Who was William Seward?

As the front runner for the 1860 Republican presidential nomination before I was selected as the party’s nominee, William H. Seward was my political rival. He was to be my Secretary of State and later my close personal friend. He helped me write my First Inaugural address (see p. 158 of our book) and the Emancipation Proclamation.

Seward also served the public as a New York state senator, a Governor of New York, and a United States Senator. He was gravely injured in an attack by one of John Wilkes Booth’s accomplices that awful night in April 1865.  He survived and continued as Secretary of State for my successor, Andrew Johnson, and in that position he negotiated the purchase of Alaska from Russia­-then commonly mocked by the public as “Seward’s Folly.” Seward House, his home in Auburn, NY, just north of Ithaca, is now a museum.

On November 18, 1863, the night before I gave my speech at Gettysburg (see p. 31 of Lincoln at Gettysburg) Seward addressed a crowd outside the house where he was staying:

"When we part to-morrow night, let us remember that we owe it to our country and to mankind that this war shall have for its conclusion the establishing of the principle of democratic government; ­ the simple principle that whatever party, whatever portion of the community, prevails by constitutional suffrage in an election, that party is to be respected and maintained in power, until it shall give place, on another trial and another verdict, to a different portion of the people. If you do not do this, you are drifting at once and irresistibly to the very verge of universal, cheerless, and hopeless anarchy. But with that principle this government ours ­ the purest, the best, the wisest, and the happiest in the world ­ must be, and, so far as we are concerned, practically will be, immortal."

I could not have said this better myself. Actually, I did. But I do not wish to be critical of my colleague.

For all of you Cornell readers, let it be known that Seward was a "voracious reader" and had "a mind crammed with information gleaned from the literature of Europe and America, and from a host of American contemporaries ranging from Washington Irving to Jean Louise Rodolphe Agassiz."(Glyndon Van Deusen, William Henry Seward, p. 209.)

Comments

[Pam Baxter]

For those interested, I'd highly recommend the following title: "A Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln" by Doris Kearns Goodwin. Among its many themes, the volume discusses Lincoln's political acumen and superior leadership qualities. He had the ability to select men of incredible talent, utilize their unique strengths, compensate for their weaknesses, and manage their titanic egos.

[BR]

The William Seward House is a 30 minute drive north in Auburn, NY and well worth your time. It is often forgotten that assassins attempted to kill Seward at the same time as Lincoln, but Seward survived his injuries.