The Man for the Job

STANTON: THE LIFE AND TIMES OF LINCOLN'S SECRETARY OF WAR (643 pp.)--Benjamin P. Thomas and Harold M. Hyman--Knopf ($8.50).

Few prominent Americans have been hated so much as Edwin McMasters Stanton, Abraham Lincoln's Secretary of War. Stanton was vilified as the man who ruined the South by championing the vindictive Reconstruction Acts. Even today, an esoteric cult of historians stoutly maintains that Stanton planned the assassination of Lincoln so that he could take over the country.

Historian Benjamin P. Thomas was completing his research for a definitive biography of Stanton when he died in 1956. Harold M. Hyman, 37, a historian at U.C.L.A., took Thomas' research, added to it, and wrote Stanton: The Life and Times of Lincoln's Secretary of War.

Tolerant Giraffe. At first. Hyman seems to be joining the Stanton haters. He cheerfully reports that Stanton was possessed of a "wily versatility in ingratiating himself simultaneously with men of widely divergent views," and was more than willing to advance his career by setting his sail to catch the political winds. There is even evidence. Hyman admits, that Stanton connived to discredit his predecessor so that he could get the job.

Although his enemies later claimed he was illegitimate, Edwin Stanton was born in thoroughly respectable circumstances to an Ohio doctor and his devout Methodist wife. Long before he became Secretary of War. Stanton made a name for himself as an outspoken lawyer who loved the rough-and-tumble of both politics and the courtroom.

It was common knowledge in Washington that Stanton had been referring to Lincoln for years as "a giraffe" and "a low, cunning clown." But Lincoln named Stanton Secretary of War partly because he was a Democrat who could bring some balance to the Republican-dominated Cabinet, partly because he was a talented man who could bring some organization to the chaotic War Department.

Jokes in Crisis. The two men became stanch allies and farm friends, although Stanton never could abide Lincoln's habit of cracking jokes in time of crisis. "God damn it to hell," Stanton stormed after one round of presidential humor, "was there ever such nonsense?" Stanton once told a petitioner that the President was a damned fool. When the petitioner repeated the remark to the President, Lincoln professed astonishment: "Did Stanton call me a damn fool? Well, I guess I had better step over and see Stanton about this. Stanton is usually right."

He usually was. Stanton angrily swept the graft and inefficiency out of the War Department, set about building the greatest army in the U.S.'s young history. He early spotted the weakness in McClellan and the greatness in Grant. Anyone who wanted to talk to him had only to show up in his reception room. Writes Hyman: "Stanton personified force and competence as he stood behind the tall desk, looking each visitor squarely, almost defiantly, in the eye, his wide forehead flushed, his complexion dark and mottled, his lips compressed above his immense black beard, which gave off a mixed odor of tobacco and cologne."

Great Second-Rater. Hyman scoffs at the theory that Stanton concocted the assassination of Lincoln. After the war, Secretary Stanton did indeed try to impose a tough peace on the South. It simply was not in Stanton's makeup to be generous to the former enemy.

Stanton clashed savagely with President Andrew Johnson, a Tennessean who favored mild treatment of the South. When Johnson fired him, Stanton barricaded himself in his office--he had to send a sergeant out for food. In large part, it was Johnson's attack on Stanton that led Congress to try to impeach the President. The attempt failed by one vote, and Stanton, worn out by the battle, sadly resigned. Said Grant: "He believed that Johnson was Jeff Davis in another form and he used his position in the Cabinet like a picket holding his position in the line." Brusque, sly and opportunistic, Stanton was not a great man, Hyman decides in the end. But he was the special blend of gut-fighter and idealist that Lincoln wanted and needed. "Taken together, these characteristics, when joined with the personal loyalty he offered to Lincoln, enabled Stanton, the second-rate man, to serve greatly," sums up Hyman. "He was the man for those extraordinary times, and he did a titanic job in the face of immense difficulties."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.