Glass. 
 Book. 
 
 
 I 
 
 COPYRICHT DEPOSIT 
 
Complete Works of 
 Abraham Lincoln 
 
GETTYSBURG EDITION 
 
 This Edition de Luxe is limited to seven 
 hundred numbered and registered sets, 
 
 Number\ /.0 
 
 $Z0mtfbwn4£j& 
 

 Complete Works of 
 
 Abraham Lincoln 
 
 Edited by 
 
 John G. Nicolay and John Hay 
 
 With a General Introduction by 
 
 Richard Watson Gilder, and Special Articles 
 
 by Other Eminent Persons 
 
 New and Enlarged Edition 
 
 VOLUME V 
 
 New York 
 Francis D. Tandy Company 
 
LIBRARY Of CONGRESS 
 
 TwoCoDies Received 
 
 MAY 24 1906 
 
 /Copyig-ht Entry 
 
 CLASS (X XXc. Ni 
 
 COPY B, 
 
 
 
 Copyright, 1894, by 
 
 JOHN G. NICOLAY W JOHN HAY 
 
 Copyright, igoj, by 
 
 FRANCIS D. TANDY 
 
 \ 
 
Abraham Lincoln, the Great 
 Republican. 1 
 
 IT requires the most gracious pages in the world's 
 history to record what one American achieved. 
 The story of this simple life is the story of a 
 plain, honest, manly citizen, true patriot, and pro- 
 found statesman, who believing with all the strength 
 of his mighty soul in the institutions of his country, 
 won because of them the highest place in its govern- 
 ment — ■ then fell a precious sacrifice to the Union he 
 held so dear, which Providence had spared his life 
 long enough to save. 
 
 What were the traits of character which made 
 Abraham Lincoln prophet and master, without a rival, 
 in the greatest crisis in our history? What gave him 
 such mighty power? To me the answer is simple: 
 Lincoln had sublime faith in the people. He walked 
 with and among them. He recognized the importance 
 and power of an enlightened public sentiment and was 
 guided by it. Even amid the vicissitudes of war, he 
 concealed little from public review and inspection. 
 In all he did, he invited, rather than evaded, exam- 
 
 1 From an Address by William McKinley, before the Marquette 
 Club, Chicago, February 12, 1896. 
 
vi Abraham Lincoln 
 
 ination and criticism. He submitted his plans and 
 purposes, as far as practicable, to public consideration 
 with perfect frankness and sincerity. There was 
 such homely simplicity in his character that it could 
 not be hedged in by the pomp of place, nor the cere- 
 monials of high official station. He was so accessible 
 to the public that he seemed to take the whole people 
 into his confidence. Here, perhaps, was one secret 
 of his power. The people never lost their confidence 
 in him, however much they unconsciously added to his 
 personal discomfort and trials. His patience was al- 
 most superhuman ; and who will say that he was mis- 
 taken in his treatment of the thousands who thronged 
 continually about him? More than once when re- 
 proached for permitting visitors to crowd upon him, 
 he asked, in pained surprise: "Why, what harm 
 does this confidence in men do me? I get only good 
 and inspiration from it." 
 
 Horace Greeley once said : " I doubt whether 
 man, woman or child, white or black, bond or free, 
 virtuous or vicious, ever accosted, or reached forth a 
 hand to Abraham Lincoln, and detected in his coun- 
 tenance or manner, any repugnance or shrinking from 
 the proffered contact, any assumption of superiority, 
 or betrayal of disdain." 
 
 Frederick Douglass, the orator and patriot, is cred- 
 ited with saying: "Mr. Lincoln is the only white 
 man with whom I have ever talked, or in whose pres- 
 ence I have ever been, who did not consciously or un- 
 consciously betray to me that he recognized my 
 color." 
 
The Great Republican vii 
 
 George Bancroft, the historian, alluding to this 
 characteristic, which was never so conspicuously mani- 
 fested as during the darker hours of the war, beauti- 
 fully illustrated it in these memorable words : " As 
 a child, in a dark night, on a rugged way, catches 
 hold of the hand of its father for guidance and sup- 
 port, Lincoln clung fast to the hand of the people, and 
 moved calmly through the gloom." 
 
 His earliest public utterances were marked by this 
 confidence. On March 9, 1832, when announcing 
 himself as a candidate for Representative in the Illi- 
 nois Legislature, he said that he felt it his duty to 
 make known to the people his sentiments upon the 
 questions of the day : 
 
 11 Every man is said to have his precious ambi- 
 tion," he observed, " and whether it be true or not, 
 I can say, for one, that I have no other so great as 
 that of being truly esteemed by my fellow men by 
 rendering myself worthy of their esteem. How far 
 I shall succeed in gratifying this ambition is yet to 
 be developed. I am young and unknown to many 
 of you. I was born, and have ever remained, in the 
 humblest walks of life. I have no wealthy or popu- 
 lar relatives or friends to recommend me. My case 
 is thrown exclusively upon the independent voters of 
 the county. . . . But if the good people, in 
 their wisdom, shall see fit to keep me in the back- 
 ground, I have been too familiar with disappoint- 
 ments to be very much chagrined." 
 
 In this remarkable address — to me always pa- 
 thetic — made when he was only twenty-three, the 
 
viii Abraham Lincoln 
 
 main elements of Lincoln's character and the qualities 
 which made his great career possible are revealed 
 with startling distinctness. It expresses the experi- 
 ence of the noble young man of to-day equally as 
 well as then. We see therein " that brave old wis- 
 dom of sincerity," that oneness in feeling with the 
 common people, and that supreme confidence in them, 
 which formed the foundation of his political faith. 
 
 Among the statesmen of America, Lincoln is the 
 true Democrat; and, Franklin perhaps excepted, the 
 first great one. He had no illustrious ancestry, no 
 inherited place or wealth, and none of the prestige, 
 power, training, or culture which were assured to the 
 gentry or landed class of our own Colonial times. 
 Nor did Lincoln believe that these classes, respectable 
 and patriotic however they might be, should, as a 
 matter of abstract right, have the controlling influ- 
 ence in our government. Instead, he believed in the 
 all-pervading power of public opinion. 
 
 Lincoln had little or no instruction in the common 
 school; but, as the eminent Dr. Cuyler has said, he 
 was graduated from " the grand college of free la- 
 bor, whose works were the flat-boat, the farm, and 
 the backwoods lawyer's office." He had a broad 
 comprehension of the central idea of popular govern- 
 ment. The Declaration of Independence was his 
 handbook; time and again he expressed his belief in 
 freedom and equality. On July i, 1854, he wrote: 
 
 " Most governments have been based, practically, 
 on the denial of the equal rights of men. Ours be- 
 gan by affirming those rights. They said ' some men 
 
The Great Republican ix 
 
 are too ignorant and vicious to share in government.' 
 ' Possibly so,' said we, ' and by your system you 
 would always keep them ignorant and vicious. We 
 proposed to give all a chance; and we expected the 
 weak to grow stronger, the ignorant wiser, and all 
 better and happier together.' We made the experi- 
 ment, and the fruit is before us. Look at it, think of 
 it! Look at it in its aggregate grandeur, extent of 
 country, and numbers of population." 
 
 Lincoln believed in the uplifting influences of free 
 government, and that by giving all a chance we could 
 get higher average results for the people than where 
 governments are exclusive and opportunities are lim- 
 ited to the few. No American ever did so much as 
 he to enlarge these opportunities, or tear down the 
 barriers which excluded a free participation in them. 
 In his first message to Congress, at the special session 
 convening on July 4, 1861, he gave signal evidence of 
 his faith in our institutions, and their elevating influ- 
 ences, in most impressive language. He said: 
 
 " It may be affirmed without extravagance that the 
 free institutions we enjoy have developed the powers 
 and improved the condition of our whole people be- 
 yond any example in the world. Of this we now 
 have a striking and an impressive illustration. So 
 large an army as the Government has now on foot 
 was never before known without a soldier in it but 
 who has taken his place there of his own free choice." 
 (Then what followed in his message is, to me, the 
 highest and most touching tribute ever spoken or 
 written of our matchless Volunteer Army of 1861-65 
 
x Abraham Lincoln 
 
 by any American statesman, soldier, or citizen from 
 that day to this:) " But more than this, there are 
 many single regiments whose members, one and 
 another, possess full practical knowledge of all the 
 arts, sciences, and professions, and whatever else, 
 whether useful or elegant, is known in the world; 
 and there is scarcely one from which there could not 
 be selected a President, a Cabinet, a Congress, and 
 perhaps a Court, abundantly competent to administer 
 the Government itself." 
 
 What a noble, self-sacrificing army of freemen he 
 describes ! The like of it mankind never saw before 
 and will not look upon soon again. Their service 
 and sacrifice were not in vain — the Union is 
 stronger, freer and better than ever before because 
 they lived, and the peace, fraternity and harmony, 
 which Lincoln prayed might come, and which he 
 prophesied would come, is happily here. And now 
 that the wounds of the war are healed, may we not, 
 with grateful hearts, resolve, in the words of Lincoln, 
 that we will " care for him who shall have borne the 
 battle, and for his widow, and his orphan." 
 
 Lincoln's antecedent life seems to have been one 
 of unconscious preparation for the great responsibili- 
 ties which were committed to him in i860. As 
 one of the masses himself, and living with them, 
 sharing their feelings, and sympathizing with their 
 daily trials, their hopes and aspirations, he was better 
 fitted to lead them than any other man of his age. 
 He recognized more clearly than any one else that 
 the plain people he met in his daily life, and knew 
 
The Great Republican xi 
 
 so familiarly, were, according to the dictates of jus- 
 tice and our theory of government, its ultimate rulers 
 and the arbiters of its destiny. He knew this not as 
 a theory, but from his own personal experience. 
 
 Born in poverty, and surrounded by obstacles on 
 every hand seemingly insurmountable but for the 
 intervening hand of Providence, Lincoln grew every 
 year into greater and grander intellectual power and 
 vigor. His life, until he was twelve years old, was 
 spent either in a " half-faced camp " or cabin. Yet 
 amid such surroundings the boy learned to read, 
 write, and cipher, to think, declaim, and speak, in a 
 manner far beyond his years and time. All his days 
 in the school-house " added together would not make 
 a single year." But every day of his life from in- 
 fancy to manhood was a constant drill in the school 
 of nature and experience. His study of books and 
 newspapers was beyond that of any other person in 
 his town or neighorhood, and perhaps of his county 
 or section. He did not read many books, but he 
 learned more from them than any other reader. It 
 was strength of body as well as of mind that made 
 Lincoln's career possible. Ill success only spurred 
 him into making himself more worthy of trust and 
 confidence. Nothing could daunt him. He might 
 have but a single tow-linen shirt, or only one pair of 
 jeans pantaloons, he often did not know where his 
 next dollar was to come from, but he mastered Eng- 
 lish grammar and composition, arithmetic, geometry, 
 surveying, logic, and the law. 
 
 How well he mastered the art of expression, is 
 
xii Abraham Lincoln 
 
 shown by the incident of the Yale professor who 
 heard his Cooper Institute speech and called on him 
 at his hotel, to inquire where he had learned his match- 
 less power as a public speaker. The modest country 
 lawyer was in turn surprised to be suspected of pos- 
 sessing unusual talents as an orator, and could only 
 answer that his sole training had been in the school 
 of experience. 
 
 Eight years' service in the Illinois Legislature, two 
 years in Congress and nearly thirty years' political 
 campaigning, in the most exciting period of American 
 politics, gave scope for the development of his pow- 
 ers, and that tact, readiness, and self-reliance, which 
 were invaluable to a modest, backward man, such as 
 Lincoln naturally was. Added to these qualities, he 
 had the genius, which communizes, which puts a man 
 on a level, not only with the highest, but with the 
 lowest of his kind. By dint of patient industry, and 
 by using wisely his limited opportunities, he became 
 the most popular orator, the best political manager, 
 and the ablest leader of his party in Illinois. 
 
 But the best training he had for the Presidency, 
 after all, was his twenty-three years' arduous experi- 
 ence as a lawyer traveling the circuit of the courts 
 of his district and State. Here he met in forensic 
 contests, and frequently defeated some of the most 
 powerful legal minds of the West. In the higher 
 courts he won still greater distinction in the impor- 
 tant cases committed to his charge. 
 
 With this preparation, it is not surprising that Lin- 
 coln entered upon the Presidency peculiarly well 
 
The Great Republican xiii 
 
 equipped for its vast responsibilities. His contempo- 
 raries, however, did not realize this. The leading 
 statesmen of the country were not prepossessed in his 
 favor. They appear to have had no conception of 
 the remarkable powers latent beneath that uncouth 
 and rugged exterior. It seemed to them strangely 
 out of place that the people should at this, the great- 
 est crisis of their history, entrust the supreme execu- 
 tive power of the Nation to one whom they pre- 
 sumptuously called " this ignorant rail-splitter from 
 the prairies of Illinois." Many predicted failure 
 from the beginning. 
 
 Lincoln was essentially a man of peace. He in- 
 herited from his Quaker forefathers an intense oppo- 
 sition to war. During his brief service in Congress 
 he found occasion more than once to express it. He 
 opposed the Mexican war from principle, but voted 
 men and supplies after hostilities actually began. In 
 one of his few speeches in the House, he character- 
 ized military glory as " that rainbow that rises in 
 showers of blood — that serpent that charms but to 
 destroy." When he became responsible for the wel- 
 fare of the country, he was none the less earnest for 
 peace. He felt that even in the most righteous cause, 
 war is a fearful thing, and he was actuated by the 
 feeling that it ought not to be begun except as a 
 last resort, and then only after it had been precipi- 
 tated by the enemies of the country. He said in 
 Philadelphia, on February 22, 1861 : 
 
 11 There is no need of bloodshed and war. There 
 is no necessity for it. I am not in favor of such a 
 
xiv Abraham Lincoln 
 
 course; and I may say in advance that there will be 
 no bloodshed unless it is forced upon the Govern- 
 ment. The Government will not use force unless 
 force is used against it." 
 
 In the selection of his Cabinet, he at once showed 
 his greatness and magnanimity. His principal rivals 
 for the Presidential nomination were invited to seats 
 in his council chamber. No one but a great man, 
 conscious of his own strength, would have done this. 
 It was soon perceived that his greatness was in no 
 sense obscured by the presence of the distinguished 
 men who sat about him. The most gifted statesmen 
 of the country: Seward, Chase, Cameron, Stanton, 
 Blair, Bates, Welles, Fessenden, and Dennison, some 
 of whom had been leaders in the Senate of the United 
 States, composed that historic Cabinet, and the man 
 who had been sneered at as " the rail-splitter " suf- 
 fered nothing by such association and comparison. 
 He was a leader in fact as well as name. 
 
 Magnanimity was one of Lincoln's most striking 
 traits. Patriotism moved him at every step. At the 
 beginning of the war he placed at the head of three 
 most important military departments three of his po- 
 litical opponents — Patterson, Butler and McClellan. 
 He did not propose to make it a partisan war. He 
 sought by every means in his power to enlist all who 
 were patriots. 
 
 In his message of July 4, 1 861, he stated his pur- 
 pose in these words : 
 
 " I desire to preserve the Government that it may 
 be administered for all, as it was administered by the 
 
The Great Republican xv 
 
 men who made it. On the side of the Union 
 it is a struggle to maintain in the world that form 
 and substance of Government whose leading object 
 is to elevate the condition of men, lift artificial bur- 
 dens from all shoulders and clear the paths of lauda- 
 ble pursuits for all, to afford all an unfettered start 
 and a fair chance in the race of life. This is the 
 leading object of the Government for whose existence 
 we contend." 
 
 Many people were impatient at Lincoln's conserva- 
 tism. He gave the South every chance possible. He 
 pleaded with them with an earnestness that was pa- 
 thetic. He recognized that the South was not alone 
 to blame for the existence of slavery, but that the 
 sin was a National one. He sought to impress upon 
 the South that he would not use his office as President 
 to take away from them any constitutional right, great 
 or small. 
 
 In his first inaugural he addressed the men of the 
 South as well as the North, as his " countrymen," 
 one and all, and with an outburst of indescribable 
 tenderness, exclaimed: "We are not enemies, but 
 friends. We must not be enemies." And then in 
 those wondrously sweet and touching words which 
 even yet thrill the heart, he said: 
 
 " Though passion may have strained, it must not 
 break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of 
 memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot 
 grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over 
 this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union 
 
xvi Abraham Lincoln 
 
 when again touched, as surely they will be, by the 
 better angels of our nature." 
 
 But his words were unheeded. The mighty war 
 came with its dreadful train. Knowing no wrong, he 
 dreaded no evil for himself. He had done all he 
 could to save the country by peaceful means. He 
 had entreated and expostulated, now he would do and 
 dare. He had in words of solemn import warned 
 the men of the South. He had appealed to their pa- 
 triotism by the sacred memories of the battle-fields 
 of the Revolution, on which the patriot blood of their 
 ancestors had been so bravely shed, not to break up 
 the Union. Yet all in vain. " Both parties depre- 
 cated war; but one would make war rather than let 
 the Nation survive; and the other would accept war 
 rather than let it perish. And the war came." 
 
 Lincoln did all he could to avert it, but there was 
 no hesitation on his part when the sword of rebellion 
 flashed from its scabbard. He was from that mo- 
 ment until the close of his life unceasingly devoted 
 and consecrated to the great purpose of saving the 
 Union. All other matters he regarded as trivial, 
 and every movement, of whatever character, whether 
 important or unimportant of itself, was bent to that 
 end. 
 
 The world now regards with wonder the infinite 
 patience, gentleness and kindness, with which he bore 
 the terrible burdens of that four years' struggle. 
 Humane, forgiving and long-suffering himself, he 
 was always especially tender and considerate of the 
 poor, and in his treatment of them was full of those 
 
The Great Republican xvii 
 
 " kind little acts which are of the same blood as great 
 and holy deeds." As Charles Sumner so well said: 
 11 With him as President, the idea of republican in- 
 stitutions, where no place is too high for the hum- 
 blest, was perpetually manifest, so that his simple 
 presence was a proclamation of the equality of all 
 men." 
 
 During the whole of the struggle, he was a tower 
 of strength to the Union. Whether in defeat or vic- 
 tory, he kept right on, dismayed at nothing, and never 
 to be diverted from the pathway of duty. Always 
 cool and determined, all learned to gain renewed 
 courage, calmness and wisdom from him, and to lean 
 upon his strong arm for support. The proud des- 
 ignation, " Father of His Country," was not more ap- 
 propriately bestowed upon Washington, than the af- 
 fectionate title " Father Abraham " was given to 
 Lincoln by the soldiers and loyal people of the North. 
 
 The crowning glory of Lincoln's administration, 
 and the greatest executive act in American history, 
 was his immortal Proclamation of Emancipation. 
 Perhaps more clearly than anyone else Lincoln had 
 realized years before he was called to the Presidency, 
 that the country could not continue half slave and 
 half free. He declared it before Seward proclaimed 
 the " irrepressible conflict." The contest between 
 freedom and slavery was inevitable; it was written in 
 the stars. The Nation must be either all slave, or 
 all free. Lincoln with almost supernatural prescience 
 foresaw it. His prophetic vision is manifested 
 through all his utterances, notably in the great de- 
 
xviii Abraham Lincoln 
 
 bate between himself and Douglas. To him was 
 given the duty and responsibility of making that great 
 classic of liberty, the Declaration of Independence, 
 no longer an empty promise, but a glorious fulfill- 
 ment. 
 
 Many long and thorny steps were to be taken be- 
 fore this great act of justice could be performed. 
 Patience and forbearance had to be exercised. It 
 had to be demonstrated that the Union could be saved 
 in no other way. 
 
 Lincoln, much as he abhorred slavery, felt that his 
 chief duty was to save the Union, under the Consti- 
 tution, and within the Constitution. He did not as- 
 sume the duties of his great office with the purpose 
 of abolishing slavery, nor changing the Constitution, 
 but as a servant of the Constitution and the laws of 
 the country then existing. In a speech delivered in 
 Ohio, in 1859, he said: " The people of the United 
 States are the rightful masters of both Congress and 
 the Courts — not to overthrow the Constitution, but 
 to overthrow the men who would overthrow the Con- 
 stitution." 
 
 This was the principle which governed him, and 
 which he applied in his official conduct when he 
 reached the Presidency. We now know that he had 
 emancipation constantly in his mind's eye for nearly 
 two years after his first inauguration. It is true, he 
 said at the start, " I believe I have no lawful right to 
 interfere with slavery where it now exists, and have 
 no intention of doing so; " and that the public had 
 little reason to think he was meditating general eman- 
 
The Great Republican xix 
 
 cipation until he issued his preliminary proclamation, 
 September 22, 1862. 
 
