Camp, June 22, 1863.
Lee is in earnest in some direction, and, within a month, I
think we shall need all the troops we can raise, either to enable us to reap
the full benefit of a victory or to lessen the disaster of a defeat. I am going
to write to Governor Andrew that it is not enough for Massachusetts to be ahead
in volunteering, ahead in coloured troops, and ahead in so many things, she
must be ahead in conscribing, that is the example needed now, — conscription
for old regiments, no more officers, only men: and in conscription, why should
not Massachusetts set the example of no substitutes? She has already so many
men ahead against the next draft, that the conscription will not be very
severe, and why should not all go who are chosen?
SOURCE: Edward Waldo Emerson, Life and Letters of
Charles Russell Lowell, p. 263
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