The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1886-11-07
GRANT IN PEACE.
BY GENERAL ADAM sADEAU.
NO. XXI.
Grant and Seward.

Grant and Seward. Their characters were as
unlike as their policies and their achievements.
During the last months OF the war Seward paid
visit at Grants headquarters at City Point,
and while there he told me story which illus
trates more than point in his character de
was describing the alarm and anxiety of the
North In the autumn of 1864 For months
Grant had accomplished nothing in front of
Richmond; Hood had forced Sherman to retrace
his steps from Atlanta, and Early had nearly
captured Washington. The opponents of the
government at the North made the most of the
situation for political purposes. The elections
were approaching and Cabinet council was
held. 1t was necessary, Seward said, to throw
something overheard in order to save the ship,
and emancipation was to be the Jonah. He was
selected he told me, TO make the sacrifice, and
proceeded to Auburn, where he delivered the
speech which rlany will remember, reopening
the whole question of slavery and emancipation,
when the States should return to the Union.
when the insurgents" he said, ''shall have
disbanGed their armies and laid down their
arms, the war will instantly cease; and all the
war measures then existing, including those
which affect slavery will cease also; and all the
moral, economical and political questions, as
well questions affecting slavery as Others which
shall then be existing between individuals and
States and the federal government, whether
they arose before the civil war began,
whether they grew out of it. will, by force of the
Constitution, pass over to the arbitrament Of
courts of law and to the councils of legislation"
So spoke the Secretary of State a year and a
half after the Proclamation Of Emancipation had
been made.
A few days later he returned to Washington.
and soon the news was brought Of Sheridans vic
tory at Winchester. Seward took the telegram
to the President 1t was long past midnight, and
Lincoln came to the door of his bedroom in his
nightgown There he held the candle while the
Secretary of State read to him the great intelli-
gence. The President was delighted, of course,
at the victory; but Seward exclaimed: "And
what, Mr.. President, is to become of me2' He
told me this story. l suppose, to illustrate his
spirit of self-sacrifce but when l repeated it to
Grant the soldier looked at the act in different
hight He thought the sacrifice of principle
should not have been made, and was shocked
that Seward could have thought of himself in
such crisis. But Seward believed in sacri-
ficing even political principle to the success of
great cause or the salvation of country. He
said to me at this time Nations have never
more virtue than just enough to save them
selves" -
Grants course under somewhat similar cir
cumstances was different. He often told me of
the pressure brought to induce him to sign what
was known the imitation act Personal and
political friends of Importance assured him that
his refusal would be fatal to Republican success
at the polls, and, although his judgment was op-
posed to the measure he finally wrote out a.
message approving the bill. He even read the
message TO his Cabinet, but in writing and read
ing it the weakness of his forced reasoning be-
came more apparent than ever. He could not
bring himself to do violence to his own couvic-
sions That night he tore no the message and
wrote another, which contained veto that for
sver defeated imitation.
Each of these men had IN his own way, ac-
complished great things for the state Seward
was an adroit and intellectual strategist-a man
born with the instincts and used to the arts of
diplomacy; a statesman who had aimed at the
highest place-but. when he failed in his aim,
had humbled himself to take a secondary post,
in which he conceived and carried out an inter
national policy for his triumphant rival; a man
who. after the war, and the success of the prin-
cipes ana the party with whom and for whom
he had battled half lifetime, found himself
suddenly in the Cabinet of Southerner, deter
mined To bring the defeated Southerners back to
the position and the power they had enjoyed be.
fore they rebelled and Seward not only acqui-
ssced in the design. but aided it with
all the skill and intellect he had
VII aM kha nthA 40
There was nothing in such a character or
career to attract or to assimilate with Grant
who was by nature blunt and plain in word and
act; soldier TO the core; unused to bending
when he could not break. and ignorant of any
means to accomplish his purposes but the most
direct and forcible. Even in war he had been
less of stratesist than fighter. and he carried
the same characteristics into civil affairs Indeed
whenever, later in his political career, he was in
duced by political associates to lay aside his own
peculiar Girectness and attempt maneuyrng he
failed. His ways were never those of diplomacy.
even of legitimate craft The of
technical politician he became the less was his
hold on the people. and the less the success he
achieved When he returned to his native
straightforwardness and outspokenness his in
fuence and popularity were regained. Such
man could not appreciate Johnsons Secretary of
State.
Seward had succeeded by temporzing and ne
gotiating by patience and subtle skill, By sub
hitting to what was inevitable and obtaining
whatever was attainable in at first postponing
and at last preventing the active Intervention of
England and France in favor of the South dur
ing the war; and he hoped afterward to secure
the withdrawal of the French from Mexico by
she same means. But to Grant this seemed to
indicate indifference to the result and he finally
came to believe that Seward was willing for Max
imilian to remain Here was their first open.
difference. They were antagonists apparently
even in aim and certainly in means and methods
and manner The consequence was not only