 Just a month before, exactly, he had written to the 
 editor of the New York Tribune: 
 
 11 My paramount object is to save the Union, and 
 not either to save or destroy slavery. If I could save 
 the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it; 
 if I could save it by freeing all the slaves, I would 
 do it; and if I could do it by freeing some and leav- 
 ing others alone, I would also do that." 
 
 The difference in his thought and purpose about 
 " the divine institution " is very apparent in these two 
 expressions. Both were made in absolute honor and 
 sincerity. Public sentiment had undergone a great 
 change, and Lincoln, valiant defender of the Consti- 
 tution that he was, and faithful tribune of the peo- 
 ple that he always was, changed with the people. 
 The war had brought them and him to a nearer real- 
 ization of our absolute dependence upon a Higher 
 Power, and had quickened his conceptions of duty 
 more acutely than the public could realize. The pur- 
 poses of God, working through the ages, were per- 
 haps more clearly revealed to him than to any other. 
 
 Besides, it was as he himself once said: " It is a 
 quality of revolutions not to go by old lines or old 
 laws, but to break up both and make new ones." He 
 was " naturally anti-slavery," and the determination 
 he formed when as a young man he witnessed an 
 auction in the slave shambles of New Orleans, never 
 forsook him. It is recorded how his soul burned 
 with indignation, and that he then exclaimed, " If I 
 
xx Abraham Lincoln 
 
 ever get a chance to hit that thing, I'll hit it hard." 
 He " hit it hard " when as a member of the Illinois 
 Legislature he protested that " the institution of 
 slavery is founded on both injustice and bad policy." 
 
 He " hit it hard " when as a member of Congress 
 he " voted for the Wilmot Proviso as good as forty 
 times." He " hit it hard " when he stumped his 
 state against the Kansas-Nebraska bill, and on the 
 direct issue carried Illinois in favor of the restriction 
 of slavery by a majority of 4A 1 4 votes. He " hit 
 it hard " when he approved the law abolishing slavery 
 in the District of Columbia, an anti-slavery measure 
 that he had voted for in Congress. He " hit it 
 hard" when he signed the acts abolishing slavery in 
 all the Territories, and for the repeal of the Fugitive 
 Slave Law. But it still remained for him to strike 
 slavery its death-blow. He did that in his glorious 
 Proclamation of Freedom. 
 
 It was in this light that Lincoln himself viewed 
 these great events. He wrote a mass-meeting of 
 unconditional Union men at Springfield, 111., August 
 26, 1863, as follows: 
 
 " The emancipation policy and the use of colored 
 troops constitute the heaviest blow yet dealt to the 
 Rebellion, and at least one of these important suc- 
 cesses could not have been achieved when it was but 
 for the aid of black soldiers. . . . The job was 
 a great National one, and let none be banned who 
 bore an honorable part in it. . . . Peace does 
 not appear so distant as it did. I hope it will come 
 soon, and come to stay; and so come as to be worth 
 
The Great Republican xxi 
 
 the keeping in all future time. It will then have 
 proved that among the free men there can be no suc- 
 cessful appeal from the ballot to the bullet, and that 
 they who take such appeal are sure to lose their case 
 and pay the cost. And then there will be some black 
 men who can remember that with silent tongue, and 
 clenched teeth, and steady eye, and well-poised bay- 
 onet, they have helped mankind on to this great con- 
 summation, while I fear there will be some white 
 ones unable to forget that with malignant heart and 
 deceitful speech they strove to hinder it." 
 
 Secretary Seward tells how when he carried the 
 historic Proclamation to the President for signature 
 at noon on the first day of January, 1863, he said: 
 " I have been shaking hands since nine o'clock this 
 morning, and my right hand is almost paralyzed. If 
 my name ever goes into history, it will be for this 
 act, and my whole soul is in it. If my hand trem- 
 bles when I sign the Proclamation all who examine 
 the document hereafter, will say, ' he hesitated.' " 
 He turned to the table, took up his pen and slowly, 
 firmly wrote that ' Abraham Lincoln ' with which the 
 whole world is now familiar. Then he looked up 
 and said: " That will do." 
 
 In all the long years of slavery agitation, unlike 
 any of the other anti-slavery leaders, Lincoln always 
 carried the people with him. In 1854 Illinois cast 
 loose from her old Democratic moorings and fol- 
 lowed his leadership in a most emphatic protest 
 against the repeal of the Missouri Compromise. In 
 1858 the people of Illinois endorsed his opposition 
 
xxii Abraham Lincoln 
 
 to the aggressions of slavery, in a state usually Demo- 
 cratic, even against so popular a leader as " the Little 
 Giant." In i860 the whole country endorsed his po- 
 sition on slavery, even when the people were contin- 
 ually harangued that his election meant the dissolu- 
 tion of the Union. During the war the people ad- 
 vanced with him step by step to its final overthrow. 
 Indeed, in the election of 1864 the people not only 
 endorsed emancipation, but went far towards recog- 
 nizing the political equality of the negro. They 
 heartily justified the President in having enlisted col- 
 ored soldiers to fight side by side with the white man 
 in the noble cause of union and liberty. Aye, they 
 did more, they endorsed his position on another and 
 vastly more important phase of the race problem. 
 They approved his course as President in reorganiz- 
 ing the government of Louisiana, and a hostile press 
 did not fail to call attention to the fact that this 
 meant eventually negro suffrage in that State. 
 
 Perhaps, however, it was not known then that Lin- 
 coln had written the new Free State Governor, on 
 March 13, 1864, as follows: 
 
 " Now you are about to have a convention, which, 
 among other things, will probably define the elective 
 franchise. I barely suggest for your private consid- 
 eration, whether some of the colored people may not 
 be let in — as for instance, the very intelligent, and 
 especially those who have fought gallantly in our 
 ranks. They would probably help, in some trying 
 time to come, to keep the jewel of liberty within the 
 family of freedom." 
 
The Great Republican xxiii 
 
 Lincoln had that happy, peculiar habit, which few 
 public men have attained, of looking away from the 
 deceptive and misleading influences about him, and 
 none are more deceptive than those of public life in 
 our capitals, straight into the hearts of the people. 
 He could not be deceived by the self-interested host 
 of eager counselors who sought to enforce their own 
 particular views upon him as the voice of the country. 
 He chose to determine for himself what the people 
 were thinking about and wanting him to do, and no 
 man ever lived who was a more accurate judge of 
 their opinions and wishes. 
 
 The battle of Gettysburg turned the scale of the 
 war in favor of the Union, and it has always seemed 
 to me most fortunate that Lincoln declared for eman- 
 cipation before rather than after that decisive contest. 
 A later Proclamation might have been construed as a 
 tame and cowardly performance, not a challenge of 
 Truth to Error for mortal combat. The ground on 
 which that battle was fought is held sacred by every 
 friend of freedom. But important as the battle itself 
 was the dedication of it as a National Cemetery is 
 celebrated for a grander thing. The words Lincoln 
 spoke there will live " until time shall be no more," 
 through all eternity. Well may they be forever pre- 
 served on tablets of bronze upon the spot where he 
 spoke, but how infinitely better it would be if they 
 could find a permanent lodging place in the soul of 
 every American ! 
 
 Lincoln was a man of moderation. He was neither 
 an autocrat nor a tyrant. If he moved slowly some- 
 
xxlv Abraham Lincoln 
 
 times, it was because it was better to move slowly, 
 and, like the successful general that he was, he was 
 only waiting for his reserves to come up. Possessing 
 almost unlimited power, he yet carried himself like 
 one of the humblest of men. He weighed every 
 subject He considered and reflected upon every 
 phase of public duty. He got the average judgment 
 of the plain people. He had a high sense of jus- 
 tice, a clear understanding of the rights of others, 
 and never needlessly inflicted an injury upon any man. 
 
 He said, in response to a serenade, November 10, 
 1864, just after his triumphal election for a second 
 term to the great office of President: 
 
 " Now that the election is over, may not all hav- 
 ing a common interest reunite in a common effort to 
 save our common country? For my own part, I 
 have striven and shall strive to avoid placing any 
 obstacle in the way. So long as I have been here I 
 have not willingly planted a thorn in any man's 
 bosom. While I am deeply sensible to the high com- 
 pliment of a re-election, and duly grateful, as I trust, 
 to Almighty God for having directed my countrymen 
 to a right conclusion, as I think, for their own good, 
 it adds nothing to my satisfaction that any other man 
 may be disappointed or pained by the result." 
 
 It is pleasant to note that in the very last public 
 speech by President Lincoln, on April 11, 1865, he 
 uttered noble sentiments of charity and good-will sim- 
 ilar to those of his sublime second inaugural, which 
 were of peculiar interest to the people of the South. 
 In discussing the question of reconstruction, he said: 
 
The Great Republican xxv 
 
 11 We all agree that the seceded States, so called, 
 are out of their proper practical relation with the 
 Union, and that the sole object of the government, 
 civil and military, in regard to those States, is to 
 again get them into that proper practical relation. I 
 believe that it is not only possible, but in fact easier, 
 to do this without deciding or even considering 
 whether these States have ever been out of the Union, 
 than with it. Finding themselves safely at home, it 
 would be utterly immaterial whether they had ever 
 been abroad. Let us all join in doing the acts neces- 
 sary to restoring the proper practical relations between 
 these States and the Union, and each forever after in- 
 nocently indulge his own opinion whether in doing the 
 acts he brought the States from without into the 
 Union, or only gave them proper assistance, they 
 never having been out of it." 
 
 It is not difficult to place a correct estimate upon 
 the character of Lincoln. He was the greatest man 
 of his time, especially approved of God for the work 
 He gave him to do. History abundantly proves his 
 superiority as a leader, and establishes his constant 
 reliance upon a Higher power for guidance and sup- 
 port. The tendency of this age is to exaggeration, 
 but of Lincoln certainly none have spoken more high- 
 ly than those who knew him best. 
 
 A distinguished orator has said: "Lincoln sur- 
 passed all orators in eloquence; all diplomatists in wis- 
 dom; all statesmen in foresight; and the most ambi- 
 tious in fame." 
 
 This is in accord with the estimate of Stanton who 
 
xxvi Abraham Lincoln 
 
 pronounced him " the most perfect ruler of men the 
 world had ever seen." 
 
 Seward, too, declared Lincoln " a man of destiny, 
 with character made and molded by Divine Power to 
 save a nation from perdition." 
 
 Ralph Waldo Emerson characterized him as " the 
 true representative of this continent; an entirely pub- 
 lic man; father of his country; the pulse of twenty 
 millions throbbing in his heart, the thought of their 
 minds articulated by his tongue. 
 
 Bancroft wisely observed: "Lincoln thought al- 
 ways of mankind, as well as his own country, and 
 served human nature itself; he finished a work which 
 all time cannot overthrow." 
 
 Sumner said that in Lincoln " the West spoke to the 
 East, pleading for human rights, as declared by our 
 fathers." 
 
 Horace Greeley, in speaking of the events which 
 led up to and embraced the Rebellion, declared: 
 " Other men were helpful, and nobly did their part; 
 yet, looking back through the lifting mists of those 
 seven eventful, tragic, trying, glorious years, I clearly 
 discern the one providential leader, the indispensable 
 hero of the great drama, Abraham Lincoln." 
 
 James Russell Lowell was quick to perceive and 
 proclaim Lincoln's greatness. In December, 1863, 
 in a review of the " President's Policy," in the At- 
 lantic Monthly, he said: "Perhaps none of our 
 Presidents since Washington has stood so firm in the 
 confidence of the people as Lincoln, after three years' 
 stormy administration. ... A profound com- 
 
The Great Republican xxvii 
 
 mon sense is the best genius for statesmanship. Hith- 
 erto the wisdom of the President's measures has been 
 justified by the fact that they always resulted in more 
 firmly uniting public opinion." 
 
 Lincoln is certainly the most sagacious and far- 
 seeing statesman in the annals of American history. 
 His entire public life justifies this estimate of him. 
 It is notable that his stand upon all public questions 
 in his earlier as well as his later career stamp him as 
 the wisest exponent of political truths we have ever 
 had. 
 
 The greatest names in American history are Wash- 
 ington and Lincoln. One is forever associated with the 
 independence of the States and formation of the Fed- 
 eral Union ; the other with universal freedom and the 
 preservation of that Union. Washington enforced 
 the Declaration of Independence as against England; 
 Lincoln proclaimed its fulfillment not only to a down- 
 trodden race in America, but to all people for all 
 time, who may seek the protection of our flag. These 
 illustrious men achieved grander results for mankind 
 within a single century — from 1775 to 1865 — 
 than any other men ever accomplished in all the years 
 since first the flight of time began. Washington en- 
 gaged in no ordinary revolution. With him it was 
 not who should rule, but what should rule. He 
 drew his sword, not for a change of rulers upon an 
 established throne, but to establish a new govern- 
 ment, which should acknowledge no throne but the 
 
xxviii Abraham Lincoln 
 
 tribune of the people. Lincoln accepted war to save 
 the Union, the safeguard of our liberties, and re-es- 
 tablished it on " indestructible foundations " as for- 
 ever " one and indivisible." To quote his own grand 
 words : 
 
 " Now we are contending that this Nation under 
 God, shall have a new birth of freedom; and that 
 government of the people, by the people, for the peo- 
 ple, shall not perish from the earth." 
 
 Each lived to accomplish his appointed task. .„ Each 
 received the unbounded gratitude of the people of 
 his time, and each is held in great and ever-increas- 
 ing reverence by posterity. The fame of each will 
 never die. It will grow with the ages, because it is 
 based upon imperishable service to humanity — not 
 to the people of a single generation or country, but 
 to the whole human family, wherever scattered, for- 
 ever. 
 
 The present generation knows Washington only 
 from history, and by that alone can judge him. Lin- 
 coln we know by history also ; but thousands are still 
 living who participated in the great events in which he 
 was leader and master. Many of his contemporaries 
 survived him; some are here yet in almost every lo- 
 cality. So Lincoln is not far removed from us. In- 
 deed, he may be said to be still known to the mil- 
 lions; not surrounded by the mists of antiquity, nor 
 by a halo of idolatry that is impenetrable. 
 
 He never was inaccessible to the people. Thou- 
 sands carry with them yet the words which he spoke 
 in their hearing; thousands remember the pressure of 
 
The Great Republican xxix 
 
 his hand; and I remember, as though it were but 
 yesterday, and thousands of my comrades will recall, 
 how, when he reviewed the Army of the Potomac im- 
 mediately after the battle of Antietam, his indescrib- 
 ably sad, thoughtful, far-seeing expression pierced 
 every man's soul. Nobody could keep the people 
 away from him, and when they came to him he would 
 suffer no one to drive them back. So it is that an 
 unusually large number of the American people came 
 to know this great man, and that he is still so well re- 
 membered by them. It can not be said that they are 
 mistaken about him, or that they misinterpreted his 
 character and greatness. 
 
 This host of witnesses, without exception, agree as 
 to the true nobility and intellectual greatness of Lin- 
 coln. All proudly claim for Lincoln the highest abil- 
 ities and the most distinguished and self-sacrificing 
 patriotism. Lincoln taught them, and has taught us, 
 that no party or partisan can escape responsibility to 
 the people; that no party advantage, or presumed 
 party advantage, should ever swerve us from the plain 
 path of duty, which is ever the path of honor and 
 distinction. He emphasized his words by his daily 
 life and deeds. He showed to the world by his lofty 
 example, as well as by precept and maxim that there 
 are times when the voice of partisanship should be 
 hushed and that of patriotism only be heeded. He 
 taught that a good service done for the country, even 
 in aid of an unfriendly Administration, brings to the 
 
xxx Abraham Lincoln 
 
 men and the party who rise above the temptation of 
 temporary partisan advantage, a lasting gain in the 
 respect and confidence of the people. He showed 
 that such patriotic devotion is usually rewarded, not 
 only with retention in power and the consciousness 
 of duty well and bravely done, but with the gratifica- 
 tion of beholding the blessings of relief and pros- 
 perity, not of a party, or section, but of the whole 
 country. This, he held, should be the first and great 
 consideration of all public servants. 
 
 When Lincoln died, a grateful people, moved by 
 a common impulse, immediately placed him side by 
 side with the immortal Washington, and unanimously 
 proclaimed them the two greatest and best Ameri- 
 cans. That verdict has not changed, and will not 
 change, nor can we conceive how the historians of this 
 or any age will ever determine what is so clearly a 
 matter of pure personal opinion as to which of these 
 noble men is entitled to greatest honor and homage 
 from the people of America. 
 
 A recent writer says : " The amazing growth Lin- 
 coln made in the esteem of his countrymen and the 
 world, while he was doing his great work, has been 
 paralleled by the increase of his fame in the years since 
 he died." He might have added that, like every im- 
 portant event of his life, Lincoln's fame rests upon 
 a severer test than that of any other American. 
 Never, in all the ages of men, have the acts, words, 
 motives — even thoughts — of any statesman been so 
 scrutinized, analyzed, studied, or speculated upon, as 
 his. Yet from all inquirers, without distinction as to 
 
The Great Republican xxxi 
 
 party, church, section, or country, from friend and 
 foe alike, comes the unanimous verdict that Abraham 
 Lincoln must have no second place in American his- 
 tory, and that he will never be second to any in the 
 reverent affections of the American people. 
 
 My fellow citizens, a noble manhood, nobly con- 
 secrated to man, never dies. The Martyr to Liberty, 
 the Emancipator of a Race, the Savior of the only 
 free Government among men, may be buried from 
 human sight, but his deeds will live in human grati- 
 tude forever. 
 
 " Great captains, with their guns and drums, 
 
 Disturb our judgment for the hour, 
 But at last silence comes; 
 
 These are all gone, and, standing like a tower, 
 Our children shall behold his fame; 
 
 The kindly-earnest, brave, far-seeing man, 
 Sagacious, patient, dreading praise, not blame, 
 
 New birth of our new soil, the first American." 
 
 '/Z^^. 
 
Sonnet in 1862 
 
 By John James Piatt. 
 
 Stern be the Pilot in the dreadful hour 
 When a great nation, like a ship at sea 
 With the wroth breakers whitening at her lee, 
 
 Feels her last shudder if her Helsman cower; 
 
 A godlike manhood be his mighty dower! 
 Such and so gifted, Lincoln may'st thou be 
 With thy high wisdom's low simplicity 
 
 And awful tenderness of voted power: 
 
 From our hot records then thy name shall stand 
 On time's calm ledger out of passionate days 
 
 With the pure debt of gratitude begun, 
 And only paid in never-ending praise — 
 
 One of the many of a mighty Land, 
 
 Made by God's providence the Anointed One. 
 
Illustrations 
 
 Abraham Lincoln Frontispiece 
 
 Photogravure from the original photograph by Hesler in 1857. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 General William T. Sherman xxxii 
 
 Wood-engraving after a photograph by Bell. 
 
 Abraham Lincoln 28 
 
 Photogravure after the painting from life by Matthews. 
 
 Old State House, Springfield, Illinois . . . 98" 
 
 From a contemporary photograph. 
 
 Gideon Welles 130 
 
 Wood-engraving from an original photograph by Brady. 
 
 Wendell Phillips 190 
 
 From a rare engraving by Robin. 
 
 Lincoln's Home at Springfield, Illinois . . . 292 
 
 From an original photograph. 
 
 Abraham Lincoln 328 
 
 From a rare engraving by Weger of Leipzig. 
 
 Gettysburg Address, November 19, 1863 . . 338 
 
 Facsimile of the first draft in Lincoln's handwriting, showing 
 his corrections. 
 
Complete Works of 
 Abraham Lincoln 
 
 Volume V 
 [1858— 1860] 
 
Complete Works of 
 Abraham Lincoln 
 
 The Seventh and Last Joint Debate, at 
 Alton, Illinois, October 15, 1858. 
 
 Senator Douglas's Opening Speech. 
 
