Ohio History Journal

RICHARD PLANTAGANET LLEWELLYN BABER.

 

 

A SKETCH AND SOME OF HIS LETTERS.

 

 

DUANE MOWRY.

[A few months since we received from Mr. Duane Mowry of

Milwaukee, Wisconsin, duplicates of some letters written by Mr. R. P. L.

Baber, formerly of Columbus, Ohio, to Judge James R. Doolittle, at

one time United States Senator from Wisconsin. With the view of

publishing these letters Mr. Mowry wrote the late E. L. Taylor for

information concerning Mr. Baber. Mr. Taylor's reply was also for-

warded us by Mr. Mowry. We publish Mr. Taylor's letter and the

Baber letters which we understand were never before made public.-

EDITOR.]

SKETCH OF MR. BABER--E. L. TAYLOR, SR.

In respect to the late Richard Llewellyn Plantaganet Baber,

I would say that I knew him well from 1855-6, and even be-

fore, to the time of his death. He was a native of Virginia.

It is my recollection that he graduated from, or at least attended

Princeton College. He was a man of good education, but had

but little tendency to literature during his active life.  His

father was a minister in the Presbyterian church. He was a

lawyer and for several years after he came to Columbus was

a partner of Noah H. Swayne, under the name and style of

Swayne & Baber. He was a nephew of either Judge Swayne

or of Mrs. Swayne, I am not sure which, but think the latter. I

cannot give his date of birth or death, but he was born about

1830 and died about 1880, or near that date.¹

He was a member of the State Constitutional Convention

of 1872 from this county and lived some few years after that

but just how many I do not remember. Our court records

(which I have caused to be searched as to his death) do not

 

1 Since above was written, I have the record to show that Mr. Baber

was born August 3, 1823, and died July 25, 1885. His remains are

interred in Green Lawn Cemetery at Columbus, Ohio. - D. MOWRY.

(370)

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Richard Plantaganet Llewellyn Baber.      371

 

show any record, although it has long been customary to make

a record, and memorandum of members of the bar on their

decease. I suppose it was overlooked in this case as he had

long years been inactive in the practice, and the younger mem-

bers of the bar did not know or appreciate him, so in some way

it was overlooked.

During the continuance of Swayne & Baber no firm in Ohio

was better known. Judge Swayne was a very able and accom-

plished lawyer, and had the leading practice at this bar for many

years, and up to the time he was appointed Associate Justice

of the Supreme Court of the U. S. by Lincoln, which was about

1862-3. That appointment ended the firm of Swayne & Baber,

and about that time Mr. Baber was appointed paymaster in the

army and thereafter never practiced much at the bar. He was

a good worker under Judge Swayne, but had no faculty of

getting business on his own account, so the ending of that part-

nership was practically the end of Mr. Baber's active practice.

Mr. Baber never held but two offices. First, paymaster in

the army, appointed by Lincoln; second, he was elected a mem-

ber of the Constitutional Convention of Ohio in 1872 as a

Democrat, and was a useful, hard-working member. Many of

his old Republican friends supported him, as he was qualified for

that place, and although he had years before gone over to the

Democratic party they felt kindly toward him, and were glad

to support him for any office for which he was fitted. His

Republican friends never in the least resented his deflection from

the party. They would have been glad at any time to have

given him a good appointment, but his limitations were such

as to make this impossible as you will see further on. In fact

his Republican friends did all they could long after he left

the party to have him nominated for Attorney General of the

State on the Democratic ticket, which was an office he could

have filled with credit, and in that behalf the late John Little,

then Attorney General, (Republican), gave Mr. Baber all the

special employments in his power so as to further his chances

for the nomination in his party, but he failed of the nomination.

He would have been defeated with his party if he had been

nominated as the state went Republican,

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372      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

Mr. Baber was intense: most intense in everything. If he

had a case in Court he could neither think nor talk of anything

else, and to the other attorneys was on that account next to a

nuisance. In politics he was still worse so that his friends

used to avoid him as far as possible and shut him off in his

talk all they could. But there was no diverting him from the

subject. In a campaign he made many speeches, wrote articles

and incessantly worked for his party, and at all times went

about with his pockets and hands full of paper, speeches, clip-

pings and documents of every kind. No man knew the argu-

ment of his party better than Mr. Baber.

