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Ordinarily, Lincoln would have shelved Chandler’s arrogant letter until his temper cooled. This time, however, he did not stifle his anger. Apparently, Chandler had struck a nerve by insinuating that Lincoln did not know his own mind. Although the president listened to the opinions of many, he took pride in arriving at his own decisions in his own way. Nor would he countenance Chandler’s slanderous assertion that men like Seward, Weed, and Blair deserved the dishonorable grave of traitors.

“My dear Sir,” Lincoln began his cold reply. “I have seen Gov. [Edwin D.] Morgan and Thurlow Weed, separately, but not together, within the last ten days; but neither of them mentioned the forthcoming message, or said anything, so far as I can remember, which brought the thought of the Message to my mind. I am very glad the elections this autumn have gone favorably, and that I have not, by native depravity, or under evil influences, done anything bad enough to prevent the good result. I hope to ‘stand firm’ enough not to go backward, and yet not go forward fast enough to wreck the country’s cause.”

Lincoln’s impatience with Chandler may have been aggravated by the fact that he was coming down with a mild case of smallpox. The illness would last for several weeks and fray his self-restraint, yet it left his humor intact. “Yes, it is a bad disease, but it has its advantages,” he told some visitors. “For the first time since I have been in office, I have something now to give to everybody that calls.” The enforced bedrest that attended his sickness allowed Lincoln the quiet he needed to complete his message to Congress. The pause in his frenetic life proved helpful as he laid out his own views on the knotty problem of Reconstruction, which he considered “the greatest question ever presented to practical statesmanship.”

Most everyone assumed, Noah Brooks wrote, “that the President would either ignore reconstruction altogether,” as the conservatives suggested, or follow the radicals’ advice and “give an elaborate and decisive program.” No one predicted “such an original message,” which cleverly mollified both wings of his divided party. John Hay was present when the message was read. “I never have seen such an effect produced by a public document,” he recorded in his diary that night. “Chandler was delighted, Sumner was beaming, while at the other political pole [James] Dixon and Reverdy Johnson said it was highly satisfactory.”

Radicals were thrilled with the stipulation that before the president would pardon any rebel or restore the rights of property, he must not only swear allegiance to the Union but also accept emancipation. To abandon the laws and proclamations promising freedom to the slaves would be “a cruel and an astounding breach of faith,” Lincoln said, adding that “while I remain in my present position I shall not attempt to retract or modify the emancipation proclamation; nor shall I return to slavery any person who is free by the terms of that proclamation, or by any of the acts of Congress.” By this statement, Sumner enthused, “He makes Emancipation the corner-stone of reconstruction.” The Missouri radical Henry Blow agreed. Though he recently had castigated Lincoln, he now lauded him. “God bless Old Abe,” he said. “I am one of the Radicals who have always believed in the President.”

Once again the radicals’ doubts about Lincoln’s firmness on slavery had proved unfounded. Early in August, he had written a letter to Nathaniel Banks, the general in charge of occupied Louisiana, delineating his thoughts on Reconstruction and emancipation. While not desiring to dictate to the Creole state, Lincoln “would be glad for her to make a new Constitution recognizing the emancipation proclamation, and adopting emancipation in those parts of the state to which the proclamation does not apply. And while she is at it, I think it would not be objectionable for her to adopt some practical system by which the two races could gradually live themselves out of their old relation to each