Norman B. Judd, of Chicago, was also expecting a place in the Cabinet. He was a lawyer by profession and general attorney of the Chicago and Rock Island Railroad. He had been a member of the State Senate, where he contributed largely to Trumbull's first election to the United States Senate, after which he had been devoted to Trumbull's political interests and no less to Lincoln's. He was chairman of the Republican State Committee and a member of the National Committee. He had been a delegate-at-large to the Chicago Convention, where he had worked untiringly and effectively for Lincoln's nomination. He was not a man of ideas, but was fertile in expedients. In politics he was a "trimmer," sly, cat-like, and mysterious, and thus he came to be considered more farseeing then he really was; but he was jovial, companionable, and popular with the boys who looked after the primaries and the nominating conventions. Both as a legislator and a party manager his reputation was good, but his qualities were those of the politician rather than of the statesman. He was certainly the equal of Caleb Smith and the superior of Cameron. If he had been taken into the Cabinet, he would not have been ejected without assignable reasons nine months later. It was known immediately after the November election that he expected a Cabinet position and that Trumbull favored him.
January 3, 1861, Judd wrote to Trumbull that he had heard no word from Lincoln, but he had heard indirectly from Butler (state treasurer) that Lincoln "never had a truer friend than myself and there was no one in whom he placed greater confidence; still circumstances embarrassed him about a Cabinet appointment." Judd understood this to mean that he would not be appointed and he took it very much to heart. Doubtless the circumstance that most embarrassed Lincoln was the same that operated in Cameron's case. David Davis was insisting that his pledge to the Indiana delegates should be made good.
January 6, Lincoln made an early call on Gustave Koerner at his hotel in Springfield, before the latter was out of bed. Koerner gives the following account of it in his "Memoirs":[48]
I unbolted the door and in came Mr. Lincoln. "I want to see you and Judd. Where is his room?" I gave him the number, and presently he returned with Judd while I was dressing.
