[lentulusgracchus]

Post up a little more about Cassius Clay; I saw his name dropped on another thread just yesterday. The Blairs' names tend to get tossed around as a known quantity: they were Lincoln relatives and partisans from IIRC Missouri, but Clay is a new (to me) name. Lincoln had some interesting, and very useful, political friends whom he called on a lot in the intrigue-filled first two months of his administration: people like Ward Lamon, Thurlow Weed, Clay, the Blairs, and Gustavus Fox. He used Seward a lot, too -- Seward of the hot-stove reputation.

[Paul C. Jesup]

From what I understand, when Lincoln first got to D.C. he worked under Senator Clay and that is where Abe got most of his pro-federal government, pro-tax and spend views.