From the time he came to Columbus, which was early in

the fifties, he was an intense Republican. I heard him make

speeches in the Fremont campaign in 1856, in which campaign

he was very enthusiastic and earnest; and in the Lincoln cam-

paign of 1860 he was almost beside himself. In enthusiasm,

activity and effectiveness he was beyond example or comparison

-and it may well be doubted if any other man of his time did

nearly so much, and so unreservedly, as Mr. Baber, to make

Lincoln the nominee of his party. He became greatly inter-

ested in the debates of Lincoln and Douglas, and in 1859 went

in person to Illinois to see Mr. Lincoln to induce him to have

the debates collected and published in book form for general

circulation with a view of furthering his nomination. He suc-

ceeded in that behalf, and further succeeded in arranging to

have Mr. Lincoln come to Columbus and make a speech, which

he did in September, 1859. I heard that speech, which was I

believe the first he ever made outside of his own state. This

led to an invitation to speak at Cincinnati the next night and at

Indianapolis the following night. In conversation I asked him

if he was to make any further speeches, and he said that he

was not; that he would "have to go home and go to work or

the bread barrel would give out."

Mr. Baber also made arrangement for the publication of

the debates, and it was a matter of form only that the late

George M. Parsons, then Chairman of the Republican Com-

mittee of Ohio sent a written request to Mr. Lincoln for his

consent to the publication to which he returned a favorable

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Richard Plantaganet Llewellyn Baber.      373

reply. But this was only a formal matter, the arrangement

having been already made by Mr. Baber. William Dean How-

ells, the novelist, then a writer on the Ohio State Journal, was

selected to edit the volume, and it was published here by Follet

Foster, and 16,000 copies immediately printed and distributed

for the purpose of influencing the delegates at the National Con-

vention. A great many more were issued after that, and the

country flooded with them. In all this Mr. Baber (with financial

assistance of the late Samuel Galloway, and perhaps Judge

Swayne, and a few others) was the main spring and active mov-

ing power and force.

Mr. Baber was a delegate to the State Republican con-

vention that year (1860) and was very active in creating a

Lincoln sentiment in the convention. He was also a delegate

to the National convention at Chicago, and perhaps more than

any other, influenced the Ohio delegation for Mr. Lincoln, who

received the nomination.

Mr. Baber's services were acknowledged by the party by

making him a member of the Electoral College to head the Lin-

coln ticket in 1860, and when the members of the college met

after the election to cast the vote of the State he was selected to

carry the vote to Washington, which honor he greatly appre-

ciated.

That Mr. Baber expected further and more substantial

recognition when Mr. Lincoln should come into office was but

natural, and Mr. Lincoln, as well as the party leaders was an-

xious to have him rewarded. But there was the rub. What

possible place was there in which this erratic man would fit?

The whole field was canvassed to find a place for him, but the

unfortunate fact was that he was in every way unfitted to fill

any high position or one at all commensurate with his services.

He was the strangest and most erratic man that could be

imagined. He was a combination of strength of mind and

purpose, with everything that was unconventional and ridiculous.

He was strictly honest, earnest, truthful, temperate, amiable to

the last degree and without guile or deceit, open-hearted and

out-spoken in everything. But with all these virtues and good

qualities he united so much rudeness of manner-such a want

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374       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

 

