The 1860 Republican National Convention was a presidential nominating convention that met May 16–18 in Chicago, Illinois. It was held to nominate the Republican Party's candidates for president and vice president in the 1860 election. The convention selected former representative Abraham Lincoln of Illinois for president and Senator Hannibal Hamlin of Maine for vice president.
Entering the 1860 convention, Senator William H. Seward of New York was generally regarded as the front-runner, but Lincoln, Governor Salmon P. Chase of Ohio, former representative Edward Bates of Missouri, and Senator Simon Cameron of Pennsylvania all commanded support from a significant share of delegates. Seward led on the first ballot but fell short of a majority, while Lincoln finished in a strong second place. Cameron's delegates shifted to Lincoln on the second ballot, leaving Lincoln essentially tied with Seward. Lincoln clinched the nomination on the third ballot after consolidating support from more delegates who had backed candidates other than Seward.
Hamlin was nominated on the second vice presidential ballot, defeating Cassius Clay of Kentucky and several other candidates.
The ticket of Lincoln and Hamlin went on to win the 1860 general election. After taking office in 1861, Lincoln appointed all four of his major opponents to his cabinet: Seward for secretary of state, Chase for secretary of the treasury (and later for chief justice), Bates for attorney general, and Cameron for secretary of war.
History
Background
thumb|right|320px|Wood-frame "Wigwam" building specially designed for the 1860 Republican Convention in Chicago
By 1860 the dissolution of the Whig Party in America had become an accomplished fact, with establishment Whig politicians, former Free Soilers, and a certain number of anti-Catholic populists from the Know Nothing movement flocking to the banner of the fledgling anti-slavery Republican Party. While 1856 Republican presidential nominee John C. Frémont had met with failure, party gains were made throughout the Northern United States as the sectional crisis over slavery intensified.
Horace Greeley, Ebenezer R. Hoar, and Edwin D. Morgan were interested in holding the 1860 convention in a border state. Party leaders sought to hold their 1860 nominating convention in the burgeoning Middle Western trade center of Chicago, then a city of some 110,000 people. The city had no sufficiently large meeting hall, so an appropriation was made for a temporary wood-frame assembly hallknown as the "Wigwam"to seat ten thousand delegates, guests, and observers. The rapidly designed and constructed building proved well fit for the purpose, featuring excellent lines of sight and stellar acoustics, allowing even an ordinary speaker to be heard throughout the room.
The Convention commanded the interest and attention of a multitude of curious citizens who crowded the "Wigwam" to the rafters. Delegations were seated by state and the gathering was virtually devoid of Southern participation, with no delegations attending from the slave states of North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Arkansas, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Florida.
Delegation voting strength was loosely based upon the size of each state's congressional delegation, subject to some modification by the Credentials Committee, with the Northeastern delegations of New York (70), Pennsylvania (54), Massachusetts (26), and New Jersey (14) constituting the largest regional block, surpassing the Midwestern states of Ohio (46), Indiana (26), Illinois (22), and Iowa (8). Some 86 votes were apportioned to the six states of New England.
Daily affairs
With the convention called to order on May 16, former U.S. Representative David Wilmot of Pennsylvania was elected temporary chairman of the gathering. He had been the author in 1848 of the Wilmot Proviso which would have banned slavery from new states incorporated into the Union.</blockquote>
Organizational tasks filled the rest of the first day's activities, including the appointment of a Credentials Committee and a Resolutions Committee.
In addition to the preservation of the Union, all five of these additional promises were enacted by the Thirty-seventh Congress and implemented by Abraham Lincoln or the presidents who immediately succeeded him.
Presidential nomination
Presidential candidates
<gallery perrow="4" style="text-align:center;">
File:Abraham Lincoln O-26 by Hesler, 1860 (cropped).jpg|Former Representative<br>Abraham Lincoln<br />of Illinois
File:William H. Seward portrait - restoration.jpg|Senator<br>William H. Seward<br>of New York
File:Smn Cameron-SecofWar (3x4a).jpg|Senator <br>Simon Cameron<br />of Pennsylvania
File:Mathew Brady, Portrait of Secretary of the Treasury Salmon P. Chase, officer of the United States government (1860–1865, full version) (1).jpg|Former Governor<br>Salmon P. Chase<br>of Ohio
File:Edward Bates - Brady-Handy (cropped).jpg|Former Representative<br>Edward Bates<br>of Missouri
File:WLDayton-1856 (cropped 3x4).png|State Attorney General<br>William L. Dayton <br>of New Jersey
File:IMG JohnMcLeanBWcrop.png|Associate Justice<br>John McLean<br>of Ohio
</gallery>
thumb|right|320px|Drawing of the Wigwam interior during the 1860 nominating convention. Note the second story gallery and curved ceiling structure to allow for better acoustics.
