Kewaunee Enterprize was the first newspaper on
Wisconsin’s Peninsula when it published its first edition on Wednesday, June
22, 1859. Door County Advocate followed on March 22, 1862. What started
as the Ahnapee Record in June 1873 became Algoma Record Herald in
1918. There were other Peninsula papers within those years, however they came
and went, or merged with the big three.
Of the papers, it was only the Enterprize that saw
the nomination and the election of Abraham Lincoln. It was only the
Enterprize that witnessed the start of the War Between the States, later
being mostly known as the Civil War.
The presidential election of 1860 was 164 years ago. One
hundred sixty years certainly brings change, but then again……not so much.
In today’s world, news travels electronically in seconds, however in 1860 telegraphs had not yet made it to the Peninsula. Travel was primarily by horse or boat, and while railroads were making inroads, it was over 30 years before trains were a reality on the Peninsula. News came to the lake port communities via the ship captains and any newspapers they brought with them. Door County was set off from Brown County in 1851 and Kewaunee County was set off from Door a year later. The Peninsula is no longer the “backwater” it was in 1860 when often news was hearsay, although many would say today's rumor-spreader is social media.
When the Enterprize published on Wednesday, May 30,
1860, it told readers the Republican nomination of Abraham Lincoln in Chicago
“astonished everybody, and none more than that party.” The paper went on to say
there was no use in “disguising the fact than that the nomination is a wet
blanket” on the party’s election chances. It said the charming, gregarious
William H. Seward was really the enthusiastic choice and looked forward to by
the rank and file as the preeminent choice.
It said that Lincoln, Pennsylvania’s Simon Cameron, Missouri’s
Edwin Bates and others were fair enough as candidates but that Seward was a
champion of the issues, a man of extraordinary talent and more. Lincoln was
identified as a man of good reputation with a “sort of coarse popularity.” He
was called a country stump speaker. His sense was sound, but his talent was
“medium.” The Enterprize did not say that at the Chicago convention, Mr.
Lincoln was on his own turf. Called the Chicago Wigwam,** the building was
specifically erected for the convention in the young city that would after play
an important part in U.S. politics.
In a reprint from the Green Bay Advocate, found in
the Enterprize, the Advocate said it could probably find 20
Wisconsin farmers within a day’s drive who would be at least equal to Lincoln
in “all valuable respects.”
The Advocate thought Lincoln’s nomination was brought
about by those hostile to Seward, those who would rather have the party
defeated than have Seward succeed. It thought the Democrats who were about to
meet at Baltimore might have learned a lesson from the Republicans: “Chicanery
is fatal to party success.” Men who were faithful, prominent and demanded by
the people were those the Enterprize felt must be nominated even though
it did not suit the political managers. Had Seward been nominated, the paper
felt, the Democrats would have had a horrible time defeating him. Green Bay
Advocate said the Democrats only needed to be marshalled on election day to
march “over the field to certain and rapid victory” with a candidate like Stephen
A. Douglas.
Enterprise Editor Garland said that from
boyhood forward men were raised to see talents and abilities in looking for a
presidential nominee. It carried correspondence from the Free Democrat which
said there was excitement in the city (Chicago) and issued a statement “of
ground of the fitness and capacity of ‘Old Abe’ for the high office for which
he was nominated.” It was also written that “the Press & Tribune
office was illuminated from the top to bottom, and on each side of the counting
room stood a rail taken out of 3,000 split by Old Abe on the Sagamom River
bottom some 30 years ago, and on the inside were two more rails hung with
tapers.” “Old Abe” was a mere 52 years old.
The Free Democrat said it learned early of Lincoln’s
“peculiar fitness” for office. Mockingly, the Enterprize said if rail
splitting was a qualification for office, Kewaunee County would have no problem
finding several hundred men who qualified as timber candidates. It went on to
say stalworth farmers “who are sound on the rail” should be selected to bear
aloft the Republican banner.”
Boston Chronicle of the same date said Friday, May
18, would be remembered by the men of Massachusetts as the day the Republican
party executed itself. Since the death of Daniel Webster, the paper had not seen
men “so sober and so sad.” The Chronicle thought if the capital sunk
into the earth, if the courthouse turned around, if city hall and the old state
house moved to the customs house..….all those unnatural things could not have
produced such profound a sensation as the announcement of Lincoln’s nomination.
It said the intense sadness of the Republicans was so bad that Democrats “could
not find it in their hearts to make light of their affliction.” But they did.
When a Boston merchant asked what possessed Republicans to
nominate such a man, a “shabby man said it was availability.” As the merchant
walked off, he was said to be muttering, “And are the great interests of this
great nation to be given over to a man we do not know, because someone says he
is “available?” It was said men stood in groups on the street discussing the
“blunder.” Mr. Seward had the hearts of New England masses. He spoke well, he
was educated and had a familiar name. How could such a man be thrust aside with
the likes of Abraham Lincoln? The Illinois rail splitter was nominated in the
morning and in the afternoon, Massachusetts’ sister state, Maine, won the
“second prize” in Hannibal Hamlin. Such candidates could not be more
unfortunate for Massachusetts and even women and children were laughing, said
the Chronicle. Still, there was a 100-gun salute, however nobody knew if it
signaled the life or death of the six-year old party.
