The US Senate confirms the appointment of Edwin M. Stanton as Secretary of WAr. Stanton, "an energetic, tireless worker, was known to have uttered statements deragatory to President Lincoln." and was also a friend of General McClellan.
Union - Military
Kentucky/TennesseeOn the Tennessee River, a Union gunboat operates a reconnaissance from today until January 25, going almost as far as Fort Henry just below the Kentucky/Tennessee line. This operation is in conjunction with Ulysses GRant's ovrland operation from CAiro.
Missouri
There are Union expeditions to Benron, Bloomfield, and Dallas until the 17th of Jan.
Edwin Stanton at Wikipedia
Edwin McMasters Stanton (December 19, 1814 – December 24, 1869) was an American lawyer and politician who served as Secretary of War under the Lincoln Administration during the American Civil War from 1862–1865. Stanton's effective management helped organize the massive military resources of the North and guide the Union to victory.
After Lincoln's assassination, Stanton remained as the Secretary of War under the new 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 led the House of Representatives to impeach him.
Early life and career
Stanton was born in Steubenville, Ohio, the eldest of the four children of David and Lucy Norman Stanton. Throughout his childhood and adult life Stanton suffered from asthma. Stanton's father, a physician of Quaker stock, died in 1827 when Edwin was only thirteen. He was forced to leave school to help support his mother, and ran a general store in Steubenville.
Stanton began his political life as a lawyer in Ohio and an antislavery Democrat. After leaving from Kenyon College he returned to Steubenville in 1833 to get a job to support his family. He began studying law and was admitted to the Ohio bar in 1836. At the age of twenty one Stanton argued his first case before the court. He built a house in the small town of Cadiz, Ohio, and practiced law there until 1847, when he moved to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He resided at one point in Richmond, Ohio, in what is now Everhart Bove Funeral Home.
Law and politics
Stanton's legal career would bring him to practice in Ohio, then Pittsburgh, and finally in Washington, D. C In 1856, he moved to Washington, D.C., where he had a large practice before the Supreme Court.
In 1859, Stanton was the defense attorney in the sensational trial of Daniel E. Sickles, a politician and later a Union general, who was tried on a charge of murdering his wife's lover, Philip Barton Key II (son of Francis Scott Key), but was acquitted after Stanton invoked one of the first uses of the insanity defense in U.S. history. In 1860 Stanton gave up a successful law practice and was appointed Attorney General in the lame-duck presidential administration of James Buchanan.
Stanton was sent to California in 1858 by the US Attorney General as special Federal agent for the settlement of land claims, where he succeeded in breaking up a conspiracy to defraud the US government of vast tracts of land of considerable value.
Attorney general
In 1860 he was appointed Attorney General by President James Buchanan. He strongly opposed secession, and is credited by historians for changing Buchanan's governmental position away from tolerating secession to denouncing it as unconstitutional and illegal.
Time of war
Civil war
Stanton was Lincoln's closest adviser during the American Civil War but was divided over the issue he supported arming freed slaves to fight in the Union Army.
After Lincoln was elected president, Stanton agreed to work as a legal adviser to the inefficient Secretary of War, Simon Cameron who was dismissed by Lincoln for including in his yearly report the call of freed slaves to be armed and used against the Confederate Army.
Cameron was replaced by Stanton on January 15, 1862. Lincoln, who was unaware of Stanton's role in the report, appointed him as his new Secretary of War. He accepted the position only to "help save the country." He was very effective in administering the huge War Department, but devoted considerable amounts of his energy to the persecution of Union officers whom he suspected of having traitorous sympathies for the South, the most famous of these being Maj. Gen. Fitz John Porter. Stanton used his power as Secretary to ensure every general who sat on the court-martial would vote for conviction or else be unable to obtain career advancement.
On August 8, 1862 Stanton issued an order to "arrest and imprison any person or persons who may be engaged, by act, speech or writing, in discouraging volunteer enlistments, or in any way giving aid and comfort to the enemy, or in any other disloyal practice against the United States."