The Republican National Convention met in mid-May 1860, after the Democrats had been forced to adjourn their convention in Charleston, South Carolina. With the Democrats in disarray and a sweep of the Northern states possible, the Republicans felt confident going into their convention in Chicago. William H. Seward from New York was considered the front-runner, followed Salmon P. Chase from Ohio, and Missouri's Edward Bates. Abraham Lincoln from Illinois, was lesser known, and was not considered to have a good chance against Seward. Seward had been governor and senator of New York, was from firm Whig backgrounds, and was a very able politician. Also running were John C. Frémont, William L. Dayton, Cassius M. Clay, and Benjamin Wade, who might be able to win if the convention deadlocked.
As the convention developed, however, it was revealed that frontrunners Seward, Chase, and Bates had each alienated factions of the Republican Party. Seward had been painted as a radical, and his speeches on slavery predicted inevitable conflict, which spooked moderate delegates. He also was firmly opposed to nativism, which further weakened his position. He had also been abandoned by his longtime friend and political ally Horace Greeley, publisher of the influential New-York Tribune. As the convention approached, Lincoln did not campaign very actively, as the "office was expected to seek the man". So it did at the Illinois state convention in downstate Decatur, a week before the national convention. Young politician Richard Oglesby had secretly found several fence rails from the Hanks-Lincoln farm that Lincoln may have split as a youngster, and paraded them into the convention with a banner that proclaimed Lincoln to be "The Rail Candidate" for president. Lincoln received a thunderous ovation, surpassing the expectations of him and his political allies.
Even with such support from his home state, Lincoln faced a difficult task if he was to win the nomination. He set about ensuring that he was the second choice of most delegates, realizing that the first round of voting at the convention was unlikely to produce a clear winner. He engineered that the convention would happen in Chicago, which would be inherently friendly to the Illinois-based Lincoln. He also made sure that the Illinois delegation would vote as a bloc for him. Lincoln did not attend the convention in person, and left the task of delegate wrangling to his friends Leonard Swett, Ward Hill Lamon, and David Davis.
During the night of May 17–18, they worked frantically to win anti-Seward delegates for Lincoln. They showed that Lincoln already had the most support after Seward, which persuaded some. They also made a deal with Simon Cameron of Pennsylvania, who recognized that he had no chance of winning the nomination himself. Cameron controlled the Pennsylvania delegation, and he offered to trade his support for the promise of a cabinet position for himself and control of Federal patronage in Pennsylvania. Lincoln did not want to make any such deal; from Springfield, he telegraphed to Davis "". Despite this restriction, Davis reached an understanding with Cameron, which eventually led to Cameron's appointment as Secretary of War.
The next day (May 18), when voting for the nomination began, Seward led on the first ballot with Lincoln a distant second. But on the second ballot, the Pennsylvania delegation switched to Lincoln, as well as some other delegates, putting him in a near-tie with Seward. Lincoln's combination of a moderate stance on slavery, long support for economic issues, his western origins, and strong oratory proved to be exactly what the delegates wanted in a president. On the third ballot on May 18, Lincoln secured the nomination overwhelmingly. Senator Hannibal Hamlin from Maine was nominated for vice-president, defeating Cassius M. Clay. Hamlin was surprised by his nomination, saying he was "astonished" and that he "neither expected nor desired it."
Among other accounts, an article, entitled "The Four Votes", published in the May 19, 1860, edition of the Chicago Press and Tribune attests that after seeing how close Lincoln was to the 234 votes needed, Robert K. Enos, a member of the Ohio delegation, was responsible for getting three fellow Ohio delegates to announce after the close of the third ballot that they were shifting their four votes to Lincoln, giving him sufficient votes to win the nomination. This triggered an avalanche towards Lincoln on the fourth ballot, with a final count of 350 votes for Lincoln out of 466 cast.
