Lincoln The tireless President

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The demands of the presidency during the greatest national crisis in the country’s history didn’t allow #AbrahamLincoln any such luxury. Those closest to him wrote about his focus, commitment, and his selflessness in shouldering the burdens of an entire nation.
Edward D. Neill, assistant secretary to the President, reflected that Lincoln’s “capacity for work was wonderful. While other men were taking recreation through the sultry months of summer, he remained in his office attending to the wants of the nation. He was never an idler or a lounger. Each hour he was busy.”
John Hay, another Lincoln assistant, said of him in mid-1863, “The Tycoon is in fine whack. I have rarely seen him more serene and busy. He is managing this war…foreign relations, and planning a reconstruction of the Union, all at once.” To Hay Lincoln was a “backwoods Jupiter” who “wields the bolts of war and the machinery of government with a hand equally steady and equally firm.”
That Lincoln aged while in office is undeniable. Many presidents do. However, Lincoln was the only president to guide the country through a brutal four-year civil war. And this unprecedented crisis impacted his countenance, his health, and, in the end, it cost him his life.
Hay communicated his belief that divine intervention brought Lincoln to the forefront of history when he said, “There is no man in the country who is so wise, so gentle and so firm. I believe the hand of God placed him where he is.”
Images: Library of Congress; Lincoln in 1860, Lincoln in 1865.
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Lincoln did work diligently to win the war. That doesn't mean that other men -- notably Seward and Chase -- were incapable of winning the war, or perhaps even doing a better job than Lincoln did. No attack on Lincoln is intended here, but there is no need to exaggerate his abilities.
 
Lincoln did work diligently to win the war. That doesn't mean that other men -- notably Seward and Chase -- were incapable of winning the war, or perhaps even doing a better job than Lincoln did. No attack on Lincoln is intended here, but there is no need to exaggerate his abilities.
Sometimes the best person is not always the most electable. Seward may have been too closely identified with abolition and Chase, while anti-slavery, may have been too closely identified with the southern elite.
 
Sometimes the best person is not always the most electable. Seward may have been too closely identified with abolition and Chase, while anti-slavery, may have been too closely identified with the southern elite.
Sorry! Chase was an Ohioan. The politician whom I had in mind was Bates.
 
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