page_title: Edwin Stanton
section_title: Early days in office
hierarchical_section_title: Edwin Stanton / Lincoln's Secretary of War (1862—1865) / Early days in office
caption_attribution_description: English: Full-length portrait of American lawyer and statesman Edwin Stanton. This image is available from the United States Library of Congress's Prints and Photographs division under the digital ID cph.3c01375. This tag does not indicate the copyright status of the attached work. A normal copyright tag is still required. See Commons:Licensing for more information. العربية&#160;| čeština&#160;| Deutsch&#160;| English&#160;| español&#160;| فارسی&#160;| suomi&#160;| français&#160;| עברית&#160;| magyar&#160;| italiano&#160;| македонски&#160;| മലയാളം&#160;| Nederlands&#160;| polski&#160;| português&#160;| русский&#160;| slovenčina&#160;| slovenščina&#160;| Türkçe&#160;| українська&#160;| 中文&#160;| 中文（简体）‎&#160;| 中文（繁體）‎&#160;| +/−
context_page_description: Edwin McMasters Stanton was an American lawyer and politician who served as Secretary of War under the Lincoln Administration during most of the American Civil War. Stanton's management helped organize the massive military resources of the North and guide the Union to victory. However, he was criticized by many Union generals, who perceived him as overcautious and micromanaging. He also organized the manhunt for Abraham Lincoln's assassin, John Wilkes Booth.
  After Lincoln's assassination, Stanton remained as the Secretary of War under the new US president, Andrew Johnson, during the first years of Reconstruction. He opposed the lenient policies of Johnson towards the former Confederate States. Johnson's attempt to dismiss Stanton ultimately led to Johnson being impeached by the Radical Republicans in the House of Representatives. Stanton returned to law after he retired as Secretary of War. In 1869, he was nominated as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court by Johnson's successor, Ulysses S. Grant, but Stanton died four days after his nomination was confirmed by the Senate.
context_section_description: Under Cameron, the War Department had earned the moniker "the lunatic asylum." The department was barely respected among soldiers or government officials, and its authority was routinely disregarded. The army's generals held the brunt of the operating authority in the military, while the President and the War Department interceded only in exceptional circumstances. The department also had strained relations with Congress, especially Representative John Fox Potter, head of the House's "Committee on Loyalty of Federal employees", which sought to root out Confederate sympathizers in the government. Potter had prodded Cameron to remove about fifty individuals he suspected of Confederate sympathies; Cameron had paid him no mind.
  Stanton was sworn in on January 20. Immediately, he set about repairing the fractious relationship between Congress and the War Department. Stanton met with Potter on his first day as secretary, and on the same day, dismissed four persons whom Potter deemed unsavory. This was well short of the fifty people Potter wanted gone from the department, but he was nonetheless pleased. Stanton also met with Senator Benjamin Wade and his Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War. The committee was a necessary and fruitful ally; it had subpoena power, thus allowing it to acquire information Stanton could not, and could help Stanton remove War Department staffers. Wade and his committee were happy to find an ally in the executive branch, and met with Stanton often thereafter. Stanton made a number of organizational changes within the department as well. He appointed John Tucker, an executive at the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad, and Peter H. Watson, his partner in the reaper case, to be his assistant secretaries, and had the staff at the department expanded by over sixty employees. Further, Stanton appealed to the Senate to cease appointments of military officials until he could review the more than 1,400 individuals up for promotion. Hitherto, military promotions were a spoils system, where individuals favorable to the administration were given promotions, regardless of merit. This ceased under Stanton.
  On January 29 Stanton ordered that all contracts to manufacturers of military materials and supplies outside the United States be voided and replaced with contracts within the country, and that no such further contracts be made with foreign companies. The order provoked apprehension in Lincoln's cabinet. The United Kingdom and France were searching for cause to recognize and support the Confederates, and Stanton's order may have given it to them. Secretary of State Seward thought the order would "complicate the foreign situation." Stanton persisted, and his January 29 order stood.
  Meanwhile, Stanton worked to create an effective transportation and communication network across the North. His efforts focused on the railroad system and the telegraph lines. Stanton worked with Senator Wade to push through Congress a bill that would codify the ability of the President and his administration to forcibly seize railroad and telegraph lines for their purposes. Railroad companies in the North were accommodating to the needs and desires of the federal government for the most part, and the law was rarely used. Stanton also secured the government's use of telegraph. He relocated the military's telegraphing operations from McClellan's army headquarters to his department, a decision the general was none too pleased with. The relocation gave Stanton closer control over the military's communications operations, and he exploited this. Stanton forced all members of the press to work through Assistant Secretary Watson, where unwanted journalists would be disallowed access to official government correspondence. If a member of the press went elsewhere in the department, they would be charged with espionage.
  Prior to Stanton's incumbency as War Secretary, President Lincoln apportioned responsibility for the security of government against treachery and other unsavory activities to several members of his cabinet, mostly Secretary Sew
caption: Stanton as Secretary of War
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