Edwin M. Stanton

David Stanton, a physician, died suddenly in December 1827, and the family he left was destitute. Edwin, 13, came out of school and went to work in a Steubenville bookstore. The asthma had already arrived — it haunted him for life, sometimes to the point of convulsion — and because it barred him from anything physical he went at books instead. He got three semesters at Kenyon College before the money ran out, read law under Daniel Collier, and was admitted to the bar in 1835. His first wife, Mary, died of bilious fever in March 1844. He dressed and redressed her body until she looked as she had on their wedding day, then walked the house at night with a lamp, asking where Mary was.

Buchanan made him attorney general in December 1860, and he threatened to resign if the president pulled the garrison out of Fort Sumter. Lincoln swore him in as secretary of war on January 20, 1862, handing him a department the army called the lunatic asylum. Stanton moved the military telegraph into his own building, shifted 20,000 men from Virginia to Tennessee in ten days, and furloughed soldiers home so they could vote in 1864. Then Andrew Johnson. Congress wrote the Tenure of Office Act with Stanton specifically in mind. Johnson suspended him in August 1867, the Senate put him back in January 1868, and on February 21 Johnson named Lorenzo Thomas to the job. Stanton would not go. He barricaded himself inside the War Department for weeks, and three days later the House impeached the president.

He was not fastidious about how he won. In the McCormick reaper case his own side had an 1844 machine altered by a blacksmith and aged with salt and vinegar so it would pass for untouched — Stanton examined it and was overjoyed. In 1859 he built the insanity defense that got Congressman Daniel Sickles acquitted of shooting Philip Barton Key dead in Lafayette Square, the first time that plea worked in an American court. Running the hunt for Lincoln's killers, he had witnesses held on ships with canvas bags over their heads. It cost him. He left office in May 1868 with the remnants of a salary and a 500-dollar loan, and a judge who had expected a burly man met instead a feeble and exhausted invalid whose pallor shocked the courtroom.

He wanted the Supreme Court and lobbied Grant for it through a bishop. On December 19, 1869, his 55th birthday, Grant and Vice President Colfax came to his house to offer the seat. The Senate confirmed him the next day, 46 to 11. On the night of the 23rd he could not get air, and he died about three in the morning on December 24 — the only confirmed nominee ever to accept and then die before taking the oath. The cabinet, the entire Court and much of Congress walked behind the caisson to Oak Hill Cemetery. His reputation has tracked Reconstruction's ever since, and it is still contested: William Marvel calls him Lincoln's autocrat, Walter Stahr defends him.

Edwin M. Stanton's life against the full span of the corpus.

• Pennsylvania v. Wheeling and Belmont Bridge Co. case
  He had a steamer ram its smokestack into the bridge to prove the obstruction 1852
• McCormick v. Manny defense case
  Won with a doctored reaper — and with a Springfield lawyer named Lincoln shut out of the argument 1856
• Defense of Daniel Sickles case
  The first successful insanity plea in American law 1859
• The military telegraph office other
  Moved out of army headquarters and into the War Department, under his hand 1862
• Bureau of Colored Troops other
  Created by War Department General Order No. 143 1863

• 1827 aged ~13 His father dies and he is taken out of school to work in a bookstore The family was left destitute.
• 1844 aged ~30 His wife Mary dies of bilious fever His grief alarmed the household. He searched the house at night with a lamp, asking where she was.
• April 26, 1859 aged 44 Wins an acquittal for Daniel Sickles on a plea of temporary insanity Sickles had shot Philip Barton Key dead in Lafayette Square.
• December 20, 1860 aged 46 Sworn in as attorney general as the South begins to leave
• January 20, 1862 aged 47 Sworn in as secretary of war The department he inherited was known around the army as the lunatic asylum.
• April 15, 1865 aged 50 Takes control of Washington the night Lincoln is shot He sealed the city, guarded the cabinet and directed the manhunt for John Wilkes Booth.
• February 21, 1868 aged 53 Refuses to surrender the War Department to Lorenzo Thomas He barricaded himself in the building. The House impeached Andrew Johnson three days later.
• December 20, 1869 aged 55 Confirmed to the Supreme Court, 46 to 11
• December 24, 1869 aged 55 Dies at about three in the morning, never having taken the oath He remains the only confirmed nominee to accept a seat and die before serving.

• Abraham Lincoln 1809–1865
  16th President who preserved the Union during the Civil War and issued the Emancipation Proclamation. served
• Andrew Johnson 1808–1875
  17th president whose obstruction of Reconstruction weakened protections for formerly enslaved people and led to impeachment. opposed
• Andrew Johnson 1808–1875
  17th president whose obstruction of Reconstruction weakened protections for formerly enslaved people and led to impeachment. refused to be removed by
• Ulysses S. Grant 1822–1885
  18th President and Union Army general whose leadership was decisive in winning the Civil War. nominated by
• William Tecumseh Sherman 1820–1891
  Union general whose campaigns through Georgia and the Carolinas helped destroy the Confederacy’s capacity to wage war. feuded with