Conservative Unionists and the Presidential Election of 1864

Conservative Unionists and the Presidential Election of 1864 William C. Harris The presidential election of 1864 was one of the most fiercely contested campaigns in American history, and also one of the most important. Abraham Lincoln's victory over Democrat George B. McClellan meant that the Civil War would not be prolonged by negotiations, as provided by the Democratic platform. Negotiations, preceded by a cease-fire, would have jeopardized Lincoln's war goals, including the complete eradication of slavery. Despite McClellan's assertion that there should be no peace short of reunion, Peace Democrats, the dominant element in the party in 1864, might have succeeded in persuading him as president to honor the party's campaign promise of an armistice, followed by a national convention of the states, to bind up the sectional wounds. Such an armistice, as Lincoln and the Republicans insisted, could have sounded the death knell of the Union he and his party were pledged to preserve. The fate of the Thirteenth Amendment might also have been endangered by the success of the Democrats and McClellan, who believed that a harmonious Union could never be restored if the national government persisted in its attempts to impose emancipation upon the South. No issue more clearly divided Lincoln and McClellan than that of emancipation. Even if the Democrats had ended the war in the spring of 1865, as Lincoln did, and destroyed slavery, it still is reasonable to believe that the history of Reconstruction would have been far different with McClellan in the Executive Mansion. McClellan's election would have strengthened the conservatives in Congress, creating a stronger antiRepublican minority than existed after Lincoln's victory. The conservative coalition, with the backing of President McClellan, would probably have been able to block any Republican effort, Radical or otherwise, to prevent the quick restoration of former Confederates to power or protect black freedom. The commitment of Democratic leaders, including McClellan, to the restoration of the status quo antebellum virtually guaranteed a Civil War History, Vol. XXXVIII, No. 4, c 1992 by The Kent State University Press PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION OF 1864299 different policy toward the South under the Democrats and, at least for a time, a different view of the powers of the federal government vis-àvis the states. Finally, had McClellan won the election of 1864, perhaps followed by serious consequences to the Union, the historical reputation of Lincoln—a man who so eloquently expressed and nobly lived the ideals of the American creed—would have been tarnished. The election and Lincoln's leadership in bringing the war to a satisfactory conclusion for the Union insured this president's high place in history. Historians, of course, have studied and written about the election of 1864. The standard account of the campaign appeared in 1954. Written by William F. Zornow, this book is the only in-depth study of the contest. Its title, Lincoln & the Party Divided, suggests the book's emphasis: the real struggle in the contest was the moderate Lincoln's effort to keep the party united and foil the attempts by Republican politicians, mainly of the Radical wing, to replace him as the party's candidate in the election. Lincoln, however, according to Zornow, had the support of the people and through skillful maneuvering, aided by Union military successes at Atlanta and Mobile Bay in August and September, was able to thwart the designs of the politicians of his party. In the end, Republican editors and politicians rallied to his support, though without much enthusiasm, and he easily won the election. Zornow, despite his lengthy chronicling of the divisions within the Republican party, downplays the significance of the election when he writes that General George B. McClellan, the Democratic candidate, "placed himself on the same platform with Lincoln," suggesting that if McClellan had won the presidency he would have pursued the same policies as Lincoln.1 Historians writing since the appearance of Zornow's book have found a strong unifying theme in the 1864 election. They maintain that, though some divisions existed between the two political parties on the means to end the war, the campaign and election strengthened American democratic institutions at a time when they were put...