of all that is proper decorum; such neglect of his dress and of

his person as to make him impossible in polite society. He

was also entirely wanting in discretion and judgment. He was

not subject to the most ordinary rules of genteel life and con-

duct. He was also entirely devoid of method in the conduct of

business and affairs and could not be relied upon to do any-

thing on his own account. This of course all unfitted him for

high or responsible positions in the public service. If he had

simply possessed his good qualities without his defects he could

have had almost anything he wanted, and have been a positive

influence and power in Lincoln's administration. But something

had to be done for him. The army was open for all the young

men in the country, but he was unfitted for active service, not

only by temperament, but also by physical infirmities from

which he suffered all his life, and which greatly tended to his

comparatively early death. But as before said, something had

to be done, and so it was finally arranged that he should be made

a paymaster in the army with the rank and pay of Major, to

which he reluctantly consented. Personally he had no qualifica-

tions for that office. Although honest to the last extent he was

not fitted to have charge of large amounts of money or the dis-

bursement of it. However, his friends furnished a bond for

him but with the understanding that he should have a thoroughly

competent clerk, who would conduct his business, and such a

man was secured for him, and his accounts were kept straight,

strictly correct, and finally settled to a dollar. Incidentally, I

may say, that the young man appreciated the good qualities of

Mr. Baber and formed a strong attachment for him, and when

some years after the war he died of a lingering disease, he

made him executor of his will, and gave him $1,000, out of his

small estate of about $8,000, which I am sorry to say he needed,

and was a God-send to him.

An incident which happened will well illustrate Mr. Baber's

general character and conduct. Some time not long after he

had entered on his duties as Paymaster he was at Cairo, Ill.,

waiting further orders, and having nothing active to do, he

thought of a friend, Joe Sullivant, Jr., an old Columbus boy,

then living on a large estate in central Illinois, and so with-

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Richard Plantaganet Llewellyn Baber.       375

 

out notice to even his clerk, posted off to make him a visit,

which lasted for some weeks, and when it finally occurred to

him to return, he found he had been dismissed from the service

for "absence without leave". But his friends here at once took

the matter up and Mr. Lincoln promptly ordered him re-in-

stated.

Your mention of Mr. Baber's letters to Senator Doolittle

calls to mind that he read one or more of them to me before

sending them, and all that movement comes back to me in a

somewhat vague way. I was not myself in sympathy with it,

but Mr. Baber was full of it and seemed to want me to know

his views and sentiments at the time. In this connection I would

say that one evening while Governor Dennison was Post Master

General, I was alone with him in his library in Washington,

when Senator Doolittle came in and they had a conference or

talk in my presence, in which the Senator very freely ex-

pressed his dissatisfaction of the then existing situation.

Amiable, honest, eccentric, energetic, poor Llewellyn Baber,

once one of the best known men in this community, and I may

say of the State, passed away in comparative poverty and ob-

scurity, and except for a few of the older residents is now for-

gotten; and yet if he had not lived it is extremely doubtful, if

indeed not certain, that Abraham Lincoln would ever have been

President of the United States.

 

 

LETTERS OF MR. BABER.

The letters of R. P. L. Baber to the Honorable James R.

Doolittle, at the time of their writing, a United States senator

from Wisconsin, were found among the private papers and

correspondence of Judge Doolittle. They have never been pub-

lished. Without knowing who Mr. Baber was, the intelligence

made manifest in the letters attracted the attention of the con-

tributor at once. And upon inquiry it was learned that the

author of the letters did, at one time, figure prominently, in the

public affairs of Ohio. Further investigation brought a most

interesting sketch of Mr. Baber by one of his contemporaries

and fellow townsmen, E. L. Taylor, Esquire, of Columbus, Ohio.

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376        Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

 

It is not my purpose to discuss the measures brought forth

in this correspondence, but to submit the letters as bearing upon

an important period of our country's political life, and, in his

opinion, as valuable to the historical student.     It would seem,

too, that Mr. Taylor's sketch does needed justice to the memory

of a really interesting and worthy personality.

Milwaukee, Wis., Oct. 1, 1909.

 

COLUMBUS, O., February 28th, 1866.

HON. JAMES R. DOOLITTLE.

My Dear Sir:-I have been intending to write you as to the present

political situation, for some time, but I have delayed for developments,

so as to inform you more certainly. When I arrived here on the 1st of

January, the Legislature was so engrossed, in the election of U. S.