The president recognized Stanton's ability, but whenever necessary Lincoln managed to "plow around him." Stanton once tried to fire the Chief of the War Department Telegraph Office, Thomas Eckert. Lincoln prevented this by praising Eckert to Stanton. Yet, when pressure was exerted to remove the unpopular secretary from office, Lincoln refused. His high opinion of Stanton can be seen from the following quote:
“ He is the rock on the beach of our national ocean against which the breakers dash and roar, dash and roar without ceasing. He fights back the angry waters and prevents them from undermining and overwhelming the land. Gentlemen, I do not see how he survives, why he is not crushed and torn to pieces. Without him I should be destroyed. ”
—President Abraham Lincoln[6], on Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton
Lincoln's last act as President was overriding Stanton's decision supporting the execution of George S.E. Vaughn for spying. Lincoln pardoned Vaughn one hour before he was assassinated.
Post-War
Stanton disagreed with Johnson's plans to readmit the seceded states to the Union without guarantees of civil rights for freed slaves. In 1867 President Johnson attempted to force Stanton from office and replace him with Ulysses S. Grant. Stanton refused to go and was supported by the Senate. After the Civil War Stanton remained as Secretary of War but found it difficult to perform his duties under the new president, Andrew Johnson.
When Stanton came to the Peterson House, he took charge of the scene. At Lincoln's death Stanton uttered what became a memorable quote, "Now he belongs to the ages," and lamented, "There lies the most perfect ruler of men the world has ever seen." He vigorously pursued the apprehension and prosecution of the conspirators involved in Lincoln's assassination. These proceedings were not handled by the civil courts, but by a military tribunal, and therefore under Stanton's aegis. Stanton has subsequently been accused of witness tampering, most notably of Louis J. Weichmann, and of other activities that skewed the outcome of the trials.
Andrew Johnson's administration
Stanton continued to hold the position of secretary of war under President Andrew Johnson until 1868. The two clashed over implementation of Reconstruction policy, so Johnson removed Stanton from the Cabinet and replaced him with Ulysses S. Grant. However, this was overruled by the Senate, and Stanton barricaded himself in his office when Johnson tried again to replace Stanton with General Thomas, while radical Republicans initiated impeachment proceedings against Johnson on the grounds that Johnson's removal of Stanton without Senate approval violated the Tenure of Office Act. Johnson escaped conviction by a single vote in the Senate, in part because of a secret agreement with Senate members to abide by the Republican legislations.
U.S. Supreme Court
After this, Stanton resigned and returned to the practice of law. The next year he was appointed by President Grant to the Supreme Court, but he died four days after he was confirmed by the Senate. He died in Washington, DC, and is buried there in Oak Hill Cemetery.
Marriage and Family
Edwin Stanton married Mary Lamson on May 31, 1836. They had two children, Lucy Lamson Stanton (b. March 11, 1837; d. 1841) and Edwin Lamson Stanton (b. August 1842). They built a house in Cadiz, Ohio,where Stanton practiced law. His fifteen-month-old daughter Lucy died in 1841. Mary Lamson Stanton died on March 13, 1844. After losing his daughter, his beloved wife and his brother who committed suicidse Stanton went through a period of a deep depression. He would then move to Pittsburgh, and involve himself in legal work, where he became quite proficient and turned into a ferocious litigator.
Stanton married again in 1856 to Ellen Hutchinson, and had four children with his second wife: Eleanor Adams Stanton (b. May 9, 1857), James Hutchinson Stanton (b. 1861; d. July 10, 1862), Lewis Hutchinson Stanton (b. 1862), and Bessie Stanton (b. 1863). Stanton was enumerated with his family in the 1860 Census. At this time, his profession is noted as lawyer, his real estate value is $40,000, and his personal assets valued at $267,000. The family had four servants living with them.
Stanton on US Postage
Edwin Stanton was the second American other than a US President to appear on a US Postage issue, the first being Benjamin Franklin, who appeared on a stamp in 1847. The first and only Stanton stamp was issued March 6, 1871. This was also the only stamp issued by the post office that year. The Stanton 7-cent stamp paid the single rate postage for letters sent from the U.S. to various countries in Europe.
Bibliography
The Civil War Day By Day: An Almanac 1861-1865. E.B. Long with Barbara Long, De Capo, 1971
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