 LADIES AND GENTLEMEN: It is 
 now nearly four months since the can- 
 vass between Mr. Lincoln and myself 
 commenced. On the 16th of June the Re- 
 publican convention assembled at Springfield, 
 and nominated Mr. Lincoln as their candi- 
 date for the United States Senate, and he, on 
 that occasion, delivered a speech in which he 
 laid down what he understood to be the Re- 
 publican creed, and the platform on which 
 he proposed to stand during the contest. The 
 principal points in that speech of Mr. Lincoln's 
 were: First, that this government could not 
 endure permanently divided into free and slave 
 States, as our fathers made it; that they must all 
 
2 Stephen A. Douglas [Oct. 15 
 
 become free or all become slave; all become one 
 thing or all become the other, otherwise this 
 Union could not continue to exist. I give you 
 his opinions almost in the identical language 
 he used. His second proposition was a crusade 
 against the Supreme Court of the United States, 
 because of the Dred Scott decision; urging as 
 an especial reason for his opposition to that de- 
 cision that it deprived the negroes of the rights 
 and benefits of that clause in the Constitution of 
 the United States which guarantees to the citi- 
 zens of each State all the rights, privileges, and 
 immunities of the citizens of the several States. 
 On the 10th of July I returned home, and de- 
 livered a speech to the people of Chicago, in 
 which I announced it to be my purpose to ap- 
 peal to the people of Illinois to sustain the 
 course I had pursued in Congress. In that 
 speech I joined issue with Mr. Lincoln on the 
 points which he had presented. Thus there 
 was an issue clear and distinct made up between 
 us on these two propositions laid down in the 
 speech of Mr. Lincoln at Springfield, and con- 
 troverted by me in my reply to him at Chicago. 
 On the next day, the nth of July, Mr. Lincoln 
 replied to me at Chicago, explaining at some 
 length, and reaffirming the positions which he 
 had taken in his Springfield speech. In that 
 Chicago speech he even went further than he 
 
1858] Speech at Alton 3 
 
 had before, and uttered sentiments in regard to 
 the negro being on an equality with the white 
 man. He adopted in support of this position 
 the argument which Lovejoy, and Codding, and 
 other Abolition lecturers had made familiar in 
 the northern and central portions of the State, 
 to wit: that the Declaration of Independence 
 having declared all men free and equal by Di- 
 vine law, negro equality was also an inalienable 
 right, of which they could not be deprived. He 
 insisted, in that speech, that the Declaration of 
 Independence included the negro in the clause 
 asserting that all men were created equal, and 
 went so far as to say that if one man was allowed 
 to take the position that it did not include the 
 negro, others might take the position that it did 
 not include other men. He said that all these 
 distinctions between this man and that man, 
 this race and the other race, must be discarded, 
 and we must all stand by the Declaration of In- 
 dependence, declaring that all men were created 
 equal. 
 
 The issue thus being made up between Mr. 
 Lincoln and myself on three points, we went 
 before the people of the State. During the fol- 
 lowing seven weeks, between the Chicago 
 speeches and our first meeting at Ottawa, he 
 and I addressed large assemblages of the people 
 in many of the central counties. In my speeches 
 
4 Stephen A. Douglas [Oct. 15 
 
 I confined myself closely to those three posi- 
 tions which he had taken, controverting his 
 proposition that this Union could not exist as 
 our fathers made it, divided into free and slave 
 States, controverting his proposition of a cru- 
 sade against the Supreme Court because of the 
 Dred Scott decision, and controverting his 
 proposition that the Declaration of Independ- 
 ence included and meant the negroes as well 
 as the white men, when it declared all men to 
 be created equal. I supposed at that time that 
 these propositions constituted a distinct issue be- 
 tween us, and that the opposite positions we had 
 taken upon them we would be willing to be held 
 to in every part of the State. I never intended 
 to waver one hair's breadth from that issue either 
 in the north or the south, or wherever I should 
 address the people of Illinois. I hold that when 
 the time arrives that I cannot proclaim my po- 
 litical creed in the same terms not only in the 
 northern but the southern part of Illinois, not 
 only in the Northern but the Southern States, 
 and wherever the American flag waves over 
 American soil, that then there must be some- 
 thing wrong in that creed — so long as we live 
 under a common Constitution, so long as we 
 live in a confederacy of sovereign and equal 
 States, joined together as one for certain pur- 
 poses, that any political creed is radically wrong 
 
1858] Speech at Alton 5 
 
 which cannot be proclaimed in every State and 
 every section of that Union, alike. I took up 
 Mr. Lincoln's three propositions in my several 
 speeches, analyzed them, and pointed out what 
 I believed to be the radical errors contained in 
 them. First, in regard to his doctrine that this 
 government was in violation of the law of God, 
 which says that a house divided against itself 
 cannot stand; I repudiated it as a slander upon 
 the immortal framers of our Constitution. I 
 then said, I have often repeated, and now again 
 assert, that in my opinion our government can 
 endure forever, divided into free and slave 
 States as our fathers made it — each State having 
 the right to prohibit, abolish, or sustain slavery, 
 just as it pleases. This government was made 
 upon the great basis of the sovereignty of the 
 States, the right of each State to regulate its 
 own domestic institutions to suit itself, and that 
 right was conferred with the understanding and 
 expectation that inasmuch as each locality had 
 separate interests, each locality must have dif- 
 ferent and distinct local and domestic institu- 
 tions, corresponding to its wants and interests. 
 Our fathers knew, when they made the govern- 
 ment, that the laws and institutions which were 
 well adapted to the green mountains of Ver- 
 mont were unsuited to the rice plantations of 
 South Carolina. They knew then, as well as 
 
6 Stephen A. Douglas [Oct. 15 
 
 we know now, that the laws and institutions 
 which would be well adapted to the beautiful 
 prairies of Illinois would not be suited to the 
 mining regions of California. They knew that 
 in a republic as broad as this, having such a 
 variety of soil, climate, and interest, there must 
 necessarily be a corresponding variety of local 
 laws — the policy and institutions of each State 
 adapted to its condition and wants. For this 
 reason this Union was established on the right 
 of each State to do as it pleased on the question 
 of slavery, and every other question, and the 
 various States were not allowed to complain of, 
 much less interfere with, the policy of their 
 neighbors. 
 
 Suppose the doctrine advocated by Mr. Lin- 
 coln and the Abolitionists of this day had pre- 
 vailed when the Constitution was made, what 
 would have been the result? Imagine for a mo- 
 ment that Mr. Lincoln had been a member of 
 the convention that framed the Constitution of 
 the United States, and that when its members 
 were about to sign that wonderful document, 
 he had arisen in that convention, as he did at 
 Springfield this summer, and addressing him- 
 self to the President, had said: "A house di- 
 vided against itself cannot stand; this govern- 
 ment, divided into free and slave States, cannot 
 endure; they must all be free or all be slave, 
 
1858] Speech at Alton 7 
 
 they must all be one thing or all the other; 
 otherwise, it is a violation of the law of God, 
 and cannot continue to exist" — suppose Mr. 
 Lincoln had convinced that body of sages that 
 that doctrine was sound, what would have been 
 the result? Remember that the Union was then 
 composed of thirteen States, twelve of which 
 were slaveholding and one free. Do you think 
 that the one free State would have out-voted 
 the twelve slave-holding States, and thus have 
 secured the abolition of slavery? On the other 
 hand, would not the twelve slave-holding States 
 have out-voted the one free State, and thus have 
 fastened slavery, by a constitutional provision, 
 on every foot of the American republic forever? 
 You see that if this Abolition doctrine of Mr. 
 Lincoln had prevailed when the government 
 was made, it would have established slavery as 
 a permanent institution, in all the States, wheth- 
 er they wanted it or not; and the question for 
 us to determine in Illinois now, as one of the 
 free States, is whether or not we are willing, 
 having become the majority section, to enforce 
 a doctrine on the minority which we would have 
 resisted with our heart's blood had it been at- 
 tempted on us when we were in a minority. 
 How has the South lost her power as the ma- 
 jority section in this Union, and how have the 
 free States gained it, except under the opera- 
 
8 Stephen A. Douglas [Oct. 15 
 
 tion of that principle which declares the right 
 of the people of each State and each Territory 
 to form and regulate their domestic institutions 
 in their own way? It was under that principle 
 that slavery was abolished in New Hampshire, 
 Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New 
 Jersey, and Pennsylvania; it was under that 
 principle that one half of the slave-holding 
 States became free; it was under that principle 
 that the number of free States increased until, 
 from being one out of twelve States, we have 
 grown to be the majority of States of the whole 
 Union, with the power to control the House of 
 Representatives and Senate, and the power, con- 
 sequently, to elect a President by Northern 
 votes without the aid of a Southern State. Hav- 
 ing obtained this power under the operation of 
 that great principle, are you now prepared to 
 abandon the principle, and declare that merely 
 because we have the power you will wage a war 
 against the Southern States and their institu- 
 tions until you force them to abolish slavery 
 everywhere? 
 
 After having pressed these arguments home 
 on Mr. Lincoln for seven weeks, publishing a 
 number of my speeches, we met at Ottawa in 
 joint discussion, and he then began to crawfish 
 a little, and let himself down. I there pro- 
 pounded certain questions to him. Amongst 
 
1858] Speech at Alton 9 
 
 others, I asked him whether he would vote for 
 the admission of any more slave States in the 
 event the people wanted them. He would not 
 answer. I then told him that if he did not an- 
 swer the question there I would renew it at 
 Freeport, and would then trot him down into 
 Egypt and again put it to him. Well, at Free- 
 port, knowing that the next joint discussion took 
 place in Egypt, and being in dread of it, he did 
 answer my question in regard to no more slave 
 States in a mode which he hoped would be sat- 
 isfactory to me, and accomplish the object he 
 had in view. I will show you what his answer 
 was. After saying that he was not pledged to 
 the Republican doctrine of "no more slave 
 States," he declared: 
 
 I state to you freely, frankly, that I should be 
 exceedingly sorry to ever be put in the position of 
 having to pass upon that question. I should be ex- 
 ceedingly glad to know that there never would be 
 another slave State admitted into this Union. 
 
 Here permit me to remark that I do not think 
 the people will ever force him into a position 
 against his will. He went on to say: 
 
 But I must add, in regard to this, that if slavery 
 shall be kept out of the Territory during the terri- 
 torial existence of any one given Territory, and then 
 the people should — having a fair chance and a clear 
 
io Stephen A. Douglas [Oct. 15 
 
 field when they come to adopt a constitution — if 
 they should do the extraordinary thing of adopting 
 a slave constitution, uninfluenced by the actual pres- 
 ence of the institution among them, I see no alter- 
 native, if we own the country, but we must admit it 
 into this Union. 
 
 That answer Mr. Lincoln supposed would 
 satisfy the old-line Whigs, composed of Ken- 
 tuckians and Virginians, down in the southern 
 part of the State. Now, what does it amount 
 to? I desired to know whether he would vote 
 to allow Kansas to come into the Union with 
 slavery or not, as her people desired. He would 
 not answer, but in a roundabout way said that 
 if slavery should be kept out of a Territory dur- 
 ing the whole of its territorial existence, and 
 then the people, when they adopted a State con- 
 stitution, asked admission as a slave State, he 
 supposed he would have to let the State come 
 in. The case I put to him was an entirely dif- 
 ferent one. I desired to know whether he 
 would vote to admit a State if Congress had 
 not prohibited slavery in it during its territorial 
 existence, as Congress never pretended to do 
 under Clay's compromise measures of 1850. He 
 would not answer, and I have not yet been able 
 to get an answer from him. I have asked him 
 whether he would vote to admit Nebraska if 
 her people asked to come in as a State with % 
 
1858] Speech at Alton n 
 
 constitution recognizing slavery, and he refused 
 to answer. I have put the question to him with 
 reference to New Mexico, and he has not ut- 
 tered a word in answer. I have enumerated 
 the Territories, one after another, putting the 
 same question to him with reference to each, 
 and he has not said, and will not say, whether, 
 if elected to Congress, he will vote to admit any 
 Territory now in existence with such a consti- 
 tution as her people may adopt. He invents 
 a case which does not exist, and cannot exist, 
 under this government, and answers it; but he 
 will not answer the question I put to him in 
 connection with any of the Territories now in 
 existence. The contract we entered into with 
 Texas when she entered the Union obliges us 
 to allow four States to be formed out of the old 
 State, and admitted with or without slavery, as 
 the respective inhabitants of each may deter- 
 mine. I have asked Mr. Lincoln three times 
 in our joint discussions whether he would vote 
 to redeem that pledge, and he has never yet 
 answered. He is as silent as the grave on the 
 subject. He would rather answer as to a state 
 of the case which will never arise than commit 
 himself by telling what he would do in a case 
 which would come up for his action soon after 
 his election to Congress. Why can he not say 
 whether he is willing to allow the people of 
 
12 Stephen A. Douglas [Oct. 15 
 
 each State to have slavery or not, as they please, 
 and to come into the Union when they have the 
 requisite population as a slave or a free State, 
 as they decide? I have no trouble in answering 
 the question. I have said everywhere, and now 
 repeat to you, that if the people of Kansas want 
 a slave State they have a right, under the Con- 
 stitution of the United States, to form such a 
 State, and I will let them come into the Union 
 with slavery or without it, as they determine. 
 If the people of any other Territory desire 
 slavery, let them have it. If they do not want 
 it, let them prohibit it. It is their business, not 
 mine. It is none of our business in Illinois 
 whether Kansas is a free State or a slave State. 
 It is none of your business in Missouri whether 
 Kansas shall adopt slavery or reject it. It is 
 the business of her people, and none of yours. 
 The people of Kansas have as much right to 
 decide that question for themselves as you have 
 in Missouri to decide it for yourselves, or we in 
 Illinois to decide it for ourselves. 
 
 And here I may repeat what I have said in 
 every speech I have made in Illinois, that I 
 fought the Lecompton constitution to its death, 
 not because of the slavery clause in it, but be- 
 cause it was not the act and deed of the people 
 of Kansas. I said then in Congress, and I say 
 now, that if the people of Kansas want a slave 
 
1858] Speech at Alton 13 
 
 State, they have a right to have it. If they 
 wanted the Lecompton constitution, they had 
 a right to have it. I was opposed to that con- 
 stitution because I did not believe that it was 
 the act and deed of the people, but, on the con- 
 trary, the act of a small, pitiful minority, acting 
 in the name of the majority. When at last it 
 was determined to send that constitution back 
 to the people, and accordingly, in August last, 
 the question of admission under it was submit- 
 ted to a popular vote, the citizens rejected it 
 by nearly ten to one, thus showing conclusively 
 that I was right when I said that the Lecomp- 
 ton constitution was not the act and deed of the 
 people of Kansas, and did not embody their 
 will. 
 
 I hold that there is no power on earth, under 
 our system of government, which has the right 
 to force a constitution upon an unwilling peo- 
 ple. Suppose that there had been a majority 
 of ten to one in favor of slavery in Kansas, and 
 suppose there had been an Abolition President, 
 and an Abolition administration, and by some 
 means the Abolitionists succeeded in forcing an 
 Abolition constitution on those slave-holding 
 people, would the people of the South have sub- 
 mitted to that act for one instant? Well, if you 
 of the South would not have submitted to it a 
 day, how can you, as fair, honorable, and honest 
 
14 Stephen A. Douglas [Oct. 15 
 
 men, insist on putting a slave constitution on a 
 people who desire a free State? Your safety 
 and ours depend upon both of us acting in good 
 faith, and living up to that great principle 
 which asserts the right of every people to form 
 and regulate their domestic institutions to suit 
 themselves, subject only to the Constitution of 
 the United States. 
 
 Most of the men who denounced my course 
 on the Lecompton question objected to it not 
 because I was not right, but because they thought 
 it expedient at that time, for the sake of keep- 
 ing the party together, to do wrong. I never 
 knew the Democratic party to violate any one 
 of its principles out of policy or expediency, 
 that it did not pay the debt with sorrow. There 
 is no safety or success for our party unless we 
 always do right, and trust the consequences to 
 God and the people. I chose not to depart from 
 principle for the sake of expediency in the Le- 
 compton question, and I never intend to do it 
 on that or any other question. 
 
 But I am told that I would have been all right 
 if I had only voted for the English bill after 
 Lecompton was killed. You know a general 
 pardon was granted to all political offenders on 
 the Lecompton question, provided they would 
 only vote for the English bill. I did not accept 
 the benefits of that pardon, for the reason that 
 
1858] Speech at Alton 15 
 
 I had been right in the course I had pursued, 
 and hence did not require any forgiveness. Let 
 us see how the result has been worked out. Eng- 
 lish brought in his bill referring the Lecompton 
 constitution back to the people, with the pro- 
 vision that if it was rejected Kansas should be 
 kept out of the Union until she had the full 
 ratio of population required for a member of 
 Congress, thus in effect declaring that if the 
 people of Kansas would only consent to come 
 into the Union under the Lecompton constitu- 
 tion, and have a slave State when they did not 
 want it, they should be admitted with a popula- 
 tion of 35,000; but that if they were so obstinate 
 as to insist upon having just such a constitution 
 as they thought best, and to desire admission as 
 a free State, then they should be kept out until 
 they had 93,420 inhabitants. 
 
 I then said, and I now repeat to you, that 
 whenever Kansas has people enough for a slave 
 State she has people enough for a free State. 
 I was, and am, willing to adopt the rule that no 
 State shall ever come into the Union until she 
 has the full ratio of population for a member of 
 Congress, provided that rule is made uni- 
 form. 
 
 I made that proposition in the Senate last 
 winter, but a majority of the senators would 
 not agree to it; and I then said to them, "If 
 
16 Stephen A. Douglas £° ct - «* 
 
 you will not adopt the general rule, I will not 
 consent to make an exception of Kansas." 
 
 I hold that it is a violation of the fundamental 
 principles of this government to throw the 
 weight of federal power into the scale, either in 
 favor of the free or the slave States. Equality 
 among all the States of this Union is a funda- 
 mental principle in our political system. We 
 have no more right to throw the weight of the 
 Federal Government into the scale in favor of 
 the slave-holding than of the free States, and, 
 least of all, should our friends in the South con- 
 sent for a moment that Congress should with- 
 hold its powers either way when they know that 
 there is a majority against them in both houses 
 of Congress. 
 
 Fellow-citizens, how have the supporters of 
 the English bill stood up to their pledges not 
 to admit Kansas until she obtained a population 
 of 93,420 in the event she rejected the Lecomp- 
 ton constitution? How? The newspapers in- 
 form us that English himself, whilst conduct- 
 ing his canvass for reelection, and in order to 
 secure it, pledged himself to his constituents 
 that if returned he would disregard his own bill 
 and vote to admit Kansas into the Union with 
 such population as she hight have when she 
 made application. We are informed that every 
 Democratic candidate for Congress in all the 
 
1858] Speech at Alton 17 
 
 States where elections have recently been held 
 was pledged against the English bill, with per- 
 haps one or two exceptions. Now, if I had 
 only done as these anti-Lecompton men who 
 voted for the English bill in Congress, pledging 
 themselves to refuse to admit Kansas if she re- 
 fused to become a slave State until she had a 
 population of 93,420, and then returned to their 
 people, forfeited their pledge, and made a new 
 pledge to admit Kansas any time she applied, 
 without regard to population, I would have had 
 no trouble. You saw the whole power and 
 patronage of the Federal Government wielded 
 in Indiana, Ohio, and Pennsylvania to elect anti- 
 Lecompton men to Congress, who voted against 
 Lecompton, then voted for the English bill, and 
 then denounced the English bill, and pledged 
 themselves to their people to disregard it. My 
 sin consists in not having given a pledge, and 
 then in not having afterward forfeited it. For 
 that reason, in this State, every postmaster, every 
 route agent, every collector of the ports, and 
 every federal office-holder, forfeits his head the 
 moment he expresses a preference for the Demo- 
 cratic candidates against Lincoln and his Abo- 
 lition associates. A Democratic administra- 
 tion, which we helped to bring into power, 
 deems it consistent with its fidelity to principle, 
 and its regard to duty, to wield its power in this 
 
1 8 Stephen A. Douglas [Oct. 15 
 
 State in behalf of the Republican Abolition can- 
 didates in every county and every congressional 
 district against the Democratic party. All I 
 have to say in reference to the matter is that 
 if that administration have not regard enough 
 for principle, if they are not sufficiently at- 
 tached to the creed of the Democratic party to 
 bury forever their personal hostilities in order 
 to succeed in carrying out our glorious princi- 
 ples, I have. I have no personal difficulty with 
 Mr. Buchanan or his cabinet. He chose to 
 make certain recommendations to Congress, as 
 he had a right to do, on the Lecompton ques- 
 tion. I could not vote in favor of them. I had 
 as much right to judge for myself how I should 
 vote as he had how he should recommend. He 
 undertook to say to me, "If you do not vote as 
 I tell you, I will take off the heads of your 
 friends." I replied to him, "You did not elect 
 me; I represent Illinois, and I am accountable 
 to Illinois, as my constituency, and to God, but 
 not to the President or to any other power on 
 earth." 
 
