the
Convention. This will enable us to define with some certainty the
points on which his policy would be likely to differ from that of Mr.
Lincoln. He agrees with him that the war was a matter of necessity, not
of choice. He agrees with him in assuming a right to emancipate slaves
as a matter of military expediency, differing only as to the method and
extent of its application,--a mere question of judgment. He agrees
with, him as to the propriety of drafting men for the public service,
having, indeed, been the first to recommend a draft of men whom he was
to command himself. He agrees with him that it is not only lawful, but
politic, to make arrests without the ordinary forms of law where the
public safety requires it, and himself both advised and accomplished
the seizure of an entire Legislature. So far there is no essential
difference, and beyond this we find very little, except that Mr.
Lincoln was in a position where he was called on to act with a view to
the public welfare, and General McClellan in one where he could express
abstract opinions, without the responsibility of trial, to be used
hereafter for partisan purposes as a part of his "record." For example,
just after his failure to coerce the State of Virginia, he took
occasion to instruct his superiors in their duty, and, among other
things, stated his opinion that the war "should not be a war looking to
the subjugation of the people of any State," but "should be against
armed forces and political organizations." The whole question of the
right to "coerce a sovereign State" appears to have arisen from a
confusion of the relations of a State to its own internal policy and to
the general government. But a State is certainly a "political
organization," and, if we understand General McClellan rightly, he
would coerce a State, but not the people of it,--a distinction which we
hope he appreciates better than its victims would be likely to do. We
find here also no diversity in principle between the two men, only that
Mr. Lincoln has been compelled to do, while General McClellan has had
the easier task of telling us what he would do. After the Peninsular
campaign, we cannot but think that even the latter would have been
inclined to say, with the wisest man that ever spoke in our tongue, "If
to do were as easy as to know what 'twere good to do, chapels had been
churches, and poor men's cottages princes' palaces."

[5] This letter was published in the public jou