As the Civil War loomed ever nearer on the horizon, Ewing hoped to make moderation and compromise prevail and thus to preserve the Union. In particular, he favored the extension of the Missouri Compromise line to the Pacific Coast. To this end, he participated as a delegate from Ohio in the Peace Conference called by Virginia. The Conference met in Washington on February 4, 1861, and continued for twenty-three days with Ewing playing a conspicuous role. However, neither he nor the others who favored a policy of moderation were able to overcome the determined opposition of the Republican delegates. Once the war began he rendered loyal support to Lincoln's administration. Three of his four sons served as officers in the Union Army, and his son in law and former ward, William Tecumseh Sherman, was second only to Grant in the final stages of the struggle. Trusted by Lincoln for his advice on matters of public policy as well as upon points of law, it was he who urged upon the President the release of the captured Confederate agents, Mason and Slidell. Indeed, his influence with Lincoln was so great that on many occasions, often to the despair of Cabinet members, he was able to secure from the President pardons or other favors for friends and for clients.

During the winter of 1861-1862, when the Ohio Legislature was considering the choice of a successor to Ben Wade, whose term in the Senate was to expire in 1863, a movement was afoot in favor of Ewing; however, his Democratic and Conservative support was not sufficient to overcome the hostility of the Radicals. Eventually, Wade was re-elected. In 1864, Ewing supported Lincoln's re-election, fearing that the election of McClellan would signal the dissolution of the Union. As hostilities drew to a close, he once again turned to the advocacy of policies of moderation and conciliation. Eventually, he came to be one of President Andrew Johnson's principal advisors. For example, it was upon his advice that Johnson appointed Henry Stanbery, Ewing's former pupil and partner, Attorney General, and O.H. Browning Secretary of the Interior. Not only did he advise Johnson on situations, but he even furnished the President with veto messages. Eventually, he was considered for a Cabinet post. When Stanton was removed as Secretary of War and Lorenzo Thomas was prevented from taking office by Stanton, who barricaded himself in the War Office, it was Ewing's name that Johnson, on February 22, 1868, sent to the Senate for confirmation as Secretary of War. However, Congress and the Nation were in the midst of the impeachment crisis and no action was ever taken on the nomination.

Ewing's conviction that the country must be rescued from the grip of the Radicals, stemming from his dislike for their economic policies, as well as for their reconstruction policies, impelled him to take as active a party as he could in the 1868 campaign. Unable to make speeches himself, the elderly statesman wrote several for his son, General Thomas Ewing, who was campaigning for the Democratic ticket. After the defeat of the Democrats, he continued to give advice, particularly on the Nation's finances. Although he had long been an advocate of the old Whig policy of high protective tariffs, he now saw that such tariffs, instead of protecting infant industries which he had conceived to be for the benefit of the entire country, were insuring to the benefit of a small class of monopoly minded capitalists. He therefore condemned them.

Meanwhile, he continued to devote considerable time and effort to his law practice and to the supervision of his salt works. Winters he still spent in Washington, arguing cases before the Supreme Court. However, old age was rapidly overtaking him. On October 22, 1869, he was stricken while arguing a case before the Supreme Court and for several hours his life was despaired of. Although he recovered and quickly resumed his activities, by the Spring of 1871 a gradual enfeeblement was evident. By October, he was bedfast. Received into the fold of the Roman Catholic Church, the Faith of his beloved wife, Maria, who had passed on in 1864, he breathed his last on October 26, 1871.

He died revered by his family and respected by his colleagues. Nine years of his adult life had been spent in public service. The remainder he had devoted to the practice of law. A self-made man, he had risen to great heights both in the service of his country and in the practice of his chosen profession. The decisions of the Supreme Court were greatly enriched by his arguments. Although his early education had been largely informal, he was noted not only for his knowledge of the law but also for the wide range of his genius which embraced the classics, history, poetry, the arts, architecture, and science -- all of which were arranged and classified in his mind with great order and exactness. Indeed, Daniel Webster once said of him that he was the best informed man he had ever met and that he had never conversed with him for five minutes without being wiser for having done so. The esteem in which he was held at the time of his death was amply attested to by the numerous letters and messages of condolence received by his family, as well as by the fact that the Supreme Court of the United States, in an unusual tribute, devoted several pages of their reports (12 Wallace, vii-ix) to an account of his life.

Bibliographical Note

The only full length biography of Thomas Ewing which has appeared to date is an unpublished doctoral dissertation entitled "Thomas Ewing, Last of the Whigs" and presented by Paul