 And now this warfare is made on me because 
 I would not surrender my convictions of duty, 
 because I would not abandon my constituency, 
 and receive the orders of the executive authori- 
 ties how I should vote in the Senate of the Uni- 
 ted States. I hold that an attempt to control 
 
1858] Speech at Alton 19 
 
 the Senate on the part of the executive is sub- 
 versive of the principles of our Constitution. 
 The executive department is independent of the 
 Senate, and the Senate is independent of the 
 President. In matters of legislation the Presi- 
 dent has a veto on the action of the Senate, and 
 in appointments and treaties the Senate has a 
 veto on the President. He has no more right 
 to tell me how I shall vote on his appointments 
 than I have to tell him whether he shall veto or 
 approve a bill that the Senate has passed. When- 
 ever you recognize the right of the executive to 
 say to a senator, "Do this, or I will take off the 
 heads of your friends," you convert this govern- 
 ment from a republic into a despotism. When- 
 ever you recognize the right of a President to 
 say to a member of Congress, "Vote as I tell 
 you, or I will bring a power to bear against you 
 at home which will crush you," you destroy the 
 independence of the representative, and convert 
 him into a tool of executive power. I resisted 
 this invasion of the constitutional rights of a 
 senator, and I intend to resist it as long as I have 
 a voice to speak, or a vote to give. Yet Mr. 
 Buchanan cannot provoke me to abandon one 
 iota of Democratic principles out of revenge or 
 hostility to his course. I stand by the platform 
 of the Democratic party, and by its organiza- 
 tion, and support its nominees. If there are 
 
20 Stephen A. Douglas [Oct. 15 
 
 any who choose to bolt, the fact only shows that 
 they are not as good Democrats as I am. 
 
 My friends, there never was a time when it 
 was as important for the Democratic party, for 
 all national men, to rally and stand together as 
 it is to-day. We find all sectional men giving 
 up past differences and uniting on the one ques- 
 tion of slavery, and when we find sectional men 
 thus uniting, we should unite to resist them and 
 their treasonable designs. Such was the case 
 in 1850, when Clay left the quiet and peace of 
 his home, and again entered upon public life 
 to quell agitation and restore peace to a dis- 
 tracted Union. Then we Democrats, with Cass 
 at our head, welcomed Henry Clay, whom the 
 whole nation regarded as having been preserved 
 by God for the times. He became our leader 
 in that great fight, and we rallied around him 
 the same as the Whigs rallied around Old Hick- 
 ory in 1832 to put down nullification. Thus 
 you see that while Whigs and Democrats fought 
 fearlessly in old times about banks, the tariff, 
 distribution, the specie circular, and the sub- 
 treasury, all united as a band of brothers when 
 the peace, harmony, or integrity of the Union 
 was imperiled. It was so in 1850, when Abo- 
 litionism had even so far divided this country, 
 North and South, as to endanger the peace of 
 the Union. Whigs and Democrats united in 
 
1858] Speech at Alton 21 
 
 establishing the compromise measures of that 
 year, and restoring tranquillity and good feel- 
 ing. These measures passed on the joint action 
 of the two parties. They rested on the great 
 principle that the people of each State and each 
 Territory should be left perfectly free to form 
 and regulate their domestic institutions to suit 
 themselves. You Whigs and we Democrats 
 justified them in that principle. In 1854, when 
 it became necessary to organize the Territories 
 of Kansas and Nebraska, I brought forward the 
 bill on the same principle. In the Kansas-Ne- 
 braska bill you find it declared to be the true 
 intent and meaning of the act not to legislate 
 slavery into any State or Territory, nor to ex- 
 clude it therefrom, but to leave the people there- 
 of perfectly free to form and regulate their do- 
 mestic institutions in their own way. 
 
 I stand on that same platform in 1858 that I 
 did in 1850, 1854, and 1856. The Washington 
 "Union," pretending to be the organ of the ad- 
 ministration, in the number of the 5th of this 
 month, devotes three columns and a half to es- 
 tablish these propositions: first, that Douglas 
 in his Freeport speech held the same doctrine 
 that he did in his Nebraska bill in 1854; sec- 
 ond, that in 1854 Douglas justified the Nebraska 
 bill upon the ground that it was based upon the 
 same principle as Clay's compromise measures 
 
22 Stephen A. Douglas [Oct. 15 
 
 of 1850. The "Union" thus proved that Doug- 
 las was the same in 1858 that he was in 1856, 
 1854, and 1850, and consequently argued that 
 he was never a Democrat. Is it not funny that 
 I was never a Democrat? There is no pretense 
 that I have changed a hair's-breadth. The 
 "Union" proves by my speeches that I explained 
 the compromise measures of 1850 just as I do 
 now, and that I explained the Kansas and Ne- 
 braska bill in 1854 just as I did in my Freeport 
 speech, and yet says that I am not a Democrat, 
 and cannot be trusted, because I have not 
 changed during the whole of that time. It has 
 occurred to me that in 1854 the author of the 
 Kansas and Nebraska bill was considered a 
 pretty good Democrat. It has occurred to me 
 that in 1856, when I was exerting every nerve 
 and every energy for James Buchanan, standing 
 on the same platform then that I do now, that 
 I was a pretty good Democrat. They now tell 
 me that I am not a Democrat, because I assert 
 that the people of a Territory, as well as those 
 of a State, have the right to decide for them- 
 selves whether slavery can or cannot exist in 
 such Territory. Let me read what James Bu- 
 chanan said on that point when he accepted the 
 Democratic nomination for the presidency in 
 1856. In his letter of acceptance, he used the 
 following language: 
 
1858] Speech at Alton 23 
 
 The recent legislation of Congress respecting do- 
 mestic slavery, derived as it has been from the 
 original and pure fountain of legitimate political 
 power, the will of the majority, promises ere long to 
 allay the dangerous excitement. This legislation is 
 founded upon principles as ancient as free govern- 
 ment itself, and in accordance with them has sim- 
 ply declared that the people of a Territory, like those 
 of a State, shall decide for themselves whether slav- 
 ery shall or shall not exist within their limits. 
 
 Doctor Hope will there find my answer to the 
 question he propounded to me before I com- 
 menced speaking. Of course no man will con- 
 sider it an answer, who is outside of the Demo- 
 cratic organization, bolts Democratic nomina- 
 tions, and indirectly aids to put Abolitionists 
 into power over Democrats. But whether Dr. 
 Hope considers it an answer or not, every fair- 
 minded man will see that James Buchanan has 
 answered the question, and has asserted that the 
 people of a Territory, like those of a State, shall 
 decide for themselves whether slavery shall or 
 shall not exist within their limits. I answer 
 specifically, if you want a further answer, and 
 say that while under the decision of the Supreme 
 Court, as recorded in the opinion of Chief Jus- 
 tice Taney, slaves are property like all other 
 property, and can be carried into any Territory 
 of the United States the same as any other de- 
 
24 Stephen A. Douglas [Oct. 15 
 
 scription of property, yet when you get them 
 there they are subject to the local law of the 
 Territory just like all other property. You 
 will find in a recent speech delivered by that 
 able and eloquent statesman, Hon. Jefferson 
 Davis, at Bangor, Maine, that he took the same 
 view of this subject that I did in my Freeport 
 speech. He there said: 
 
 If the inhabitants of any Territory should refuse 
 to enact such laws and police regulations as would 
 give security to their property or to his, it would 
 be rendered more or less valueless in proportion to 
 the difficulties of holding it without such protection. 
 In the case of property in the labor of man, or what 
 is usually called slave property, the insecurity would 
 be so great that the owner could not ordinarily re- 
 tain it. Therefore, though the right would remain, 
 the remedy being withheld, it would follow that the 
 owner would be practically debarred, by the circum- 
 stances of the case, from taking slave property into 
 a Territory where the sense of the inhabitants was 
 opposed to its introduction. So much for the oft- 
 repeated fallacy of forcing slavery upon any com- 
 munity. 
 
 You will also find that the distinguished 
 Speaker of the present House of Representa- 
 tives, Hon. James L. Orr, construed the Kansas 
 and Nebraska bill in this same way in 1856, and 
 also that great intellect of the South, Alexander 
 
1858] Speech at Alton 25 
 
 H. Stephens, put the same construction upon it 
 in Congress that I did in my Freeport speech. 
 The whole South is rallying to the support of 
 the doctrine that if the people of a Territory 
 want slavery they have a right to have it, and if 
 they do not want it that no power on earth can 
 force it upon them. I hold that there is no 
 principle on earth more sacred to all the friends 
 of freedom than that which says that no institu- 
 tion, no law, no constitution, should be forced 
 on an unwilling people contrary to their wishes; 
 and I assert that the Kansas and Nebraska bill 
 contains that principle. It is the great princi- 
 ple contained in that bill. It is the principle 
 on which James Buchanan was made President. 
 Without that principle he never would have 
 been made President of the United States. I 
 will never violate or abandon that doctrine, if 
 I have to stand alone. I have resisted the blan- 
 dishments and threats of power on the one side, 
 and seduction on the other, and have stood im- 
 movably for that principle, fighting for it when 
 assailed by Northern mobs, or threatened by 
 Southern hostility. I have defended it against 
 the North and the South, and I will defend it 
 against whoever assails it, and I will follow it 
 wherever its logical conclusions lead me. I say 
 to you that there is but one hope, one safety for 
 this country, and that is to stand immovably by 
 
26 Stephen A. Douglas [Oct. 15 
 
 that principle which declares the right of each 
 State and each Territory to decide these ques- 
 tions for themselves. This government was 
 founded on that principle, and must be adminis- 
 tered in the same sense in which it was founded. 
 But the Abolition party really think that un- 
 der the Declaration of Independence the negro 
 is equal to the white man, and that negro equal- 
 ity is an inalienable right conferred by the Al- 
 mighty, and hence that all human laws in vio- 
 lation of it are null and void. With such men 
 it is no use for me to argue. I hold that the 
 signers of the Declaration of Independence had 
 no reference to negroes at all when they de- 
 clared all men to be created equal. They did 
 not mean negroes, nor the savage Indians, nor 
 the Feejee Islanders, nor any other barbarous 
 race. They were speaking of white men. They 
 alluded to men of European birth and Euro- 
 pean descent — to white men, and to none others, 
 when they declared that doctrine. I hold that 
 this government was established on the white 
 basis. It was established by white men, for 
 the benefit of white men and their posterity for- 
 ever, and should be administered by white men, 
 and none others. But it does not follow, by 
 any means, that merely because the negro is not 
 a citizen, and merely because he is not our equal, 
 that therefore he should be a slave. On the 
 
1858] Speech at Alton 27 
 
 contrary, it does follow that we ought to extend 
 to the negro race, and to all other dependent 
 races, all the rights, all the privileges, and all 
 the immunities which they can exercise con- 
 sistently with the safety of society. Humanity 
 requires that we should give them all those priv- 
 ileges; Christianity commands that we should 
 extend those privileges to them. The question 
 then arises, What are those privileges, and what 
 is the nature and extent of them? My answer 
 is that that is a question which each State must 
 answer for itself. We in Illinois have decided 
 it for ourselves. We tried slavery, kept it up 
 for twelve years, and finding that it was not 
 profitable, we abolished it for that reason, and 
 became a free State. We adopted in its stead 
 the policy that a negro in this State shall not 
 be a slave and shall not be a citizen. We have 
 a right to adopt that policy. For my part, I 
 think it is a wise and sound policy for us. You 
 in Missouri must judge for yourselves whether 
 it is a wise policy for you. If you choose to 
 follow our example, very good; if you reject 
 it, still well; it is your business, not ours. So 
 with Kentucky. Let Kentucky adopt a policy 
 to suit herself. If we do not like it, we will 
 keep away from it; and if she does not like ours, 
 let her stay at home, mind her own business, 
 and let us alone. If the people of all the States 
 
28 Stephen A. Douglas [Oct. 15 
 
 will act on that great principle, and each State 
 mind its own business, attend to its own affairs, 
 take care of its own negroes, and not meddle 
 with its neighbors, then there will be peace be- 
 tween the North and the South, the East and 
 the West, throughout the whole Union. Why- 
 can we not thus have peace? Why should we 
 thus allow a sectional party to agitate this coun- 
 try, to array the North against the South, and 
 convert us into enemies instead of friends, mere- 
 ly that a few ambitious men may ride into power 
 on a sectional hobby? How long is it since 
 these ambitious Northern men wished for a sec- 
 tional organization? Did any one of them 
 dream of a sectional party as long as the North 
 was the weaker section and the South the 
 stronger? Then all were opposed to sec- 
 tional parties. But the moment the North 
 obtained the majority in the House and Sen- 
 ate by the admission of California, and 
 could elect a President without the aid of 
 Southern votes, that moment ambitious North- 
 ern men formed a scheme to excite the North 
 against the South, and make the people be 
 governed in their votes by geographical lines, 
 thinking that the North, being the stronger sec- 
 tion, would outvote the South, and consequently 
 they, the leaders, would ride into office on a sec- 
 tional hobby. I am told that my hour is out 
 It was very short, 
 
Abraham Lincoln 
 
 Photogravure from the Original Oil Painting 
 William T. Mat hens. 
 
1 
 
 . * 
 
 1 
 
 Pi 
 
 ■N. 
 
1858] Reply at Alton 29 
 
 Mr. Lincoln's Reply in the Alton Joint Debate. 
 
 LADIES AND GENTLEMEN: I have 
 been somewhat, in my own mind, com- 
 plimented by a large portion of Judge 
 Douglas's speech — I mean that portion which 
 he devotes to the controversy between himself 
 and the present administration. This is the sev- 
 enth time Judge Douglas and myself have 
 met in these joint discussions, and he has been 
 gradually improving in regard to his war with 
 the administration. At Quincy, day before 
 yesterday, he was a little more severe upon the 
 administration than I had heard him upon any 
 occasion, and I took pains to compliment him 
 for it. I then told him to "give it to them with 
 all the power he had"; and as some of them 
 were present, I told them I would be very much 
 obliged if they would give it to him in about 
 the same way. I take it that he has now vastly 
 improved upon the attack he made then upon 
 the administration. I flatter myself he has real- 
 ly taken my advice on this subject. All I can 
 say now is to re-commend to him and to them 
 what I then commenced — to prosecute the war 
 against one another in the most vigorous man- 
 
30 Abraham Lincoln [Oct. 15 
 
 ner. I say to them again, "Go it, husband; go 
 it, bear!" 
 
 There is one other thing I will mention be- 
 fore I leave this branch of the discussion — al- 
 though I do not consider it much of my busi- 
 ness, anyway. I refer to that part of the judge's 
 remarks where he undertakes to involve Mr. 
 Buchanan in an inconsistency. He reads some- 
 thing from Mr. Buchanan, from which he un- 
 dertakes to involve him in an inconsistency; and 
 he gets something of a cheer for having done 
 so. I would only remind the judge that while 
 he is very valiantly fighting for the Nebraska 
 bill and the repeal of the Missouri Compro- 
 mise, it has been but a little while since he was 
 the valiant advocate of the Missouri Compro- 
 mise. I want to know if Buchanan has not as 
 much right to be inconsistent as Douglas has? 
 Has Douglas the exclusive right in this country 
 of being on all sides of all questions? Is nobody 
 allowed that high privilege but himself? Is 
 he to have an entire monopoly on that subject? 
 
 So far as Judge Douglas addressed his speech 
 to me, or so far as it was about me, it is my 
 business to pay some attention to it. I have 
 heard the judge state two or three times what 
 he has stated to-day — that in a speech which I 
 made at Springfield, Illinois, I had in a very 
 especial manner complained that the Supreme 
 
1858] Reply at Alton 31 
 
 Court in the Dred Scott case had decided that 
 a negro could never be a citizen of the United 
 States. I have omitted, by some accident, here- 
 tofore to analyze this statement, and it is re- 
 quired of me to notice it now. In point of fact 
 it is untrue. I never have complained espe- 
 cially of the Dred Scott decision, because it 
 held that a negro could not be a citizen, and 
 the judge is always wrong when he says I ever 
 did so complain of it. I have the speech here, 
 and I will thank him or any of his friends to 
 show where I said that a negro should be a 
 citizen, and complained especially of the Dred 
 Scott decision because it declared he could not 
 be one. I have done no such thing, and Judge 
 Douglas so persistently insisting that I have 
 done so has strongly impressed me with the be- 
 lief of a predetermination on his part to mis- 
 represent me. He could not get his foundation 
 for insisting that I was in favor of this negro 
 equality anywhere else as well as he could by 
 assuming that untrue proposition. Let me tell 
 this audience what is true in regard to that mat- 
 ter; and the means by which they may correct 
 me if I do not tell them truly is by a recurrence 
 to the speech itself. I spoke of the Dred Scott 
 decision in my Springfield speech, and I was 
 then endeavoring to prove that the Dred Scott 
 decision was a portion of a system or scheme to 
 
32 Abraham Lincoln [Oct. 15 
 
 make slavery national in this country. I point- 
 ed out what things had been decided by the 
 court. I mentioned as a fact that they had de- 
 cided that a negro could not be a citizen — that 
 they had done so, as I supposed, to deprive the 
 negro, under all circumstances, of the remotest 
 possibility of ever becoming a citizen and claim- 
 ing the rights of a citizen of the United States 
 under a certain clause of the Constitution. I 
 stated that, without making any complaint of 
 it at all. I then went on and stated the other 
 points decided in the case, — namely, that the 
 bringing of a negro into the State of Illinois, 
 and holding him in slavery for two years here, 
 was a matter in regard to which they would 
 not decide whether it would make him free or 
 not; that they decided the further point that 
 taking him into a United States Territroy where 
 slavery was prohibited by act of Congress, did 
 not make him free, because that act of Con- 
 gress, as they held, was unconstitutional. I men- 
 tioned these three things as making up the points 
 decided in that case. I mentioned them in a 
 lump taken in connection with the introduction 
 of the Nebraska bill, and the amendment of 
 Chase, offered at the time, declaratory of the 
 right of the people of the Territories to exclude 
 slavery, which was voted down by the friends 
 of the bill. I mentioned all these things to- 
 
1858] Reply at Alton 23 
 
 gether, as evidence tending to prove a combina- 
 tion and conspiracy to make the institution of 
 slavery national. In that connection and in that 
 way I mentioned the decision on the point that 
 a negro could not be a citizen, and in no other 
 connection. 
 
 Out of this, Judge Douglas builds up his 
 beautiful fabrication — of my purpose to intro- 
 duce a perfect social and political equality be- 
 tween the white and the black races. His as- 
 sertion that I made an "especial objection" 
 (that is his exact language) to the decision on 
 this account, is untrue in point of fact. 
 
 Now, while I am upon this subject, and as 
 Henry Clay has been alluded to, I desire to 
 place myself, in connection with Mr. Clay, as 
 nearly right before this people as may be. I 
 am quite aware what the judge's object is here 
 by all these allusions. He knows that we are 
 before an audience having strong sympathies 
 southward by relationship, place of birth, and 
 so on. He desires to place me in an extremely 
 Abolition attitude. He read upon a former oc- 
 casion, and alludes without reading to-day, to 
 a portion of a speech which I delivered in Chi- 
 cago. In his quotations from that speech, as 
 he has made them upon former occasions, the 
 extracts were taken in such a way as, I suppose, 
 brings them within the definition of what is 
 
34 Abraham Lincoln [Oct. 15 
 
 called garbling — taking portions of a speech 
 which, when taken by themselves, do not pre- 
 sent the entire sense of the speaker as expressed 
 at the time. I propose, therefore, out of that 
 same speech, to show how one portion of it 
 which he skipped over (taking an extract before 
 and an extract after) will give a different idea, 
 and the true idea I intended to convey. It will 
 take me some little time to read it, but I believe 
 I will occupy the time that way. 
 
 You have heard him frequently allude to my 
 controversy with him in regard to the Declara- 
 tion of Independence. I confess that I have 
 had a struggle with Judge Douglas on that mat- 
 ter, and I will try briefly to place myself right 
 in regard to it on this occasion. I said — and 
 it is between the extracts Judge Douglas has 
 taken from this speech, and put in his published 
 speeches: 
 
 It may be argued that there are certain conditions 
 that make necessities and impose them upon us, and 
 to the extent that a necessity is imposed upon a man 
 he must submit to it. I think that was the condi- 
 tion in which we found ourselves when we estab- 
 lished this government. We had slaves among us; 
 we could not get our Constitution unless we permit- 
 ted them to remain in slavery; we could not secure 
 the good we did secure if we grasped for more: and 
 having by necessity submitted to that much, it does 
 
1858] Reply at Alton 35 
 
 not destroy the principle that is the charter of our 
 liberties. Let that charter remain as our standard. 
 
 Now I have upon all occasions declared as 
 strongly as Judge Douglas against the disposi- 
 tion to interfere with the existing institution of 
 slavery. You hear me read it from the same 
 speech from which he takes garbled extracts for 
 the purpose of proving upon me a disposition 
 to interfere with the institution of slavery, and 
 establish a perfect social and political equality 
 between negroes and white people. 
 
 Allow me, while upon this subject, briefly to 
 present one other extract from a speech of mine, 
 made more than a year ago, at Springfield, in 
 discussing this very same question, soon after 
 Judge Douglas took his ground that negroes 
 were not included in the Declaration of Inde- 
 pendence: 
 
 I think the authors of that notable instrument in- 
 tended to include all men, but they did not intend to 
 declare all men equal in all respects. They did not 
 mean to say that all men were equal in color, size, 
 intellect, moral development, or social capacity. 
 They defined with tolerable distinctness in what 
 respects they did consider all men created equal — 
 equal in certain inalienable rights, among which are 
 life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. This they 
 said, and this they meant. They did not mean to 
 
36 Abraham Lincoln [Oct. 15 
 
 assert the obvious untruth, that all were then actually- 
 enjoying that equality, nor yet that they were about 
 to confer it immediately upon them. In fact, they 
 had no power to confer such a boon. They meant 
 simply to declare the right, so that the enforcement of 
 it might follow as fast as circumstances should per- 
 mit. 
 
