Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln. Volume 6 [Dec. 13, 1862-Nov. 3, 1863].

Opinion on the Draft1Jump to section

[September 14? 1863]

It is at all times proper that misunderstanding between the public and the public servant should be avoided; and this is far more important

now, than in times of peace and tranquility. I therefore address you without searching for a precedent upon which to do so. Some of you are sincerely devoted to the republican institutions, and territorial integrity of our country, and yet are opposed to what is called the draft, or conscription.

At the beginning of the war, and ever since, a variety of motives pressing, some in one direction and some in the other, would be presented to the mind of each man physically fit for a soldier, upon the combined effect of which motives, he would, or would not, voluntarily enter the service. Among these motives would be patriotism, political bias, ambition, personal courage, love of adventure, want of employment, and convenience, or the opposites of some of these. We already have, and have had in the service, as appears, substantially all that can be obtained upon this voluntary weighing of motives. And yet we must somehow obtain more, or relinquish the original object of the contest, together with all the blood and treasure already expended in the effort to secure it. To meet this necessity the law for the draft has been enacted. You who do not wish to be soldiers, do not like this law. This is natural; nor does it imply want of patriotism. Nothing can be so just, and necessary, as to make us like it, if it is disagreeable to us. We are prone, too, to find false arguments with which to excuse ourselves for opposing such disagreeable things. In this case those who desire the rebellion to succeed, and others who seek reward in a different

way, are very active in accomodating us with this class of arguments. They tell us the law is unconstitutional. It is the first instance, I believe, in which the power of congress to do a thing has ever been questioned, in a case when the power is given by the constitution in express terms. Whether a power can be implied, when it is not expressed, has often been the subject of controversy; but this is the first case in which the degree of effrontery has been ventured upon, of denying a power which is plainly and distinctly written down in the constitution. The constitution declares that ``The congress shall have power . . . To raise and support armies; but no appropriation of money to that use shall be for a longer term than two years.'' The whole scope of the conscription act is ``to raise and support armies.'' There is nothing else in it. It makes no appropriation of money; and hence the money clause just quoted, is not touched by it. The case simply is the constitution provides that the congress shall have power to raise and support armies; and, by this act, the congress has exercised the power to raise and support armies. This is the whole of it. It is a law made in litteral pursuance of this part of the United States Constitution; and another part of the same constitution declares that ``This constitution, and the laws made in pursuance thereof . . . shall be the supreme law of the land, and the judges in every state shall be bound thereby, anything in the constitution or laws of any state to the contrary notwithstanding.''

Do you admit that the power is given to raise and support armies, and yet insist that by this act congress has not exercised the power in a constitutional mode?---has not done the thing, in the right way? Who is to judge of this? The constitution gives congress the power, but it does not prescribe the mode, or expressly declare who shall prescribe it. In such case congress must prescribe the mode, or relinquish the power. There is no alternative. Congress could not exercise the power to do the thing, if it had not the power of providing a way to do it, when no way is provided by the constitution for doing it. In fact congress would not have the power to raise and support armies, if even by the constitution, it were left to the option of any other, or others, to give or withhold the only mode of doing it. If the constitution had prescribed a mode, congress could and must follow that mode; but as it is, the mode necessarily goes to congress, with the power expressly given. The power is given fully, completely, unconditionally. It is not a power to raise armies if State authorities consent; nor if the men to compose the armies are entirely willing; but it is a power to raise and support armies given to congress by the constitution, without an if.

It is clear that a constitutional law may not be expedient or proper. Such would be a law to raise armies when no armies were needed. But this is not such. The republican institutions, and territorial integrity of our country can not be maintained without the further raising and supporting of armies. There can be no army without men. Men can be had only voluntarily, or involuntarily. We have ceased to obtain them voluntarily; and to obtain them involuntarily, is the draft---the conscription. If you dispute the fact, and declare that men can still be had voluntarily in sufficient numbers prove the assertion by yourselves volunteering in such numbers, and I shall gladly give up the draft. Or if not a sufficient number, but any one of you will volunteer, he for his single self, will escape all the horrors of the draft; and will thereby do only what each one of at least a million of his mainly brethren have already done. Their toil and blood have been given as much for you as for themselves. Shall it all be lost rather than you too, will bear your part?

