Editing Jacob Collamer (section)

==Senator==
In 1855 Collamer was elected to the [[US Senate|Senate]] as a conservative, anti-slavery [[US Republican Party|Republican]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Garrison |first1=William Lloyd |last2=Ruchames |first2=Louis |date=1975 |title=The Letters of William Lloyd Garrison: From Disunionism to the Brink of War |volume=IV |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=v5aZrAuKt0wC&pg=PA397 |location=Cambridge, MA |publisher=Cambridge, MA |page=397 |isbn=978-0-674-52663-1}}</ref> In his first term, Collamer was Chairman of the Committee on Engrossed Bills ([[34th United States Congress|Thirty-fourth Congress]]).<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/resources/pdf/CommitteeChairs.pdf |title=Chairmen of Senate Standing Committees, 1789-present |last=Historian of the United States Senate |date=2015 |website=senate.gov/ |publisher=U.S. Senate |location=Washington, DC |pages=20, 45, 54 |ref={{sfnRef|Chairmen of Senate Standing Committees, 1789-present}}}}</ref>

In 1856, Collamer received several votes for [[Vice President of the United States|Vice President]] at the [[1856 Republican National Convention|Republican National Convention]].<ref>Republican National Committee, [https://archive.org/details/proceedingsoffir00inrepu/page/64 <!-- quote="jacob collamer" votes president 1860. --> Proceedings of the First Three Republican National Conventions], 1893, pages 63-64</ref>

In the Senate, he defended his positions vigorously even when he was in the minority.{{sfn|''Jacob Collamer: Woodstock's U.S. Senator''|page=17}} When the [[United States Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources|Committee on Territories]], chaired by [[Stephen A. Douglas]], recommended passage of the [[Crittenden Amendment]], which proposed resubmitting for popular vote the pro-slavery [[Lecompton Constitution]] for [[Kansas]], Collamer and [[James R. Doolittle]] of [[Wisconsin]] refused to vote in favor but instead crafted a persuasive minority report explaining their opposition.{{sfn|''Jacob Collamer: Woodstock's U.S. Senator''|page=20}}

Collamer also represented the minority view in June 1860, when the select committee chaired by [[James Murray Mason]] issued its report on [[John Brown (abolitionist)|John Brown]]'s raid on [[Harper's Ferry]].<ref>West Virginia Culture and History, [http://www.wvculture.org/history/jbexhibit/masonreport.html Senate Select Committee Report on the Harper’s Ferry Invasion], retrieved December 17, 2013</ref> Mason argued that Brown's raid was the work of an organized abolitionist movement, which needed to be curtailed with federal authority.<ref name="wvculture.org">{{cite web|url=http://www.wvculture.org/history/jbexhibit/masonreport.html|title=Mason Report|website=www.wvculture.org}}</ref> Collamer and Doolittle countered that Brown and his followers had been caught and punished and that further government action was not necessary.<ref name="wvculture.org"/>

Collamer's years on the bench helped develop his reputation as the best lawyer in the Senate.<ref>{{cite book |last=Bogue |first=Allan G. |date=2009 |title=The Earnest Men: Republicans of the Civil War Senate |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-eZnI4lkfQUC&pg=PA32 |location=Ithaca, NY |publisher=Cornell University Press |page=32 |isbn= 978-0801475696|ref={{sfnRef|''The Earnest Men: Republicans of the Civil War Senate''}}}}</ref> His colleagues were known to pay close attention to his remarks on the Senate floor even though he spoke infrequently and even then too quietly to reach the entire chamber or the galleries.{{sfn|''The Earnest Men: Republicans of the Civil War Senate''|page=32}} [[Charles Sumner]] referred to Collamer as the "Green-Mountain [[Socrates]]"{{sfn|''The Earnest Men: Republicans of the Civil War Senate''|page=32}} and called him the wisest and best balanced statesman of his time.<ref>{{cite book |last=Barber |first=A. D. |date=November 5, 1896 |title=Vermont as a Leader in Educational Progress |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=76AyAQAAMAAJ&pg=RA5-PA107 |location=Montpelier, VT |publisher=Vermont Historical Society |page=107 |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref>

===Civil War===
At the [[1860 Republican National Convention]], Collamer received the [[favorite son]] votes of Vermont's delegates and withdrew after the first ballot.<ref>The Vermonter magazine, [https://books.google.com/books?id=wZk6AQAAMAAJ&dq=%22jacob+collamer%22+1860+convention+votes+president&pg=PA5 Incidents in the Life of Lincoln], January 1909, page 5</ref>  Reelected to the Senate in 1861, he served until his death.<ref>William Lloyd Garrison, [https://books.google.com/books?id=v5aZrAuKt0wC&dq=%22jacob+collamer%22+reelected+senate+1861&pg=PA397 The Letters of William Lloyd Garrison], 1976, page 397</ref>

In 1861, Collamer authored the bill to invest the President with new war powers and give Congressional approval to the war measures that [[Abraham Lincoln]] had taken under his own authority at the start of his administration.<ref>Jacob G. Ullery, [https://books.google.com/books?id=Nvg_AAAAYAAJ&q=collamer&pg=PA224 Men of Vermont Illustrated], 1894, pages 121-124</ref>

Collamer was the lead senator of the nine Republicans who visited Lincoln in 1862 to argue for change in the composition of his cabinet by persuading him to replace his [[US Secretary of State|Secretary of State]], [[William Henry Seward]].<ref>Chester G. Hearn, [https://books.google.com/books?id=cmZkBkmBc7wC&dq=%22jacob+collamer%22+seward+chase+lincoln+meeting+cabinet&pg=PA141 Lincoln, the Cabinet, and the Generals], 2010, pages 139-143</ref> Having been encouraged to confront Lincoln by claims of cabinet disharmony from Lincoln's [[US Secretary of the Treasury|Secretary of the Treasury]], [[Salmon P. Chase]], the senators changed their minds during the meeting after Chase was maneuvered by Lincoln into backtracking on his initial argument.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cmZkBkmBc7wC&q=%22jacob+collamer%22+seward+chase+lincoln+meeting+cabinet&pg=PA141|title=Lincoln, the Cabinet, and the Generals|first=Chester G.|last=Hearn|date=28 March 2018|publisher=LSU Press|isbn=9780807137338|via=Google Books}}</ref>

Again a member of the majority once the [[Democratic Party (United States)|Democrats]] from the southern states left the Senate during the war, Collamer was Chairman of the Committee on the Post Office and Post Roads ([[37th United States Congress|Thirty-seventh]] to [[39th United States Congress|Thirty-ninth Congresses]]) and the Committee on the Library ([[38th United States Congress|Thirty-eighth]] and Thirty-ninth Congresses).{{sfn|Chairmen of Senate Standing Committees, 1789-present}}

After the war, Collamer opposed the [[Reconstruction era of the United States|Reconstruction]] of plans of Presidents Lincoln and [[Andrew Johnson]] and was an advocate of Congressional control over the process of readmitting former [[Confederate States of America|Confederate]] states to the Union.<ref name="auto"/>