 They meant to set up a standard maxim for free 
 society which should be familiar to all and revered 
 by all — constantly looked to, constantly labored for, 
 and even, though never perfectly attained, constantly 
 approximated; and thereby constantly spreading and 
 deepening its influence and augmenting the happiness 
 and value of life to all people, of all colors, every- 
 where. 
 
 There, again, are the sentiments I have ex- 
 pressed in regard to the Declaration of Inde- 
 pendence upon a former occasion — sentiments 
 which have been put in print and read wherever 
 anybody cared to know what so humble an in- 
 dividual as myself chose to say in regard to it. 
 
 At Galesburg the other day, I said, in answer 
 to Judge Douglas, that three years ago there 
 never had been a man, so far as I knew or be- 
 lieved, in the whole world, who had said that 
 the Declaration of Independence did not in- 
 clude negroes in the term "all men." I reas- 
 sert it to-day. I assert that Judge Douglas and 
 all his friends may search the whole records of 
 
1858] Reply at Alton 37 
 
 the country, and it will be a matter of great 
 astonishment to me if they shall be able to find 
 that one human being three years ago had ever 
 uttered the astounding sentiment that the term 
 "all men" in the Declaration did not include 
 the negro. Do not let me be misunderstood. 
 I know that more than three years ago there 
 were men who, finding this assertion constantly 
 in the way of their schemes to bring about the 
 ascendancy and perpetuation of slavery, denied 
 the truth of it. I know that Mr. Calhoun and 
 all the politicians of his school denied the truth 
 of the Declaration. I know that it ran along 
 in the mouth of some Southern men for a period 
 of years, ending at last in that shameful though 
 rather forcible declaration of Pettit of Indiana, 
 upon the floor of the United States Senate, that 
 the Declaration of Independence was in that 
 respect "a self-evident lie," rather than a self- 
 evident truth. But I say, with a perfect knowl- 
 edge of all this hawking at the Declaration 
 without directly attacking it, that three years 
 ago there never had lived a man who had ven- 
 tured to assail it in the sneaking way of pretend- 
 ing to believe it and then asserting it did not 
 include the negro. I believe the first man who 
 ever said it was Chief Justice Taney in the Dred 
 Scott case, and the next to him was our friend, 
 Stephen A. Douglas. And now it has become 
 
38 Abraham Lincoln [Oct. 15 
 
 the catchword of the entire party. I would like 
 to call upon his friends everywhere, to consider 
 how they have come in so short a time to view 
 this matter in a way so entirely different from 
 their former belief; to ask whether they are not 
 being borne along by an irresistible current — 
 whither, they know not. 
 
 In answer to my proposition at Galesburg 
 last week, I see that some man in Chicago has 
 got up a letter addressed to the Chicago 
 "Times," to show, as he professes, that somebody 
 had said so before; and he signs himself "An 
 Old-Line Whig," if I remember correctly. In 
 the first place I would say he was not an old- 
 line Whig. I am somewhat acquainted with 
 the old-line Whigs. I was with the old-line 
 Whigs from the origin to the end of that party; 
 I became pretty well acquainted with them, and 
 I know they always had some sense, whatever 
 else you could ascribe to them. I know there 
 never was one who had not more sense than to 
 try to show by the evidence he produces that 
 some man had, prior to the time I named, said 
 that negroes were not included in the term "all 
 men" in the Declaration of Independence. What 
 is the evidence he produces? I will bring for- 
 ward his evidence, and let you see what he offers 
 by way of showing that somebody more than 
 three years ago had said negroes were not in- 
 
1858] Reply at Alton 39 
 
 eluded in the Declaration. He brings forward 
 part of a speech from Henry Clay — the part of 
 the speech of Henry Clay which I used to bring 
 forward to prove precisely the contrary. I 
 guess we are surrounded to some extent to-day 
 by the old friends of Mr. Clay, and they will 
 be glad to hear anything from that authority. 
 While he was in Indiana a man presented a 
 petition to liberate his negroes, and he (Mr. 
 Clay) made a speech in answer to it, which I 
 suppose he carefully wrote himself and caused 
 to be published. I have before me an extract 
 from that speech which constitutes the evidence 
 this pretended "Old-Line Whig" at Chicago 
 brought forward to show that Mr. Clay didn't 
 suppose the negro was included in the Declara- 
 tion of Independence. Hear what Mr. Clay 
 said: 
 
 And what is the foundation of this appeal to me 
 in Indiana, to liberate the slaves under my care in 
 Kentucky? It is a general declaration in the act 
 announcing to the world the independence of the 
 thirteen American colonies, that all men are created 
 equal. Now, as an abstract principle, there is no 
 doubt of the truth of that declaration; and it is de- 
 sirable, in the original construction of society, and 
 in organized societies, to keep it in view as a great 
 fundamental principle. But then I apprehend that 
 in no society that ever did exist, or ever shall be 
 
40 Abraham Lincoln [Oct. 15 
 
 formed, was or can the equality asserted among the 
 members of the human race be practically enforced 
 and carried out. There are portions, large portions, 
 — women, minors, insane, culprits, transient so- 
 journers, — that will always probably remain subject 
 to the government of another portion of the com- 
 munity. 
 
 That declaration, whatever may be the extent of 
 its import, was made by the delegations of the thir- 
 teen States. In most of them slavery existed, and 
 had long existed, and was established by law. It 
 was introduced and forced upon the colonies by the 
 paramount law of England. Do you believe that 
 in making that declaration the States that concurred 
 in it intended that it should be tortured into a virtual 
 emancipation of all the slaves within their respective 
 limits? Would Virginia and other Southern States 
 have ever united in a declaration which was to be 
 interpreted into an abolition of slavery among them? 
 Did any one of the thirteen colonies entertain such 
 a design or expectation? To impute such a secret 
 and unavowed purpose would be to charge a political 
 fraud upon the noblest band of patriots that ever 
 assembled in council — a fraud upon the confederacy 
 of the Revolution — a fraud upon the union of those 
 States whose constitution not only recognized the 
 lawfulness of slavery, but permitted the importation 
 of slaves from Africa until the year 1808. 
 
 This is the entire quotation brought forward 
 to prove that somebody previous to three years 
 
1858] Reply at Alton 41 
 
 ago had said the negro was not included in the 
 term "all men" in the Declaration. How does 
 it do so? In what way has it a tendency to 
 prove that? Mr. Clay says it is true as an ab- 
 stract principle that all men are created equal, 
 but that we cannot practically apply it in all 
 cases. He illustrates this by bringing forward 
 the cases of females, minors, and insane per- 
 sons, with whom it cannot be enforced ; but he 
 says that it is true as an abstract principle in the 
 organization of society, as well as in organized 
 society, and it should be kept in view as a fun- 
 damental principle. Let me read a few words 
 more before I add some comments of my own. 
 Mr. Clay says a little further on: 
 
 I desire no concealment of my opinions in regard 
 to the institution of slavery. I look upon it as a 
 great evil, and deeply lament that we have derived 
 it from the parent government, and from our an- 
 cestors. I wish every slave in the United States was 
 in the country of his ancestors. But here they are, 
 and the question is, how can they be best dealt with? 
 If a state of nature existed, and we were about to 
 lay the foundations of society, no man would be more 
 strongly opposed than I should be, to incorporating 
 the institution of slavery among its elements. 
 
 Now, here in this same book — in this same 
 speech — in this same extract brought forward 
 
42 Abraham Lincoln [Oct. 15 
 
 to prove that Mr. Clay held that the negro was 
 not included in the Declaration of Independ- 
 ence — W e find no such statement on his part, 
 but instead the declaration that it is a great 
 fundamental truth, which should be constantly 
 kept in view in the organization of society and 
 in societies already organized. But if I say a 
 word about it; if I attempt, as Mr. Clay said 
 all good men ought to do, to keep it in view; if, 
 in this "organized society," I ask to have the 
 public eye turned upon it; if I ask, in rela- 
 tion to the organization of new Territories, that 
 the public eye should be turned upon it, — forth- 
 with I am vilified as you hear me to-day. What 
 have I done that I have not the license of Henry 
 Clay's illustrious example here in doing? Have 
 I done aught that I have not his authority for, 
 while maintaining that in organizing new Ter- 
 ritories and societies, this fundamental princi- 
 ple should be regarded, and in organized so- 
 ciety holding it up to the public view and recog- 
 nizing what he recognized as the great princi- 
 ple of free government? 
 
 And when this new principle — this new 
 proposition that no human being ever thought 
 of three years ago — is brought forward, I com- 
 bat it as having an evil tendency, if not an evil 
 design. I combat it as having a tendency to 
 dehumanize the negro — to take away from him 
 
1 858] Reply at Alton 43 
 
 the right of ever striving to be a man. I com- 
 bat it as being one of the thousand things con- 
 stantly done in these days to prepare the public 
 mind to make property, and nothing but prop- 
 erty, of the negro in all the States in this Union. 
 But there is a point that I wish, before leav- 
 ing this part of the discussion, to ask attention 
 to. I have read, and I repeat, the words of 
 Henry Clay: 
 
 I desire no concealment of my opinions in regard 
 to the institution of slavery. I look upon it as a 
 great evil, and deeply lament that we have derived 
 it from the parent government, and from our an- 
 cestors. I wish every slave in the United States was 
 in the country of his ancestors. But here they are, 
 and the question is, how can they best be dealt with ? 
 If a state of nature existed, and we were about to lay 
 the foundations of society, no man would be more 
 strongly opposed than I should be, to incorporating 
 the institution of slavery among its elements. 
 
 The principle upon which I have insisted in 
 this canvass, is in relation to laying the founda- 
 tions of new societies. I have never sought to 
 apply these principles to the old States for the 
 purpose of abolishing slavery in those States. 
 It is nothing but a miserable perversion of what 
 I have said, to assume that I have declared Mis- 
 souri, or any other slave State, shall emancipate 
 
44 Abraham Lincoln [Oct. 15 
 
 her slaves. I have proposed no such thing. 
 But when Mr. Clay says that in laying the foun- 
 dations of societies in our Territories where it 
 does not exist, he would be opposed to the in- 
 troduction of slavery as an element, I insist that 
 we have his warrant — his license for insisting 
 upon the exclusion of that element which he de- 
 clared in such strong and emphatic language 
 was most hateful to him. 
 
 Judge Douglas has again referred to a Spring- 
 field speech in which I said, "A house divided 
 against itself cannot stand." The judge has so 
 often made the entire quotation from that speech 
 that I can make it from memory. I used this 
 language: 
 
 We are now far into the fifth year since a policy 
 was initiated with the avowed object and confident 
 promise of putting an end to the slavery agitation. 
 Under the operation of this policy, that agitation has 
 not only not ceased, but has constantly augmented. 
 In my opinion it will not cease until a crisis shall 
 have been reached and passed. " A house divided 
 against itself cannot stand." I believe this govern- 
 ment cannot endure permanently half slave and half 
 free. I do not expect the house to fall — but I do 
 expect it will cease to be divided. It will become 
 all one thing, or all the other. Either the opponents 
 of slavery will arrest the further spread of it, and 
 place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief 
 
1858] Reply at Alton 45 
 
 that it is in the course of ultimate extinction, or its 
 advocates will push it forward till it shall become 
 alike lawful in all the States — old as well as new, 
 North as well as South. 
 
 That extract, and the sentiments expressed in 
 it, have been extremely offensive to Judge Doug- 
 las. He has warred upon them as Satan wars 
 upon the Bible. His perversions upon it are 
 endless. Here now are my views upon it in 
 brief. 
 
 I said we were now far into the fifth year 
 since a policy was initiated with the avowed ob- 
 ject and confident promise of putting an end to 
 the slavery agitation. Is it not so? When that 
 Nebraska bill was brought forward four years 
 ago last January, was it not for the "avowed ob- 
 ject" of putting an end to the slavery agitation? 
 We were to have no more agitation in Con- 
 gress ; it was all to be banished to the Territories. 
 By the way, I will remark here that, as Judge 
 Douglas is very fond of complimenting Mr. 
 Crittenden in these days, Mr. Crittenden has 
 said there was a falsehood in that whole busi- 
 ness, for there was no slavery agitation at that 
 time to allay. We were for a little while quiet 
 on the troublesome thing, and that very allay- 
 ing-plaster of Judge Douglas's stirred it up 
 again. But was it not undertaken or initiated 
 with the "confident promise" of putting an end 
 
46 Abraham Lincoln [Oct. 15 
 
 to the slavery agitation? Surely it was. In 
 every speech you heard Judge Douglas make, 
 until he got into this "imbroglio," as they call 
 it, with the administration about the Lecomp- 
 ton constitution, every speech on that Nebraska 
 bill was full of his felicitations that we were 
 just at the end of the slavery agitation. The 
 last tip of the last joint of the old serpent's tail 
 was just drawing out of view. But has it proved 
 so? I have asserted that under that policy that 
 agitation "has not only ceased, but has constant- 
 ly augmented." When was there ever a greater 
 agitation in Congress than last winter? When 
 was it as great in the country as to-day? 
 
 There was a collateral object in the introduc- 
 tion of that Nebraska policy which was to clothe 
 the people of the Territories with a superior de- 
 gree of self-government, beyond what they had 
 ever had before. The first object and the main 
 one of conferring upon the people a higher de- 
 gree of self-government, is a question of fact to 
 be determined by you in answer to a single ques- 
 tion. Have you ever heard or known of a peo- 
 ple anywhere on earth who had as little to do as, 
 in the first instance of its use, the people of Kan- 
 sas had with this same right of self-government? 
 In its main policy and in its collateral object, it 
 has been nothing but a living, creeping lie from 
 the time of its introduction till to-day. 
 
1858] Reply at Alton 47 
 
 I have intimated that I thought the agitation 
 would not cease until a crisis should have been 
 reached and passed. I have stated in what way 
 I thought it would be reached and passed. I 
 have said that it might go one way or the other. 
 We might, by arresting the further spread of it, 
 and placing it where the fathers originally 
 placed it, put it where the public mind should 
 rest in the belief that it was in the course of ulti- 
 mate extinction. Thus the agitation may cease. 
 It may be pushed forward until it shall become 
 alike lawful in all the States, old as well as new, 
 North as well as South. I have said, and I re- 
 peat, my wish is that the further spread of it 
 may be arrested, and that it may be placed where 
 the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is 
 in the course of ultimate extinction. I have ex- 
 pressed that as my wish. I entertain the opin- 
 ion, upon evidence sufficient to my mind, that 
 the fathers of this government placed that in- 
 stitution where the public mind did rest in the 
 belief that it was in the course of ultimate ex- 
 tinction. Let me ask why they made provision 
 that the source of slavery — the African slave- 
 trade — should be cut off at the end of twenty 
 years? Why did they make provision that in 
 all the new territory we owned at that time, 
 slavery should be forever inhibited? Why stop 
 its spread in one direction and cut off its source 
 
48 Abraham Lincoln [Oct. 15 
 
 in another, if they did not look to its being 
 placed in the course of ultimate extinction? 
 
 Again, the institution of slavery is only men- 
 tioned in the Constitution of the United States 
 two or three times, and in neither of these cases 
 does the word "slavery" or "negro race" occur; 
 but covert language is used each time, and for 
 a purpose full of significance. What is the 
 language in regard to the prohibition of the 
 African slave-trade? It runs in about this way: 
 "The migration or importation of such persons 
 as any of the States now existing shall think 
 proper to admit, shall not be prohibited by the 
 Congress prior to the year 1808." 
 
 The next allusion in the Constitution to the 
 question of slavery and the black race, is on the 
 subject of the basis of representation, and there 
 the language used is: "Representatives and di- 
 rect taxes shall be apportioned among the sev- 
 eral States which may be included within this 
 Union, according to their respective numbers, 
 which shall be determined by adding to the 
 whole number of free persons, including those 
 bound to service for a term of years, and ex- 
 cluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all 
 other persons." 
 
 It says "persons," not slaves, not negroes ; but 
 this "three fifths" can be applied to no other 
 class among us than the negroes. 
 
1858] Reply at Alton 49 
 
 Lastly, in the provision for the reclamation 
 of fugitive slaves, it is said: "No person held 
 to service or labor in one State, under the laws 
 thereof, escaping into another, shall in conse- 
 quence of any law or regulation therein be dis- 
 charged from such service or labor, but shall 
 be delivered up, on claim of the party to whom 
 such service or labor may be due." There, 
 again, there is no mention of the word "negro," 
 or of slavery. In all three of these places, be- 
 ing the only allusion to slavery in the instru- 
 ment, covert language is used. Language is 
 used not suggesting that slavery existed or that 
 the black race were among us. And I under- 
 stand the contemporaneous history of those 
 times to be that covert language was used with 
 a purpose, and that purpose was that in our 
 Constitution, which it was hoped, and is still 
 hoped, will endure forever, — when it should be 
 read by intelligent and patriotic men, after the 
 institution of slavery had passed from among 
 us, — there should be nothing on the face of the 
 great charter of liberty suggesting that such a 
 thing as negro slavery had ever existed among 
 us. 
 
 This is part of the evidence that the fathers 
 of the government expected and intended the 
 institution of slavery to come to an end. They 
 expected and intended that it should be in the 
 
5o Abraham Lincoln [Oct. 15 
 
 course of ultimate extinction. And when I say 
 that I desire to see the further spread of it ar- 
 rested, I only say I desire to see that done which 
 the fathers have first done. When I say I de- 
 sire to see it placed where the public mind will 
 rest in the belief that it is in the course of ulti- 
 mate extinction, I only say I desire to see it 
 placed where they placed it. It is not true that 
 our fathers, as Judge Douglas assumes, made 
 this government part slave and part free. Un- 
 derstand the sense in which he puts it. He as- 
 sumes that slavery is a rightful thing within it- 
 self — was introduced by the f ramers of the Con- 
 stitution. 
 
 The exact truth is that they found the in- 
 stitution existing among us, and they left it as 
 they found it. But in making the govern- 
 ment they left this institution with many clear 
 marks of disapprobation upon it. They found 
 slavery among them, and they left it among them 
 because of the difficulty — the absolute impos- 
 sibility — of its immediate removal. And when 
 Judge Douglas asks me why we cannot let it 
 remain part slave and part free, as the fathers 
 of the government made it, he asks a question 
 based upon an assumption which is itself a false- 
 hood; and I turn upon him and ask him the 
 question, when the policy that the fathers of the 
 government had adopted in relation to this ele- 
 
1858] Reply at Alton 51 
 
 ment among us was the best policy in the world, 
 — the only wise policy, the only policy that we 
 can ever safely continue upon, that will ever 
 give us peace, unless this dangerous element 
 masters us all and becomes a national institution, 
 — I turn upon him and ask him why he could 
 not leave it alone. I turn and ask him why he 
 was driven to the necessity of introducing a new 
 policy in regard to it. He has himself said 
 he introduced a new policy. He said so in his 
 speech on the 22d of March of the present year, 
 1858. I ask him why he could not let it remain 
 where our fathers placed it. I ask, too, of 
 Judge Douglas and his friends, why we shall 
 not again place this institution upon the basis 
 on which the fathers left it? I ask you, when 
 he infers that I am in favor of setting the free 
 and the slave States at war, when the institution 
 was placed in that attitude by those who made 
 the Constitution, did they make any war? If 
 we had no war out of it when thus placed, where- 
 in is the ground of belief that we shall have war 
 out of it if we return to that policy? Have we 
 had any peace upon this matter springing from 
 any other basis? I maintain that we have not. 
 I have proposed nothing more than a return to 
 the policy of the fathers. 
 
