Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1910-06-01
new News OF YESTERDAY
Hannibal HamIin'S Journey of
Love Just Before Death.
His Last Public Service Was Plea
for the Universal Establish
ment of a Lincoln Memo
rial Day.
Rv e. ]. EDWARDS.

4
If Hannibal Hamlin, vice-president
of the United States during Lincoln's
first term in the White House, were
alive to-day he undoubtedly would
take a great deal of satisfaction in
the fact that IA of the states have so
far made of Lincoln's birthday
legal holiday. For he it was who
really started and crystallized the
movement that has led to legal OBJ
servance of the day, though l believe
you won't find this stated in any &C
count of the establishment of the day
as legal holiday.
Mr.. Hamlin, who was almost the
last survivor of those who were OF
the immediate administrative family
Of Mr.. Lincoln, died In 1891 in
Bangor, Me. 1t so CHANGED that IN
February of that year l was passen-
ger on the Boston express for New
York, and after dining. 1 went into
the smoking car. A moment or two
later a sturdy old gentleman entered,
threw himself easily upon one of the
divans, took from his pocket a very
black cigar, lighted it and began
smoking 1t was Hannibal Hamlin,
looking not a day older than he did
when, on his retirement from the SEN
ate in March of 1881, I had babe him
good-by in Washington
Quite naturally, we renewed our ac-
quaintance, and after a little converse
ton l expressed interest in the self
evident fact that he in the dead OF
winter and at his age, should be max
ing rather lengthy railroad trip.
"Now, you are not going to inter-
view me-" declared the old gentleman,
with a smile Il never have been in
terviewed and I don't purpose to be-
gin now; but l will tell you conf
dentially what the object of my trip is.
Sometimes it used to be said,
when Mr.. Lincoln was president, that
he ignored me, but that is not true.
My relations with President Lincoln
were not only cordial, but intimate,
although the public knew little of
them. And | came, in that inter
course, to have what believe to be
true understanding of Lincoln's char
acter Although he was intellectually
a great man, yet l think that his real
greatness lay in the moral grandeur
of his character. He was, morally, as
great as Washington. That is, after
all, the only true greatness.
Nov, sometime ago, as I was sit
ting in a little club down in Bangor
that | go to every day to play cards
and sometimes to chat about men and
the politics of an earlier day, it
| seemed to me that there ought to be
some formal way of recognizing per-
manently, and by all the country and
by future generations, the moral char
acter of this great leader. After
thinking the idea over, it occurred to
me that the best way would be for
every state to set apart Lincoln's
birthday as a memorial day, and so I
decided to go to New York and to
Philadelphia, and possibly to Wash
ington, where / could meet some old
friends and make an earnest plea for
the national establishment Of Lin
coins birthday as a memorial.
"I am now making this journey. |
have not much more time left me be-
fore l join those who we're associated
with Mr. Lincoln and who have passed
on; and want my last public service
to be a plea for, the universal estab-
lishment in the United States of Lin
coin Memorial Day"
A few months later, in the summer
of the same year, Hannibal Hamlin
lay dead in his home in Bangor. But
the plea for the memorial observance
of Lincolns birthday which he made
on that day before the New York
Lincoln club, and his subsequent pri-
vate effort both in New York and
Philadelphia unquestionably led to
and crystallized the agitation, which,
several years later, caused Illinois,
Minnesota and New York to be the
first states to declare the birth date
of the great war president a legal
holiday. For, until Mr. Hamlin con-
| ceived the idea of g. universal Lincoln
memorial day. and, at 80 years OF
age, and in the dead of winter, made
his Journey in love in its behalf, there
had been no determined concerted eff
fore to make the day a legal holiday
in any state, and 1t was only observed
informally at banquets by Lincoln
clubs and other organizations.
Copyright, 1909, by E. ]. Edwards.)