The _Herald_, incapable of blaming a Democrat like McClellan, in July attacked Stanton for the army’s failure, but the _Evening Post_ showed that McClellan himself had said that he had more than enough troops to take Richmond. The Chicago _Tribune_ later accused it of injustice to Lincoln in saying that McClellan should have been dismissed earlier, since Lincoln could not do so without offending loyal Democrats. That, rejoined the _Post_, is precisely the ground for our objection to McClellan; he was retained for political, not military, reasons.
These July days were the days in which Lincoln grew thin and haggard, Seward was sent upon a circuit of the North to arouse public men in support of the new enlistment programme, and Lowell wrote, “I don’t see how we are to be saved but by a miracle.” Who should succeed McClellan? Chase and Welles believed that the best general in view for the eastern command was John Pope, whose victory at Island No. 10 had given him national fame; and Bryant and Godwin, who had had some personal contact with Pope, agreed. He was called east and given the Army of Virginia. The chief command, however, went to Halleck, whom the _Evening Post_ distrusted as much as Welles did, and had already (July 23) described as slower and less enterprising than McClellan.
To Halleck the _Evening Post_ said that his motto must be that of the Athenian orator, action--action--action. The country wanted a Marshal Vorwarts; should its historians have none to record but General Trenches, General Strategy, or General Let-Escape? A few days later (Aug. 19) it published an editorial headed “Onward! Onward!” “The one essential element in our military movements now is celerity,” it urged. “Promptness in filling up the ranks already thinned by the war, promptness in organizing and sending forward new regiments, promptness in moving on the enemy.” Bryant had written Lincoln protesting against the sluggishness of military operations, and under pressure from other radicals, early in August the editor visited Washington to remonstrate. Mayor Opdyke, President Charles King of Columbia, and many other influential New Yorkers went at about the same time for the same purpose. Bryant tells us that he had a long talk with Lincoln, “in which I expressed myself plainly and without reserve, though courteously. He bore it well, and I must say that I left him with a perfect conviction of the excellence of his intentions and the singleness of his purposes, though with sorrow for his indecision.” A movement immediately began in New York to organize the radicals under a local committee.