Quotes

Dialogue

Pvt. Harold Green: Some of us was in the 2nd Kansas Colored. We fought the rebs at Jenkins' Ferry last April, just after they'd killed every Negro soldier they captured at Poison Springs. So at Jenkins' Ferry, we decided weren't taking no reb prisoners. And we didn't leave a one of 'em alive. The ones of us that didn't die that day, we joined up with the 116th U.S. Colored, sir. From Camp Nelson Kentucky. Abraham Lincoln: What's your name, soldier? Pvt. Harold Green: Private Harold Green, sir. Cpl. Ira Clark: I'm Corporal Ira Clark, sir. Fifth Massachusetts Cavalry. We're waiting over there. We're leaving our horses behind, and shipping out with the 24th Infantry for the assault next week on Wilmington. Abraham Lincoln: How long have you been a soldier? Cpl. Ira Clark: Two year, sir. Abraham Lincoln: Second Kansas Colored Infantry, they fought bravely at Jenkins' Ferry. Pvt. Harold Green: That's right, sir. Cpl. Ira Clark: They killed a thousand rebel soldiers, sir. They were very brav

Dialogue

Abraham Lincoln: [describing a dream] It's nighttime. The ship's moved by some terrible power, at a terrific speed. Though it's imperceptible in the darkness, I have an intuition that we're headed towards a shore. No one else seems to be aboard the vessel. I'm very keenly aware of my aloneness. I could be bounded in a nutshell and count myself a king of infinite space, were it not that I have bad dreams. I reckon it's the speed that's strange to me. I'm used to going a deliberate pace. I should spare you, Molly. I shouldn't tell you my dreams. Mary Todd Lincoln: I don't want to be spared if you aren't. And you spare me nothing. Perhaps it's the assault on Wilmington Port. You dream about the ship before a battle, usually. Abraham Lincoln: [rapping lightly on his forehead] How's the coconut? Mary Todd Lincoln: Beyond description. Almost two years, nothing mends. Another casualty of the war. Who wants to listen to a useless woman grouse about her carriage accident? Abraham Lincoln: I do.

Dialogue

William Seward: Even if every Republican in the House votes yes, far from guaranteed, since when has our party unanimously supported anything? But say all our fellow Republicans vote for it, we'd still be twenty votes short. Abraham Lincoln: Only twenty? We can find twenty votes. William Seward: Twenty House Democrats who will vote to abolish slavery? In my opinion... Abraham Lincoln: To which I always listen. William Seward: Or pretend to. Abraham Lincoln: With all three of my ears. William Seward: We'll win the war, sir. It's inevitable, isn't it? Abraham Lincoln: Well, it ain't won yet. William Seward: You'll begin your second term, with semi-divine stature. Imagine the possibilities peace will bring. Why tarnish your invaluable luster with a battle in the House? It's a rats' nest in there. The same gang of talentless hicks and hacks who rejected the amendment ten months ago; we'll lose. Abraham Lincoln: I like our chances now.

Dialogue

Abraham Lincoln: Thunder forth, God of War. Edwin Stanton: We'll commence our assault on Wilmington from the sea... Why is is this burned? Was the boy playing with it? Abraham Lincoln: It got took by a breeze several nights back. Edwin Stanton: This is an official War Department map! William Seward: And the entire cabinet's waiting to hear what it portends. Gideon Welles: A bombardment. From the largest fleet the Navy's ever assembled. Abraham Lincoln: Old Neptune, shake thy hoary locks. Gideon Welles: Fifty-eight ships are underway, of every tonnage and firing range. Edwin Stanton: We'll keep up a steady barrage. Our first target is Fort Fisher. It defends Wilmington port. James Speed: A steady barrage? Edwin Stanton: A hundred shells a minute. Till they surrender. William Fessenden: Dear God. Abraham Lincoln: Wilmington's their last open seaport. Therefore... Edwin Stanton: Wilmington falls, Richmond falls after. William Seward: And the war... is done. John Usher: Then why, if I may

Dialogue

Abraham Lincoln: Well, Mr. Representative Ashley! Tell us the news from the Hill. James Ashley: Ah! Well, news... Abraham Lincoln: Why for instance is this thus, and what is the reason for this thusness? William Seward: James, we want you to bring the anti-slavery amendment to the floor for debate... James Ashley: Excuse me? What? William Seward: ...immediately, and... you are the amendment's manager, are you not? James Ashley: I am, of course, but... immediately? William Seward: And we're counting on robust radical support, so tell Mr. Stevens we expect him to put his back into it, it's not going to be easy, but we trust... James Ashley: It's impossible. No, I am sorry, no, we can't organize anything immediately in the House. I have been canvassing the Democrats since the election, in case any of them softened after they got walloped. But they have stiffened if anything, Mr. Secretary. There aren't nearly enough votes— Abraham Lincoln: We're whalers, Mr. Ashley! James Ashley: Whalers?

