Diary of George Templeton Strong: January 9, 1860

To Columbia College meeting, Lafayette Place, at two in the afternoon. . . . I moved that Lieber’s opening lecture of his present Law School course be printed, which was carried.

Thereafter to Tenth Street Studio Building to call on Leutze; I spent an hour with him pleasantly. I saw his "Battle of Princeton” picture, and another, a Venetian scene—masqueraders in a gondola, the Bridge of Sighs overhead, the corpse of a state criminal just brought out into another boat, upon which the riotous festive party comes suddenly and unawares. This latter picture is unfinished, but will be among the best things Leutze has done.

SOURCE: Allan Nevins and Milton Halset Thomas, Editors, Diary of George Templeton Strong, Vol. 3, p. 3

Senator Charles Sumner to Francis Lieber, July 8, 1851

The Curtises

In the United States there is a struggle substantially coincident with yours, which is now going on. With us the slave-power is the tyranny, and it unhappily rallies to its support at the North, under the specious name of “law and order,” many worthy but timid men. But I do not doubt that this paramount influence, so injurious to the character of our government, will be ultimately overthrown, and before long. I wish I could hear that Germany was united, as she promised to be, on the assembly of the Congress at Frankfort. That was a scene worthy of our age, and full of auguries of the future.

SOURCE: Edward L. Pierce, Memoir and Letters of Charles Sumner, Vol. 3, p. 253

Diary of Gideon Welles: Saturday, December 30, 1865

The closing-up of the year, an eventful one. A review of it from my standpoint would be interesting in many respects, and, should God grant me length of days and mental and physical strength, I shall be glad to present my views when my official days have terminated. Senator Dixon called this morning, and we had a long and frank talk. I approved of his course in the Senate, and his reply to Sumner. He is evidently prepared for a breach in the party, and I think desires it. While I do not desire it, I do not deprecate it if the counsels of Sumner, Stevens, and the extreme Radicals are insisted upon and the only alternative. His principal inquiry was as to the course our friends in Connecticut would pursue in case of a breach of the party. I told him I thought they would be disposed to stand by the Administration, yet at the first go-off the Radical element might have the ascendancy in the State convention, which would assemble in about a month. But before that time the lines would probably be drawn. The organization or party machinery will control most of the party, irrespective of the merits of the questions in issue.

I gave Colston, Semmes's son-in-law, a pass to visit him to-day, and take the papers and the report of Winslow to him. Had a conversation with Dr. Lieber, who was at my house yesterday, respecting Semmes's offenses. The Doctor has no question on that point, and thinks Lee and the whole of his army liable for treason, notwithstanding Grant's terms. Advised Solicitor Bolles to call on Dr. L. Bolles thinks the trial of Semmes should be by a military or naval commission instead of by court martial.

The President sends a singular paper for a new trial of Captain Meade, who has already been tried and is under sentence of court martial. I know not how he can be again tried for the same offense, unless he himself petitions for it.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 2: April 1, 1864 — December 31, 1866, p. 407

Diary of Gideon Welles: Tuesday, July 18, 1865

The President to-day in Cabinet, after current business was disposed of, brought forward the subject of Jefferson Davis' trial, on which he desired the views of the members. Mr. Seward thought there should be no haste. The large amount of papers of the Rebel government had not yet been examined, and much that would have a bearing on this question might be expected to be found among them. Whenever Davis should be brought to trial, he was clear and decided that it should be before a military commission, for he had no confidence in proceeding before a civil court. He was very full of talk, and very positive that there should be delay until the Rebel papers were examined, and quite emphatic and decided that a military court should try Davis. Stanton did not dissent from this, and yet was not as explicit as Seward. He said he intended to give the examination of the Rebel papers to Dr. Lieber,¹ and with the force he could give him believed the examination could be completed in two weeks' time. Subsequently it was said Dr. L. had gone home and would return next week.

McCulloch was not prepared to express an opinion but thought no harm would result from delay.