{| class="wikitable sortable" style="text-align:center"
! colspan="5" | Presidential Ballot
|-
!Candidate||1st || 2nd || 3rd (Before Shifts) || 3rd (After Shifts)
|-
!Lincoln
|style="background:#fdd;"|102
|style="background:#fdd;"|181
|style="background:#fbb;"|231.5
|style="background:#fbb;"|350
|-
!Seward
|style="background:#fbb;"|173.5
|style="background:#fbb;"|184.5
|style="background:#fdd;"|180
|style="background:#fdd;"|111.5
|-
!Cameron
|style="background:#fee;"|50.5
|2
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|-
!Chase
|49
|style="background:#fee;"|42.5
|style="background:#fee;"|24.5
|style="background:#fee;"|2
|-
!Bates
|48
|35
|22
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|-
!Dayton
|14
|10
|1
|1
|-
!McLean
|12
|8
|5
|0.5
|-
!Collamer
|10
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|-
!Wade
|3
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|-
!Clay
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|2
|1
|1
|-
!Frémont
|1
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|-
!Read
|1
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|-
!Sumner
|1
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|-
!Not Represented
|152
|152
|152
|152
|-
!Not Voting
|1
|1
|1
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|}
<br />
Presidential Balloting / 3rd Day of Convention (May 18, 1860)
<gallery perrow="4" style="text-align:center;">
File:1860RepublicanPresidentialNomination1stBallot.png|1st<br />Presidential Ballot
File:1860RepublicanPresidentialNomination2ndBallot.png|2nd<br />Presidential Ballot
File:1860RepublicanPresidentialNomination3rdBallotBefore.png|3rd<br />Presidential Ballot<br />(Before Shifts)
File:1860RepublicanPresidentialNomination3rdBallotAfter.png|3rd<br />Presidential Ballot<br />(After Shifts)
</gallery>
Vice Presidential nomination
Vice Presidential candidates
<gallery perrow="3" style="text-align:center;">
File:Hannibal Hamlin, photo portrait seated, c1860-65-retouched-crop.jpg|Senator<br>Hannibal Hamlin<br>of Maine
File:Cassius Marcellus Clay (3x4a).jpg|Former<br>State Representative Cassius M. Clay<br>of Kentucky
File:JohnHickman.jpg|Representative<br>John Hickman<br>of Pennsylvania
File:AReeder.jpg|Former Kansas Governor Andrew H. Reeder<br>of Pennsylvania
File:Speaker Nathaniel P. Banks (cropped).jpg|Governor<br>Nathaniel P. Banks<br>of Massachusetts
</gallery>
Senator Hannibal Hamlin of Maine was nominated for vice president, defeating Cassius M. Clay of Kentucky.
{| class="wikitable sortable" style="text-align:center"
! colspan="3" | Vice Presidential Ballot
|-
!Candidate||1st || 2nd
|-
!Hamlin
|style="background:#fbb;"|194
|style="background:#fbb;"|367
|-
!Clay
|style="background:#fdd;"|100.5
|style="background:#fdd;"|86
|-
!Hickman
|style="background:#fee;"|57
|style="background:#fee;"|13
|-
!Reeder
|51
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|-
!Banks
|38.5
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|-
!Davis
|8
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|-
!Houston
|6
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|-
!Dayton
|3
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|-
!Read
|1
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|-
!Not Represented
|152
|152
|-
!Not Voting
|7
|style="background:#d3d3d3"|0
|}
<br />
Vice Presidential Balloting / 3rd Day of Convention (May 18, 1860)
<gallery perrow="2" style="text-align:center;">
File:1860RepublicanVicePresidentialNomination1stBallot.png|1st<br />Vice Presidential Ballot
File:1860RepublicanVicePresidentialNomination2ndBallot.png|2nd<br />Vice Presidential Ballot
</gallery>
See also
- 1860 Democratic National Convention
- 1860 United States presidential election
- History of the United States Republican Party
- List of Republican National Conventions
- United States presidential nominating convention
- Wide Awakes
- Wigwam<small> — Chicago venue for the 1860 convention.</small>
References
Works cited
Further reading
- Proceedings of the Republican National Convention held at Chicago, May 16, 17 and 18, 1860. Albany, NY: Weed, Parsons, and Company, 1860.
External links
- Republican Party Platform of 1860 at The American Presidency Project
- "Republican National Platform, 1860," Central Pacific Railroad Photographic History Museum, www.cprr.org/ <small>—Digital image of printed campaign flyer.</small>