Dialogue

William Seward: Why wasn't I consulted?! I'm Secretary of State! You, you, you informally send a reactionary dotard, to— What will happen, when these peace commissioners arrive? Abraham Lincoln: We'll hear 'em out. William Seward: Oh, splendid! And next the Democrats will invite them up to hearings on the Hill, and the newspapers — well, the newspapers — the newspapers will ask why risk enraging the Confederacy over the issue of slavery when they're here to make peace? We'll lose every Democrat we've got, more than likely conservative Republicans will join them, and all our work, all our preparing the ground for the vote, laid waste, naught for naught. Abraham Lincoln: The Blairs have promised support for the amendment if we listen to these people— William Seward: Oh, the Blairs promise, do they? You think they'll keep their promise once we have heard these delegates and refused them? Which we will have to do, since their proposal most certainly will be predicated on keeping their slav

Dialogue

Abraham Lincoln: Since we have the floor next in the debate, I thought I'd suggest you might... temper your contributions so as not to frighten our conservative friends? Thaddeus Stevens: Ashley insists you're ensuring approval by dispensing patronage to otherwise undeserving Democrats. Abraham Lincoln: I can't ensure a single damn thing if you scare the whole House with talk of land appropriations and revolutionary tribunals and punitive thisses and that's— Thaddeus Stevens: When the war ends, I intend to push for full equality, the Negro vote and much more. Congress shall mandate the seizure of every foot of rebel land and every dollar of their property. We'll use their confiscated wealth to establish hundreds of thousands of free Negro farmers, and at their side soldiers armed to occupy and transform the heritage of traitors. We'll build up a land down there of free men and free women and free children and freedom. The nation needs to know that we have such plans. Abraham Lincoln: T

Dialogue

Edwin Stanton: They cannot possibly maintain under this kind of an assault! Terry's got ten thousand men surrounding the Goddamned fort! Why doesn't he answer my cables? Gideon Welles: Fort Fisher is a mountain of a building, Edwin. Thomas Thompson Eckert: It's the largest fort they have, sir. Gideon Welles: Twenty-two big seacoast guns on each rampart... Thomas Thompson Eckert: They've been reinforcing it for the last two years... Edwin Stanton: They've taken 17,000 shells since yesterday! Thomas Thompson Eckert: They said... Gideon Welles: The commander is an old goat. Edwin Stanton: I want to hear that Fort Fisher is ours and Wilmington has fallen! Send another damn cable! The problem's their commander, Whiting. He engineered the fortress himself. The damned thing's his child; he'll defend it till his every last man is gone. He is not thinking rationally... Abraham Lincoln: Come on out, you old rat! [the room goes silent] That's what...that's what Ethan Allen called out to the comma

Dialogue

Ulysses S. Grant: Gentlemen, I suggest you work some changes to your proposal before you give it to the President. R.M.T. Hunter: We're eager to be on our way to Washington. Alexander H. Stephens: Did Mr. Lincoln tell you to tell us this? Ulysses S. Grant: It says, 'securing peace for our two countries'. And it goes on like that. Alexander H. Stephens: I don't know what you– Ulysses S. Grant: There's just one country. You and I, we're citizens of that country. I'm fighting to protect it from armed rebels. From you. Alexander H. Stephens: But Mr. Blair told us, he, he told President Jefferson Davis we were– Ulysses S. Grant: A private citizen like Preston Blair can say what he pleases, since he has no authority over anything. If you want to discuss peace with President Lincoln, consider revisions. Alexander H. Stephens: If we're not to discuss a truce between warring nations, what in heaven's name can we discuss? Ulysses S. Grant: Terms of surrender.

Dialogue

Fernando Wood: I've asked you a question, Mr. Stevens, and you must answer me. Do you or do you not hold that the precept that "all men are created equal" is meant literally? Is that the true purpose of the amendment? To promote your ultimate and ardent dream to elevate— Thaddeus Stevens: The true purpose of the amendment, Mr. Wood, you perfectly named, brainless, obstructive object? Fernando Wood: You have always insisted, Mr. Stevens, that Negroes are the same as white men are. Thaddeus Stevens: The true purpose of the amendment... I don't hold with equality in all things, only with equality before the law and nothing more. Fernando Wood: That's not true! You believe that Negroes are entirely equal to white men. You've said it a thousand times— George Pendleton: For shame! For shame! Stop prevaricating and answer Representative Wood! Thaddeus Stevens: I don't hold with equality in all things, only with equality before the law and nothing more. George Pendleton: After the decades ferv

