June 11, 1863. |
June 29. |
July 4. |
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[86]
The Democratic Convention that assembled
at Columbus, Ohio, and nominated Vallandigham for the chief magistracy of the State,1 also.
denounced the Government, and sent a committee2 to the President to demand a revocation of the sentence of their candidate, “not as a favor, but as a right.”
They assumed to speak for a “majority of the, people of Ohio.”
The President's reply
was brief and pointed.
He defended the action of the Government, and, after telling them plainly that their own attitude in the matter encouraged desertion, resistance to the draft, and the like, and that both friends and enemies of the Union looked upon it in that light3--that it was a “substantial, and, by consequence, a real strength to the enemy” --he proposed to them to dispel it, if they were friends of their country, by publicly declaring, over their own signatures, that there was a rebellion whose object and tendency was to destroy the Union, and that, in their opinion, our army and navy were constitutional means for suppressing it; that they would not do any thing calculated to diminish the efficiency of those branches of the public service; and that they would do all in their power to provide means for the support of that army and navy, while engaged in efforts to suppress the, rebellion; it being understood that the publication of the President's reply to them, with their affirmative indorsement of the propositions, should be, in itself, a revocation of the order in relation to Vallandigham.
The Committee refused to “enter into any such agreement,” giving, as a chief reason, that it was an imputation “on their own sincerity and fidelity as citizens of the United States.”
So the discussion, so far as the President was concerned, ended, and at the election for Governor of Ohio, a few months later, the assumption of the Committee, that they represented “a majority of the people” of that State, was rebuked by an overwhelming vote against Vallandigham.
The majority of his opponent was over one hundred thousand, including that given by the Ohio soldiers in the field.
It was in the midst of the excitement caused by the arrest of Vallandigham, the harangues of Opposition speakers, and the passionate appeals of some Opposition newspapers to the instincts of the more disorderly classes.
of society, that the Draft was ordered.
Then, as we have observed, the zeal of the Opposition against the measure became formidable and dangerous.
to the public welfare.
Organized resistance to the Draft appeared in various.
parts of the country, and distinguished members of the Peace, Faction were heard, on the National anniversary,
exhorting the,
1 See page 84.
2 The following are the names of the Committee: M. Burchard, David A. Houck, George Bliss, T. W. Bartley, W. J. Gordon, John O'Neill, C. A. White, W. A. Fink, Alexander Long, J. W. White, George H. Pendleton, George L. Converse, Hanzo P. Noble, James R. Morris, W. A. Hutchins, Abner L. Backus, J. F. MceKenney, P. C. DeBlond, Louis Schaefer.
3 In a letter to the London Times, dated August 17, 1868, Mathew F. Maury, formerly Superintendent of the National Observatory at Washington, and one of the most unworthy of traitors to his country, said, in proof that there was no chance for the Union: “There is already a peace party in the North. All the embarrassments with which that party can surround Mr. Lincoln, and all the difficulties that it can throw in the way of the war party in the North, operate directly as so much aid and comfort to the South.” He then pointed to the apathy of the inhabitants of Western Pennsylvania (where the influence of the Peace Faction was powerful) at the time of Lee's invasion: “to the riots in New York, and to the organized resistance to the war in Ohio,” in which Vallandigham was the leader, and said: “New York is threatening armed resistance to the Federal Government. New York is becoming the champion of State Rights in the North, and to that extent is taking Southern ground. . . . Vallandigham waits and watches over the border, pledged, if elected Governor of the State of Ohio, to array it against Lincoln and the war, and to go for peace. . . . Never were the chances for the South brighter.”
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