I doubted the resort to a military commission and thought there should be an early trial. Whether, were he to be tried in Virginia, as it was said he might be, the country was sufficiently composed and organized might be a question, but I was for a trial before a civil, not a military, tribunal, and for treason, not for the assassination. Both Seward and Stanton interrupted me and went into a discussion of the assassination, and the impossibility of a conviction, Seward taking the lead. It was evident these two intended there should be no result at this time and the talk became discursive. Twice the President brought all back to the question, and did not conceal his anxiety that we should come to some determination. But we got none.

While in Cabinet a dispatch from Admiral Radford was sent me, stating that the Treasury agent, Loomis, at Richmond, claimed the ship timber in the Navy Yard at that place. I handed the dispatch to McCulloch and asked what it meant. He professed not to know and I told him I would bring the matter up as soon as the subject under discussion was disposed of. He directly after came to me and said he must go, and should be satisfied with whatever conclusion we came to. Before he got away, the matter in hand was postponed, and I then called his attention to the dispatch. He said there was no necessity for discussing the matter, he was disposed to yield to whatever I claimed, which I told him was all ship timber and all naval property.

I was satisfied that there was money in this proceeding. Governor Pierpont wrote me a week or two since that the railroad companies wanted this timber for railroad purposes, but I declined letting them have it. Hence these other proceedings, wholly regardless of the public interest.

Later in the day I went to the Treasury Department and was assured that a telegram should be sent to the Treasury agent, to give up this timber to the Navy.

Seward explained farther about the French-Mexican matter. He is evidently much annoyed by Blair's speech. Says Bigelow never made the remarks imputed to him, and those which he did make were unauthorized and denounced.

_______________

¹ Francis Lieber.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 2: April 1, 1864 — December 31, 1866, p. 335-6

Senator James H. Hammond to Francis Lieber, April 19, 1860

WASHINGTON, April 19, 1860

. . . I don't remember what I said in my postscript, which seems to have affected you so much, but in all your comments I entirely concur. The Lovejoy explosion, and all its sequences which were so threatening last week, has been for the present providentially cast in the shade by the intensified and utterly absorbing interest in the Charleston Convention. That phase has blown over for the moment. But I assure you, and you may philosophize upon it, that unless the slavery question can be wholly eliminated from politics, this government is not worth two years', perhaps not two months', purchase. So far as I know, and as I believe, every man in both houses is armed with a revolver — some with two — and a bowie-knife. It is, I fear, in the power of any Red or Black Republican to precipitate at any moment a collision in which the slaughter would be such as to shock the world and dissolve this government. I have done, ever since I have been here, all I could to avert such a catastrophe. But, I tell you, knowing all about it here, that unless the aggression on the slaveholder is arrested, no power, short of God's, can prevent a bloody fight here, and a disruption of the Union. You know what I have said about all this, and that I do not advocate such a finale. But seeing the oldest and most conservative senators on our side, — we have no intercourse that is not official, as it were, with the other, — seeing them get revolvers, I most reluctantly got one myself, loaded it, and put it in my drawer in the senate. I can't carry it. Twice in my life I have carried pistols until I became a coward, or very nearly, and threw them aside. But I keep a pistol now in my drawer in the senate as a matter of duty to my section. I concur with you about the Brooks type, that vengeance belongs to the Almighty, and all that. I will do, as I have done, all I can in that line; and while regarding this Union as cramping the South, I will nevertheless sustain it as long as I can. Yet I will stand by to the end. I firmly believe that the slaveholding South is now the controlling power of the world — that no other power would face us in hostility. This will be demonstrated if we come to the ultimate. I have no wish to bring it about, yet am perfectly ready if others do. There might be with us commotion for a time, but cotton, rice, tobacco, and naval stores command the world; and we have sense enough to know it, and are sufficiently Teutonic to carry it out successfully. The North, without us, would be a motherless calf, bleating about, and die of mange and starvation.

But I am going off. Your speech satisfies me about Doctor Hayes's expedition, and I will give it my help.

SOURCE: Thomas Sergeant Perry, Editor, The Life and Letters of Francis Lieber, p. 310-1

Samuel Gridley Howe to Charles Sumner, probably 1850

Green Peace, Thursday Evening [probably 1850].

My Dear Sumner: — I have called twice without finding you.

Why do you not put upon me part of the duty of lionizing strangers? I can show them our own and other Institutions without going very much out of my beat. If I can serve them and you it will be a pleasure indeed. I now look upon your time and thought as far more valuable than my own, and if I can spare you for higher labours I shall be content.

