Throughline - How the Civil War changed how we vote

Episode Date: February 24, 2026

When President Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation in the middle of the Civil War, he was not just changing the terms of peace, he was risking his own political future and forcing the nation to confront what its democracy really stood for. On this week’s episode, how the presidential election of 1864 changed the way we vote and who we are as a country. To access bonus episodes and listen to Throughline sponsor-free, subscribe to Throughline+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org/throughline.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Hey, it's Ramteen. In this month's ThruLine Plus episode, our producers take us behind the scenes of our episode about the fall of Chile's democracy in the 1970s, and the music that soundtracked the era. To listen to these insider bonus episodes every month, sign up for ThruLineplus at plus.npr.org slash throughline. This is America in Pursuit,

a limited run series from ThruLine and NPR. I'm Ramtin Adablo. Each week, we bring new stories about life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness in the U.S. that began 250 years ago this year. Today, we're going back to one of the most significant moments in U.S. history, the Civil War, one of the bloodiest wars fought on American soil. At the heart of the war was the question of slavery and whether to abolish it. The Confederate South broke off from the Union because it wanted to keep slavery and the freedom to govern themselves. The Union in the North, led by President Abraham Lincoln, wanted to make slavery illegal and keep the United States together. A little less than two years into the bloody conflict on January 1, 1863, President Lincoln made a bold proclamation.

All persons held as slaves within any state or designated part of a state, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States. shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free. The Emancipation Proclamation was a major flex in federal power. Lincoln spells out new terms of peace. The fighting would only end when slavery ended. This was a risky move because the union was gearing up right presidential election, and not everyone in the union agreed with Lincoln's hardline views on abolition and how to fight the war.

He's aware that by insisting, on making emancipation a condition of peace negotiations with the Confederacy, he's giving political ammunition to the Democrats. The Democrats, the opposition, are saying you're deliberately protracting the war to secure abolition. You could get peace if only you were prepared to think about reuniting the country on the Constitution as it once was, not on what you wanted to be. So there was a lot at stake here. The election of 1864 is, in my view, the most significant election in American history, the most significant for democracy in American history.

The election would take place in the middle of the war. It would test the young republic's ability to hold an election in times of duress and shape the outcome of the war. Today on this show, Rund and I bring you the story of how the 1864 election changed how we vote and who we are as a country. That's coming up after a quick break. The war begins. Secession is met by Lincoln's determination to hold the union together,

to resolve the question of whether, as he put it, a constitutional republic, democracy, a government of the people can or cannot maintain its integrity against its own internal foes. I'm Richard Carwoodine. I taught for a number of years in Oxford University. and the Rhodes Professor Emeritus of American history. After issuing the Emancipation Proclamation,

Lincoln briefly considers walking it back. He thinks of abandoning emancipation as a basis for peace. But, but he decides it would be an ignominious surrender. He can't possibly yield on that. He said, and I quote, it would be worse than losing the presidential contest. Lincoln doubles down on his ideals as he gears up for the 1864 presidential election, an election where...

There are deep ideological and cultural divides. On the one side, you've got the democratic opposition, considering Lincoln and the administration and the federal army to be a tyrannical force, willing to crush individual freedom in a pursuit of reunion and a... an unnatural emancipationist racial order. On the other hand, you've got Lincoln and the National Union Party pledging themselves to seeing the war right through to its conclusion.

They're offering a vision of a reunified nation no longer stained by slavery. The country would be, I suppose, true to the egalitarian principles of the Declaration of Independence. It would emerge from the war with a richer democracy Initially, things looked good for Lincoln and his party, the Republicans. They were winning on the battlefield and the days of the Confederacy seemed numbered. They seemed to have the election in the back. But as winter turned to spring, the Confederates began to push back hard.

And the Federal Army faced some big losses. Things are looking so bleak, in fact, Lincoln's party chairman. It comes to Lincoln. He says, you know, you're going to lose Illinois. You're going to lose Indiana. You're going to lose Pennsylvania. These are key states. And if you lose those three states, then inevitably you're going to lose the election overall.

Confederates, looking at this, were quite sure that the weariness of the war in the north would lead to the election of a new president who would be willing to sue for peace. And they hope that the new president would be Democratic nominee, General George B. McClellan. who was, of course, a very well-loved professional soldier. McClellan had served under Lincoln, but as a candidate, his main position was that the war needed to end ASAP, and the Confederate states needed to be reunited with the Union. Emancipation be damned.

In other words, there would be a dishonorable peace that would not see the end of slavery. Meanwhile, heated political debates were happening in town squares on the home front and among soldiers on the war front. For many soldiers, abolition was the key issue in this election, whether they were for it or against it. Most soldiers in the Union or Federal Army leaned Republican, which remember was Lincoln's anti-slavery party. And that was partly a reflection of where these soldiers came from. Many were from places where having a voice wasn't a given.

And they came to the U.S. hoping that right was guaranteed. When you look at the makeup of the federal armies, you'll see that there are significant numbers of immigrant troops, of troops that have been recruited indeed from Europe, certainly Irish and German troops, who understand that they have come to a country that offers something different. And if you allow their Confederacy to succeed, you are ending what Lincoln called the last best hope of Earth,

but it's what they understand to be the last best hope of earth too. The last best hope of earth. That promise of freedom, of representation for all, which might chart a new path for the world. It's also important to note that nearly 10% of the federal army were black soldiers. I could quote you a letter from a black soldier serving in the 5th Massachusetts Cavalry. He describes McClellan and the Democrats, and I quote, as ever the chief instruments in giving aid and assistance to the common enemy of the country.