Senator, that nothing could be done, as to the indorsing of the Presi-

dent's policy. We had a large positive party for it, which, as early as

January 5th introduced resolutions, for that purpose, but the milk and

water class who are always waiting for something to turn up, under the

cry, that the Radicals did not intend to attack the President, succeeded

in tying up the resolutions in the hands of a caucus committee, until

the breach made by the veto message has placed matters in a situation

that requires great tact to engineer. We have however the party ma-

chinery in our hands, every member of the State Executive Committee,

the Governor and all the state officers, but the Radicals predominate

in the lower house. However the defeat of Schenck and with him

the Cincinnati Gazette clique has given us a substantial victory. The

rank and file of the party will stand by the veto, but the President's

severe language in his speech of the 22d inst. particularly as it was

addressed to Democrats chiefly, is being used against us. The speech

however of Senator Sherman, and Governor Cox's letter, are working

well, and I think it will come out right. I attended the Indiana State

Convention and found the whole game of the Radicals was to misrepre-

sent the issue, and deny that negro suffrage was the issue, which was at

the bottom of their whole opposition of the President's plan. Why do

not our friends in Congress compel them to tear off this mask and

come plainly on the record ? Why not introduce a resolution and force

a yea and nay vote upon it, "that Congress has no power or desire to

force negro suffrage as a condition of representation upon the seceded

states?" I did not find six delegates in Indiana who were not opposed

to such an issue. The trouble is that they cover up their true object

under the plea of excluding rebels, and it is notorious that the radical

leaders were willing to trade universal amnesty for universal suffrage

and obtained the release of Ragan (?) and Foote upon their writing

letters in favor of negro suffrage. If our friends will press them upon

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Richard Plantaganet Llewellyn Baber.             377

 

measures, wherein can they show President Johnson unfaithful to the

platform of the Union party. I wish especially you would press to a

vote and make a speech on your Bill to facilitate treason trials, and

show up to the public why Chase, Sumner and Thad Stevens oppose

a civil trial and want a military commission to escape an exposure of

their secession dogmas about the fugitive slave law. You recollect I

sent you a Cincinnati Commercial of Nov. 20th containing an article

showing the facts about the Oberling cases, and Lincoln's letter of

July 28th, 1859, condemning the whole set which set in motion the ball

that nominated him at Chicago. President Johnson has a copy of the

paper. Can't you get the article published in the Intelligencer or the

N. Y. Times? Forney wouldn't print it when I was in Washington.

Hon. Columbus Delano and Hon. Lewis D. Campbell can post you

thoroughly in this matter. Strike boldly and show whose fault it is

why Davis is not tried for treason, and that the radicals by refusing

legislation on the subject are embarrassing the President. Second let

the President's friends make prominent the fact that the radicals as

soon as they found the President in favor of the voting basis amend-

ment started the Stevens dodge of counting out population so as to ring

in directly the negro suffrage issue, for on the voting basis New England

loses four members, while Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin and Michi-

gan gain 12. The Fessenden amendment distributes the gain from the

South to the Eastern instead of the Western States and here is the

milk in the Cocoa nut. I sent you a carefully prepared table on the

basis of the vote and population of 1860, showing just how the game

works and wonder why one has not been published before. The West

should stand up for the voting amendment. Talk to Senator Sherman

and show him this table.

Lastly. Protect all the civil rights of the freedmen by proper

laws and insist on each case of senator and representative being settled

on its own merits. We must win ultimately on the programme. But

why does not the President remove Stanton at once and appoint Gen'l

Logan, who would carry the volunteer army and make Randall Sec-

retary in place of Harlan and Roselius of New Orleans in place of

Speed. Let us have a strong unit Cabinet that will make a clean sweep.

Otherwise we shall be flanked. Julian will be beaten in Indiana and all

of the same stripe will fare the same from the people. I shall be glad

to hear from you.                       Yours truly,

R. P. L. BABER.

Perhaps it will be best to publish the table I sent you.

COLUMBUS, O., Mar. 29, 1866.

HON. JAMES R. DOOLITTLE.

My Dear Sir:-I send you Cincinnati Commercial of the 24th

and 26th inst. containing articles signed "Ohio" which I desire you to

read, as they contain facts which conclusively show that Johnson stands

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378        Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

 

with Lincoln. I offered the Resolutions in the Republican State Central

Committee, on which the Union organization was formed in Ohio. I

sent a communication by this mail to President Johnson urging him,

as a member of our Union State Central Committee to put the patronage

in each Congressional District in hands that will wield it so as to count.