 I confess, when I propose a certain measure 
 of policy, it is not enough for me that I do not 
 
52 Abraham Lincoln [Oct. 15 
 
 intend anything evil in the result, but it is in- 
 cumbent on me to show that it has not a tendency 
 to that result. I have met Judge Douglas in 
 that point of view. I have not only made the 
 declaration that I do not mean to produce a con- 
 flict between the States, but I have tried to show 
 by fair reasoning, and I think I have shown to 
 the minds of fair men, that I propose nothing 
 but what has a most peaceful tendency. The 
 quotation that I happened to make in that 
 Springfield speech, that "a house divided against 
 itself cannot stand," and which has proved so of- 
 fensive to the judge, was part and parcel of the 
 same thing. He tries to show that variety in 
 the domestic institutions of the different States 
 is necessary and indispensable. I do not dis- 
 pute it. I have no controversy with Judge 
 Douglas about that. I shall very readily agree 
 with him that it would be foolish for us to insist 
 upon having a cranberry law here, in Illinois, 
 where he have no cranberries, because they have 
 a cranberry law in Indiana, where they have 
 cranberries. I should insist that it would be ex- 
 ceedingly wrong in us to deny to Virginia the 
 right to enact oyster laws, where they have 
 oysters, because we want no such laws here. I 
 understand, I hope, quite as well as Judge Doug- 
 las, or anybody else, that the variety in the soil 
 and climate and face of the country, and conse- 
 
1858] Reply at Alton 53 
 
 quent variety in the industrial pursuits and pro- 
 ductions of a country, require systems of laws 
 conforming to this variety in the natural features 
 of the country. I understand quite as well as 
 Judge Douglas, that if we here raise a barrel of 
 flour more than we want, and the Louisianians 
 raise a barrel of sugar more than they want, it is 
 of mutual advantage to exchange. That pro- 
 duces commerce, brings us together, and makes 
 us better friends. We like one another the more 
 for it. And I understand as well as Judge Doug- 
 las, or anybody else, that these mutual accommo- 
 dations are the cements which bind together the 
 different parts of this Union; that instead of 
 being a thing to "divide the house" — figura- 
 tively expressing the Union — they tend to sus- 
 tain it; they are the props of the house tending 
 always to hold it up. 
 
 But when I have admitted all this, I ask if 
 there is any parallel between these things and 
 this institution of slavery? I do not see that 
 there is any parallel at all between them. Con- 
 sider it. When have we had any difficulty 
 or quarrel amongst ourselves about the cran- 
 berry laws of Indiana, or the oyster laws of Vir- 
 ginia, or the pine-lumber laws of Maine, or the 
 fact that Louisiana produces sugar, and Illinois 
 flour? When have we had any quarrels over 
 these things? When have we had perfect peace 
 
54 Abraham Lincoln [Oct 15 
 
 in regard to this thing which I say is an element 
 of discord in this Union? We have sometimes 
 had peace, but when was it? It was when the 
 institution of slavery remained quiet where it 
 was. We have had difficulty and turmoil when- 
 ever it has made a struggle to spread itself where 
 it was not. I ask, then, if experience does not 
 speak in thunder-tones, telling us that the policy 
 which has given peace to the country heretofore, 
 being returned to, gives the greatest promise 
 of peace again. You may say, and Judge Doug- 
 las has intimated the same thing, that all this 
 difficulty in regard to the institution of slavery 
 is the mere agitation of office-seekers and am- 
 bitious northern politicians. He thinks we want 
 to get "his place," I suppose. I agree that there 
 are office-seekers among us. The Bible says 
 somewhere that we are desperately selfish. I 
 think we would have discovered that fact with- 
 out the Bible. I do not claim that I am any less 
 so than the average of men, but I do claim that 
 I am not more selfish than Judge Douglas. 
 
 But is it true that all the difficulty and agi- 
 tation we have in regard to this institution of 
 slavery springs from office-seeking — from the 
 mere ambition of politicians? Is that the truth? 
 How many times have we had danger from this 
 question? Go back to the day of the Missouri 
 Compromise. Go back to the nullification 
 
1858] Reply at Alton 55 
 
 question, at the bottom of which lay this same 
 slavery question. Go back to the time of the 
 annexation of Texas. Go back to the troubles 
 that led to the compromise of 1850. You will 
 find that every time, with the single exception 
 of the nullification question, they sprang from 
 an endeavor to spread this institution. There 
 never was a party in the history of this country, 
 and there probably never will be, of sufficient 
 strength to disturb the general peace of the coun- 
 try. Parties themselves may be divided and 
 quarrel on minor questions, yet it extends not be- 
 yond the parties themselves. But does not this 
 question make a disturbance outside of political 
 circles? Does it not enter into the churches and 
 rend them asunder? What divided the great 
 Methodist Church into two parts, North and 
 South? What has raised this constant disturb- 
 ance in every Presbyterian general assembly that 
 meets? What disturbed the Unitarian Church 
 in this very city two years ago? What has 
 jarred and shaken the great American Tract 
 Society recently — not yet splitting it, but sure 
 to divide it in the end? Is it not this same 
 mighty, deepseated power that somehow oper- 
 ates on the minds of men, exciting and stirring 
 them up in every avenue of society — in politics, 
 in religion, in literature, in morals, in all the 
 manifold relations of life? Is this the work of 
 
56 Abraham Lincoln [Oct. 15 
 
 politicians? Is that irresistible power, which 
 for fifty years has shaken the government and 
 agitated the people, to be stilled and subdued 
 by pretending that it is an exceedingly simple 
 thing, and we ought not to talk about it? If 
 you will get everybody else to stop talking about 
 it, I assure you I will quit before they have half 
 done so. But where is the philosophy or states- 
 manship which assumes that you can quiet that 
 disturbing element in our society which has dis- 
 turbed us for more than half a century, which 
 has been the only serious danger that has threat- 
 ened our institutions — I say, where is the phi- 
 losophy or. the statesmanship based on the as- 
 sumption that we are to quit talking about it, 
 and that the public mind is all at once to cease 
 being agitated by it? Yet this is the policy here 
 in the North that Douglas is advocating — that 
 we are to care nothing about it! I ask you if 
 it is not a false philosophy? Is it not a false 
 statesmanship that undertakes to build up a sys- 
 tem of policy upon the basis of caring nothing 
 about the very thing that everybody does care 
 the most about — a thing which all experience 
 has shown we care a very great deal about? 
 
 The judge alludes very often in the course of 
 his remarks to the exclusive right which the 
 States have to decide the whole thing for them- 
 selves. I agree with him very readily that the 
 
1858] Reply at Alton 57 
 
 different States have that right. He is but fight- 
 ing a man of straw when he assumes that I am 
 contending against the rights of the States to do 
 as they please about it. Our controversy with 
 him is in regard to the new Territories. We 
 agree that when the States come in as States they 
 have the right and the power to do as they please. 
 We have no power as citizens of the free States, 
 or in our federal capacity as members of the 
 Federal Union through the General Govern- 
 ment, to disturb slavery in the States where it 
 exists. We profess constantly that we have no 
 more inclination than belief in the power of the 
 government to disturb it; yet we are driven con- 
 stantly to defend ourselves from the assumption 
 that we are warring upon the rights of the States. 
 What I insist upon is, that the new Territories 
 shall be kept free from it while in the territorial 
 condition. Judge Douglas assumes that we have 
 no interest in them — that we have no right what- 
 ever to interfere. I think we have some interest. 
 I think that as white men we have. Do we 
 wish for an outlet for our surplus population, 
 if I may so express myself? Do we not feel an 
 interest in getting to that outlet with such insti- 
 tutions as we would like to have prevail there? 
 If you go to the Territory opposed to slavery, 
 and another man comes upon the same ground 
 with his slave, upon the assumption that the 
 
58 Abraham Lincoln [Oct. 15 
 
 things are equal, it turns out that he has the 
 equal right all his way, and you have no part of 
 it your way. If he goes in and makes it a slave 
 Territory, and by consequence a slave State, is 
 it not time that those who desire to have it a 
 free State were on equal ground? Let me sug- 
 gest it in a different way. How many Demo- 
 crats are there about here ["A thousand"] who 
 have left slave States and come into the free 
 State of Illinois to get rid of the institution of 
 slavery? [Another voice: "A thousand and 
 one."] I reckon there are a thousand and one. 
 I will ask you, if the policy you are now advo- 
 cating had prevailed when this country was in 
 a territorial condition, where would you have 
 gone to get rid of it? Where would you have 
 found your free State or Territory to go to? 
 And when hereafter, for any cause, the people 
 in this place shall desire to find new homes, if 
 they wish to be rid of the institution, where will 
 they find the place to go to? 
 
 Now, irrespective of the moral aspect of this 
 question as to whether there is a right or wrong 
 in enslaving a negro, I am still in favor of our 
 new Territories being in such a condition that 
 white men may find a home — may find some 
 spot where they can better their condition — 
 where they can settle upon new soil, and better 
 their condition in life. I am in favor of this 
 
1858] Reply at Alton 59 
 
 not merely (I must say it here as I have else- 
 where) for our own people who are born 
 amongst us, but as an outlet for free white peo- 
 ple everywhere, the world over — in which Hans, 
 and Baptiste, and Patrick, and all other men 
 from all the world, may find new homes and 
 better their condition in life. 
 
 I have stated upon former occasions, and I 
 may as well state again, what I understand to be 
 the real issue of this controversy between Judge 
 Douglas and myself. On the point of my want- 
 ing to make war between the free and the slave 
 States, there has been no issue between us. So, 
 too, when he assumes that I am in favor of in- 
 troducing a perfect social and political equality 
 between the white and black races. These are 
 false issues, upon which Judge Douglas has tried 
 to force the controversy. There is no founda- 
 tion in truth for the charge that I maintain 
 either of these propositions. The real issue in 
 this controversy — the one pressing upon every 
 mind — is the sentiment on the part of one class 
 that looks upon the institution of slavery as a 
 wrong, and of another class that does not look 
 upon it as a wrong. The sentiment that con- 
 templates the institution of slavery in this coun- 
 try as a wrong is the sentiment of the Republi- 
 can party. It is the sentiment around which all 
 their actions, all their arguments, circle; from 
 
6o Abraham Lincoln [Oct. 15 
 
 which all their propositions radiate. They look 
 upon it as being a moral, social, and political 
 wrong; and while they contemplate it as such, 
 they nevertheless have due regard for its actual 
 existence among us, and the difficulties of get- 
 ting rid of it in any satisfactory way, and to all 
 the constitutional obligations thrown about it. 
 Yet having a due regard for these, they desire 
 a policy in regard to it that looks to its not cre- 
 ating any more danger. They insist that it, as 
 far as may be, be treated as a wrong, and one of 
 the methods of treating it as a wrong is to make 
 provision that it shall grow no larger. They 
 also desire a policy that looks to a peaceful end 
 of slavery some time, as being a wrong. These 
 are the views they entertain in regard to it, as 
 I understand them; and all their sentiments, all 
 their arguments and propositions, are brought 
 within this range. I have said, and I repeat it 
 here, that if there be a man amongst us who does 
 not think that the institution of slavery is wrong 
 in any one of the aspects of which I have spoken, 
 he is misplaced, and ought not to be with us. 
 And if there be a man amongst us who is so im- 
 patient of it as a wrong as to disregard its actual 
 presence among us and the difficulty of getting 
 rid of it suddenly in a satisfactory way, and to 
 disregard the constitutional obligations thrown 
 about it, that man is misplaced if he is on our 
 
1858] Reply at Alton 61 
 
 platform. We disclaim sympathy with him in 
 practical action. He is not placed properly 
 with us. 
 
 On this subect of treating it as a wrong, and 
 limiting its spread, let me say a word. Has 
 anything ever threatened the existence of this 
 Union save and except this very institution of 
 slavery? What is it that we hold most dear 
 amongst us? Our own liberty and prosperity. 
 What has ever threatened our liberty and pros- 
 perity save and except this institution of slavery? 
 If this is true, how do you propose to improve 
 the condition of things by enlarging slavery — 
 by spreading it out and making it bigger? You 
 may have a wen or cancer upon your person, and 
 not be able to cut it out lest you bleed to death; 
 but surely it is no way to cure it, to engraft it 
 and spread it over your whole body. That is 
 no proper way of treating what you regard as 
 a wrong. You see this peaceful way of dealing 
 with it as a wrong — restricting the spread of 
 it, and not allowing it to go into new countries 
 where it has not already existed. That is the 
 peaceful way, the old-fashioned way, the way 
 in which the fathers themselves set us the ex- 
 ample. 
 
 On the other hand, I have said there is a senti- 
 ment which treats it as not being wrong. That 
 is the Democratic sentiment of this day. I do 
 
62 Abraham Lincoln [Oct. 15 
 
 not mean to say that every man who stands with- 
 in that range positively asserts that it is right. 
 That class will include all who positively assert 
 that it is right, and all who, like Judge Douglas, 
 treat it as indifferent, and do not say it is either 
 right or wrong. These two classes of men fall 
 within the general class of those who do not look 
 upon it as a wrong. And if there be among you 
 anybody who supposes that he, as a Democrat, 
 can consider himself "as much opposed to slavery 
 as anybody," I would like to reason with him. 
 You never treat it as a wrong. What other 
 thing that you consider as a wrong do you deal 
 with as you deal with that? Perhaps you say 
 it is wrong, but your leader never does, and you 
 quarrel with anybody who says it is wrong. Al- 
 though you pretend to say so yourself, you can 
 find no fit place to deal with it as a wrong. You 
 must not say anything about it in the free States, 
 because it is not here. You must not say any- 
 thing about it in the slave States, because it is 
 there. You must not say anything about it in 
 the pulpit, because that is religion, and has noth- 
 ing to do with it. You must not say anything 
 about it in politics, because that will disturb 
 the security of "my place." There is no place 
 to talk about it as being a wrong, although you 
 say yourself it is a wrong. But finally you will 
 screw yourself up to the belief that if the people 
 
1858] Reply at Alton 63 
 
 of the slave States should adopt a system of grad- 
 ual emancipation on the slavery question, you 
 would be in favor of it. You would be in favor 
 of it! You say that is getting it in the right 
 place, and you would be glad to see it succeed. 
 But you are deceiving yourself. You all know 
 that Frank Blair and Gratz Brown, down there 
 in St. Louis, undertook to introduce that system 
 in Missouri. They fought as valiantly as they 
 could for the system of gradual emancipation 
 which you pretend you would be glad to see suc- 
 ceed. Now I will bring you to the test. After 
 a hard fight, they were beaten; and when the 
 news came over here, you threw up your hats 
 and hurrahed for Democracy. More than that, 
 take all the argument made in favor of the sys- 
 tem you have proposed, and it carefully excludes 
 the idea that there is anything wrong in the in- 
 stitution of slavery. The arguments to sustain 
 that policy carefully exclude it. Even here to- 
 day you heard Judge Douglas quarrel with me 
 because I uttered a wish that it might some time 
 come to an end. Although Henry Clay could 
 say he wished every slave in the United States 
 was in the country of his ancestors, I am de- 
 nounced by those pretending to respect Henry 
 Clay, for uttering a wish that it might some time, 
 in some peaceful way, come to an end. 
 The Democratic policy in regard to that in- 
 
64 Abraham Lincoln [Oct. 15 
 
 stitution will not tolerate the merest breath, the 
 slightest hint, of the least degree of wrong about 
 it. Try it by some of Judge Douglas's argu- 
 ments. He says he "don't care whether it is 
 voted up or voted down" in the Territories. I 
 do not care myself, in dealing with that expres- 
 sion, whether it is intended to be expressive 
 of his individual sentiments on the subject, or 
 only of the national policy he desires to have es- 
 tablished. It is alike valuable for my purpose. 
 Any man can say that who does not see any- 
 thing wrong in slavery, but no man can logically 
 say it who does see a wrong in it; because no man 
 can logically say he don't care whether a wrong 
 is voted up or voted down. He may say he 
 don't care whether an indifferent thing is voted 
 up or down, but he must logically have a choice 
 between a right thing and a wrong thing. He 
 contends that whatever community wants slaves 
 has a right to have them. So they have if it is 
 not a wrong. But if it is a wrong, he cannot say 
 people have a right to do wrong. 
 
 He says that, upon the score of equality, 
 slaves should be allowed to go into a new Ter- 
 ritory like other property. This is strictly 
 logical if there is no difference between it and 
 other property. If it and other property are 
 equal, his argument is entirely logical. But if 
 you insist that one is wrong and the other right, 
 
1858] Reply at Alton 65 
 
 there is no use to institute a comparison be- 
 tween right and wrong. You may turn over 
 everything in the Democratic policy from be- 
 ginning to end, whether in the shape it takes 
 on the statute-book, in the shape it takes in the 
 Dred Scott decision, in the shape it takes in con- 
 versation, or the shape it takes in short maxim- 
 like arguments — it everywhere carefully ex- 
 cludes the idea that there is anything wrong in it. 
 That is the real issue. That is the issue that 
 will continue in this country when these poor 
 tongues of Judge Douglas and myself shall be 
 silent. It is the eternal struggle between these 
 two principles — right and wrong — throughout 
 the world. They are the two principles that 
 have stood face to face from the beginning of 
 time; and will ever continue to struggle. The 
 one is the common right of humanity, and the 
 other the divine right of kings. It is the same 
 principle in whatever shape it develops itself. 
 It is the same spirit that says, "You toil and work 
 and earn bread, and I'll eat it." No matter in 
 what shape it comes, whether from the mouth 
 of a king who seeks to bestride the people of his 
 own nation and live by the fruit of their labor, 
 or from one race of men as an apology for en- 
 slaving another race, it is the same tyrannical 
 principle. I was glad to express my gratitude 
 at Quincy, and I reexpress it here to Judge 
 
66 Abraham Lincoln [Oct. 15 
 
 Douglas — that he looks to no end of the institu- 
 tion of slavery. That will help the people to 
 see where the struggle really is. It will here- 
 after place with us all men who really do wish 
 the wrong may have an end. And whenever 
 we can get rid of the fog which obscures the real 
 question, — when we can get Judge Douglas and 
 his friends to avow a policy looking to its per- 
 petuation, — we can get out from among them 
 that class of men and bring them to the side of 
 those who treat it as a wrong. Then there will 
 soon be an end of it, and that end will be its 
 "ultimate extinction." Whenever the issue can 
 be distinctly made, and all extraneous matter 
 thrown out, so that men can fairly see the real dif- 
 ference between the parties, this controversy will 
 soon be settled, and it will be done peaceably 
 too. There will be no war, no violence. It 
 will be placed again where the wisest and best 
 men of the world placed it. 
 
 Brooks of South Carolina once declared that 
 when this Constitution was framed, its framers 
 did not look to the institution existing until 
 this day. When he said this, I think he stated 
 a fact that is fully borne out by the history 
 of the times. But he also said they were bet- 
 ter and wiser men than the men of these days; 
 yet the men of these days had experience which 
 they had not, and by the invention of the cotton- 
 
1858] Reply at Alton 67 
 
 gin it became a necessity in this country that 
 slavery should be perpetual. I now say that, 
 willingly or unwillingly, purposely or without 
 purpose, Judge Douglas has been the most 
 prominent instrument in changing the position 
 of the institution of slavery, — which the fathers 
 of the government expected to come to an end 
 ere this, — and putting it upon Brook's cotton- 
 gin basis — placing it where he openly confesses 
 he has no desire there shall ever be an end of it. 
 I understand I have ten minutes yet. I will 
 employ it in saying something about this argu- 
 ment Judge Douglas uses, while he sustains the 
 Dred Scott decision, that the people of the Ter- 
 ritories can still somehow exclude slavery. The 
 first thing I ask attention to is the fact that Judge 
 Douglas constantly said, before the decision, that 
 whether they could or not, was a question for the 
 Supreme Court. But after the court has made 
 the decision, he virtually says it is not a question 
 for the Supreme Court, but for the people. 
 And how is it he tells us they can exclude it? 
 He says it needs "police regulations," and that 
 admits of "unfriendly legislation." Although 
 it is a right established by the Constitution of the 
 United States to take a slave into a Territory of 
 the United States and hold him as property, yet 
 unless the territorial legislature will give 
 friendly legislation, and, more especially, if they 
 
68 Abraham Lincoln [Oct. 15 
 
 adopt unfriendly legislation, they can practically 
 exclude him. Now, without meeting this prop- 
 osition as a matter of fact, I pass to consider the 
 real constitutional obligation. Let me take the 
 gentleman who looks me in the face before me, 
 and let us suppose that he is a member of the 
 territorial legislature. The first thing he will 
 do will be to swear that he will support the Con- 
 stitution of the United States. His neighbor by 
 his side in the Territory has slaves and needs 
 territorial legislation to enable him to enjoy that 
 constitutional right. Can he withhold the legis- 
 lation which his neighbor needs for the enjoy- 
 ment of a right which is fixed in his favor fn 
 the Constitution of the United States which he 
 has sworn to support? Can he withhold it with- 
 out violating his oath? And more especially, 
 can he pass unfriendly legislation to violate his 
 oath? 
 
 Why, this is a monstrous sort of talk about 
 the Constitution of the United States! There 
 has never been as outlandish or lawless a doc- 
 trine from the mouth of any respectable man 
 on earth. I do not believe it is a constitutional 
 right to hold slaves in a Territory of the 
 United States. I believe the decision was im- 
 properly made, and I go for reversing it. Judge 
 Douglas is furious against those who go for re- 
 versing a decision. But he is for legislating it 
 
1858] Reply at Alton 69 
 
 out of all force while the law itself stands. I 
 repeat that there has never been so monstrous a 
 doctrine uttered from the mouth of a respectable 
 man. 
 
