THE REMINISCENCES OF CARL SCHURZ
There was no real antagonism among us to Abraham Lincoln of Illinois. He was universally recognized as a true anti-slavery leader who had done our cause very great service. We esteemed him most highly, but we did not favor his nomination, because we were for Seward, as the current phrase then was, “first, last, and all the time.”
But I must confess that my enthusiasm for Seward received a little chill, even before the convention met. Immediately after our arrival at Chicago, we from Wisconsin thought it our duty to report ourselves at the headquarters of the New York delegation to ask for suggestions as to what we might do to further the interests of our candidate. But we did not find there any of the distinguished members of that delegation whom we most wished to see—William M. Evarts, George William Curtis, Henry J. Raymond, Governor Morgan, and others. We found only the actual chief manager of the Seward interest, Mr. Thurlow Weed, and around him a crowd of men, some of whom did not strike me as desirable companions. They were New York politicians, apparently of the lower sort, whom Thurlow Weed had brought with him to aid him in doing his work. What that work consisted in I could guess from the conversations I was permitted to hear, for they talked very freely about the great services they had rendered or were going to render. They had marched in street parades with brass bands and Seward banners to produce the impression that the whole country was ablaze with enthusiasm for Seward. They had treated members of other delegations with no end of champagne and cigars, to win them for Seward, if not as their first, then at least as their second choice, to be voted for on the second or third ballot. They had hinted to this man and that man supposed to wield some influence, that if he could throw that influence for Seward, he might, in case of success, count upon
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