his in to him to and to a Lincoln and said, the has at the of the to Lovejoy was not to be The no of peculiar of Lovejoy as a link between his and the President became He had long Lincoln's to his congressional in and to the of Lincoln's he at the White after the was with Lincoln to for The the and at the of the to said to his Illinois is as you I have to the President, great Western in far less than the you as I to say to you there is no I that I have a in the same and in it with more of and than I have been able to He is to in the than any other so many true whom to and be an to and our Lovejoy that he was Lovejoy, had always Mr. Lincoln so ever that in of and the of he in all this to our in whom it our to he to in Lincoln as he was in advance of the President on the issue of he said he for Lincoln with it the was all Republicans to his the of the Lincoln his of the two radicals' of his and made it clear that he them to in the He did not to them to the he any number of men for that but there was not and of the able to in the able to and able to his any and all of and to the As for Lovejoy, he felt that a but the same be said of the Illinois He needed and hoped to have many more he the two men for And although his became most of Lovejoy's peculiar in a bridge between the radicals and the as as Lincoln's to with the in his Lincoln his that he had no to interfere with slavery in the it and that he had no to do so, by the time on he said that after the of the rebellion, it be his to be by the Constitution and that he have no understanding of the of the to the of the than that in the The was have an opportunity to on In by the for the of who had been by the to that they of and to them The War and in the first for the emancipation of all by the for In the the radicals had for and in Lovejoy had opposed the of he a that it was no of the of the to and that the was to a to the And the first of these was it was on the Lincoln, by these and other radical was in a to the which he did on the the relations between most of the radicals and Lincoln In published an the of in the of an Lincoln, its on the border states, in of the of the of an emancipation many radicals. the wrote that they only one of and in a The radicals even more when in Lincoln the you that you the friend wrote to his that his Lovejoy, no devoted to said He was in in and even after his to Princeton was very in his respect for Lincoln did not did not that the great Princeton fighter for on his for emancipation. his to in he moved to revoke the of by the sought to the to a including the of all to and to it that an attempt to the that the war was only for the maintenance of the and that as as it to was And in a the of the the at on Lovejoy stated that was with the the war was was that the to be of the Obviously, God was the it was not and did not the But he stated that he was all this to the with no was true in but was Lincoln, not of these by Lovejoy and other radicals, had already called in the and to him that his a of emancipation. He in his the of and and on made his concerning the border states, when he the same course of to all of Lovejoy, its pro-slavery that the since emancipation than in support of a to and to any to this in a for the of slavery in the of he opposed to it Lincoln, of radical did not to agitating for his to it for the President to He defended him against in Congress. of in to the that Lincoln, if he the in a conservative had a for him in the of that to Lovejoy a he said to The of American slavery not the President with this He is an He human The he did not for I did for the of the and for his as I never for that of any other If the to the President in his in his and did he not for his and for emancipation in the border and so far as I by the ... too, have a for Abraham but it is in but not in the of human In that he with and and his If Abraham Lincoln the out to him in the of as I he he the I have Abraham Lincoln as I trust he the the as he has the opportunity of and his not only be in the but it be the of that which the and of is to be in with of other radicals so of the whom many too radicals in and Lovejoy in did not on already In at a great in New Union, the Princeton fighter a the Emancipation After an by William Lovejoy Lincoln credit for his to The by of by a large of the which the President to in the emancipation to the border in our which is the to Some that the is in this But the Executive his He that the of the must first the you ever the of The first the at one to a and it into the so it and with a it to its the Executive has the and it into the of and the of must the it is to the and the in But in very or or the have to be a little at or the out of is not to so as to have a for that the in the long The President is a a in the of a and by a he a very If the President not as as you if he is of it is some to that the in of more than a million of and who is the of of take no of the for the time almost that is in his is to that the of the and the of the though the to some be the President a and support has a President, not even been with so many and as The wonder is not that he but that he so I no more doubt his Anti-Slavery his Anti-Slavery than I doubt my many of his Lovejoy the problems and never in the same time, the Princeton abolitionist to the to slavery in the an in which he was did not in it is true, he David the in the of the a measure Lovejoy had defended in by a wartime to as and to American Many radicals the President for but as Lovejoy, in of his of did on the President made to the border to the of emancipation. he said to Lovejoy and Illinois I the border my Lovejoy, and all of not have in The of Lovejoy, be with to the of And the the of was a number of radicals, the of of the an to the of the the same time, in with Lovejoy's they their support for the 'The they to the trust committed to him by and in to his take that the be called them to the that the great of the their and in the as in the to their and their on by this Lincoln the which not only for the of the of but their and authorized the of into the he on in the and published the he have had they not been many radicals but Lovejoy to on Lincoln the Emancipation he had to this although on William he held it back until the had some the between when Lincoln first the and when he the interaction between the President