was
really caring for them as a father would, and that they could go to him,
every one of them, as they would go to a father, and talk to him of what
troubled them, sure to find a willing ear and tender sympathy. Thus,
their President, and his cause, and his endeavors, and his success
gradually became to them almost matters of family concern. And this
popularity carried him triumphantly through the Presidential election
of 1864, in spite of an opposition within his own party which at first
seemed very formidable.

Many of the radical antislavery men were never quite satisfied with
Lincoln's ways of meeting the problems of the time. They were very
earnest and mostly very able men, who had positive ideas as to "how this
rebellion should be put down." They would not recognize the necessity
of measuring the steps of the government according to the progress
of opinion among the plain people. They criticised Lincoln's cautious
management as irresolute, halting, lacking in definite purpose and in
energy; he should not have delayed emancipation so long; he should not
have confided important commands to men of doubtful views as to slavery;
he should have authorized military commanders to set the slaves free
as they went on; he dealt too leniently with unsuccessful generals; he
should have put down all factious opposition with a strong hand instead
of trying to pacify it; he should have given the people accomplished
facts instead of arguing with them, and so on. It is true, these
criticisms were not always entirely unfounded. Lincoln's policy had,
with the virtues of democratic government, some of its weaknesses, which
in the presence of pressing exigencies were apt to deprive governmental
action of the necessary vigor; and his kindness of heart, his
disposition always to respect the feelings of others, frequently made
him recoil from anything like severity, even when severity was urgently
called for. But many of his radical critics have since then revised
their judgment sufficiently to admit that Lincoln's policy was, on the
whole, the wisest and safest; that a policy of heroic methods, while it
has sometimes accomplished great results, could in a democracy like
ours be maintained only by constant success; that it would have quickly
broken down under the weight of disaster; that it might have been
successful from the start, had the Union, at the beginning of the
conflict, had its Grants and Shermans and Sheridans, its Farraguts