SEWARD 793 so discharge our trust as to secure in the high- est attainable degree their happiness." The phrase "higher law," thus applied to the law of God, was the subject of much excited com- ment in the senate and in the public press, and was afterward urged as a ground of re- proach by the political enemies of Mr. Seward. The death of President Taylor in July, 1850, and the accession of Vice President Fillmore, brought the conservative wing of the whig party into prominence; but Mr. Seward still maintained his position as a leader on the anti-slavery side. Besides his speeches on the compromises of 1850, he delivered several oth- ers on the commercial and industrial relations of the country. His speeches on the repeal of the Missouri compromise and the admission of Kansas, like those on the compromises of 1850, were widely circulated. In 1858 he made a speech at Rochester, in which, after alluding to the constant collision between the systems of free and slave labor in the United States, he said: "It is an irrepressible con- flict between opposing and enduring forces, and it means that the United States must and will, sooner or later, become either entirely a slaveholding nation, or entirely a free labor nation." The southern secession threatening during the last session of the 36th congress (1860-'61), Mr. Seward in the senate expressed his views on "the state of the Union" in two speeches, in which he said: "I avow my ad- herence to the Union with my friends, with my party, with my state, or without either, as they may determine ; in every event of peace or war, with every consequence of honor or dishonor, of life or death." He declared also in conclusion : "I certainly shall never direct- ly or indirectly give my vote to establish or sanction slavery in the common territories of the United States, or anywhere else in the world." Mr. Seward's second term closed with the 36th congress, March 4, 1861. He had been reflected in 1855 under circum- stances of peculiar interest. He was strenu- ously opposed both by those who disliked his uncompromising resistance to the slave in- terest, and by those who could not tolerate his opposition to the " American " party, at that time a rising power throughout the Union. The whig party having adopted in 1852 a plat- form approving of the slavery compromises of 1850, and nominated Gen. Scott for the presidency, Mr. Seward declined to sustain the platform, while he yielded his support to the candidate. In the presidential canvass of 1856 he was very active in behalf of Col. Fre- mont, the republican candidate. In 1859 he made a second visit to Europe, and extended his travels to Egypt and the Holy Land. In 1860, as in 1856, a large portion of the re- publican party favored his nomination for the presidency. In the convention, on the first ballot, he received 173 votes, Mr. Lincoln, the next highest, 102 necessary for a choice, 233. Lincoln having been nominated, Seward actively canvassed the western states in his be- half. Lincoln tendered the chief place in his cabinet to Mr. Seward, and on March 4, 1861, he entered upon the duties of secretary of state. Secession was then imminent, but Seward ap- parently failed at first to apprehend the mag- nitude of the movement. He declined (March, 1861) to negotiate with confederate commis- sioners, but believed that the difficulties of the two sections could be settled without recourse to arms; and he favored as a peace measure the evacuation of Forts Pickens and Sumter. During the entire war his management of for- eign affairs was eminently politic and effective. Conspicuous among these efforts were his con- duct in the Trent affair (November, 1861) ; his declining the proposal of France to unite with Russia and Great Britain to mediate between the federal government and the confederates ; his course in respect to the French invasion of Mexico; and his thorough reorganization of the diplomatic service abroad, so that by the American representatives, as well as by his own despatches, the real issues at stake in the civil war were constantly made prominent to foreign governments. His diplomatic manage- ment during this critical period more than once kept the country from involvement in a foreign war. On Lincoln's election to a second term Seward continued as secretary of state. Early in the spring of 1865 he was thrown from his carriage, and his jaw and one arm were broken. While he was confined to his bed by these injuries, on the night of the assas- sination of Lincoln, April 14, one of the con- spirators penetrated to Seward's room and struck him several times with a knife, and also severely wounded Frederick W. Seward, who came to his father's rescue. The assassin es- caped from the house, but was soon arrested, and was hanged with other conspirators, July 7. Mr. Seward's recovery was slow and pain- ful ; but as soon as he was able he resumed the duties of his office under President Johnson, becoming unpopular with a large portion of his party from his support of the president's re- construction policy. In March, 1869, he retired from public life, and soon after made an ex- tended tour through California and Oregon, and went to Alaska, which had been acquired during his secretaryship and mainly through his efforts. In August, 1870, accompanied by members of his family, he set out upon a tour around the world, returning to Auburn in Oc- tober, 1871. He was everywhere received with the greatest distinction, and the results of his observations were embodied in " William H. Seward's Travels around the World," edited by his adopted daughter, Olive Risley Seward (8vo, New York, 1873). Mr. Seward^contrib- uted a historical essay, entitled "Notes on New York," to the great work on the natural history of the state, to which it forms the in- troduction. In the senate he delivered eulo- giums on Clay, Webster, Clayton, Rusk, and Broderick. In 1849 he prepared a life of John