 I suppose most of us (I know it of myself) 
 believe that the people of the Southern States 
 are entitled to a congressional fugitive-slave 
 law; that it is a right fixed in the Constitution. 
 But it cannot be made available to them without 
 congressional legislation. In the judge's lan- 
 guage, it is a "barren right" which needs legis- 
 lation before it can become efficient and valuable 
 to the persons to whom it is guaranteed. And, 
 as the right is constitutional, I agree that the 
 legislation shall be granted to it. Not that we 
 like the institution of slavery; we profess to have 
 no taste for running and catching negroes — at 
 least, I profess no taste for that job at all. Why 
 then do I yield support to a fugitive-slave law? 
 Because I do not understand that the Constitu- 
 tion, which guarantees that right, can be sup- 
 ported without it. And if I believed that the 
 right to hold a slave in a Territory was equally 
 fixed in the Constitution with the right to re- 
 claim fugitives, I should be bound to give it the 
 legislation necessary to support it. I say that no 
 man can deny his obligation to give the neces- 
 sary legislation to support slavery in a Territory, 
 who believes it is a constitutional right to have it 
 
70 Abraham Lincoln [Oct. 15 
 
 there. No man can, who does not give the Abo- 
 litionists an argument to deny the obligation en- 
 joined by the Constitution to enact a fugitive- 
 slave law. Try it now. It is the strongest Abo- 
 lition argument ever made. I say, if that Dred 
 Scott decision is correct, then the right to hold 
 slaves in a Territory is equally a constitutional 
 right with the right of a slaveholder to have his 
 runaway returned. No one can show the distinc- 
 tion between them. The one is express, so that 
 we cannot deny it; the other is construed to be in 
 the Constitution, so that he who believes the de- 
 cision to be correct believes in the right. And 
 the man who argues that by unfriendly legisla- 
 tion, in spite of that constitutional right, slavery 
 may be driven from the Territories, cannot avoid 
 furnishing an argument by which Abolitionists 
 may deny the obligation to return fugitives, and 
 claim the power to pass laws unfriendly to the 
 right of the slaveholder to reclaim his fugitive. 
 I do not know how such an argument may 
 strike a popular assembly like this, but I defy 
 anybody to go before a body of men whose minds 
 are educated to estimating evidence and reason- 
 ing, and show that there is an iota of difference 
 between the constitutional right to reclaim a 
 fugitive, and the constitutional right to hold a 
 slave, in a Territory, provided this Dred Scott 
 decision is correct. I defy any man to make an 
 
1858] Reply at Alton 71 
 
 argument that will justify unfriendly legislation 
 to deprive a slaveholder of his right to hold his 
 slave in a Territory, that will not equally, in all 
 its length, breadth, and thickness, furnish an ar- 
 gument for nullifying the fugitive-slave law. 
 Why, there is not such an Abolitionist in the 
 nation as Douglas, after all. 
 
72 Stephen A. Douglas [Oct. 15 
 
 Mr. Douglas's Rejoinder in the Alton Joint 
 Debate. 
 
 MR. LINCOLN has concluded his re- 
 marks by saying that there is not such 
 an Abolitionist as I am in all Amer- 
 ica. If he could make the Abolitionists of Illi- 
 nois believe that, he would not have much 
 show for the Senate. Let him make the Aboli- 
 tionists believe the truth of that statement, and 
 his political back is broken. 
 
 His first criticism upon me is the expression 
 of his hope that the war of the administration 
 will be prosecuted against me and the Demo- 
 cratic party of this State with vigor. He wants 
 that war prosecuted with vigor; I have no doubt 
 of it. His hopes of success, and the hopes of his 
 party, depend solely upon it. They have no 
 chance of destroying the Democracy of this 
 State except by the aid of federal patronage. 
 He has all the federal office-holders here as his 
 allies, running separate tickets against the Dem- 
 ocracy to divide the party, although the leaders 
 all intend to vote directly the Abolition ticket, 
 and only leave the greenhorns to vote this sep- 
 arate ticket who refuse to go into the Abolition 
 
1858] Rejoinder at Alton 73 
 
 camp. There is something really refreshing in 
 the thought that Mr. Lincoln is in favor of prose- 
 cuting one war vigorously. It is the first war 
 I ever knew him to be in favor of prosecuting. 
 It is the first war that I ever knew him to believe 
 to be just or constitutional. When the Mexican 
 war was being waged, and the American army 
 was surrounded by the enemy in Mexico, he 
 thought the war was unconstitutional, unneces- 
 sary, and unjust. He thought it was not com- 
 menced on the right spot. 
 
 When I made an incidental allusion of that 
 kind in the joint discussion over at Charleston, 
 some weeks ago, Lincoln, in replying, said that 
 I, Douglas, had charged him with voting against 
 supplies for the Mexican war, and then he 
 reared up, full length, and swore that he never 
 voted against the supplies, — that it was a slan- 
 der, — and caught hold of Ficklin, who sat on 
 the stand, and said, "Here, Ficklin, tell the peo- 
 ple that it is a lie." Well, Ficklin, who had 
 served in Congress with him, stood up and told 
 them all he recollected about it. It was that 
 when George Ashmun, of Massachusetts, 
 brought forward a resolution declaring the war 
 unconstitutional, unnecessary, and unjust, Lin- 
 coln had voted for it. "Yes," said Lincoln, "I 
 did." Thus he confessed that he voted that the 
 war was wrong, that our country was in the 
 
74 Stephen A. Douglas [Oct "15 
 
 wrong, and consequently that the Mexicans were 
 in the right; but charged that I had slandered 
 him by saying that he voted against the supplies. 
 I never charged him with voting against the sup- 
 plies in my life, because I knew that he was not 
 in Congress when they were voted. The war 
 was commenced on the 13th day of May, 1846, 
 and on that day we appropriated in Congress 
 ten millions of dollars and fifty thousand men to 
 prosecute it. During the same session we voted 
 more men and more money, and at the next ses- 
 sion we voted more men and more money, so that 
 by the time Mr. Lincoln entered Congress we 
 had enough men and enough money to carry on 
 the war, and had no occasion to vote for any 
 more. When he got into the House, being op- 
 posed to the war, and not being able to stop the 
 supplies, because they had all gone forward, all 
 he could do was to follow the lead of Corwin, 
 and prove that the war was not begun on the 
 right spot, and that it was unconstitutional, un- 
 necessary and wrong. Remember, too, that this 
 he did after the war had been begun. It is 
 one thing to be opposed to the declaration of 
 a war, another and very different thing to take 
 sides with the enemy against your own country 
 after the war has been commenced. Our army 
 was in Mexico at the time, many battles had been 
 fought; our citizens, who were defending the 
 
1858] Rejoinder at Alton 75 
 
 honor of their country's flag, were surrounded 
 by the daggers, the guns, and the poison of the 
 enemy. Then it was that Corwin made his 
 speech in which he declared that the American 
 soldiers ought to be welcomed by the Mexicans 
 with bloody hands and hospitable graves; then it 
 was that Ashmun and Lincoln voted in the House 
 of Representatives that the war was unconstitu- 
 tional and unjust; and Ashmun's resolution, Cor- 
 win's speech, and Lincoln's vote were sent to 
 Mexico and read at the head of the Mexican 
 army, to prove to them that there was a Mexican 
 party in the Congress of the United States who 
 were doing all in their power to aid them. That 
 a man who takes sides with the common enemy 
 against his own country in time of war should 
 rejoice in a war being made on me now, is very 
 natural. And in my opinion, no other kind of 
 a man would rejoice in it. 
 
 Mr. Lincoln has told you a great deal to-day 
 about his being an old-line Clay Whig. Bear 
 in mind that there are a great many old Clay 
 Whigs down in this region. It is more agree- 
 able, therefore, for him to talk about the old 
 Clay Whig party than it is for him to talk Abo- 
 litionism. We did not hear much about the 
 old Clay Whig party up in the Abolition dis- 
 tricts. How much of an old-line Henry Clay 
 Whig was he? Have you read General Single- 
 
y6 Stephen A. Douglas [Oct. 15 
 
 ton's speech at Jacksonville? You know that 
 General Singleton was, for twenty-five years, the 
 confidential friend of Henry Clay in Illinois, 
 and he testified that in 1847, when the constitu- 
 tional convention of this State was in session, 
 the Whig members were invited to a Whig cau- 
 cus at the house of Mr. Lincoln's brother-in- 
 law, where Mr. Lincoln proposed to throw Hen- 
 ry Clay overboard and take up General Taylor 
 in his place, giving, as his reason, that if the 
 Whigs did not take up General Taylor, the 
 Democrats would. 
 
 Singleton testifies that Lincoln, in that speech, 
 urged, as another reason for throwing Henry 
 Clay overboard, that the Whigs had fought 
 long enough for principle, and ought to begin 
 to fight for success. Singleton also testifies that 
 Lincoln's speech did have the effect of cut- 
 ting Clay's throat, and that he (Singleton) 
 and others withdrew from the caucus in indig- 
 nation. He further states that when they got 
 to Philadelphia to attend the national con- 
 vention of the Whig party, that Lincoln was 
 there, the bitter and deadly enemy of Clay, and 
 that he tried to keep him (Singleton) out of the 
 convention because he insisted on voting for 
 Clay, and Lincoln was determined to have Tay- 
 lor. Singleton says that Lincoln rejoiced with 
 very great joy when he found the mangled re- 
 
1858] Rejoinder at Alton J7 
 
 mains of the murdered Whig statesman lying 
 cold before him. Now Mr. Lincoln tells you 
 that he is an old-line Clay Whig! General 
 Singleton testifies to the facts I have narrated, 
 in a public speech which has been printed and 
 circulated broadcast over the State for weeks, 
 yet not a lisp have we heard from Mr. Lincoln 
 on the subject, except that he is an old Clay 
 Whig. 
 
 What part of Henry Clay's policy did Lincoln 
 ever advocate? He was in Congress in 1848-49, 
 when the Wilmot proviso warfare disturbed the 
 peace and harmony of the country, until it shook 
 the foundation of the republic from its center 
 to its circumference. It was that agitation that 
 brought Clay forth from his retirement at Ash- 
 land again to occupy his seat in the Senate of 
 the United States, to see if he could not, by his 
 great wisdom and experience, and the renown 
 of his name, do something to restore peace 
 and quiet to a disturbed country. Who got up 
 that sectional strife that Clay had to be called 
 upon to quell? I have heard Lincoln boast that 
 he voted forty-two times for the Wilmot proviso, 
 and that he would have voted as many more 
 times if he could. Lincoln is the man, in con- 
 nection with Seward, Chase, Giddings, and 
 other Abolitionists, who got up that strife that 
 I helped Clay to put down. Henry Clay came 
 
78 Stephen A. Douglas [Oct. 15 
 
 back to the Senate in 1849, and saw that he must 
 do something to restore peace to the country. 
 The Union Whigs and the Union Democrats 
 welcomed him the moment he arrived, as the 
 man for the occasion. We believed that he, of 
 all men on earth, had been preserved by divine 
 providence to guide us out of our difficulties, 
 and we Democrats rallied under Clay then, as 
 you Whigs in nullification times rallied under 
 the banner of old Jackson, forgetting party 
 when the country was in danger, in order that 
 we might have a country first and parties after- 
 ward. 
 
 And this reminds me that Mr. Lincoln told 
 you that the slavery question was the only thing 
 that ever disturbed the peace and harmony of 
 the Union. Did not nullification once raise its 
 head and disturb the peace of this Union in 
 1832? Was that the slavery question, Mr. Lin- 
 coln? Did not disunion raise its monster head 
 during the last war with Great Britain? Was 
 that the slavery question, Mr. Lincoln? The 
 peace of this country has been disturbed three 
 times, once during the war with Great Britain, 
 once on the tariff question, and once on the slav- 
 ery question. His argument, therefore, that 
 slavery is the only question that has ever created 
 dissention in the Union falls to the ground. It 
 is true that agitators are enabled now to use this 
 
1858] Rejoinder at Alton 79 
 
 slavery question for the purpose of sectional 
 strife. He admits that, in regard to all things 
 else, the principle that I advocate, making each 
 State and Territory free to decide for itself, 
 ought to prevail. He instances the cranberry 
 laws, and the oyster laws, and he might have 
 gone through the whole list with the same effect. 
 I say that all these laws are local and domestic, 
 and that local and domestic concerns should be 
 left to each State and Territory to manage for 
 itself. If agitators would acquiesce in that 
 principle, there never would be any danger to 
 the peace and harmony of the Union. 
 
 Mr. Lincoln tries to avoid the main issue by 
 attacking the truth of my proposition, that our 
 fathers made this government divided into free 
 and slave States, recognizing the right of each 
 to decide all its local questions for itself. Did 
 they not thus make it? It is true that they did 
 not establish slavery in any of the States, or abol- 
 ish it in any of them; but finding thirteen States, 
 twelve of which were slave and one free, they 
 agreed to form a government uniting them to- 
 gether, as they stood, divided into free and slave 
 States, and to guarantee forever to each State 
 the right to do as it pleased on the slavery ques- 
 tion. Having thus made the government, and 
 conferred this right upon each State forever, I 
 assert that this government can exist as they 
 
80 Stephen A. Douglas [Oct. 15 
 
 made it, divided into free and slave States, if 
 any one State choses to retain slavery. He says 
 that he looks forward to a time when slavery 
 shall be abolished everywhere. I look forward 
 to the time when each State shall be allowed to 
 do as it pleases. If it chooses to keep slavery for- 
 ever, it is not my business, but its own; if it 
 chooses to abolish slavery, it is its own business, 
 not mine. I care more for the great principle 
 of self-government, the right of the people to 
 rule, than I do for all the negroes in Christen- 
 dom. I would not endanger the perpetuity of 
 this Union; I would not blot out the great in- 
 alienable rights of the white men for all the ne- 
 groes that ever existed. Hence, I say, let us 
 maintain this government on the principles on 
 which our fathers made it, recognizing the right 
 of each State to keep slavery as long as its people 
 determine, or to abolish it when they please. 
 But Mr. Lincoln says that when our fathers made 
 this government they did not look forward to 
 the state of things now existing, and therefore 
 he thinks the doctrine was wrong; and he quotes 
 Brooks, of South Carolina, to prove that our 
 fathers then thought that probably slavery 
 would be abolished by each State acting for it- 
 self before this time. Suppose they did; sup- 
 pose they did not foresee what has occurred — 
 does that change the principles of our govern- 
 
1858] Rejoinder at Alton 81 
 
 ment? They did not probably foresee the tele- 
 graph that transmits intelligence by lightning; 
 nor did they foresee the railroads that now form 
 the bonds of union between the different States; 
 or the thousand mechanical inventions that have 
 elevated mankind. But do these things change 
 the principles of the government? Our fathers, 
 I say, made this government on the principle of 
 the right of each State to do as it pleases in its 
 own domestic affairs, subject to the Constitu- 
 tion, and allowed the people of each to apply 
 to every new change of circumstances such reme- 
 dy as they may see fit to improve their condition. 
 This right they have for all time to come. 
 
 Mr. Lincoln went on to tell you that he does 
 not at all desire to interfere with slavery in the 
 States where it exists, nor does his party. I ex- 
 pected him to say that down here. Let me ask 
 him then how he expects to put slavery in the 
 course of ultimate extinction everywhere, if he 
 does not intend to interfere with it in the States 
 where it exists? He says that he will prohibit 
 it in all Territories, and the inference is, then, 
 that unless they make free States out of them he 
 will keep them out of the Union; for, mark you, 
 he did not say whether or not he would vote to 
 admit Kansas with slavery or not, as her people 
 might apply (he forgot that, as usual) ; he did 
 not say whether or not he was in favor of bring- 
 
82 Stephen A. Douglas [Oct. 15 
 
 ing the Territories now in existence into the 
 Union on the principle of Clay's compromise 
 measures on the slavery question. I told you 
 that he would not. His idea is that he will pro- 
 hibit slavery in all the Territories, and thus force 
 them all to become free States, surrounding the 
 slave States with a cordon of free States and 
 hemming them in, keeping the slaves confined 
 to their present limits whilst they go on multi- 
 plying until the soil on which they live will 
 no longer feed them, and he will thus be able 
 to put slavery in a course of ultimate extinction 
 by starvation. He will extinguish slavery in 
 the Southern States as the French general extin- 
 guished the Algerines when he smoked them 
 out. He is going to extinguish slavery by sur- 
 rounding the slave States, hemming in the slaves, 
 and starving them out of existence, as you smoke 
 a fox out of his hole. He intends to do that in 
 the name of humanity and Christianity, in order 
 that we may get rid of the terrible crime and 
 sin entailed upon our fathers of holding slaves. 
 Mr. Lincoln makes out that line of policy, and 
 appeals to the moral sense of justice and to the 
 Christian feeling to the community to sustain 
 him. He says that any man who holds to the 
 contrary doctrine is in the position of the king 
 who claimed to govern by divine right. Let 
 us examine for a moment and see what principle 
 
1858] Rejoinder at Alton 83 
 
 it was that overthrew the divine right of George 
 III. to govern us. Did not these colonies rebel 
 because the British parliament had no right to 
 pass laws concerning our property and domestic 
 and private institutions without our consent? 
 We demanded that the British government 
 should not pass such laws unless they gave us 
 representation in the body passing them — and 
 this the British government insisting on doing, 
 we went to war, on the principle that the home 
 government should not control and govern dis- 
 tant colonies without giving them a representa- 
 tion. Now Mr. Lincoln proposes to govern the 
 Territories without giving them a representa- 
 tion, and calls on Congress to pass laws controll- 
 ing their property and domestic concerns with- 
 out their consent and against their will. Thus 
 he asserts for his party the identical principle 
 asserted by George III. and the Tories of the 
 Revolution. 
 
 I ask you to look into these things, and then 
 tell me whether the Democracy or the Aboli- 
 tionists are right. I hold the people of a Terri- 
 tory, like those of a State (I use the language of 
 Mr. Buchanan in his letter of acceptance), have 
 the right to decide for themselves whether slav- 
 ery shall or shall not exist within their limits. 
 The point upon which Chief Justice Taney ex- 
 presses his opinion is simply this, that slaves, be- 
 
84 Stephen A. Douglas [Oct. 15 
 
 ing property, stand on an equal footing with 
 other property, and consequently that the owner 
 has the same right to carry that property into a 
 Territory that he has any other, subject to the 
 same conditions. Suppose that one of your mer- 
 chants was to take fifty or one hundred thousand 
 dollars' worth of liquors to Kansas. He has a 
 right to go there under that decision, but when 
 he gets there he finds the Maine liquor-law in 
 force, and what can he do with his property after 
 he gets it there? He cannot sell it, he cannot use 
 it, it is subject to the local law, and that law is 
 against him, and the best thing he can do with it 
 is to bring it back into Missouri or Illinois and 
 sell it. 
 
 If you take negroes to Kansas, as Colonel 
 Jefferson Davis said in his Bangor speech, from 
 which I have quoted to-day, you must take them 
 there subject to the local law. If the people 
 want the institution of slavery, they will protect 
 and encourage it; but if they do not want it, 
 they will withhold that protection, and the ab- 
 sence of local legislation protecting slavery ex- 
 cludes it as completely as a positive prohibition. 
 You slaveholders of Missouri might as well un- 
 derstand what you know practically, that you 
 cannot carry slavery where the people do not 
 want it. All you have a right to ask is that the 
 people shall do as they please ; if they want slav- 
 
1858] Rejoinder at Alton 85 
 
 ery, let them have it; if they do not want it, 
 allow them to refuse to encourage it. 
 
 My friends, if, as I have said before, we will 
 only live up to this great fundamental principle, 
 there will be peace between the North and the 
 South. Mr. Lincoln admits that under the Con- 
 stitution, on all domestic questions except slav- 
 ery, we ought not to interfere with the people 
 of each State. What right have we to interfere 
 with slavery any more than we have to interfere 
 with any other question? He says that this 
 slavery question is now the bone of contention. 
 Why? Simply because agitators have combined 
 in all the free States to make war upon it. Sup- 
 pose the agitators in the States should combine 
 in one half of the Union to make war upon the 
 railroad system of the other half. They would 
 thus be driven to the same sectional strife. Sup- 
 pose one section makes war upon any other pe- 
 culiar institution of the opposite section, and the 
 same strife is produced. The only remedy and 
 safety is that we shall stand by the Constitution 
 as our fathers made it, obey the laws as they are 
 passed, while they stand the proper test, and sus- 
 tain the decisions of the Supreme Court and 
 the constituted authorities. 
 