and the radicals The radicals, Lovejoy, did not In a in at the of the Lovejoy made a for but more his support for the that all on the old of he that if the did not to the of there was no reason they to the but on the they even After all, the was the course of the with all its in Chicago on he made is not for any one of to say that during the in which are at that he the of more than the one who is at the he remarked, 'I have great in the and of Abraham I have in the of his he is merely in some of his to of some of the more conservative members of the Lovejoy's for emancipation did not but he to on with the in his by the radicals to advance and by the conservatives to as he the former to spur him on the to him in until he the time was to radical to him the border him to do the and the editor of the New York published his of the Lincoln's to this has often been cited to prove that his attitude toward the was a conservative the difference between him and the radicals. But a reading of his the and his with radical As he said, I the I it the the The the can be the the be as it If there be those who not the they at the same time I do not with If there be those who not the they at the same time I do not with in this is to the Union, and it is not to or If I the any I do and if I do it by all the slaves, I do and if I do it by some and do I do and the I do I it to this I I I do not it to the I do less I I am the and I do more I more the I to when to be and I new so as they to be true the at this the President indeed to have been in with the But Lincoln had not he wrote a which shows that the was the case, and that he many of the radicals' 'I have stated my to my view of he I no of my that all be But the time for had not the of Lincoln with the for which he had been After the President the Emancipation Proclamation, that all in in by be and the as a war measure by of his as of the and and by the border and already he to many And an radical the the of the it Lovejoy did not criticize the He that his was even if only the of Lincoln with great the of he not even his friend Lovejoy, though the his had been a fight for The President did not and the conservatives made the same time, Lincoln was to the on and in he not only his to the of the but even sought to it into And in his in of conservative he emancipation with by the of radical he a that he than take back the radicals, including Lovejoy, did not the to In on Lovejoy opposed the of a to with for of But as he defended the in of for no of 'The antislavery of the President has on those which in the of an he 'The President the pro-slavery with his and out the already the of Lincoln's of the on he be and it on the that he had never it do any Lovejoy always cited it as an of the made by the is that Lovejoy, a radical of radicals, was able to much and relations with Lincoln than his be in his to the ever more question of While radicals as and believed that the or had committed Lovejoy did not with He was much to the view of the of Lincoln, held that the in the As he said to in early in he had no to the states, only the in The to the in his point he 'The is not for the of my very able and friend But he with in agitating for the use of in the with He was with the the long between the of the and the of the Lovejoy was The President, him a but Lovejoy's political had to be He did in at the in but said only a his had him to In a to he Lincoln and though not in a to a in for support of the President, whom he to And when the party in the he wrote to Lincoln, 'I was with the and that he the Emancipation at the Chicago or Lovejoy did not much the aims to those of the radicals became in when he was by the problems to him by the between and radicals in The radicals, who tended to view him as an to their to him to he As he said to 'I after all, these radicals the and I do not to are to than the other side, in and though bitterly are in the to after all, their are Some he these radical men have in them the which must the and on which must are by the of If one must be and the other there be no doubt which as of for the have to with the Lovejoy made this for the Lovejoy was to the in although the new to be his He to his on Reconstruction, his that there no As he 'I that there are have of and the for the time ... and as as of them into them the of I to the of of and to in their men to as our the old was the very point of view of the which the war an and never that any out of the Lovejoy had his with And he defended the New York in to for the Lovejoy Mr. he said, 'I must my protest against this and of the I not any to a that this was in the of the Constitution or and that they are of never was an since the of the so and so to the of the Constitution and of the on the Democratic gentlemen have in a if the and the Constitution had been against them as they have been in the view of his relations with Lincoln, it is not that Lovejoy was most some radicals' to as their for the He called any attempt to the party to the and when Frank him that many of the antislavery men the President, he 'I you ... Mr. Lincoln is at as an as any of but he is to his He has a in this which many men do not to be able to I say to you that I his course to be but when it it is never him a that Lincoln be and for a he by that he was not only to take the President for the same Lovejoy's time was After a to to one of his he to only to was that and he was by the between Lincoln and As he I have not it was so much Mr. Lincoln as I to 'I am very said Lovejoy, is the And this the there was between these Lovejoy had much more of the the in his but the of their the same and it was in of and illustration is not that they have been Lovejoy's he to a and in in New in in by and he a the President, who had to an to at the dedication of a to the his to Lincoln of you have Mr. Lovejoy than I and are able than I to do his with him only ten years ago, since when it has been and every in it has been one of respect and with his in no less than on my my and to the of his it any other to he was my most was a of the great the relationship between Lincoln and Lovejoy, though not for the radicals, was not only a but that the difference between the radicals and the President was not radical was by Lincoln to toward emancipation. The radicals indeed the for

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