The Confederacy was also very interested in the outcome of the presidential election. And, as Grant wrote to one of his commanders in August of 1864, the Confederates also had a preferred candidate:

"The rebellion is now fed by the bickering and differences North. The hope of a counter-revolution over the draft or the Presidential election keeps them together. Then too, they hope for a Peace candidate who would let them go. A 'peace at any price' is fearful to contemplate. It would be but the beginning of war."

By August of 1864, Lincoln's political insiders advised him that his reelection was in jeopardy. Republican leader Thurlow Weed wrote to Secretary of State William Seward, "I have told Mr. Lincoln that his re-election was an impossibility."

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