Papers Relating to Foreign Affairs, Accompanying the Annual Message of the President to the Second Session Thirty-eighth Congress, Part IV, Appendix to diplomatic correspondence of 1865; the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, late president of the United States of America, and the attempted assassination of William H. Seward, Secretary of State, and Frederick W. Seward, Assistant Secretary, on the evening of the 14th of April, 1865; expressions of condolence and sympathy inspired by these events

Reply of Mr. Bigelow.

undated

Gentlemen: I respect and share the emotions which have inspired this address. I shall have a melancholy satisfaction in communicating it to those whose stricken hearts have the first claim to its consolations.

The crime which has provoked this impressive demonstration from the loyal Americans in Paris is one which unites all the elements of human depravity in their largest proportions, Its victims are among those whose loss at the present moment the whole civilized world would most unanimously deplore. Upon us, his compatriots, who knew best what a rare collection of public and private virtues went down into the grave with Abraham Lincoln, this blow has fallen with peculiar severity, and I thank you for the faithful eloquence with which you have interpreted our common sorrow.

But no crime was ever committed that was not an involuntary homage to virtue. The war between the principles of good and evil is always waging; and if the Lamb that took away the sins of the world had to bear his testimony upon the cross, why should he who proclaimed deliverance to a race of bondmen be safe from the treacherous hand of the assassin? How more appropriately could our great national reproach ultimate itself? Was it more than historic justice to mark the grave of chattel slavery in the United States by a crime that was never perpetrated, whatever the pretence, except in the interests of slavery?

Those who, like myself, are accustomed to search for the hand of God in the phenomena of human life, cannot but feel, as, after much reflection, I am led to feel, that our people were never nearer to Him than at the dreadful moment when we seemed, humanly speaking, most deserted. What revelations that crime has made; what lessons it has taught, and will teach; what prejudices it has corrected; what hostilities it has suspended; what sympathies it has awakened! They are in everyone’s mind; they are on everyone’s tongue. Even here in a foreign land, and where what we most cherish in our political institutions may be supposed to be but imperfectly comprehended, what American has not been surprised and comforted by the spontaneous and universal demonstrations of sympathy which our national bereavement has elicited from ail parties, and from every class, from the humblest and from the most exalted? Such a tribute was never paid to our country before; such homage was never paid to any other American. And why to Mr. Lincoln? Because his death, and the time and manner of it, seem to have rendered his whole public career luminous, and to make it clear to the most distant observers that our late President, inspired by a love which made all men his brothers, had been building wiser than they knew; that he had been lighting the fight of humanity, of justice, and of civilization; and, finally, that he had been summoned hence to receive a crown of triumph more enduring than that which was preparing for him here.

It is not too much to say that during the long four years of our bloody struggle with this rebellion the world made less progress in comprehending its baleful origin and purposes, and the common interest of humanity in resisting it, than has been made during the brief interval which has elapsed since this dreadful tragedy. By the hand of an assassin that simple-hearted and single-minded patriot has been transfigured, and has taken his place in history as the impersonation of a cause which henceforth it will be blasphemy to assail.

I was never so proud of being an American as when I learned with what comparative unanimity my countrymen put the seal of their approbation upon all the sacrifices he had invited them to make by re-electing him to the Presidency. Nor was I ever more proud of being a man than since I have learned by his death how, during all his troubled administration, his public and private virtues have been secretly but steadily graving themselves upon the hearts of mankind. My heart goes out more than ever to our brothers in foreign lands; who have shown such readiness to lessen the burden of our great affliction by sharing it with us.

I desire to join with all my heart in your expressions of sympathy for those-whose grief is yet too poignant to be assuaged by such considerations as these. May God sustain them, and in his own good time reveal to them the silver lining which always lies concealed in the folds of the darkest clouds.

And, while weeping with those that weep, you do well to rejoice with those who rejoice that God in his mercy shortened the arm that was lifted against our venerable and illustrious Secretary of State and his noble sons. Had they too been swept into a martyr’s grave, then, indeed, had assassination triumphed. But, thanks be to God, they still live, and in them lives on our lamented President. In their trials, in their disappointments, in their plans, in their hopes, in their triumphs, the late President and Mr. Seward were one. In Mr. Seward’s escape the murderer of the President is deprived of every advantage that could possibly have tempered the remorse by which, for the remaining hours of his wretched life, he must have been tormented. Swift justice has already overtaken him, and he is now where we have no occasion to follow him, either with our wrath or with our commiseration.

I had occasion, some three years ago, to warn Mr. Seward of plots maturing then against the lives of leading loyal statesmen in different cities of our republic, intelligence of which had reached me here. His reply has acquired, from recent events, such a painful interest that I feel justified by the present occasion in reading it to you:

“Department of State,
“Washington, July 15, 1862.

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“There is no doubt that from a period anterior to the breaking out of the insurrection, plots and conspiracies for purposes of assassination have been frequently formed and organized. And it is not unlikely that such an one as has been reported to you is now in agitation among the insurgents. If it be so, it need furnish no ground for anxiety. Assassination is not an American practice or habit, and one so vicious and so desperate cannot be engrafted into our political system.

“This conviction of mine has steadily gained strength since the civil war began. Every day’s experience confirms it. The President, during the heated season, occupies a country house near the Soldiers’ Home, two or three miles from the city. He goes to and from that place on horseback, night and morning, unguarded. I go there, unattended, at all hours, by daylight and moonlight, by starlight and without any light.”

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You will remark in these lines that same hopeful, confiding nature that think eth no evil; that inextinguishable reliance on the good sense and manly instincts of his country-people, which has sustained him, and through him, in a great degree, the nation during four long years of trial which required, if any ever did, statesmen that walked by faith, and not by sight.

Among the many marvellous results of this great tragedy there is still one to which, I am sure, you will pardon an allusion.

The fatal ball that raised Abraham Lincoln to the glory of a martyr, discharged a debt of gratitude to Andrew Johnson, for which nothing short of the highest national honors would suffice. Among the statesmen now living it would be difficult to name one who, according to his opportunity, has placed his country under greater obligations than the constitutional successor of President Lincoln. With some experience of almost every condition of social life, he has passed through every grade of public distinction in the United States, from the lowest to the very highest, and he never quitted any public trust except for one of greater honor and responsibility. That could never be said of an ordinary man. Mr. Johnson has now entered upon new and unprecedented trials. I share fully your confidence in his ability to meet them all. It should be a matter of congratulation with us, in this hour of national affliction, that the mantle of our lamented President should have fallen upon the ample shoulders of a statesman so experienced, so upright, and so meritorious as Andrew Johnson.