As for myself, alas, the silver cord is loosed. I have lately, encouraged by apparently returning vigour and urged by letters from Lieber and Henry, applied my mind to the preparation of a paper for the Smithsonian on Laura; but a few hours' brain work prostrates me. Slight as have seemed my ailments, they have been deep-seated and severe; more so than you can conceive, unless you are physiologist enough to know how much is required to exhaust the fountain of a nervous energy so abundant as mine was and which has never been abused. But n'importe; let the wreck of me not rot uselessly, but let the bits be of some use to my friends, and to you the most beloved of them.

I send you Felton's letter.¹ I have read it not only with brimming but with overflowing eyes; it has made me sad and heart-sick. What a lesson! How completely are most minds moulded by external pressure, and how untoward is that pressure in our old friend's case. He is not one of those who are a law unto themselves; he is not even richly gifted in capacity for the highest and best moral attainments; but think of what he was with old surroundings and what he is now! When he wrote that letter you did not deserve his praise and admiration so much as you do now; I say this deliberately. You then merited and had the homage of the heart and the affections, for your own overflowed to your friends; but now you have a claim for the approval and admiration of the intellect. I sometimes fear that the fountains of affection are growing less abundant; but never mind; you will soon open a new spring, and the living waters of love will gush forth at the call of wife and children, as they never have at the call of friends.

But I do not know what I am writing about, except to say I want much to see you: — yet when I see you I have nothing to say worth your hearing. But then I have nothing to say to my children worth hearing, though I love to be with them even when they sleep. . . .

Ever yours,

s. G. h.

_______________

¹ See ante, page 265. This was evidently a letter written before the quarrel between Felton and Sumner,

SOURCE: Laura E. Richards, Editor, Letters and Journals of Samuel Gridley Howe, Volume 2, p. 328-9

Charles Sumner to Francis Lieber, May 2, 1865

I read to President Johnson Colonel Baker’s letter,¹ with your introduction. He said at once that he accepted every word of it; that colored persons are to have the right of suffrage; that no State can be precipitated into the Union; that rebel States must go through a term of probation. All this he had said to me before. Ten days ago the chief-justice and myself visited him in the evening to speak of these things. I was charmed by his sympathy, which was entirely different from his predecessor's. The chief-justice is authorized to say wherever he is what the President desires, and to do everything he can to promote organization without distinction of color. The President desires that the movement should appear to proceed from the people. This is in conformity with his general ideas; but he thinks it will disarm party at home. I told him that while I doubted if the work could be effectively done without federal authority, I regarded the modus operandi as an inferior question; and that I should be content, provided equality before the law was secured for all without distinction of color. I said during this winter that the rebel States could not come back, except on the footing of the Declaration of Independence and the complete recognition of human rights. I feel more than ever confident that all this will be fulfilled. And then what a regenerated land! I had looked for a. bitter contest on this question; but with the President on our side, it will be carried by simple avoirdupois.”

_______________

¹ Of North Carolina, late a Confederate officer.

SOURCE: Edward Lillie Pierce, Memoir and Letters of Charles Sumner, Volume 4, p. 243

Francis Lieber to Major-General Henry W. Halleck, September 10, 1865

New York, September 10,1865.

