the turmoil of political
currents; each tried oiling the waters, and in the attempt each
ruined his candidacy. Seward's speech in condemnation of John Brown
in February, 1860, was an appeal to the conservative North against the
radical North, and to many of his followers it seemed a change of front.
It certainly gained him no new friends and it lost him some old ones, so
that his star as a presidential candidate began its decline.

The first ballot in the Republican convention surprised the country.
Of the votes, 233 were necessary for a choice. Seward had only 173 1/2.
Next to him, with 102 votes, stood none of the leading candidates, but
the comparatively obscure Lincoln. A gap of more than 50 votes separated
Lincoln from Cameron, Chase, and Bates. On the second ballot Seward
gained 11 votes, while Lincoln gained 79. The enemies of Seward, finding
it impossible to combine on any of the conspicuous candidates, were
moving toward Lincoln, the man with fewest enemies. The third ballot
gave Lincoln the nomination.

We have seen that one of the basal questions of the time was which new
political group should absorb the Whig remainder. The Constitutional
Union party aimed to accomplish this. The Republicans sought to
out-maneuver them. They made their platform as temperate as they could
and yet consistent with the maintenance of their opposition to Douglas
and popular sovereignty; and they went no further in their anti-slavery
demands than that the territories should be preserved for free labor.

Another basal question had been considered in the Republican platform.
Where would Northern capital stand in the reorganization of parties?
Was capital, like men, to become frankly sectional or would it remain
impersonal, careless how nations rose or fell, so long as dividends
continued? To some extent capital had given an answer. When, in the
excitement following the John Brown incident, a Southern newspaper
published a white list of New York merchants whose political views
should commend them to Southerners, and a black list of those who
were objectionable, many New Yorkers sought a place in the white list.
Northern capital had done its part in financing the revived slave trade.
August Belmont, the New York representative of the Rothschilds, was one
of the close allies of Davis, Yancey, and Benjamin in their war upon
Douglas. In a word, a great portion of Northern capital had its heart
where its investments were--in the South.