Why was the Lincoln Administration at a disadvantage in its early recruitment efforts?

The Federal government had never been a central base with regards to recruiting military personnel and sustaining its size in force. The individual states were always the source of new regiments, and the state governors headed those efforts as required. Now, as a civil war was upon the nation, the Union was dependent upon the state governors to provide the needed troops. This was a chaotic situation as states did not all equally provide new volunteer recruits.Thus the Union had to gain new recruits by public relations style methods, draft acts and by paying bonus to tempt men to join the military.

Washington DC placed pressure on the governors to advance recruitment. When one governor believed he supplied enough troops, there was infighting between them if some governors were slack on their efforts.