Schenck as chairman of the organization to re-elect Radical Congressmen

is flooding the country with documents for negro suffrage and universal

amnesty. We are ready for fight in Ohio but want our enemy deprived

of the patronage. Again to put us in a fighting attitude pass some law

to protect Freedmen under the Constitutional Amendment abolishing

slavery. Press your bill for the trial of treason cases and try Davis in

Tennessee as soon as practicable, force the New England radicals to

vote down the voting basis of representation and the admission of the

Tennessee members, pure and simple and we've got them. Our State

Committee will probably call a convention in August. I wish you would

write me as it is necessary that there be some co-operation among the

Johnson men in all the states. The Stockton case was a great outrage

and the President must veto the Colorado bill, to kill the game to

obtain 2/3 majority.                       Yours truly,

R. P. L. BABER.

COLUMBUS, OHIO, 11th January, 1867.

HON. JAMES R. DOOLITTLE.

My Dear Sir:-The friends of the Administration and the re-

storation of the Union have been quietly watching the signs of the times

to see if any movement can be made to save the Ship of State from

going on the breakers. The late decision of the Supreme Court fore-

shadowing the fate of Radical legislation in that tribunal in its mad

effort to ignore all constitutional restraint and prevent the return of the

Government to its ordinary action in time of peace, encourages the

hope that steps will be immediately taken to bring up directly for

decision the question, whether the late seceded states, must be treated

as states in the Union under the state governments inaugurated and

acquiesced in by the people at the President's suggestion. The Radical

leaders fearing the result are hastening to set up counter state gov-

ernments, by means of the Negro vote, intending to recognize these

as the valid state governments, thinking to hind the Courts by the

action of the political department of the Government, as in the Borden

case. Our friends must manage to prevent the success of this scheme.

It strikes me on reflection, that a division can be produced by the

Southern Legislatures requesting Congress under the 5th Article as

to amendments to call a National Convention to propose amendments

to the Constitution of the United States, indicating at the same time by

resolution, what amendments they would be willing to ratify. This would

be meeting fairly the proposition of Ben Wade's Memphis speech, de-

claring a willingness now to hear what terms the South had to propose,

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Richard Plantaganet Llewellyn Baber.            379

 

as the amendments did not suit them. This makes an opening to make

a division against New England tariff rule, which is grinding down the

agricultural states with taxes. Ohio would stand by any amendment

that would unite this interest, provided, representation in Congress is

placed exclusively on voters, and the Negro, women, children and

aliens were put on the same footing, by counting all of them out in

the representation. Senator Sherman offered this proposition in the

Union Senatorial Caucus, and it has the advantage over the amendment

in its present shape, in not recognizing the Negro, as a class out of

whom voters ought to be made, which by putting direct taxes on prop-

erty, it avoids the monstrous injustice of taxing according to population,

without allowing representation by the same rule. The present amend-

ment was merely shaped as a bridge to get over the elections, knowing

that it would be rejected, for it is obvious that representation should

either be based upon population exclusively, or upon political power,

namely voters. Pressure is being brought to have the Alabama Legis-

lature adopt the amendment in its present shape, and I think there is

the place to start this counter movement. It would defeat the present

New England swindling amendment, which preserves the present in-

equality between that section and the West. I send you a copy of a

speech I made during the campaign, which shows, that under the Census

of 1860, Indiana, with 280,000 votes will elect only one more Congress-

man than Massachusetts with 170,000, and in the future this inequality

will increase. I have accordingly taken the proposed amendment and

modified it, so as to leave out some of the most objectionable features.