. . . The Secretary of War is going to ask Congress for an appropriation for a lecturer on the Law and Usages of War on Land, at West Point, and to give me the place if he gets the appropriation. You recollect the thing is an old plan of mine. My idea is that only ten or twelve lectures should be given, toward the end of the whole West Point course. There has been very little written on the subject, nor is there any book exactly fitted as a text-book. Your book comes nearest, but it is far more for the lawyer than for the nascent officer.  . . . I consider the arming of negroes in our recent war one of the most important features, not only in a military point of view, but also, and chiefly, with reference to our law, polity, and national status. It interests me therefore deeply to know who first conceived this bold idea; — Stanton, Thomas, you? I recollect that a good while before the appointment of the Old Hundred Commission I said to Mr. Stanton that something ought to be done to organize the negroes who came to us from the enemy, and whom General McClellan was so desirous to return with his compliments. The Secretary seized upon the idea, as one who had occupied himself with the subject or who felt the inconvenience of the then existing state of things, and asked me to give him my views on the subject, and if anything could be learned from the English management of the navies [sic]. My idea then was to organize armed working companies of the negroes, their armament and drilling to be for the purpose of defence, and also for the duty of guarding stores, &e. You may remember the paper; at least I feel pretty sure that I sent you a copy. Not long after, however, I found that the Government had conceived, for that time, the very bold plan of simply arming and organizing the colored people. Now who had the first idea? There can be no breach of confidence in telling now to whom the honor is due. The measure ought to be tabled, with the proper name, in the great archives of history. Using the word archives reminds me of my bureau. The name has lately been changed into Archive Office of the War Department. Having recently received some boxes with the papers of disbanded army corps, it appears that this office is to be that of General American War Archives — a very good idea. I have been here for a few days, and return to Washington to-morrow. As yet I have found very little of any special importance. Beauregard is the veriest coxcomb, corresponding with scores of misses, and receiving information about the noblesse in his veins; Sanders, the lowest party hack; Jefferson Davis, quiet. Once he says of Butler, “justly called the beast.” Though unimportant, I must beg you to treat this as a confidential communication, as my order is to be silent; to you, of course, I can speak. We met with a great deal of Richmond street-dirt in the boxes, proving that your order had been executed with the besom, — and such disorder! . . .

SOURCE: Thomas Sergeant Perry, Editor, The Life and Letters of Francis Lieber, p. 359-60

Francis Lieber to Senator Charles Sumner, August 4, 1865

New York, August 4, 1865.

I should have been in favor of strict justice, that is, death, for the worst, — not from revenge, but distinctly to stamp treason as treason, which has never yet been done in the United States, while in our country it is treason indeed. In fact, treason here is like those infamous conspiracies in the Middle Ages, of some bloodthirsty nobles — on a vast scale. But all this is out of the question. As to exile, we must not forget that we can only get at it by way of conditional pardon, not by a law; whence arises immediately the difficulty, what will you do with the traitors who do not apply for pardon, or who decline accepting it? In European countries, at least I believe in all European countries, a pardon is an official act – which the culprit cannot decline if he desires it. It is there as authoritative an act as the verdict of guilty. It has been decided differently in the United States, because, it is said, it implies an acknowledgment of guilt. Of course the matter would be still very difficult in case of death, for suppose a man sentenced to be hanged would not accept of pardon, he could not be executed. Be this as it may, in the present case of traitors, pardon cannot be forced upon a man. Now what is to be done with men of the worst kind who do not apply for pardon, like Hunter, and who decline your pardon on condition of exile? This is the only difficulty I see, and a very great one it seems to me. What if Mason and Slidell should quietly return and defy the Government? I really wish some six patriotic, calm, deep, and far-seeing men — some thorough lawyers, some statesmen, and judicious, plain citizens — could hold a consultation.

SOURCE: Thomas Sergeant Perry, Editor, The Life and Letters of Francis Lieber, p. 358

Francis Lieber to Senator Charles Sumner, April 11, 1865

New York, April 11, 1865.

. . . I hope the President will walk very, very warily in coming to his new proclamation. I do not blame Lee's being received on parole; but I hope things are looked at in a very clear light, and that it is plainly seen by every one that, virtually, you put a rebel beyond trial for treason when you receive him according to the laws of war, as prisoner of war, and parole him, — most surely so with us. People here agree with me on this point; but, say they (e. g. Bancroft), he is not restored to his citizenship. I cannot see what can withhold from Lee his citizenship, so soon as the war is declared at an end, and, the parole being at an end, he must be given his freedom. All that the President may do as commander-in-chief in war, dissolves when the war ends, except, of course, those things regarding which postliminium exists not.

SOURCE: Thomas Sergeant Perry, Editor, The Life and Letters of Francis Lieber, p. 357

Francis Lieber to Senator Charles Sumner, April 4, 1865

New York, April 4,1865.