Dialogue

Abraham Lincoln: He'll be fine, Molly. City Point's away back from the front lines, and fighting, he'll be an adjutant running messages for General Grant. Mary Todd Lincoln: The war will take our son! A sniper, or a shrapnel shell. Or typhus, same as took Willie, it takes hundreds of boys a day! He'll die, uselessly, and how will I ever forgive you? Most men, their firstborn is their favorite. You...you've always blamed Robert for being born, for trapping you in a marriage that's only ever given you grief and caused you regret! Abraham Lincoln: That's simply not true. Mary Todd Lincoln: And if the slaughter of Cold Harbor is on your hands same as Grant, God help us! We'll pay for the oceans of spilled blood you've sanctioned, the uncountable corpses we'll be made to pay with our son's dear blood. Abraham Lincoln: Just...just this once, Mrs. Lincoln, I demand of you to try and take the liberal and not the selfish point of view! Robert will never forgive himself, can you imagine he'll fo

Dialogue

Mary Todd Lincoln: You think I'm ignorant of what you're up to because of this you haven't discussed this scheme with me as you ought to have done? When have I ever been so easily bamboozled? I believe you when you insist that amending the Constitution and abolishing slavery will end this war, and since you are sending my son into the war, woe unto you if you fail to pass the amendment. Abraham Lincoln: Seward doesn't want me leaving big muddy footprints all over town. Mary Todd Lincoln: No one has ever lived who knows better than you, the proper placement of footfalls on treacherous paths. Seward can't do it. You must. Because if you fail to acquire the necessary votes, woe unto you, sir. You will answer to me.

Dialogue

Elizabeth Keckley: I know the vote is only four days away; I know you're concerned. Thank you for your concern over this, and I want you to know: They'll approve it. God will see to it. Abraham Lincoln: I don't envy Him His task. He may wish He'd chosen an instrument for His purpose more wieldy than the House of Representatives. Elizabeth Keckley: Then you'll see to it. Abraham Lincoln: Are you afraid of what lies ahead? For your people? If we succeed? Elizabeth Keckley: White people don't want us here. Abraham Lincoln: Many don't. Elizabeth Keckley: What about you? Abraham Lincoln: I... I don't know you, Mrs. Keckley. Any of you. You're... familiar to me, as all people are. Un-accommodated, poor, bare, forked creatures such as we all are. You have a right to expect what I expect, and likely our expectations are not incomprehensible to each other. I assume I'll get used to you. But what you are to the nation, what'll become of you once slavery's day is done, I don't know. Elizabeth Kec

Dialogue

George Yeaman: I can't vote for the amendment, Mr. Lincoln. Abraham Lincoln: I saw a barge once, Mr. Yeaman, filled with colored men in chains, heading down the Mississippi to the New Orleans slave markets. It sickened me, 'n more than that, it brought a shadow down, a pall around my eyes. Slavery troubled me, as long as I can remember, in a way it never troubled my father, though he hated it. In his own fashion. He knew no smallholding dirt farmer could compete with slave plantations. He took us out from Kentucky to get away from 'em. He wanted Indiana kept free. He wasn't a kind man, but there was a rough moral urge for fairness, for freedom in him. I learnt that from him, I suppose, if little else from him. We didn't care for one another, Mr. Yeaman. George Yeaman: I... well, I'm sorry to hear that... Abraham Lincoln: Loving kindness, that most ordinary thing, came to me from other sources. I'm grateful for that. George Yeaman: I hate it, too, sir, slavery, but - but we’re entirely

Dialogue

Preston Blair: We've managed our members to a fare-thee-well, you've had no defections from the Republican right to trouble you, whereas to what you promised— where the hell are the commissioners?! James Ashley: Oh my God, it's true. You... you lied to me, Mr. Lincoln! You evaded my requests for a denial that, that there is a Confederate peace offer because, because there is one! We are absolutely guaranteed to lose the whole thing and we'll be discredited, the amendment itself will be tainted. What if, what if these peace commissioners appear today? Or worse, on the morning— Montgomery Blair: We don't need a goddamned abolition amendment! Leave the Constitution alone! State by state you can extirpate— Abraham Lincoln: [pounds his hand on the table, silencing them both] I can't listen to this anymore. I can't accomplish a goddamn thing of any human meaning or worth until we cure ourselves of slavery and end this pestilential war, and whether any of you or anyone else knows it, I know I

Dialogue

Edward McPherson: Roll call concludes. Voting is completed. Now— Schuyler Colfax: Mr. Clerk? Please call my name. I want to cast a vote. George Pendleton: I object! The Speaker doesn't vote. Schuyler Colfax: The Speaker may vote if he so chooses. George Pendleton: It is highly unusual, sir. Schuyler Colfax: This isn't usual, Mr. Pendleton. This is history. Edward McPherson: How does Mr. Schuyler Colfax vote? Schuyler Colfax: Aye, of course.