I would prefer that the 3d section was out altogether, but practically

the test oath affects the same thing as to Federal offices, and the South,

in consideration of not being interfered with as to qualification of their

own state officers, had better yield the point, and enable the President

and his friends to throw on the selfishness of the New England states,

the rejection of any amendment as to representation which cuts down her

political powers. I would write Governor Parsons on the subject, if I

knew where he was. I hope you will look over carefully the drafts of

the amendments, and make any changes that would give the movement

success. It is useless to battle longer a revolutionary party on a.mere

defensive position. Throw out at the South a counter proposition which

will separate the West from New England, for on the questions of tariff

and taxation, the votes of all Agricultural communities, will ultimately

concentrate, when the passions of our people, inflamed by demagogues,

have cooled. I am convinced unless something is done, the country

will yet have to meet the shock of a civil war, running through all

of the states. I send you a copy of my speech on the proposed impeach-

ment, made at the 8th of January supper. It was vociferously applauded.

But I am satisfied that all Democrats care for, is to preserve their

organization, yet it will back any movement the Administration will

make through the Southern Legislatures. Please talk with President

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380       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

 

Johnson on this subject and with Southern men, and write me. General

Swayne is in command in Alabama, and though he is a Radical, being

a free trade man, would go for the Johnson voting basis amendment.

Prompt action must be taken, and some one ought to go to Alabama

to manage. Tom Miller our Democratic Assessor has turned out the

Johnson men and put in Radicals in their places to secure his confirma-

tion. Post the President.

Yours my dear Sir,

Very truly,

R. P. L. BABER,

Member of National Union Committee from Ohio.

 

PLAN OF SETTLEMENT.

WHEREAS, The Congress of the United States has pro-

posed to the Legislatures of the several states sundry amend-

ments to the Constitution of the United States, and,

WHEREAS, It is proper that the voice of the people of all

the states should be heard in order that the Union may be re-

stored in feeling and indeed, as well as in name, and

WHEREAS, The state of Alabama has already performed in

good faith, all that was claimed at the end of the war as neces-

sary to accomplish that object, and

WHEREAS, The Constitution of the United States provides

that on the request of the legislatures of two-thirds of the states,

Congress may call a National Convention to propose amend-

ments to said Constitution, which shall be valid on the ratifica-

tion of three-fourths of the states in the Union,

Resolved by the General Assembly of the State of Alabama,

First, That the Congress of the United States be requested to

call a National Convention to propose amendments to the Con-

stitution of the United States to become valid on a ratification

by Conventions of three-fourths of the states.

Resolved, Second, that the people of Alabama, as a pledge

of the good faith in which this request is made for the purpose

of restoring peace and concord to our common country, are

willing to ratify, when proposed, the following amendments, as a

final settlement of the controversies which have grown out of

the civil war:

1st. No state shall make or enforce any law which shall

abridge the privileges, or immunities of citizens of the United

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Richard Plantaganet Llewellyn Baber.         381

 

States, nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty or

property without due process of law, nor deny to any person

within its jurisdiction the equal protection of its laws.

2d. Representatives shall be apportioned among the several

states which may be included within this Union according to the

number of male citizens of the United States, not less than 21

years of age, possessing the qualifications of electors for the

most numerous branch of the State Legislature, in pursuance of

the Constitution and laws of each state. Direct taxes shall be

apportioned according to the value of property, real and personal

in each state, to be ascertained by laws, but no new state shall

be admitted into the Union, until it contains at least, citizen

voters sufficient for one representative under the existing appor-

tionment.

3d. No person shall be a senatorial representative in Con-

gress, or elector of President, or Vice-President, or hold any of-

fice, civil or military, under the United States, who having pre-

viously taken an oath as a member of Congress, or as an officer

of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or re-

bellion against the same, or given aid and comfort to the enemies

thereof.  But the President may on a vote of three-fifths of

each house of Congress, remove such disability by a special

pardon.

4th. The validity of the public debt of the United States

authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of

pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or

rebellion, shall not be denied, but neither the United States,

nor any state shall assume or pay any debt or obligation in-

curred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United

States, or any claim for loss, or emancipation of any slave, but

all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held void.

5th. Congress shall have power to enforce, by laws neces-

sary and proper the provisions of these amendments.

 

P. S. The subject of amendments must be gotten out of the hands

of Congress and before the people, or with the two-thirds in that body

there will soon be a consolidated despotism. Won't the defeat of Thad

Stevens and Forney in Pennsylvania tend to break their rule in

Washington ?

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