How do you feel now? was the constant question yesterday in the street, in the clubs, in the dwellings of the people, and I cannot help asking you the same question, even though the answer be known to me. I am sure the breaking up of the conspiracy, and settling some sort of order, — in short, the military action, will occupy us fully a year yet. In the mean time the question of admission comes nearer and nearer. Had we adopted the Amendment there would have been little difficulty, I take it. By a State-rebellion the States went out; by State-revolution, against the temporary de facto government, they might come back. But shall Virginia be readmitted “in thirty days,” as is intimated in the papers? A fine thing it would be! Vestigia nulla retrorsum was John Hampden's motto; let it be ours. Not a step backward. No slavery, no plenary pardon to all. It would be the ruin of the country. I very much wish I knew how the President thinks and feels on this subject; Mr. Seward, I suppose, is altogether for eau sucrée.

SOURCE: Thomas Sergeant Perry, Editor, The Life and Letters of Francis Lieber, p. 356-7

Francis Lieber to Senator Charles Sumner, March 29, 1865

New York, March 29, 1865.

. . . How often have I said, “Let us beat the enemy and the logic will soon enough follow.” Such letters as Orleans’s and Cobden’s you should read to the President, and pound it into him that we want no peace. We want the restoration of the country minus slavery.  . . . Cobden touches on a very sore point, the necessary statesmanship of the Republican party when the military acting begins to cease. Now the Republican party has fervor, impulse, national convictions, and self-sacrifice; but we are sadly deficient in statesmanship, both with reference to financial and international matters.  . . . You will have to walk very bolt and straight before those English who seem to be so intensely anxious about your friendship to England, mais “soyez forts, et nous vous protégerons.”

SOURCE: Thomas Sergeant Perry, Editor, The Life and Letters of Francis Lieber, p. 356

Francis Lieber to Senator Charles Sumner, January 22, 1865

New York, January 22, 1865.

. . . I am unqualifiedly against the retaliation resolutions concerning prisoners of war. The provision that the Southerners in our hands shall be watched over by national soldiers who have been in Southern pens, is unworthy of a great people or high-minded statesmen. I abhor this revenge on prisoners of war, because we should sink thereby to the level of the enemy's dishonor. And what is more, I defy Congress or Government to make the Northern people treat captured Southerners as our sons are treated by them. God be thanked! You could not do it; and if you could, how it would brutalize our own people! I feel the cruelty as keenly as any one. I grieve most bitterly that men whom we and all the world have taken to possess the common attributes of humanity, and who are our kin, have sunk so low; I feel the hardship of seeing no immediate and direct remedy except in conquering and extinguishing the Rebellion; but I maintain that the proposed retaliation is not the remedy. Revenge is passion, and ought never to enter the sphere of public action. Passion always detracts from power. Calmly to maintain our ground would do us in the end far more good. I am indeed against all dainty treatment of the prisoners in our hands; but for the love of our country and the great destiny of our people, do not sink even in single cases to the level of our unhappy enemy. The only remedy for this bitter evil, as for all others that beset us now, is — let us send men and men to our Shermans and Thomases, that they may strike and strike again. Let us place ourselves right before our own times and before posterity. . . .

SOURCE: Thomas Sergeant Perry, Editor, The Life and Letters of Francis Lieber, p. 355-6

Francis Lieber to Senator Charles Sumner, December 29, 1864

New York, December 29, 1864.

I must write to you, my friend, even from my sick-bed. Some time ago you wrote to me what topics were before you in the Committee of Foreign Affairs, on all of which you invited my say. . . . I merely single out the Reciprocity Treaty. I have not studied the details of the objections. You know I am a free-trader, which means nothing more than a non-obstructionist, one that considers it rebellion in the puny creature to dare interfering with his Maker's material elementary law of civilization — that of exchange. But apart from this, I see the very worst consequences which would naturally result from establishing the harsh, and I think semi-barbarous, line of prohibition between us and Canada; the harsher, the less feasible the thing will be. All will suffer from it, except the smuggler — the armed smuggler en gros, such as he was known under Napoleon. . . .

SOURCE: Thomas Sergeant Perry, Editor, The Life and Letters of Francis Lieber, p. 354-5

Francis Lieber to Senator Charles Sumner, December 24, 1864

December 24, 1864.

