In his acknowledge of intelligence that comes from other sources, Lincoln also looked for expertise in areas that were not those in which he was knowledgeable. Kearns Goodwin (2005, p. 365) offers the following example regarding Lincoln’s reliance on the financial expertise of Salmon Chase, his Secretary of the Treasury:
Lincoln looked to Chase for guidance on the complex problem of financing a war at a time when the government was heavily in debt. The economic Panic of 1857, corruption in the Buchanan administration, and the partial dismemberment of the Union had taken a massive toll on the government coffers. With Congress not in session to authorize new tariffs and taxes, Chase was forced to rely on government loans to sustain war expenditures. Banks held back at first, demanding higher interest rates than the government could afford to pay, but eventually, Chase cobbled together enough revenue to meet expenses until Congress convened.
Chase later noted proudly that in the early days of the war, Lincoln relied on him to carry out functions that ordinarily belonged to the War Department.””
While these examples relate to Lincoln openness to advise from and reliance on expertise from members of his cabinet, Kearns Goodwin (2005, pp.491-492) offers many examples of the hearty and often heated debates that took place during frequent cabinet meetings.
Hearty and Heated Debate
I offer one except from her account. It concerns a highly contentious cabinet meeting regarding the removal of Secretary Stanton from his office. This meeting was attended not only by members of Lincoln’s cabinet but also a “Committee of Nine” (senators who came to the meeting with a resolution to remove Stanton from his post):
“. . . Lincoln proposed a joint session later that evening with cabinet and the Committee of Nine. . . . Lincoln began the unusual session by reading the resolutions of the senators and inviting a candid discussion of the issues raised. . . [Lincoln defended] Seward against the committee’s charge. . . The senators renewed their demand that ‘the whole Cabinet” must ‘consider and decide great questions, ‘with no one individual directing the ‘whole Executive action.’ They noted with approval that John Quincy Adams adhered to the majority vote of his cabinet even when he disagreed with them.
. . .Blair followed with a long argument that ‘sustained the President and dissented most decidedly from the idea of a plural Executive.’ Though he ‘had differed much with Mr. Seward,’ he nonetheless ‘believed him as earnest as any one in the war; though it would be injurious to the public service to have him leave the Cabinet, and that the Senate had better not meddle with matters of that kind.’ Bates expressed wholehearted agreement with Blair. . . .
After nearly five hours of open conversation, sensing he was making headway, Lincoln asked each of the senators if he still desired to see Seward resign his position. Though four . . . reaffirmed their original position, the others had changed their minds. When the meeting adjourned at1 a.m., the senators suspected that no change in the cabinet would be made.”
