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.