I do not say that all who would avoid serving in the war, are unpatriotic; but I do think every patriot should willingly take his chance under a law made with great care in order to secure entire fairness. This law was considered, discussed, modified, and amended, by congress, at great length, and with much labor; and was finally passed, by both branches, with a near approach to unanimity. At last, it may not be exactly such as any one man out of congress, or even in congress, would have made it. It has been said, and I believe truly, that the constitution itself is not altogether such as any one of it's framers would have preferred. It was the joint work of all; and certainly the better that it was so.

Much complaint is made of that provision of the conscription law which allows a drafted man to substitute three hundred dollars for himself; while, as I believe, none is made of that provision which allows him to substitute another man for himself. Nor is the three hundred dollar provision objected to for unconstitutionality; but for inequality---for favoring the rich against the poor. The substitution of men is the provision if any, which favors the rich to the exclusion of the poor. But this being a provision in accordance with an old and well known practice, in the raising of armies, is not objected to. There would have been great objection if that provision had been omitted. And yet being in, the money provision really modifies the inequality which the other introduces. It allows men to escape the service, who are too poor to escape but for it. Without the money provision, competition among the more wealthy might, and probably would, raise the price of substitutes

above three hundred dollars, thus leaving the man who could raise only three hundred dollars, no escape from personal service. True, by the law as it is, the man who can not raise so much as three hundred dollars, nor obtain a personal substitute for less, can not escape; but he can come quite as near escaping as he could if the money provision were not in the law. To put it another way, is an unobjectionable law which allows only the man to escape who can pay a thousand dollars, made objectionable by adding a provision that any one may escape who can pay the smaller sum of three hundred dollars? This is the exact difference at this point between the present law and all former draft laws. It is true that by this law a some what larger number will escape than could under a law allowing personal substitutes only; but each additional man thus escaping will be [a] poorer man than could have escaped by the law in the other form. The money provision enlarges the class of exempts from actual service simply by admitting poorer men into it. How, then can this money provision be a wrong to the poor man? The inequality complained of pertains in greater degree to the substitution of men, and is really modified and lessened by the money provision. The inequality could only be perfectly cured by sweeping both provisions away. This being a great innovation, would probably leave the law more distasteful than it now is.

The principle of the draft, which simply is involuntary, or enforced service, is not new. It has been practiced in all ages of the world. It was well known to the framers of our constitution as one of the modes of raising armies, at the time they placed in that instrument the provision that ``the congress shall have power to raise and support armies.'' It has been used, just before, in establishing our independence; and it was also used under the constitution in 1812. Wherein is the peculiar hardship now? Shall we shrink from the necessary means to maintain our free government, which our grand-fathers employed to establish it, and our own fathers have already employed once to maintain it? Are we degenerate? Has the manhood of our race run out?

Again, a law may be both constitutional and expedient, and yet may be administered in an unjust and unfair way. This law belongs to a class, which class is composed of those laws whose object is to distribute burthens or benefits on the principle of equality. No one of these laws can ever be practically administered with that exactness which can be conceived of in the mind. A tax law, the principle of which is that each owner shall pay in proproportion [sic] to the value of his property, will be a dead letter, if no one can be compelled to pay until it can be shown that every other one will

pay in precisely the same proportion according to value; nay even, it will be a dead letter, if no one can be compelled to pay until it is certain that every other one will pay at all---even in unequal proportion. Again the United States House of representatives is constituted on the principle that each member is sent by the same number of people that each other one is sent by; and yet in practice no two of the whole number, much less the whole number, are ever sent by precisely the same number of constituents. The Districts can not be made precisely equal in population at first, and if they could, they would become unequal in a single day, and much more so in the ten years, which the Districts, once made, are to continue. They can not be re-modelled every day; nor, without too much expence and labor, even every year.

