Have reluctantly come to the conclusion to visit the navy
yards. It is a matter of duty, and the physicians and friends insist it will be
conducive to health and strength. If I could go quietly it would give me
pleasure, but I have a positive dislike to notoriety and parade, — not because
I dislike well-earned applause, not because I do not need encouragement, but
there is so much insincerity in their showy and ostentatious parades, where the
heartless and artful are often the most prominent.
The President cordially approves my purpose, which he thinks
and says will do me good and strengthen me for coming labors.
Chase has been to me, urging the dispatch of several vessels
to seize the armored ships which are approaching completion in Great Britain
and which may be captured off the English coast. The objections are: first, we
cannot spare the ships; second, to place a naval force in British waters for
the purpose indicated would be likely to embroil us with that power; third, the
Secretary of State assures me in confidence that the armored vessels building
in England will not be allowed to leave. This third objection, which, if
reliable, is in itself a sufficient reason for non-action on my part, I am not
permitted to communicate to the Secretary of the Treasury, who is a part of the
government and ought to know the fact. It may be right that the commercial
community, who are deeply interested and who, of course, blame me for not
taking more active and energetic measures, should be kept in ignorance of the
true state of the case, but why withhold the truth from the Secretary of the
Treasury? If he is not to be trusted, he is unfit for his place; but it is not
because he is not to be trusted. These little things injure the Administration,
and are in themselves wrong. I am, moreover, compelled to rely on the oral,
unwritten statement of the Secretary of State, who may be imposed upon and
deceived, who is often mistaken; and, should those vessels escape, the blame
for not taking preliminary steps to seize them will fall heavily on me. It
grieves Chase at this moment and lessens me in his estimation, because I am
doing nothing against these threatened marauders and can give him no sufficient
reasons why I am not.
The subject of a reunion is much discussed. Shall we receive
back the Rebel States? is asked of me daily. The question implies that the
States have seceded, — actually gone out from us, — that the Union is at
present dissolved, which I do not admit. People have rebelled, some voluntarily,
some by compulsion. Discrimination should be made in regard to them. Some
should be hung, some exiled, some fined, etc., and all who remain should do so
on conditions satisfactory and safe. I do not trouble myself about the
Emancipation Proclamation, which disturbs so many. If New York can establish
slavery or imprison for debt, so can Georgia. The States are and must be equal
in political rights. No one State can be restricted or denied privileges or
rights which the others possess, or have burdens or conditions imposed from
which its co-States are exempt. The Constitution must be amended, and our Union
and system of government changed, to reach what is demanded by extreme men in
this matter.
SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles,
Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 1: 1861 – March 30,
1864, p. 428-30
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