Let Down the Bars a Leetle
One of the mischief-makers abounding in Washington, and doing more harm than all the rebel calumniators, hastened to repeat to the President that the secretary of war had plainly called him a “d—d fool!”
“You don’t say so? This wants looking into. For, if Stanton called me that, it must be true!—for he is nearly every time right!” He took his seat, and excused himself, jerking out as he stalked forth, glad to be quit of the pest:
“I will step over and see him!”
He was going to have the bars let down “a leetle.”
“THE ADMINISTRATION CAN STAND IT IF THE TIMES CAN.”
Mrs. Hugh McCulloch and Mrs. Dole (Indian Commissioner) went to Mrs. Lincoln’s reception. The host expressed constant gladness to see the ladies, as “they asked no offices.”
Mrs. McCulloch protested that she did want something.
“I want you to suppress the Chicago Times because it does nothing but abuse the Administration.”
McCulloch was in the treasury.
“Oh, tut, tut! We must not abridge the liberties of: the press or the people!1 But never mind the Chicago Times! The Administration can stand it, if the Times can.”
Notes
1 The suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act, 1863, was sorely against the President’s sentiments, fond of liberty himself and fixed on constitutional rule—but he bowed to the inevitable. Nevertheless, he softened the rod, and many imprisoned under the edict were never brought to trial.