One of his harshest critics was radical Senator Benjamin Wade of Ohio. He felt Lincoln was not doing enough and that Lincoln’s moderate approach was holding back the Union from victory. As President Pro Tempore of the Senate, Wade was a powerful leader in the senate, and Lincoln could not afford to alienate him.
Once, Wade came to the White House to tell Lincoln that General Grant should be fired. When Lincoln hesitated to agree, Wade told him: “You are the father of every military blunder made during the war. You are on the road to hell, Sir, and you are not a mile off this minute.” Lincoln responded: “Senator, that is just about the distance from here to the Capitol, is it not?”
According to a story in the New York Herald (November 26, 1863), a temperance committee visited President Lincoln and also asked him to fire General Grant. Their reason was that Grant drank too much. Lincoln said, “Well, I wish some of you would tell me what brand of whiskey that Grant drinks. I would like to send a barrel of it to every one of my other generals.”
According to stories, a foreign diplomat once came upon Lincoln polishing his shoes. The diplomat exclaimed, “What, Mr. President, you black your own boots?” Lincoln smiled and replied, “Yes, whose do you black?”
Once, a prominent Boston citizen asked Lincoln, “You never swear, Mr. President, do you? Lincoln answered, “Oh, I don’t have to. You know I have Stanton in my Cabinet.”
Lincoln towered over most other men, but one day met a soldier even taller than he was. He looked the soldier over and then asked him, “Say, friend, does your head know when your feet are cold?”
It was the subject of the many Union defeats and the criticism heaped upon the Lincoln administration that often resulted in the best, and most needed, humor. A visitor once asked Lincoln for a pass through the Union lines in Virginia in order to visit Richmond. Lincoln explained, “I should be very happy to oblige you if my passes were respected; but the fact is, within the past two years I have given passes to Richmond to two hundred and fifty thousand men and not one has got there yet.”
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