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Show The Three Men Who Plade Lincoln President By ELMO SCOTT WATSON '"PlIIS is the story of three JL men named Jesse V. Fell, David Davis and Leonard Swelt. Perhaps you never heard of those men before. But if it hadn't been for them you might never have heard of Abraham Lincoln, either. That is why you are hearing of them, here and now. Several years ago Dr. William E. Barton, famous as an author- x' . ' "V ' v , - t I - T- - v.vrtft'Afatonl l-'i-VwWv'f v.-.v.. . a-.- .v. JESSE W. FELL ity on Lincoln, in an address before be-fore the Illinois State historical society declared: "Oregon could have made Lincoln Lin-coln a senator, but it is not certain cer-tain that any other state than Illinois could have made him President. He needed essentially essential-ly the conditions which he found in Illinois to develop the qualities quali-ties which Were inherent in him; and he needed a political situa-' situa-' tion such as existed in Illinois to make him at the opportune time the President of the United States. . ." Now comes another authority on Lincoln who takes what Barton Bar-ton said of Illinois, and narrows it down to an Illinois city. He is Sherman Day Wakefield, author au-thor of a new book, "HOW LINCOLN LIN-COLN BECAME PRESIDENT The Part Played by Blooming-ton, Blooming-ton, Illinois, and Certain of Its Citizens in Preparing Him for the Presidency and Securing His Nomination and Election," published pub-lished recently by Wilson-Erick-son, Inc., of New York. In the first chapter of his book Mr. Wakefield quotes the foregoing passage from Barton's speech and adds: : "Lincoln did not become President Presi-dent merely through his own ability. To be sure this was the ultimate cause of his success, but there were other factors in the situation. One of these was that he became fitted for office through hard experience in association asso-ciation with men of unusual ca pacity; and another, that he won the support of three influential men in Bloomington who devoted themselves with untiring energy to his cause." Those three men were Jesse W. Fell, David Davis and Leonard Leon-ard Swett. One of them was a Quaker from Pennsylvania, one was born on the eastern shore of Maryland and the third was a Yankee from Maine. So those three states can claim some share with Illinois, through their three native sons, in giving Abraham Abra-ham Lincoln to the nation and to the world. Jesse Fell was the Quaker. He was born in New Garden township, town-ship, Chester county, Pennsylvania, Pennsylva-nia, November 10, 1808, just three months before a son arrived ar-rived in the log cabin home of Tom and Nancy Hanks Lincoln ginning of a friendship which endured for 30 years and which was destined to be more important im-portant to that young legislator than either man then realized. In 1336 Fell became interested in real estate and turned his law office over to a young lawyer named David Davis. Davis was born at "The Rounds," Sassafras Sassa-fras Neck, in Cecil county, Maryland, Mary-land, on March 9, 1315. Graduated Gradu-ated from Kenyon college in Ohio at the age of seventeen, he studied stud-ied law for two years in an office in Lenox, Mass., and then attended at-tended law school in New Haven, Ha-ven, Conn., for a year. In 1835 he moved to Pekin, 111., and was admitted to the Illinois bar the following year. Evidently the young Marylander wasn't any too successful in Pekin for he was about to return to his native state when Jesse Fell suggested that he move to Bloomington and take over Fell's law practice which he was giving up for the real estate business. Davis accepted ac-cepted the offer, which also included in-cluded financial aid. About this time he first became acquainted, acquaint-ed, with Lincoln. But their closest clos-est association came some twelve years later when Davis, as a judge, and Lincoln, as a lawyer, were making the rounds of the Eighth Judicial. Circuit of Illinois. It was during this period in Lincoln's life that the youngest of the trio came on the scene. He was Leonard Swett, born near the village of Turner in Oxford Ox-ford county, Maine, on August 11, 1825. After three years at Waterville (now Colby) college, he began studying in the office of a law firm in Portland. He DAVID DAVIS stayed there two years, traveled for a year in the South and finally final-ly volunteered to serve in the Mexican war, during which time he contracted a disease which nearly proved fatal. Discharged Dis-charged from the service at Jefferson Jef-ferson Barracks, Mo., before he had fully recovered, Swett started start-ed for home. En route east he arrived in Bloomington where he settled down to teaching school rmrl t-oaHircf law wV)ilf fPPain- ing his health. He was admitted ad-mitted to the bar in June, 1849, and began the active practice of law in Bloomington. Through his acquaintance with Judge Davis Da-vis he met Lincoln, who had just returned from his one term in congress to take up his work as a circuit-riding lawyer again. "Lincoln spent over half of every ev-ery year riding the circuit," writes Wakefield. "And the influence in-fluence of the Eighth Circuit upon the career of Lincoln can scarcely be overestimated. It was on this circuit that Lincoln made the friendship of all sorts of people, and here he first became famous. But it was principally his friends in Bloom- ili.-fe-.:;'! SB 1-$."-!:? The Wigwam In Chicago Where Lincoln Was Nominated down in Kentucky. Migrating West at the age of twenty-three, Fell studied law in an attorney's office in Steubenville, Ohio, for two years, then continued his westward-faring to the raw little pioneer village of Bloomington, 111., where he opened its first law office in the spring of 1833. The next year legal business took Fell to Vandalia, then the state capital, and there he met a lanky young legislator from Sangamon San-gamon county named Abraham Lincoln. This marked the be- ington, headed by Jesse W. Fell, Judge David Davis and Leonard Swett, who created his countrywide country-wide fame, conceived of him as President, and secured his nomination." nom-ination." The first step toward this goal i was taken by Jesse W. Fell in 1854. On May 30 of that year the Kansas-Nebraska bill, which had been introduced into congress con-gress by Senator Stephen A. Douglas, became a law. Almost immediately the anti-slavery elements ele-ments in the North began to Lincoln in I860 make an issue of the bill and in August Douglas returned to his home state to justify