Mr. Seward to Mr. Adams, November 30, 1862

Mr. Seward to Mr.
Adams.

Sir: I have expected to be able to inform you
that General Burnside has advanced across the Rappahannock. His
preparations are ready, and the movement is imminent. He has a large and
fine army.

General Banks’s latest day assigned for embarkation has passed. I trust
he will be on his way when this despatch leaves the coast. The Passaic
has at last left her port. The Secretary of the Navy reckons confidently
on the rapid completion and despatch of sufficient iron-clad auxiliaries
to reduce Charleston.

The gold speculation seems to have passed its zenith, and to be decidedly
declining.

More of moderation and self-reliance is manifested by the people now than
at any time since the war began.

Congress has come together in, I think, a good, practical and patriotic
temper. The President’s message grasps the subject of slavery earnestly
and confidently. It would be unbecoming, even if it were possible, to
predict the reception which his bold suggestion of gradual and
compensated emancipation will meet. It is something to know, perhaps it
is all that can be known now, that the great problem of the civil war
maintains its importance, and secures the consideration it deserves.
While the people hesitate, doubt, and divide upon each new suggestion
that is made for the solution of the problem, they no longer shrink from
contemplating and studying it. If they seem to the world to be slow in
reaching it, the world ought to be reassured of their success by the
reflection that no nation ever advanced faster in a task so complicated
and so difficult. The great question heretofore has been: Can the
constitutional Union endure through the trial? There is no longer any
ground for despondency on that point. When we compare the military and
naval conditions of the country now with what they were when Congress
came together a year ago—when we compare the condition of our foreign
relations now existing with that which prevailed when Congress assembled
a year ago—we see evidences of strength, power, and stability which then
it would have seemed presumptuous to expect.

I am, sir, your obedient servant,