Hannibal Hamlin

[Anita]

(06-24-2018 07:37 PM)L Verge Wrote:  Anita has probably already perused the U.S. Senate's online page regarding Schuyler Colfax, but its opening paragraph is telling - especially Lincoln's opinion (if accurate):

Schuyler Colfax, 17th Vice President (1869-1873) Schuyler Colfax

"As amiable a man who ever served in Congress, good-natured, kindly, cordial, and always diplomatic, Indiana's Schuyler Colfax won the nickname "Smiler" Colfax. Through two of the most tumultuous decades in American public life, Colfax glided smoothly from the Whig to Know-Nothing to Republican parties, mingling easily with both conservatives and radicals. He rose to become Speaker of the House and vice president and seemed poised to achieve his goal of the presidency. Along the way, there were those who doubted the sincerity behind the smile and suspected that for all his political dexterity, Colfax stood for nothing save his own advancement. Those close to President Abraham Lincoln later revealed that he considered Speaker Colfax an untrustworthy intriguer, and President Ulysses S. Grant seemed relieved when the Republican convention dumped Vice President Colfax from the ticket in 1872. Even the press, which counted the Indiana editor as a colleague and pumped him up to national prominence, eventually turned on Colfax and shredded his once admirable reputation until he disappeared into the forgotten recesses of American history...

"When the Thirty-eighth Congress convened in December 1863, House Republicans—with their numbers considerably thinned—elected Schuyler Colfax Speaker, despite President Lincoln's preference for a Speaker less tied to the Radical faction of his party. ...

"Colfax's efforts at party harmony and a moderate course of Reconstruction were short lived. Johnson resented Colfax's preempting his own statement of policy on the subject. The president's plans to reconstruct the South showed little regard for the rights of the freedmen, and he vetoed such relatively moderate congressional efforts as the Freedmen's Bureau bill. His action drove moderate and radical Republicans into an alliance that brought about congressional Reconstruction of the South. Finally, Johnson's dismissal of Secretary of War Edwin Stanton in violation of the Tenure of Office Act convinced even moderates like Colfax that the president must be impeached. Through all of these dramatic events, Colfax's most astonishing success was his ability to retain the support of all sides in his party and to hold House Republicans together. The party defections that saved Johnson took place in the Senate rather than the House. ..."

Anita is certainly correct that it is difficult to find much on Colfax as VP unless you want to dwell on his entanglement in the scandals of the administration.

Laurie, yes I read the article. I guess Lincoln wasn't fooled by his nickname, "Smiler" Colfax. Thanks for posting the excerpt. https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/his...Colfax.htm

From The "Tragic Life and Cold Death of Schuyler Colfax" by Todd Arrington.

" After his inglorious departure from the vice presidency, Colfax traveled the country as a popular lecturer, often speaking about his interactions with Abraham Lincoln during the Civil War. On the morning of January 13, 1885, he arrived in Mankato, Minnesota on a train from Milwaukee. Mankato was just a stop for Colfax; he was trying to get to Iowa for a speaking engagement. The Omaha Line Depot from which the next leg of his journey would depart was about three-quarters of a mile away. Despite a reported temperature of thirty degrees below zero, Colfax walked from one station to the other. Upon arriving at the Omaha Line Depot, Colfax entered the waiting room, looked at a map on the wall, sat down, and died. No one in the station knew who the dead man was until they searched his pockets and found a letter with his name on it. His death was likely caused by a heart attack brought on by the physical exertion of walking almost a mile in extreme cold. Colfax was only sixty-one when he died."

http://werehistory.org/schuyler-colfax/