Gotham_ A History of New York City to 1898 - Edwin G. Burrows [691]
In early January two delegations—one Republican, one Democratic—left for Washington to plead for compromise with the South. Both efforts failed. At month’s end thirty metropolitan leaders tried again, clambering aboard a special train with a monster memorial signed by forty thousand New York businessmen. Despite a respectful hearing from Republican congressmen over supper at Willard’s Hotel, they made little impact. Indeed the Republicans soon introduced the Morrill tariff, which raised duties sharply, in some cases by 100 percent.
Some New Yorkers tried to use their financial muscle to force Republicans to compromise, saying they would otherwise refuse to buy the government’s loans. Enraged Republicans countered that if a few wealthy businessmen tried to negate the democratic will, the government would issue bonds directly to the people: Horace Greeley said money could “be raised without difficulty, and in spite of Wall Street.” The would-be capital strike collapsed.
LINCOLN REDUX
At this juncture, on February 19, Abraham Lincoln, on his way to Washington to be inaugurated, made his second visit to New York City. He arrived at three P.M. on the Albany train at the Hudson River Railroad Company depot on 30th Street at Tenth Avenue. From here he was taken, in a procession of hackneys escorted by the Metropolitans, past crowds almost equal to the turnout for the prince of Wales, to Astor House, across from City Hall Park. Nearby buildings were thick with spectators. Barnum’s Museum across the way was bedecked with bright flags and banners. From the top of a Broadway omnibus gridlocked in traffic, Walt Whitman watched Lincoln step out on the sidewalk, stretch his arms and legs, and scan the crowd of thirty to forty thousand. There was, he remembered, “a sulky, unbroken silence. . . . I had, I say, a capital view of it all, and especially of Mr. Lincoln, his look and gait—his perfect composure and coolness—his unusual and uncouth height, his dress of complete black, stovepipe hat push’d back on the head, dark-brown complexion, seam’d and wrinkled yet canny-looking face, black, bushy head of hair, disproportionately long neck, and his hands held behind him as he stood observing the people. He look’d with curiosity upon that immense sea of faces, and the sea of faces return’d the look with similar curiosity.”
The next morning at eight o’clock, accompanied by Thurlow Weed and James Watson Webb, Lincoln was driven to the Fifth Avenue home of Moses Grinnell’s daughter, where he breakfasted with a hundred of the city’s most prosperous merchants. Present were the leading Republican proponents of compromise. Someone remarked to Lincoln on the number of assembled millionaires, pointedly underscoring the city’s financial clout. “Oh, indeed, is that so?” countered Lincoln deftly, underscoring his political muscle. “Well, that’s quite right. I’m a millionaire myself. I got a minority of a million in the votes last November.”
During the remainder of the day Lincoln made short remarks to Mayor Wood and the City Council before huge throngs at City Hall while his wife visited Barnum’s and received ladies at the Astor House. At night he took in an evening reception, an elaborate dinner, a performance of Verdi’s new Un hallo in maschera at the Academy of Music (to which he wore black kid gloves, a gaffe at which the press snickered next day), and a midnight serenade. The following day he left for Washington.
A week later anxious businessmen followed him there. William E. Dodge, industrialist and financier, explained that New Yorkers were nervous about the position he would take toward the South in his forthcoming inaugural and wanted to know “whether the grass shall grow in the streets of our commercial cities.” Lincoln responded pleasantly that “if it depends upon me, the grass will not grow anywhere except in the fields and meadows.” But when Dodge pressed him, asking if this meant he would yield to the just demands of the South, Lincoln replied grimly