Inogorators of this bloody conflict on the rightful domains of freedom. Is this the people's candidate? McClellan, the secret advocate of dissension, disloyalty, treason, and the ardent lover of human slavery? But here's the thing. Regardless of where soldiers fell politically, most of them shared one important thing in common. They couldn't vote. There's only one state in 1861 when the war starts that has actually granted soldiers the right of voting in the field, of absentee voting.

When you've got a million men in arms in the Union Army by the high point of the war, this is a huge proportion of the voting public that you're disfranchising unless you make special arrangements for them. As the war went on, pressure was building. to give soldiers the right to vote. Those pressures come overwhelmingly from the Republicans. Why them? Lincoln and the Republicans become aware

of just what kind of loyalty they have within the federal forces. Which meant if they gave soldiers the vote, it would likely help them win the election. So Lincoln tried to make some special arrangements. He wrote to his general saying, it would please me if you would allow the soldiers to return for the fall elections.

But the reality was most soldiers weren't going to be able to get furloughs to go home and vote. After all, it was the middle of a war, and there was only so much the federal government could do. So, as always, it fell to the states to decide if and how those soldiers would vote. I mean, what had to happen was, of course,

legal change, statutory change. States began passing laws to give soldiers the vote. Some instituted absentee voting, which is still around today. You allow the soldiers in the camps to submit a ballot into ballot boxes that were taken to the camps

by state election commissioners. And then on polling day, the soldiers deposit their tickets under the supervision of the commanding officer and the commissioners. Other states instituted something called proxy voting. where you allow someone that you designate to cast your vote for you in your home precinct. But it's easy to see how that might not go according to plan.

An imposter could pretend to be the proxy. A commanding officer might intimidate soldiers into voting for a certain person or keep them from mailing their ballots. And the envelope marks soldiers vote? Could easily be opened and a different ballot be submitted inside. Thing is, even in states where soldiers could vote, questions hung over these new ways of voting and raise concerns about the legitimacy of the election. Both sides claim malpractice and fraud. You have Democrats claiming that the War Department is delaying the delivery of soldiers' votes back home.

Where they're known to be McClellan votes, they are being held up by the War Department. Even claims that the ballots are being extensively altered by. by removing McClellan's votes from the envelopes and substituting Lincoln ballots, waiting the scales very powerfully in favor of the Republicans and the administration. The men who would vote the McClellan ticket were kept here, and only A's men were sent to their states to vote. All of the McClellan men were kept here. I suppose I might have gotten home if I would have said I would vote for A,

but never. I would sooner stay here for another year than to come home and vote for him. But the Republicans too could point legitimately to the arrest of several Democrats in Washington and Baltimore for forging McClellan ballots. He's designed to swing the vote in New York State. So both parties are at it. But it's the Republicans who are able to present themselves most powerfully and most convincingly to the army that they are the friends of the Democratic rights of the soldiers. I cast the first vote I have ever cast for the election of Lincoln. In doing so, I felt that I was doing my country as much service as I have ever done on the field of battle.

November 8, 1864. Election Day The day itself passed off peacefully enough, but there is this strong sense of tension, a sense of high excitement, determination to be heard on the day, to stand up for your rights as voters, regardless of what your commanding officers might want, or regardless of what the other party's campaigners might want. The votes were counted.

Among the soldiers, Lincoln got three votes for every one McClellan got. Before long, it was clear that Lincoln had won the election. Yes, there's fraud. Yes, there's manipulation. Yes, there's partisanship. this malpractice. But I think ultimately there was enough of authenticity and good practice in the absentee balancing in the war for the result itself not to have been to distortion. A few days later, Lincoln addressed the nation.

The present rebellion brought our republic to a severe test and a presidential election occurring in regular course during the rebellion added not a little to the strain. I mean, he knew that the electoral process in wartime had its shortcomings, but what it showed was just how deeply embedded the idea of representative government had become in the United States over the years since the revolution.

The election, along with its incidental and undesirable strife, has done good, too. It has demonstrated that a people's government can sustain a national election, in the midst of a great civil war. Until now, it has not been known to the world that this was a possibility. Amidst a bloody war, with all the messiness and drama that came with the election, democracy managed to preserve its most fundamental pillar, voting.

Thousands of soldiers had voted for the first time. The 1864 election laid the groundwork for expanding voting rights. That's it for this week's episode of a moment. America in pursuit. If you want to hear the full-length throughline episode, check out how we vote. And be sure to join us next Tuesday when we talk about what came after the Civil War and emancipation. What is going to happen to nearly four million African Americans who had been enslaved in the South? Are they going to have basic rights? Are they not going to have basic rights? We'll bring you the story of the 14th Amendment and the debate over who is an American.

and what rights come with that. That's next time. This episode was produced by Kiana Morgadam and edited by Christina Kim with help from the Thuline production team. Music, as always, by me, Ramtin Arablui, and my band Drop Electric. Special thanks to Julie Kane,

Irene Noguchi, Beth Donovan, Casey Minor, and Lindsay McKenna. We're your hosts, Ramtin, Aram Thuie, and Rand, Abd al-Fattah. Thank you for listening.