but he has become irritable, uncomfortable, so that he is never perfectly happy unless he is thoroughly miserable and able to make everybody else just as uncomfortable as he is himself.  He is either determined to annoy me, or that I shall pat him on the shoulder and coax him to stay.  I don’t think I ought to do it.  I will not do it.  I will take him at his word.”  So he did.  This was at the end of June, 1864, when Lincoln’s apprehensions about his own re-election were keen, and the resignation of Chase, along with the retention of Blair, seemed likely to provoke anger which was very dangerous to himself.  An excellent successor to the indispensable man was soon found.  Chase found more satisfaction than ever in insidious opposition to Lincoln.  Lincoln’s opportunity of requiting him was not yet.

The question of the Presidency loomed large from the beginning of the year to the election in November.  At first, while the affairs of war seemed to be in good train, the chief question was who should be the Republican candidate.  It was obviously not a time when a President of even moderate ability and character, with all the threads in his hands, could wisely have been replaced except for overwhelming reasons.  But since 1832, when Jackson had been re-elected, the practice of giving a President a second term had lapsed.  It has been seen that there was friction, not wholly unnatural, between Lincoln and many of his party.  The inner circles of politicians were considering what candidate could carry the country.  They were doing so with great anxiety, for disaffection was growing serious in the North and the Democrats would make a good fight.  They honestly doubted whether Lincoln was the best candidate, and attributed their own excited mood of criticism to the public at large.  They forgot the leaning of ordinary men towards one who is already serving them honestly.  Of the other possible candidates, including Chase, Fremont had the most energetic backers.  Enough has been said already of his delusive attractiveness.  General Butler had also some support.  He was an impostor of a coarser but more useful stamp.  A successful advocate in Massachusetts, he had commanded the militia of the State when they first appeared on the scene at Baltimore in 1861, and he had been in evidence ever since without sufficient opportunity till May, 1864, of proving that real military incapacity of which some of Lincoln’s friends suspected him.  He had a kind of resourceful impudence, coupled with executive vigour and a good deal of wit, which had made him useful in the less martial duties of his command.  Generals in a war of this character were often so placed that they had little fighting to do and much civil government, and Butler, who had first treated slaves as “contraband” and had dealt with his difficulties about negroes with more heart and more sense than many generals, had to some extent earned his reputation among the Republicans.