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adroit at computation that at one time, as Lincoln stated it, “the aggregate of the credits due to all the States exceeded very considerably the number of men called for.” This vexation was of a most trying nature since a vital condition of the President’s success in the war was that he should have the active and zealous support of these governors. When he told the committee of the Rhode Island legislature that “men and not an adjustment of balances was the object of the call” for troops, he answered with his clear logic the reclamations that poured in upon Stanton and the provost-marshal general; nevertheless, he did not urge it to triumph in the argument but to persuade the committee and the country that he must have men. However, be the necessity never so dire, he purposed proceeding with the utmost fairness. The governors were forward in making suggestions and most of them felt that some things should be done differently. Maryland, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana and Illinois were in constant danger of invasion; threatened raids from Canada and other British provinces kept the authorities of New York, Vermont and Maine in a state of alarm; all these and similar troubles were brought to the War Department with requests for succor and protection. The patience of Stanton when he replied to the claims and grievances of the governors exhibits another side of this man who was often irascible to an extraordinary degree. But it was the patience of a determined man who gave the cue to his department with the result that during the last two years of the war the commissary and quarter-master’s departments were admirably managed and the transportation of troops and supplies well carried out. After Lincoln it was Stanton more than any other who smoothed the way for the governors to carry out their predilection for energetically upholding the national administration

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