My Dear Sumner, — You will feel the loss of Earl Carlisle much. I sympathize with you. I do not know whether your intimacy continued to his end, but he was, I understand, on our side. Cornewall Lewis went before him, so we lose the few friends we have in England fast. Serrez les rangs. What we have to do is to fight through, and leave the rest to Him to whom all history belongs. We are all on a battle-field. Blessed are those who fight and fall in a righteous cause, but all must fight and fall in this life, which is life only as far as it is struggle within and without.

The attempted interference with the foreign policy, by the house, and the proposition of retaliation by the member from Maine, are illustrations of the pitiful Athenian government by the agora. When such attempts are made even by the representative government, what must be the state of things where the multitude (not the populus) rule, or rather, can rush into action at any moment. I am the sworn enemy of all absolutism, and I trust my friends will remember of me this one thing, that I am the one who first spoke of “democratic absolutism.” Until I used that term, absolutism meant monarchical, unchecked power. It came into use under Ferdinand VII of Spain. I spoke of democratic absolutism in presence of Judge Story, or to him, when you were yet a Cambridge student. It struck him, and he first hesitated to allow the term, but soon approved it. . . .

SOURCE: Thomas Sergeant Perry, Editor, The Life and Letters of Francis Lieber, p. 354

Francis Lieber to Judge Thayer

Is it not possible to formulate the idea that government interference in elections is a nefarious thing into a law? We shall suffer here greatly from the contributions which every custom-house, navy-yard and post-office man is assessed to pay. I spoke of the illogical character of the thing in my “Political Ethics;” also in my “Civil Liberty” — a passage which Governor Seymour quoted in one of his messages.  . . . I know it is very difficult to prevent it — as difficult as to forestall false naturalization papers; but can nothing be done? And is there not always something gained when a society puts its legislative frown on an offence? The case of an executive using the power given by the people, and the money taken from them, against a free and correct expression of their opinion, is a monstrosity, and, in a polity in which everything depends on election, an act of high treason against the sovereign. So it seems to me.  . . . Why not make every officer of the government, when he assumes the office, take an oath that he will not allow himself to be assessed, or otherwise deprived of portions of his salary or other money he possesses, directly or indirectly, by his superiors, for election purposes? Elaborate such a law. . . .

SOURCE: Thomas Sergeant Perry, Editor, The Life and Letters of Francis Lieber, p. 353

Francis Lieber to Senator Charles Sumner, December 11, 1864

New York, December 11,1864.

. . . War to the knife to slavery. Let us have no “slavery is dead.” It is not dead. Nothing is dead until it is killed. I trust our President feels this in his inmost soul. His message seems to pin him down to it. Now let the nation pin itself down by the Amendment. This Amendment is the clear idea, the distinct formulation, motto and principle, of all the inarticulated roar of our battles — the test, the battle-cry, the article of faith. The sooner it is pronounced, so that no receding is possible, the better for all concerned. . . .

Slavery dead? Why, did you see how the secretary of the Citizens' Association but yesterday spoke of Abolitionists? A man who now declares himself for the Union but not against slavery seems to me much like one who might have begged St. Chrysostom to baptize him fully and wholly unto Christ, but to allow him not to give up his Jove and Venus, and the rest. We fight for our country, that is, for its integrity, and slavery cuts it asunder far more clearly and injuriously than any geographic division could do. Such a division can be removed by a treaty, by force of arms, by the brush of the map-maker; but slavery is an institution, and has all the tenacity of institutions, whether they be for weal or woe, until they are destroyed, and the life is bruised out of their head.

If you see the President, and have an unofficial conversation with him, tell him how much those citizens who have no office or place, but simply love their country with all their heart, and have given their sons for that country, have thanked God for the passages in his message which relate to slavery. . . .

SOURCE: Thomas Sergeant Perry, Editor, The Life and Letters of Francis Lieber, p. 352-3

Francis Lieber to Major-General Henry W. Halleck, October 15, 1864

New YorK, October 15, 1864.

