Lincoln meets with the delegation from the Confederacy. Vice-President Stephens asks if the South would be allowed to rejoin the Union in time to block the Amendment but Lincoln says that slavery in this nation is finished. Stephens sneers that Lincoln’s Union is bound together by lies and that it wasn’t democracy but trickery that passed the Amendment. However, at this point General Sherman has reached Atlanta during his March to the Sea – having cut his way through the South. The War is almost over.
Lincoln agrees to let Robert join the war effort- as a personal envoy under Lt. General Grant – a fact that enrages Mary. She screams that Lincoln is sending his oldest son to die on the fields of battle so soon after losing a son to typhoid. When she tells him that he does not know grief, Lincoln rails against her – saying that there are days when he wishes he could curl in the ground next to their deceased son’s coffin. He tells her that his grief is very real but that he must force himself to stay strong in order to carry the burden of the nation.