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’s gratification in the outcome. She told Elizabeth Blair that “she regretted the making up of the family quarrel—that there was not a member of the Cabinet who did not stab her husband & the Country daily,” with the exception of Monty Blair. Her protective suspicions were reaffirmed during a visit to a Georgetown spiritualist on New Year’s Eve. Mrs. Laury’s revelations combined comforting communications from Willie with political commentary on affairs of the day. In particular, the spiritualist warned “that the cabinet were all the enemies of the President, working for themselves, and that they would have to be dismissed, and others called to his aid before he had success.”

Lincoln listened patiently to Mary’s concerns, but he knew that he had now balanced his team of rivals and consolidated his leadership. “I do not now see how it could have been done better,” he told Hay. “I am sure it was right. If I had yielded to that storm & dismissed Seward the thing would all have slumped over one way & we should have been left with a scanty handful of supporters. When Chase gave in his resignation I saw that the game was in my own hands & I put it through.”

The happy resolution of the crisis provided an upbeat ending to a very difficult year.

BATTLEFIELDS OF THE CIVIL WAR

CHAPTER 19

“FIRE IN THE REAR”

AS THE FIRST DAY of January 1863 approached, the public evinced a “general air of doubt” regarding the president’s intention to follow through on his September pledge to issue his Emancipation Proclamation on New Year’s Day. “Will Lincoln’s backbone carry him through?” a skeptical George Templeton Strong asked. “Nobody knows.”

The cynics were wrong. Despite repeated warnings that the issuance of the proclamation would have harmful consequences for the Union’s cause, Lincoln never considered retracting his pledge. As Frederick Douglass had perceived, once the president staked himself to a forward position, he did not give up ground. The final proclamation deviated from the preliminary document in one major respect. The document still proclaimed that “all persons held as slaves” within states and parts of states still in rebellion “are, and henceforward shall be free”; but Lincoln, for the first time, officially authorized the recruitment of blacks into the armed forces. Stanton and Chase had advocated this step for many months, yet Lincoln, knowing that it would provoke serious disaffection in his governing coalition, had hesitated. Now, as the public began to comprehend the massive manpower necessary to fight a prolonged war, he believed the timing was right.

The cabinet members suggested a few changes that Lincoln cheerfully adopted, most notably Chase’s proposal to conclude the legalistic document with a flourish, invoking “the considerate judgment of mankind, and the gracious favor of Almighty God…upon this act.”

On the morning he would deliver the historic proclamation, Lincoln rose early. He walked over to his office to make final revisions and sent the document by messenger to the State Department, where it was put into legal form. He then met with General Burnside, who had readied his army for “another expedition against the rebels along the Rappahannock,” only to be restrained by the president. Lincoln explained that several of Burnside’s division commanders had made forceful objections to the new plan. Troubled by the realization that he had lost the confidence of his officers, Burnside offered to resign. Lincoln managed to assuage the discord temporarily, but three weeks later, he would replace Burnside with “Fighting Joe” Hooker. A West Point graduate who had fought in the Mexican War, Hooker had served under McClellan in the Peninsula Campaign and at Antietam.

Seward returned from the State Department with the formally copied proclamation shortly before 11 a.m. Lincoln read it over once more and made ready to sign it when he noticed a technical error in the format. The document had to be returned to the State Department for correction. Since the traditional New Year’s reception was about to begin,