Refusal Of Seward Resignation

To Wm. H. Seward

EXECUTIVE MANSION, March 4, 1861.

MY DEAR SIR:—Your note of the 2d instant, asking to withdraw your acceptance of my invitation to take charge of the State Department, was duly received. It is the subject of the most painful solicitude with me, and I feel constrained to beg that you will countermand the withdrawal. The public interest, I think, demands that you should; and my personal feelings are deeply enlisted in the same direction. Please consider and answer by 9 A.M. to-morrow.

Your obedient servant,
A. LINCOLN.