the operation
of the odious law. The mercantile element was instantly and fully
accepted by them. The most patriotic did not hesitate to make every
effort to have the assigned quotas reduced; they drew jealous
comparisons to show inequalities; and they concocted all sorts of
schemes for obtaining credits. Not marshaling recruits in the field, but
filling quotas upon paper, seemed a legitimate purpose; for the matter
had become one of figures, of business, of competition, and all the
shrewdness of the Yankee mind was at once aroused to gain for one's
self, though at the expense of one's neighbors. Especially the
Democratic officials were viciously fertile in creating obstacles. The
fact that the Act of Congress was based on the precedent of an Act of
the Confederate Congress, passed a year before, did not seem in the
least to conciliate the Copperheads. Governor Seymour of New York
obtained a discreditable preeminence in thwarting the administration. He
gathered ingenious statistics, and upon them based charges of dishonest
apportionments and of fraudulent discrimination against Democratic
precincts. He also declared the statute unconstitutional, and asked the
President to stay all proceedings under it until it could be passed upon
by the Supreme Court of the United States,--an ingenuous proposition,
which he neglected to make practicable by arranging with General Lee to
remain conveniently quiescent while the learned judges should be
discussing the methods of reinforcing the Northern armies.

In a word, Mr. Lincoln was confronted by every difficulty that
Republican inventiveness and Democratic disaffection could devise. Yet
the draft must go on, or the war must stop. His reasonableness, his
patience, his capacity to endure unfair trials, received in this
business a demonstration more conspicuous than in any other during his
presidency. Whenever apportionments, dates, and credits were questioned,
he was liberal in making temporary, and sometimes permanent allowances,
preferring that any error in exactions should be in the way of
moderation. But in the main business he was inflexible; and at last it
came to a direct issue between himself and the malcontents, whether the
draft should go on or stop. In the middle of July the mob in New York
city tested the question. The drafting began there on Saturday morning,
July 11. On Monday morning, July 13, the famous riot broke out. It was
an appalling storm of rage on the part of