o that just when the war was at its hottest, the patriotism of
the people seemed at its coldest. Defeats in the field and Copperheadism
at home combined in their dispiriting and deadly work. Voluntary
enlistment almost ceased. Thereupon Congress passed an act "for
enrolling and calling out the national forces." All able-bodied
citizens between twenty and forty-five years of age were to "perform
military duty in the service of the United States, when called on by the
President for that purpose."[50] This was strenuous earnest, for it
portended a draft.

The situation certainly was not to be considered without solicitude
when, in a war which peculiarly appealed to patriotism, compulsion must
be used to bring involuntary recruits to maintain the contest. Yet the
relaxation of the patriotic temper was really not so great as this fact
might seem to indicate. Besides many partial and obvious explanations,
one which is less obvious should also be noted. During two years of war
the people, notoriously of a temperament readily to accept new facts and
to adapt themselves thereto, had become accustomed to a state of war,
and had learned to regard it as a _condition_, not normal and permanent,
yet of indefinite duration. Accordingly they were now of opinion that
the government must charge itself with the management of this condition,
that is to say, with the conduct of the war, as a strict matter of
business, to be carried on like all other public duties and functions.
In the first months of stress every man had felt called upon to
contribute, personally, his own moral, financial, and even physical
support; but that crisis had passed, and it was now conceived that the
administration might fairly be required to arrange for getting men and
money and supplies in the systematic and business-like fashion in which,
as history taught, all other governments had been accustomed to get
these necessaries in time of war.

At any rate, however it was to be explained or commented upon, the fact
confronted Mr. Lincoln that he must institute enrollment and drafting.
The machinery was arranged and the very disagreeable task was entered
upon early in the summer of 1863. If it was painful in the first
instance for the President to order this, the process was immediately
made as hateful as possible for him. Even loyal and hearty
"war-governors" seemed at once to accept as their chief object the
protection of the people of their respective States from