Schurz, Carl

Life Span
to
    Full name
    Carl Schurz
    Place of Birth
    Burial Place
    Birth Date Certainty
    Exact
    Death Date Certainty
    Exact
    Gender
    Male
    Race
    White
    Sectional choice
    North
    No. of Spouses
    1
    Family
    Margarethe Meyer (wife)
    Education
    Other
    Other Education
    University of Bonn
    Occupation
    Politician
    Military
    Diplomat
    Attorney or Judge
    Businessman
    Journalist
    Writer or Artist
    Relation to Slavery
    White non-slaveholder
    Political Parties
    Republican
    Liberal Republican
    Other Affiliations
    Abolitionists (Anti-Slavery Society)
    Government
    Lincoln Administration (1861-65)
    Hayes Administration (1877-81)
    Diplomat
    US Senate
    Other state government
    Military
    Union Army
    Foreign military

    Carl Schurz (American National Biography)

    Scholarship
    [Carl Schurz's] principal occupation, however, was politics, and since he was an opponent of slavery, he joined the Republican party. He had become fluent in English, was an excellent speaker, and was much sought after by the party to win over other German Americans. So effectively did he campaign for the antislavery cause in two languages that in 1857, before he had even completed his naturalization, he was nominated for lieutenant governor. Because of nativist influence, he, unlike other Republicans, lost. But he remained loyal to the party, even in 1859 when he failed in his efforts to obtain the gubernatorial nomination. Lecturing throughout the North and taking up the law to recoup financial losses incurred during the panic of 1857, he made a name for himself and in 1860 became the chairman of the Wisconsin delegation to the Republican National Convention in Chicago.

    In Chicago, Schurz first favored William H. Seward but then switched to Abraham Lincoln, whom he had come to appreciate in the 1858 campaign. Elected to the Republican National Committee, he organized a campaign centered on ethnic groups. He himself wooed the Germans, and Lincoln was convinced that this effort made a decisive contribution to the Republican victory. Schurz's reward was an appointment as minister to Spain.
    Hans L. Trefousse, "Schurz, Carl," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/04/04-00886.html.
    Chicago Style Entry Link
    Schurz, Carl. Abraham Lincoln: An Essay. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1897. view record
    Schurz, Carl. Life of Henry Clay. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1887. view record
    How to Cite This Page: "Schurz, Carl," House Divided: The Civil War Research Engine at Dickinson College, https://hd.housedivided.dickinson.edu/node/12847.