OREGON'S NOMINATION OF LINCOLN 211
"The general expectation was that Mr. Seward would re- ceive the nomination for the first ofHce. . . . The person chiefly instrumental in frustrating the hopes of Mr. Seward's friends was the editor of the Tribune. At least we may say, with the utmost confidence, that, had Mr. Greeley, in his news- paper and at Chicago, given a hearty support to Mr. Seward, that gentleman would have been nominated."
Likewise ascribing the defeat of Seward to Greeley, Edward Everett Hale, Jr., in his William H. Seward, says (p. 259) :
"This was a very great surprise and disappointment to Sew- ard's political friends, and to himself. It was ascribed to a number of causes, notably the course of Horace Greeley, who had attended the convention with a view of supporting Bates, on the ground that Seward could not be elected."
Thornton Kirkland Lothrop, in his William Henry Seward (p. 215), says Greeley was ready to support anybody to beat Seward; "And it has been said that, when Seward was ac- tually defeated, he [Greeley] openly gave thanks that he was even with him at last." This author admits that the influence of Greeley was probably exaggerated, but does not deny that it was effective. "Greeley bided his time," continues Loth- rop, "and in 1860 went from New York to Chicago as a dele- gate from Oregon to the Republican convention that he might do all in his power to get even with Seward and defeat his nomination."
Editor Raymond, Greeley's newspaper protege and later his rival, who had supplanted Greeley with Seward and Weed in the State Whig convention of 1854, was badly cut up by Sew- ard's defeat in 1860. Knowing these associations, we may more intimately judge his comments in the New York Times, in a letter written from Auburn, New York, after an interview with Seward, following the convention :
"The great point aimed at was Mr. Seward's defeat ; and, in that endeavor, Mr. Greeley labored harder and did tenfold more than the whole family of Blairs, together with the gubernatorial candidates to whom he modestly hands over the honors of the effective campaign. . . . It is perfectly safe to say that no other man certainly no one occupying a position less favor- able for such an assault could possibly have accomplished
