been called to order, the Administration
party of 1864 was far from being the same organization that had, in
1856, voiced its protest against the Kansas-Nebraska Bill.

The excesses of the Democrats aided Lincoln almost as much as the
efforts of the party which nominated him. A convention at Chicago, in
August, presided over by Governor Seymour, of New York, and under the
dominance of Clement L. Vallandigham, did not need to denounce the war
as a failure in order to disappoint the Union Democrats. Not even the
nomination of McClellan, nor his repudiation of the platform, could undo
the result of such leadership. It was far from certain which ticket
would receive the greater vote in November, but it was clear that union
against disunion was the issue, and that men would vote according to
their hopes and fears. The former were in the ascendant when the polls
were opened, for Sherman had gained a decisive victory in his occupation
of Atlanta, while Farragut had gained another at Mobile Bay. On the
strength of these successes the Union ticket carried every State but
Delaware, Kentucky, and New Jersey.

Chase, who left the Treasury during the presidential campaign, had by
that time finished the work which carried the financial burdens of the
Civil War and provided party texts for another generation. He had come
to his task without special fitness, but had speedily mastered the
essentials of war finance. In his reports he outlined the policy which
Congress followed, more or less closely. Taxes ought to be increased, he
urged, to meet all the costs of civil administration, interest on the
debt, and sinking fund for the same. These were current burdens which
the country ought not to try to escape. But the extra cost of the war,
which was to be regarded as a permanent investment by the Union for its
own defense, might fairly be made a charge upon posterity. To meet these
he urged the creation of a sufficient bonded debt.

The Thirty-seventh Congress (1861-63) had been more ready to borrow
than to tax. In all its experience until 1861 the United States had met
no crisis in which large revenues had been required. In the thirty
preceding years its total annual receipts had ranged from $20,000,000 to
$81,000,000, while in the fiscal year in which the war began the total
had reached $83,000,000, of which $41,000,000 were loans rather than
revenue. Since the panic of 1857 the Treasury had faced a deficit at the
end of each year, and