Dialogue

Thaddeus Stevens: I wish you'd been present. Lydia Hamilton Smith: I wish I'd been. Thaddeus Stevens: It was a spectacle. Lydia Hamilton Smith: You can't bring your housekeeper to the House. I won't give them gossip. This is enough. This is... it's more than enough for now. Thaddeus Stevens: Read it to me again, my love. Lydia Hamilton Smith: Proposed. Thaddeus Stevens: And adopted. Lydia Hamilton Smith: Adopted. An amendment to the Constitution of the United States. Section One. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction. Thaddeus Stevens: Section two. Lydia Hamilton Smith: Congress shall have power to enforce this amendment by appropriate legislation.

Dialogue

Alexander Stephens: Let me be blunt. Will the Southern states resume their former position in the Union speedily enough to enable us to to enable us to block ratification of this here Thirteenth Amendment? Abraham Lincoln: I'd like peace immediately. Alexander Stephens: Yes, and...? Abraham Lincoln: I'd like your states restored to their practical relations immediately. Alexander Stephens: If this could be given me in writing, as Vice President of the Confederacy, I'd bring that document with celerity to Jefferson Davis. William Seward: Surrender and we can discuss reconstruction. Alexander Stephens: Surrender won't be thought of unless you've assured us, in writing, that we'll be readmitted in time to block this amendment. Robert Hunter: This is the arrogant demand of a conqueror for a humiliating, abject— William Seward: You'll not be conquered people, Mr. Hunter. You will be citizens, returned to the laws and the guarantees of rights of the Constitution. Alexander Stephens: Which no

Dialogue

Abraham Lincoln: [discussing the terms of Lee's surrender with Grant] Once he surrenders, send his boys back to their homes and their farms, their shops. Ulysses S. Grant: Yes, sir, as we discussed. Abraham Lincoln: Liberality all around. Not punishment, I don't want that. And their leaders, Jeff and the rest of them, they escape, leave the country while my back's turned, that wouldn't upset me none. When peace comes, it mustn't just be hangings. Ulysses S. Grant: [silently observing Lincoln for a moment] By outward appearance, you're ten years older than you were a year ago. Abraham Lincoln: Hm. [nods] Some weariness has bit at my bones. I never seen the like of it before, what I seen today. [almost to himself] Never seen the like of it before. Ulysses S. Grant: You always knew that - what this was going to be: Intimate, and ugly. You must've needed to see it close when you decided to come down here. Abraham Lincoln: Hm. [stands, grasps Grant's outstretched hand with both of his own]

Dialogue

Mary Todd Lincoln: You've an itch to travel? Abraham Lincoln: I'd like that. To the West by rail. Mary Todd Lincoln: Overseas. Abraham Lincoln: The Holy Land. Mary Todd Lincoln: [laughs] Awfully pious for a man who takes his wife out buggy-riding on Good Friday. Abraham Lincoln: Jerusalem. Where David and Solomon walked. I dream of walking in that ancient city. Mary Todd Lincoln: All anyone will remember of me is I was crazy and I ruined your happiness. Abraham Lincoln: Anyone thinks that doesn't understand, Molly. Mary Todd Lincoln: When they look at you, at what it cost to live at the heart of this, they'll wonder at it. They'll wonder at you. They should. But they should also look at the wretched woman by your side, of they want to understand what this was truly like. For an ordinary person. For anyone other than you. Abraham Lincoln: We must try to be happier. We must. Both of us. We've been miserable for so long.

Dialogue

Abraham Lincoln: I did say some colored men, the intelligent, the educated, and veterans, I qualified it. James Ashley: Mr. Stevens is furious, he wants to know why you qualified it. Schuyler Colfax: No one heard the intelligent or the educated part. All they heard was the first time any president has ever made mention of Negro voting. Abraham Lincoln: Still, I wish I'd mentioned it in a better speech. James Ashley: Mr. Stevens also wants to know why you didn't make a better speech. John Nicolay: Mrs. Lincoln's waiting in the carriage. She wants me to remind you of the hour, and that you'll have to pick up Miss Harris and Major Rathbone. Abraham Lincoln: Am I in trouble? William Slade: No, sir. Abraham Lincoln: I suppose it's time to go though I would rather stay.

Dialogue

Dr. Joseph Barnes: It's 7:22 in the morning, Saturday the 15th of April. It's all over. The President is no more. Edwin Stanton: Now he belongs to the ages.