his efforts in its behalf. On September 1 Douglas made a speech in Chicago, Chi-cago, defending the Kansas-Nebraska bill and he was scheduled to address a Democratic meeting in Bloomington on the same subject sub-ject later in the month. In the meantime a German Anti-Nebraska state convention was held in Bloomington and on the evening of September 12, Lincoln Lin-coln who was then in town to attend court, was invited to address ad-dress the delegates. On that occasion oc-casion he "for the first time in his life, publicly and in forthright forth-right words denounced slavery and asserted that it was incompatible in-compatible with American institutions." insti-tutions." As a result of this speech Jesse Fell conceived the idea of having a discussion of the subject by Lincoln and Douglas Doug-las when the latter came to Bloomington for the Democratic meeting on September 26. So Fell arranged to have Lincoln Lin-coln be in Bloomington on that date and when Douglas arrived he laid before the two men his plan for a series of joint debates. Lincoln was willing, but Douglas Doug-las declined. Although Fell's plan failed at the time, he did not give up the idea and for the next four years he continued to urge that the debates be held. In the meantime Lincoln, although al-though defeated in his attempt to win a seat in the United States senate in an election held in February, Feb-ruary, 1855, had become increasingly increas-ingly prominent in the councils of the Anti-Nebraska party in Illinois. On May 29, 1856 this party held a state convention in dates for state offices and elect delegates to a national convention. conven-tion. At that time Lincoln delivered de-livered in Major's hall in Bloomington Bloom-ington his famous "L o s t Speech," the climax of which was his declaration "We will say to the Southern disunionists, We won't go out of the Union, and you SHAN'T!'.' But if 1856 was an important year in Lincoln's career, 1858 was even more important. He and Douglas were rivals in the election for United States senator sena-tor and they were opponents in the famous Lincoln-Douglas debates. de-bates. Douglas won the election but popular opinion returned Lincoln Lin-coln as the winner of the debates. de-bates. Moreover, they made him "for the first time a nationally Irnum ficriiT'o TTntil isHrnolHr known, his rise to the presidency was impossible." Just as Jesse W. Fell was the first to suggest the debates with Douglas, so was he "the first man ociiiuoij ku biiuiii. ui i-iiii- coln as a Presidential possibility possi-bility and to urge Lincoln to become be-come a candidate." In giving the circumstances under which this came about, Wakefield quotes Fell's own words as follows: "In the fall of 1858, during the discussion between Senator Douglas and Mr. Lincoln, I had occasion to visit the Middle and Eastern states; and as the whole country was then agitated by the slavery question, and that discussion cut a prominent figure fig-ure in the agitation, I was frequently fre-quently applied to for information informa-tion in reference to Mr. Lincoln. I felt my state pride flattered by these inquiries, and still more to find the New York Tribune, and other papers, publishing co pious exuaeis iium uiese uia-cussions, uia-cussions, taken from the Chicago press. I did what little I could to satisfy so laudable a curiosity, curiosi-ty, not thinking, at first, that anything further would come of this discussion, in reference to Mr. Lincoln, than his election to the senate. At length, from the frequency of these inquiries and public notices of the Illinois contest, con-test, an impression began to form, that by judicious efforts he could be made the Republican candidate for the presidency in 18G0." Upon his return home, Fell presented the matter to Lincoln who rather pooh-poohed the idea. He admitted that he would like to be President but that he was also aware of the many practical difficulties which would prevent its coming to pass. Fell, however, how-ever, was firm in his conviction that it could be brought about and, as corresponding secretary of the Republican state central committee, he industriously promoted pro-moted the idea everywhere he went in Illinois. Furthermore he prevailed upon Lincoln to write an autobiographical sketch which he sent to a Republican leader in Pennsylvania who gave it wide circulation in the East. Back in Illinois Fell "had convinced con-vinced David Davis and Leonard Leon-ard Swett of the feasibility of making Lincoln President, and Lincoln found himself backed by as loyal and efficient a triumvirate trium-virate as he could well have." They formed a Lincoln club in Bloomington which, while professing pro-fessing to promote the interests of the Republican party, in reality real-ity was to boost Lincoln's candidacy. candi-dacy. They engineered an endorsement en-dorsement of him for President at a Republican mass meeting, held in Bloomington on April 2, 1860, to choose delegates to the state convention in Decatur on May 9. At this convention Lincoln's cousin, John Hanks, appeared with his famous fence rails, and Lincoln was hailed as the "Rail Candidate for President." Despite De-spite some sentiment for William H. Seward of New York and Edward Ed-ward Bates of St. Louis as Republican Re-publican nominees, Lincoln's friends brought about a unani- LEONARD SWETT mous endorsement of his candidacy candi-dacy and a pledge that the Illinois Illi-nois delegates to the national convention in Chicago would vote as a unit for him. A week before the convention opened in the Wigwam, a building build-ing which had been especially built for the meeting, the Illinois delegation, headed by David Davis, who was ably assisted by Leonard Swett, opened Lincoln headquarters in the Tremont hotel. ho-tel. There they planned their convention strategy and set to work to win delegates from other oth-er states for their candidate, The story of that convention and its result is a familiar one to most Americans. Not so familiar fa-miliar is the "behind-the-scenes" story and that is the one which Mr. Wakefield has told in his new book. The evidence which he produces in it lends strength to his declaration that "The successful suc-cessful nomination and later election of Lincoln was beyond question chiefly the work of the three Bloomington men David Davis, Leonard Swett and Jesse W. Fell." That is why they should be written down as the men who gave to their nation one of its greatest men and to history one of its immortals. Wealern Newspaper Union. |