. . . I dare say you have already attended to the subject I am going to write about; still I feel prompted to say what follows. From the “New York Times” of this day I observe that much noise is made about the Rebels using our men, captured by them, for working in the fortifications, and that General Butler seems to fall into the error of considering it a grievous offence on the part of the enemy. We ought always to take care not to make ourselves ridiculous. Not to speak of 76 of General Orders No. 100, the employment of prisoners of war is universal: employment for domestic ends (such as when Russia distributed Frenchmen to the farmers, or Napoleon set Prussians to dig one of the chief canals of France) ; or for military purposes, such as working in army factories; or, lastly, for actual army purposes, such as working at fortifications, building roads, bridges near armies, &e. General Meigs asked my opinion on this very subject some months ago, and I wrote him a somewhat elaborate letter, which, were it necessary, might be referred to. That we have abstained from doing so until now, and have fed all along some fifty thousand idle prisoners, is another question. I believe it was done because we have a barbarous and reckless enemy, who threatened to use our men in pestiferous swamps if we should utilize the prisoners in our hands. That we tell them, “If you use our men, we shall use yours,” is all right; but let us not talk of unheard cruelty if they simply set the prisoners to work. We expose ourselves, especially when we do this in the face of our own general order and our own acknowledgment of the law of war. I, for one, am in favor of setting Rebel prisoners to work, — especially now, when the Rebels have used United States prisoners for fortifying Richmond, &c, although I think we must be prepared for insolent resistance and proportionate coercion on our part. . . .

SOURCE: Thomas Sergeant Perry, Editor, The Life and Letters of Francis Lieber, p. 351-2

Francis Lieber to Major-General Henry W. Halleck, September 1, 1864

New York, September 1, 1864.

My Dear Friend, — I write, but do not know very well why, unless it be that a sad heart will run over as well as a joyous one. Things look very, very gloomy. The shameless, disgraceful, and treasonable proclamation of the McClellan convention, with the universal support it finds with high and low of all anti-administration people, and the utter apathy of the loyal people for Lincoln, are fearful. There are but two things that could save us — a telling victory, or rather the taking of Richmond, and Mr. Lincoln's withdrawal. The first will not take place with our decimated army; the other will not occur. Mr. Lincoln might withdraw very patriotically and gracefully, but he would hardly do it individually, and certainly not be allowed to do it by his cabinet. A new convention would take up Grant, I dare say.  . . . All this is nothing necessarily against Mr. Lincoln; but individuals wear out quickly in revolutionary times, were it for no other reason than that familiarity with a name takes from it the enthusiasm. Even Napoleon would not have been able to mount and bridle the steed of revolution, had he come in at first. The fact is — no matter what the reason — the fact is, that there is no spark of that enthusiasm or inspiriting motive-power, call it what you may, for Mr. Lincoln, without which you cannot move so comprehensive an election as that of a president. We must have a new man against a new man, and we cannot have him without Mr. Lincoln's withdrawal. Oh, that an angel could descend and show him what a beautiful stamp on his name in history such a withdrawal would be! He could say in his letter that it is a universal law that names wear out in revolutions and civil wars, and that he withdraws, &c. I do not know that history would record a nobler act than this would be. If he does not speedily withdraw we are beaten; if we are beaten, our country is extinguished, and loathsome disgrace is our children's inheritance.  . . . If this country gets ultimately through, safe and hale, no matter with how many scars, a great civil war with a presidential election in the very midst of it (while the enemy has to stand no such calamity), I shall set it down as the most wonderful miracle In the whole history of events. Sometimes I feel as if I should write to the President; but then, how would he listen to a private individual in a matter of such moment? Rulers do not divest themselves of crowns by being piped to on a single flute. Would to God you could write to me more cheerfully!

SOURCE: Thomas Sergeant Perry, Editor, The Life and Letters of Francis Lieber, p. 350-1

Francis Lieber to Senator Charles Sumner, July 20, 1864

July 20,1864.

I received this moment “The Express” of July 16, which you sent me. It was to be expected that you would be sneered at. You recollect how “The Tribune” ridiculed the Academy of Science. How can it be otherwise? The writers of our journals are, as a general rule, young, irresponsible men, obliged to write every day something that will take, something smart. Has it never struck you, — what would have become of Christianity had it appeared in a world with full-blown journalism? Nay, imagine even the Council of Trent with reporters present! . . .

SOURCE: Thomas Sergeant Perry, Editor, The Life and Letters of Francis Lieber, p. 350