Abraham Lincoln : a biographical essay . en when demanded bynecessity, should never be permitted to pass withouta protest on the one hand, and without an apologyon the other. It is well they did not so pass dur-ing our civil war. That arbitrary measures were re-sorted to, is true. That they were resorted to mostsparingly, and only when the government thoughtthem absolutely required by the safety of the repub-lic, will now hardly be denied. But certain it isthat the history of the world does not furnish asingle example of a government passing throughso tremendous a crisis as our civil war was w
Abraham Lincoln : a biographical essay . en when demanded bynecessity, should never be permitted to pass withouta protest on the one hand, and without an apologyon the other. It is well they did not so pass dur-ing our civil war. That arbitrary measures were re-sorted to, is true. That they were resorted to mostsparingly, and only when the government thoughtthem absolutely required by the safety of the repub-lic, will now hardly be denied. But certain it isthat the history of the world does not furnish asingle example of a government passing throughso tremendous a crisis as our civil war was with sosmall a record of arbitrary acts, and so little inter-ference with the ordinary course of law outsidethe field of military operations. No AmericanPresident ever wielded such power as that whichwas thrust into Lincolns hands. It is to be hopedthat no American President ever will have to beintrusted with such power again. But no man wasever intrusted with it to whom its seductions wereless dangerous than they proved to be to Abraham. __/f /, /;i/// f// /, I >/./ ABRAHAM LINCOLN 129 Lincoln. With scrupulous care he endeavored, evenunder the most trying circumstances, to remainstrictly within the constitutional limitations of hisauthority; and whenever the boundary became in-distinct, or when the dangers of the situation forcedhim to cross it, he was equally careful to mark hisacts as exceptional measures, justifiable only by theimperative necessities of the civil war, so that theymight not pass into history as precedents for simi-lar acts in time of peace. It is an unquestionablefact that during the reconstruction period whichfollowed the war, more things were done capableof serving as dangerous precedents than during thewar itself. Thus it may truly be said of him notonly that under his guidance the republic was savedfrom disruption and the country was purified ofthe blot of slavery, but that, during the stormiestand most perilous crisis in our history, he so con-ducted
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