The New York Tribune felt
Seward’s election chances were so strong that his nomination was a foregone
conclusion, so when news of Lincoln’s nomination came, it was considered a
hoax. It was said in 1856 that John C. Fremont was nominated to be defeated
until the Republican party got stronger.* The Tribune opined “Lincoln
was set up to be knocked down to save the credit of some other man.” Then the New
York Times of a few days earlier suggested Lincoln’s nomination was so bad
that the chances of any candidate
nominated at Baltimore were greatly improved.
Then the Boston Courier,
an old line Whig journal, believed it was the same influences that overthrew
Daniel Webster in Baltimore in 1852 secured the defeat of Mr. Seward in
Chicago. The Courier said Seward was a first class statesman and anybody
who knew the “rail splitter” would be the first to admit he was not. It said that
nomination was the “meanest specimen of availability.” The Courier asked
what Republican editors had to say about such “impudence.”
Editor Thurlow Weed of the Albany
Journal was Seward’s political manager, and Weed came “ungracefully” to the
support of Lincoln, doing so under protest and writing that it was only “an
idle attempt to disguise the disappointment of the people of New York” in
regard to the failure of the Chicago convention. Kewaunee Enterprize
pointed out that Republicans of Wisconsin were of the same spirit. On the 21st
of June, the New York Tribune suggested that some prominent members of
the Albany lobby were goning to bolt the Chicago nominations. The Albany lobby
was made up of its favorite son’s supporters.
On May 23,1860, just days before Kewaunee received the news
that the Hon. Abraham Lincoln was nominated for President on the third ballot,
Capt. Smith of the schooner Racine brought a newspaper, the Racine
Daily Journal, which gave the account of the Republican convention held the
previous Friday, May 18.
The Journal said the third formal ballot gave Mr.
Lincoln 235 votes. The first ballot gave Seward 193 ½, Lincoln 102, Bates, 48,
Cameron 50 ½ and Samuel Chase 49. On the second, Seward received 184 ½ ,
Lincoln 181, Bates 45, Chase 42 ½ with the balance scattered among others. Then
came the third ballot. When Hannibal Hamlin was nominated as vice president
that afternoon, it was said the nominations were confirmed with such enthusiasm
that it was almost beyond conception. But, as history tells us, that was not quite factual, but, of
course, politics is politics.
News from Chicago was that an
hour before Mr. Green opened the Republican convention with a prayer, the
facility was densly crowded. First, it was moved by Blair of Missouri, to admit
5 more delegates to give them a vote equal to the electorial vote.
According to news received, it
was Everett of New York nominating William Seward. Abraham Lincoln’s campaign
manager Norman B. Judd of Illinois nominated him. No surprise that others from
the candidates' home states did the nominating, but it was Caleb B. Smith of Indiana
who seconded Lincoln’s nomination. It was said all candidates received great
applause, but the most was reserved for Lincoln and Seward.
Surprising as it was, Abraham Lincoln won the presidential election. Before he could take office in March 1861, the February
13, 1861, issue of the Enterprise reported Madison Patriot of the
4th said it felt “irrepressible” Republicans got themselves into “bad order”
with the president elect, which they would find out in due time. It did say Mr.
Lincoln was considered to be a man of sense who knew he could never be
president of the whole country. The Enterprize pointed out that Seward
and Cameron (by then in support of Lincoln) spoke for themselves and the
President-elect.
The paper said if Mr. Lincoln redeemed the “hope warmed into
life, he could rely on the confidence and support of every Northern Democrat.”
If they backed him, he had nothing to fear. The paper suggested a wait and see
approach. It hoped he could restore government to its “original stability and
safety.”
With unprecedented security arrangements to that time, Abraham
Lincoln took office on March 4, 1861. On March 13, the Enterprize told
readership that Mr. Lincoln made one of
his characteristic speeches that was either ignorance of the widespread effects
of national division or a woeful misrepresentation of the true state of trade
and business when he said there was “no cause for this and nobody is hurt.” The
paper said thousands were unemployed in the North – reported to be 30% in Philadelphia alone -
because of secession brought about by “intense love for the Negro,” in
preference to citizens "means somebody is hurt and pretty badly too.”
The March 20 Enterprize carried an article from the
March 9 Patriot about winning back the seceding states. Thus, it said,
Mr. Lincoln was trying to steer the “old, shattered ship of State between the
dangers of Scylla and Charybdis,” and if he got the Union through, he would be
the greatest of all great men. If he failed, he would go down with the sinking
of the Union to be known no more.”
And the rest, as they say, is history.
-------------------
*March 20, 1854, is the date given for the establishment of
the Republican Party in Ripon, Wisconsin. Those founding it were against the
expansion of slavery.
**Although Chicago's 1860 population was nearing 110,000, the city did not have a large enough facility to house the presidential convention. Call "the Wigwam," meaning "temporary shelter, the wooden building was constructed in under a month to serve the convention. It was destroyed by fire in 1869.
Note: Men who ran against Mr. Lincoln were part of his first cabinet. Most positions changed with Lincoln’s short second term. In 1861, William H. Seward became President Lincoln’s Secretary of State. Edward Bates was Attorney General, Caleb Smith was Secretary of the Interior, Simon Cameron the Secretary of War and Solomon P. Chase Secretary of the Treasury.
Sources: An-An-api-sebe: Where is the River?, Kewaunee Enterprize (became Kewaunee Enterprise in 1865), Wikipedia.
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