Artemus Ward (Charles Farrar Browne) was President Abraham Lincoln's favorite writer.

President Lincoln insisted on reading Artmus Ward's letter, "High-Hand Outrage at Utica", to his cabinet before presenting to them "The Emanicipation Proclamation", freeing the slaves.

Lincoln said to his canbinet ministers, "With the fearful strain that is upon me night and day, if I did not laugh I should die, and you need this medicine as much as I do."

In his autobiography, Abraham Lincoln, The War Years, Carl Sandburg quotes a writer of The New York Herald Tribune, "Ordinarily Honest Old Abe does not display much energy or spirit. So long as he is left in peace to read Artemus Ward's book and crack his own little jokes, he is happy. But when an emergency comes, Old Abe is ready to meet it."

Originally Browne had not been a supporter of Lincoln in the conflict between Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas (also of Illinois). In the presidential campaign of 1860, which climaxed Browne's stay with the Cleveland Plain Dealer, the Democratic Party was split between Northerner Stephen A. Douglas and Southener John C. Breckinridge, running against Lincoln and "The Black Republicans" (socalled for their opposition to slavery). As associate editor of The Plain Dealer, Browne ardently supported Douglas. Browne played a major role in Douglas' campaign organ, the weekly Campaign Plain Dealer, which was highly influential in the West for the issues of union and popular sovereignty. Both papers agreed with Douglas that the extremism both in the North and the South was morally bad and threatened the union.

In July, 1860, The Campaign Plain Dealer declared, regarding the Republicans: "No Black Republican candidate has ever been elected President of these United States, and none (in our opinion) ever can be! It is impossible to so sectionalize the country as to perfectly unite the North aganst the South.... A party founded , built up, and perpetuated on the sole principle of hostility to the South can never attain the Presidency as long as there is a Union party in the country." Unlike the attacks of other comic newspaper writers, Browne's opposition to Lincoln consisted in mildly poking fun of the campagain image of "Honest Abe". In "A Political Sermon by the Rev. Hardshell Pike", Browne repeatedly wrote of Lincoln, "He split some rails in Illinoy and bossed a roarin' flat-boat."< P align="justify"> In "How Old Abe Received the News of His Nomination", Browne described the meeting with the delegation from the Springfield Nomination Convention: "It was a grand, a magnificant spectacle. There stood Honest Ole Abe in his shirt-sleeves, a pair of leather home-made suspenders holding up a pair of home-made pantaloons, the seat of which was neatly patched with substantial cloth with of a different color. 'Mr Lincoln, Sir, you've been nominated, Sir, for the highest office, Sir --,' 'Oh, don't bother me', said Honest Old Abe. 'I took a stent this mornin' to split three million rails afore night, and I don't want to be pestered with no stuff about no Convention till I get my stent done.'"

But, after election of Lincoln, the last issue of The Campaign Plain Dealer conceded, "Popular Sovereignty Democrats. those who voted for Douglas and Johnson, it becomes us more than all others, to submit with the best grace to the popular will and bow to the majority of the people." Two days after this, Browne left Cleveland to join the staff of Vanity Fair. One of the earliest Artemus Ward letters in Vanity Fair -- "Interview with Mr. Lincoln" [Act II, Scene 8, herein] -- made clear Browne's willingness to support the new President. With his continued support, he became Lincoln's favorite writer."