This sort of difficulty applies in full force, to the practical administration of the draft law. In fact the difficulty is greater in the case of the draft law. First, it starts with all the inequality of the congressional Districts; but these are based on entire population, while the draft is based upon those only who are fit for soldiers, and such may not bear the same proportion to the whole in one District, that they do in another. Again, the facts must be ascertained, and credit given, for the unequal numbers of soldiers which have already gone from the several Districts. In all these points errors will occur in spite of the utmost fidelity. The government is bound to administer the law with such an approach to exactness as is usual in analagous cases, and as entire good faith and fidelity will reach. If so great departures as to be inconsistent with such good faith and fidelity, or great departures occurring in any way, be pointed out, they shall be corrected; and any agent shown to have caused such departures intentionally, shall be dismissed.

With these views, and on these principles, I feel bound to tell you it is my purpose to see the draft law faithfully executed.

Annotation

[1]   AD, DLC-RTL. Nicolay and Hay date this document ``August [15?] 1863'' (NH, IX, 74), but a bracketed date on the first page of the manuscript reads ``[Aug 30?] 1863.'' From the contents it may be inferred that Lincoln intended to use the piece either as a public address or as part of a communication. An endorsement by Robert Todd Lincoln written on the back of the last page of the manuscript reads: ``This Mss. was probably written at the time of the Sprd. Letter of Aug---63---but not incorporated with it & never published.'' The reference is, of course, to Lincoln's letter to James C. Conkling, August 26, supra, but it would seem more probable that Lincoln contemplated issuance of his sentiments on the draft to counteract the numerous efforts to block enforcement of the law. Gideon Welles refers to such a paper as having been prepared by the president on September 14, but abandoned in favor of the proclamation of September 15, infra, suspending habeas corpus with respect to persons taken by the draft. Welles' Diary records the Cabinet discussion:

``September 14, Monday. The President called a special Cabinet council this morning at eleven. The course pursued by certain judges is, he says, defeating the draft. They are discharging the drafted men rapidly under habeas corpus, and he is determined to put a stop to these factious and mischievous proceedings if he has the authority. The Secretary of State and Attorney-General have each been consulted and declare they have no doubt of his authority. Mr. Blair was satisfied the President had the legal power, but whether the measure proposed, which is an order from the President directing the provost marshals to disregard the writ, or to make return that the persons to be discharged was held by authority of the President, was perhaps not the best process [see draft of order, September 17, infra]. Mr. Chase feared civil war would be inaugurated if the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus was suspended. Mr. Usher had doubts and uncertainties.

``The President was very determined, and intimated that he would not only enforce the law, but if Judge Lowry [Chief Justice Walter H. Lowrie, Supreme Court of Pennsylvania] and others continued to interfere and interrupt the draft he would send them after Vallandigham. As considerable discussion had taken place, he was prepared to act, though willing to listen to, and, if mistaken, to defer to, others. Up to this point neither Mr. Stanton or myself had taken part in the discussion, though Stanton had undoubtedly expressed his opinion and prompted the proposed action.

``I remarked that the subject was not new to me, . . . I had as high regard and reverence for that writ as any one, but it seemed to me there should be some way to prevent its abuse. A factious and evil-minded judge . . . could embarrass the Government, could delay the departure of a vessel . . . could stop armies on the march . . . .

``The President said he would prepare and submit a paper at an adjourned meeting for criticism to-morrow at 9 A.M.

``September 15, Tuesday. The President read the paper which he had drawn up. Mr. Chase proposed as a preferable course that the President should, pursuant to the act of the 3rd of March last, suspend by proclamation the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus on military questions. This proposition . . . met with favor from all, and the Council adjourned to 1 P.M. for Mr. Seward to prepare a proclamation. On meeting . . . the draft which Mr. Seward had prepared was criticized and after some modifications was ordered to be recopied and carried into effect. All came into the arrangement cordially after Stanton read the reports of sundry provost marshals and others detailing the schemes practiced for defeating the draft . . . .''

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