1860 Republican National Convention - Ballot Counts

Ballot Counts

The Republican National Convention met in mid-May, after the Democrats had been forced to adjourn the 1860 Democratic National Convention in Charleston, South Carolina without a nominee and had not yet re-convened in Baltimore, Maryland. With the Democrats in disarray and with a sweep of the Northern states possible, the Republicans were confident going into their convention in Chicago. William H. Seward of New York was considered the front runner, followed by Abraham Lincoln of Illinois, Salmon P. Chase of Ohio, and Missouri's Edward Bates.

As the convention developed, however, it was revealed that Seward, Chase, and Bates had each alienated factions of the Republican Party. Delegates were concerned that Seward was too closely identified with the radical wing of the party, and his moves toward the center had alienated the radicals. Chase, a former Democrat, had alienated many of the former Whigs by his coalition with the Democrats in the late 1840s, had opposed tariffs demanded by Pennsylvania, and critically, had opposition from his own delegation from Ohio. Bates outlined his positions on extension of slavery into the territories and equal constitutional rights for all citizens, positions that alienated his supporters in the border states and southern conservatives. German-Americans in the party opposed Bates because of his past association with the Know-Nothings.

Since it was essential to carry the West, and because Lincoln had a national reputation from his debates and speeches as the most articulate moderate, he won the party's nomination on the third ballot on May 18, 1860. Lincoln associates Leonard Swett, Ward Hill Lamon, and David Davis helped engineer Lincoln's nomination, according to the 1949 doctoral thesis Ward Hill Lamon: Lincoln's Particular Friend, written by Lavern Marshall Hamand at the Graduate College of the University of Illinois.

After seeing how close Lincoln was to the 233 votes needed, Robert K. Enos, an 1860 Ohio delegate, was responsible for getting 3 fellow Ohio delegates to shift their 4 votes to Lincoln. There is a 5/19/1860 Chicago Press and Tribune article - "The Four Votes" and other accounts proving that fact. This triggered an avalanche towards Lincoln with a final count of 364 votes out of 466 cast.

Senator Hannibal Hamlin of Maine was nominated for vice president, defeating Cassius M. Clay of Kentucky.