86 Abraham Lincoln [Oct. 18 
 
 Fragment: Opinion on Election Laws of 
 Illinois. [October 15?] 1858 
 
 It is made a question whether, under our laws, 
 a person offering to vote, and being challenged, 
 and having taken the oath prescribed by the act 
 of 1849, is then absolutely entitled to vote, or 
 whether his oath may be disproved, and his vote 
 thereon lawfully rejected. In Purple's Statutes, 
 Volume I, all our existing election laws are 
 brought together, commencing on page 514 and 
 extending to page 532. They consist of acts 
 and parts of acts passed at different times. The 
 true way of reading so much of the law as ap- 
 plies to the above question, is to first read (64) 
 section x, including the form of the oath on page 
 528. Then turn back and read ( 19) section xix, 
 on page 518. If it be said that the section last 
 mentioned is not now in force, turn forward to 
 (75) section xxi, on page 530, where it is ex- 
 pressly declared to be in force. 
 
 The result is that when a person has taken the 
 oath, his oath may still be proved to be false, and 
 his vote thereupon rejected. It may be proved 
 to be false by cross-examining the proposed voter 
 himself, or by any other person, or competent 
 testimony known to the general law of evidence. 
 On page 532 is an extract of a Supreme Court 
 decision on the very section xix, on page 518, 
 
1858] Letter to J. N. Brown 87 
 
 in which, among other things, the court says: 
 "If such person takes the oath prescribed by law, 
 the judges must receive his vote, unless the oath 
 be proved false." Something of a definition 
 of residence is therein given. 
 
 *Letter to James N. Brown ' 
 
 Springfield, October 18, 1858. 
 
 My dear Sir: I do not perceive how I can 
 express myself, more plainly, than I have done 
 in the foregoing extracts. In four of them I 
 have expressly disclaimed all intentions to bring 
 about social and political equality between the 
 white and black races, and, in all the rest, I 
 have done the same thing by clear implication. 
 
 I have made it equally plain that I think the 
 negro is included in the word "men" used in the 
 Declaration of Independence. 
 
 I believe the declaration that "all men are cre- 
 
 1 This letter accompanied a little book from the hand of Lin- 
 coln, containing newspaper-clippings of portions of his speeches, 
 compiled to aid Captain Brown in the campaign of 1858. Brown 
 had been an Old-Line Whig and became a Lincoln Republican. 
 Upon the change he found he needed something to refute the 
 cry of "negro equality" brought against his new party, and 
 for that purpose Lincoln put together the booklet. Lincoln 
 further wrote : " The following extracts are taken from various 
 speeches of mine delivered at various times and places ; and I 
 believe they contain the substance of all I have ever said about 
 'negro equality.' The first three are from my answer to Judge 
 Douglas, Oct. 16, 1854, at Peoria." 
 
88 Abraham Lincoln [Oct. 26 
 
 ated equal" is the great fundamental principle 
 upon which our free institutions rest; that negro 
 slavery is violative of that principle; but that, 
 by our form of government, that principle has 
 not been made one of legal obligation; that by 
 our form of government, the States which have 
 slavery are to retain it, or surrender it at their 
 own pleasure; and that all others — individuals, 
 free-states and national government — are consti- 
 tutionally bound to leave them alone about it. 
 
 I believe our government was thus framed 
 because of the necessity springing from the act- 
 ual presence of slavery, when it was framed. 
 
 That such necessity does not exist in the ter- 
 ritories, where slavery is not present. 
 
 In his Mendenhall speech Mr. Clay says: 
 
 " Now, as an abstract principle, there is no doubt 
 of the truth of that declaration (all men are created 
 equal) and it is desirable, in the original construction 
 of society, and in organized societies, to keep it in view 
 as a great fundamental principle." 
 
 Again, in the same speech Mr. Clay says: 
 
 " If a state of nature existed, and we were about to 
 lay the foundations of society, no man would be more 
 strongly opposed than I would to incorporate the in- 
 stitutions of slavery among its elements." 
 
 Exactly so. In our new free territories, a 
 state of nature does exist. In them Congress 
 
1858] Letter to Sympson 89 
 
 lays the foundations of society; and, in laying 
 those foundations, I say, with Mr. Clay, it is de- 
 sirable that the declaration of the equality of all 
 men shall be kept in view, as a great fundamen- 
 tal principle; and that Congress, which lays 
 the foundations of society, should, like Mr. Clay, 
 be strongly opposed to the incorporation of slav- 
 ery among its elements. 
 
 But it does not follow that social and political 
 equality between white and black, must be in- 
 corporated, because slavery must not. The dec- 
 laration does not so require. 
 
 Yours as ever, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
 *Letter to Alexander Sympson 
 
 Blandinsville, October 26, 1858. 
 Dear Sir: Since parting with you this morn- 
 ing I heard some things which make me believe 
 that Edmunds and Morrill will spend this week 
 among the National Democrats trying to induce 
 them to content themselves by voting for Jake 
 Davis, and then to vote for the Douglas candi- 
 dates for Senator and Representative. Have 
 this headed off, if you can. Call Wagley's at- 
 tention to it, and have him and the National 
 Democrat for Rep. to counteract it as far as they 
 can. Yours as ever, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
90 Abraham Lincoln [Nov. 4 
 
 Letter to Edward Lusk 
 
 Springfield, October 30, 1858. 
 Dear Sir: I understand the story is still be- 
 ing told and insisted upon that I have been a 
 Know-nothing. I repeat what I stated in a 
 public speech at Meredosia, that I am not, nor 
 ever have been, connected with the party called 
 the Know-nothing party, or party calling them- 
 selves the American party. Certainly no man 
 of truth, and I believe no man of good character 
 for truth, can be found to say on his own know- 
 ledge that I ever was connected with that party. 
 Yours very truly, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
 Letter to J. J. Crittenden 
 
 Springfield, November 4, 1858. 
 My dear Sir: Yours of the 27th was taken 
 from the office by my law partner, and in the 
 confusion consequent upon the recent election, 
 was handed to me only this moment. I am 
 sorry the allusion made in the "Missouri Repub- 
 lican" to the private correspondence between 
 yourself and me has given you any pain. It 
 gave me scarcely a thought, perhaps for the rea- 
 son that, being away from home, I did not see 
 it until two days before the election. It never 
 occurred to me to cast any blame upon you. I 
 
[858] Letter to Crittenden 
 
 91 
 
 have been told that the correspondence has been 
 alluded to in the "Missouri Republican" sev- 
 eral times; but I only saw one of the allusions 
 made, in which it was stated, as I remember, 
 that a gentleman of St. Louis had seen a copy of 
 your letter to me. As I have given no copy, 
 nor ever shown the original, of course I inferred 
 he had seen it in your hands ; but it did not occur 
 to me to blame you for showing what you had 
 written yourself. It was not said that the gen- 
 tleman had seen a copy, or the original, of my 
 letter to you. 
 
 The emotions of defeat at the close of a strug- 
 gle in which I felt more than a merely selfish 
 interest, and to which defeat the use of your 
 name contributed largely, are fresh upon me; 
 but even in this mood I cannot for a moment 
 suspect you of anything dishonorable. 
 
 Your obedient servant, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
 Letter to N. B. Judd 
 
 Springfield, November 15, 1858. 
 My dear Sir: I have the pleasure to inform 
 you that I am convalescent, and hoping these 
 lines may find you in the same improving state 
 of health. Doubtless you have suspected for 
 some time that I entertain a personal wish for 
 a term in the United States Senate; and had the 
 
92 Abraham Lincoln [Nov. 16 
 
 suspicion taken the shape of a direct charge, I 
 think I could not have truthfully denied it. 
 But let the past as nothing be. 
 
 For the future, my view is that the fight must 
 go on. The returns here are not yet completed; 
 but it is believed that Dougherty's vote will be 
 slightly greater than Miller's majority over 
 Tracy. 
 
 We have some hundred and twenty thousand 
 clear Republican votes. That pile is worth 
 keeping together. It will elect a State treasurer 
 two years hence. 
 
 In that day I shall fight in the ranks, but I 
 shall be in no one's way for any of the places. 
 I am especially for Trumbull's reelection; and, 
 by the way, this brings me to the principal object 
 of this letter. Can you not take your draft of 
 an apportionment law, and carefully revise it 
 till it shall be strictly and obviously just in all 
 particulars, and then by an early and persistent 
 effort get enough of the enemy's men to enable 
 you to pass it? I believe if you and Peck 
 make a job of it, begin early, and work earnestly 
 and quietly, you can succeed in it. Unless some- 
 thing be done, Trumbull is eventually beaten 
 two years hence. Take this into serious con- 
 sideration. 
 
 Yours as ever, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
1858] Letter to Judd 93 
 
 Letter to N. B. Judd 
 
 Springfield, November 16, 1858. 
 
 Dear Sir: Yours of the 15th is just received. 
 I wrote you the same day. As to the pecuniary 
 matter, I am willing to pay according to my 
 ability; but I am the poorest hand living to get 
 others to pay. 
 
 I have been on expenses so long without earn- 
 ing anything that I am absolutely without money 
 now for even household purposes. Still, if you 
 can put in two hundred and fifty dollars for me 
 toward discharging the debt of the committee, 
 I will allow it when you and I settle the private 
 matter between us. 
 
 This, with what I have already paid, and with 
 an outstanding note of mine, will exceed my 
 subscription of five hundred dollars. This, too, 
 is exclusive of my ordinary expenses during the 
 campaign, all of which being added to my loss of 
 time and business, bears pretty heavily upon one 
 no better off in [this] world's goods than I; 
 but as I had the post of honor, it is not for me 
 to be over nice. You are feeling badly, — "And 
 this too shall pass away," never fear. 
 
 Yours as ever, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
94 Abraham Lincoln [Nov. 19 
 
 Letter to Henry Asbury 
 
 Springfield, November 19, 1858. 
 Dear Sir: Yours of the 13th was received 
 some days ago. The fight must go on. The 
 cause of civil liberty must not be surrendered at 
 the end of one or even one hundred defeats. 
 Douglas had the ingenuity to be supported in 
 the late contest both as the best means to break 
 down and to uphold the slave interest. No in- 
 genuity can keep these antagonistic elements in 
 harmony long. Another explosion will soon 
 come. Yours truly, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
 Letter to A. G. Henry 
 
 Springfield, Illinois, November 19, 1858. 
 My dear Sir: Yours of the 27th of Septem- 
 ber was received two days ago. I was at Oquaw- 
 ka, Henderson County, on the 9th of October; 
 and I may then have seen Major A. N. Arm- 
 strong; but having nothing then to fix my atten- 
 tion, I do not remember such a man. I have 
 concluded, as the best way of serving you, to 
 inclose your letter to E. A. Paine, Esq., of Mon- 
 mouth, 111., a reliable lawyer, asking him to do 
 what you ask of me. If a suit is to be brought, 
 he will correspond directly with you. 
 
1858] Letter to A. G. Henry 95 
 
 You doubtless have seen ere this the result of 
 the election here. Of course I wished, but I 
 did not much expect, a better result. The popu- 
 lar vote of the State is with us ; so that the seat 
 in the 
 
 (Lower portion of page cut off.) 
 
 whole canvass. On the contrary, John and 
 George Weber, and several such old Democrats, 
 were furiously for me. As a general rule, out 
 of Sangamon as well as in it, much of the plain 
 old Democracy is with us, while nearly all the 
 old exclusive silk-stocking Whiggery is against 
 us. I don't mean nearly all the Old Whig 
 party, but nearly all of the nice exclusive sort. 
 And why not? There has been nothing in poli- 
 tics since the Revolution so congenial to their 
 nature as the present position of the great Demo- 
 cratic party. 
 
 I am glad I made the late race. It gave me 
 a hearing on the great and durable question of 
 the age, which I could have had in no other 
 way; and though I now sink out of view, and 
 shall be forgotten, I believe I have made some 
 marks which will tell for the cause of civil lib- 
 erty long after I am gone. Mary joins me in 
 sending our best wishes to Mrs. Henry and 
 others of your family. 
 
96 Abraham Lincoln [Dec. 12 
 
 Letter to Joel A. Matteson 
 
 Springfield, November 25, 1858. 
 Dear Sir: Last summer, when a movement 
 was made in court against your road, you en- 
 gaged us to be on your side. It has so happened 
 that, so far, we have performed no service in the 
 case; but we lost a cash fee offered us on the 
 other side. Now, being hard run, we propose 
 a little compromise. We will claim nothing 
 for the matter just mentioned, if you will re- 
 lieve us at once from the old matter at the Ma- 
 rine and Fire Insurance Company, and be 
 greatly obliged to boot. Can you not do it? 
 
 Yours truly, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 *Letter to H. D. Sharpe 
 
 Springfield, December 8, 1858. 
 Dear Sir: Your very kind letter of Novem- 
 ber 9th was duly received. I do not know that 
 you expected or desired an answer; but glancing 
 over the contents of yours again, I am prompted 
 to say that, while I desired the result of the late 
 canvass to have been different, I still regard it 
 as an exceeding small matter. I think we have 
 fairly entered upon a durable struggle as to 
 whether this nation is to ultimately become all 
 
1858] Letter to Sympson 97 
 
 slave or all free, and though I fall early in the 
 contest, it is nothing if I shall have contributed, 
 in the least degree, to the final rightful result. 
 Respectfully yours, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
 *Letter to Alexander Sympson 
 
 Springfield, December 12, 1858. 
 My dear Sir: I expect the result of the elec- 
 tion went hard with you. So it did with me, 
 too, perhaps not quite so hard as you may have 
 supposed. I have an abiding faith that we shall 
 beat them in the long run. Step by step the ob- 
 jects of the leaders will become too plain for 
 the people to stand them. I write merely to let 
 you know that I am neither dead nor dying. 
 Please give my respects to your good family, 
 and all inquiring friends. 
 
 Yours as ever, A. LINCOLN. 
 
 *Legal Opinion, January 6, 1859 
 
 The nth Section of the Act of Congress, ap- 
 proved Feb. 11, 1805, prescribing rules for the 
 subdivision of Sections of land within the 
 United States system of Surveys, standing unre- 
 pealed, in my opinion, is binding on the re- 
 spective purchasers of different parts of the same 
 section, and furnishes the true rule for Survey- 
 
98 Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 22 
 
 ors in establishing lines between them. That 
 law, being in force at this time each became a 
 purchaser, becomes a condition of the purchase. 
 
 And by that law, I think the true rule for di- 
 viding into quarters, any interior Section, or 
 Sections, which is not fractional, is to run 
 straight lines through the Section from the op- 
 posite quarter section corners, fixing the point 
 where such straight lines cross, or intersect each 
 other, as the middle or center of the Section. 
 
 Nearly, perhaps quite, all the original sur- 
 veys are to some extent, erroneous, and in some 
 of the Sections, greatly so. In each of the latter, 
 it is obvious that a more equitable mode of divi- 
 sion than the above, might be adopted; but as 
 error is infinitely various perhaps no better sin- 
 gle rules can be prescribed. 
 
 At all events I think the above has been pre- 
 scribed by the competent authority. 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
 Springfield, Jany. 6, 1859. 
 
Old State House, Springfield, Ills. 
 Where Lincoln had his office during his first Presi- 
 dential campaign. 
 
1859] Lecture 99 
 
 Lecture on " Discoveries, Inventions, and 
 Improvements" [February 22? 1859], De- 
 livered in Neighboring Towns in 1859, 
 and Before the Springfield Library Asso- 
 ciation, Springfield, Illinois, February 
 22, i860 1 
 
 WE have all heard of Young America. 
 He is the most current youth of the 
 age. Some think him conceited and 
 arrogant; but has he not reason to entertain a 
 rather extensive opinion of himself? Is he not 
 the inventor and owner of the present, and 
 sole hope of the future? Men and things, 
 everywhere, are ministering unto him. Look 
 at his apparel, and you shall see cotton fabrics 
 from Manchester and Lowell; flax linen from 
 Ireland; wool cloth from Spain; silk from 
 France; furs from the arctic region; with a 
 buffalo-robe from the Rocky Mountains, as 
 a general outsider. At his table, besides plain 
 bread and meat made at home, are sugar from 
 Louisiana, coffee and fruits from the tropics, 
 salt from Turk's Island, fish from Newfound- 
 
 1 From autograph manuscript in the Lincoln Collection of 
 Charles F. Gunther, Esq., Chicago, 111.— N. and H. 
 
 LOK. 
 
ioo Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 22 
 
 land, tea from China, and spices from the 
 Indies. The whale of the Pacific furnishes his 
 candle-light, he has a diamond ring from Bra- 
 zil, a gold watch from California, and a Span- 
 ish cigar from Havana. He not only has a 
 present supply of all these, and much more; but 
 thousands of hands are engaged in producing 
 fresh supplies, and other thousands in bringing 
 them to him. The iron horse is panting and im- 
 patient to carry him everywhere in no time; and 
 the lightning stands ready harnessed to take and 
 bring his tidings in a trifle less than no time. 
 He owns a large part of the world, by right of 
 possessing it, and all the rest by right of wanting 
 it, and intending to have it. As Plato had for 
 the immortality of the soul, so Young America 
 has "a pleasing hope, a fond desire — a longing 
 after" territory. He has a great passion — a per- 
 fect rage — for the "new" ; particularly new men 
 for office, and the new earth mentioned in the 
 Revelations, in which, being no more sea, there 
 must be about three times as much land as in the 
 present. He is a great friend of humanity; and 
 his desire for land is not selfish, but merely an 
 impulse to extend the area of freedom. He is 
 very anxious to fight for the liberation of en- 
 slaved nations and colonies, provided, always, 
 they have land, and have not any liking for his 
 interference. As to those who have no land, 
 
1859] Lecture 101 
 
 and would be glad of help from any quarter, he 
 considers they can afford to wait a few hundred 
 years longer. In knowledge he is particularly 
 rich. He knows all that can possibly be known ; 
 inclines to believe in spiritual rappings, and is 
 the unquestioned inventor of "Manifest Des- 
 tiny." His horror is for all that is old, particu- 
 larly "Old Fogy"; and if there be anything old 
 which he can endure, it is only old whisky and 
 old tobacco. 
 
 If the said Young America really is, as he 
 claims to be, the owner of all present, it must 
 be admitted that he has considerable advantage 
 of Old Fogy. 1 Take, for instance, the first of all 
 fogies. Father Adam. There he stood, a very 
 perfect physical man, as poets and painters in- 
 form us; but he must have been very ignorant, 
 and simple in his habits. He had had no suffi- 
 cient time to learn much by observation, and he 
 had no near neighbors to teach him anything. 
 No part of his breakfast had been brought from 
 the other side of the world ; and it is quite prob- 
 able he had no conception of the world having 
 any other side. In all these things, it is very 
 
 1 " Young America " was the battle cry of the supporters of 
 Senator Douglas, whose youth has been given as a cause for 
 keeping him from the highest offices. These enthusiasts exploited 
 this idea through their organ, the " Democratic Review," at the 
 same time calling Cass, Buchanan and other older men "old 
 fogies." They ardently advocated the Monroe Doctrine, "mani- 
 fest destiny " and any territorial expansion. 
 
ioz Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 22 
 
 plain, he was no equal of Young America; the 
 most that can be said is, that according to his 
 chance he may have been quite as much of a 
 man as his very self-complacent descendant. 
 Little as was what he knew, let the youngster 
 discard all he has learned from others, and then 
 show, if he can, any advantage on his side. In 
 the way of land and live-stock, Adam was quite 
 in the ascendant. He had dominion over all 
 the earth, and all the living things upon and 
 round about it. The land has been sadly di- 
 vided out since; but never fret, Young America 
 will re-annex it. 
 
 The great difference between Young America 
 and Old Fogy is the result of discoveries, inven- 
 tions, and improvements. These, in turn, are 
 the result of observation, reflection, and experi- 
 ment. For instance, it is quite certain that ever 
 since water has been boiled in covered vessels, 
 men have seen the lids of the vessels rise and fall 
 a little, with a sort of fluttering motion, by force 
 of the steam ; but so long as this was not specially 
 observed, and reflected, and experimented upon, 
 it came to nothing. At length, however, after 
 many thousand years, some man observes this 
 long-known effect of hot water lifting a pot-lid, 
 and begins a train of reflection upon it. He 
 says, "Why, to be sure, the force that lifts the 
 pot-lid will lift anything else which is no hea- 
 
1859] Lecture 103 
 
 vier than the pot-lid. And as man has much 
 hard fighting to do, cannot this hot-water power 
 be made to help him?" He has become a little 
 excited on the subject, and he fancies he hears 
 a voice answering, "Try me." He does try it; 
 and the observation, reflection, and trial give to 
 the world the control of that tremendous and 
 now well-known agent called steam-power. 
 This is not the actual history in detail, but the 
 general principle. 
 
 But was this first inventor of the application 
 of steam wiser or more ingenious than those who 
 had gone before him? Not at all. Had he not 
 learned much of those, he never would have 
 succeeded, probably never would have thought 
 of making the attempt. To be fruitful in in- 
 vention, it is indispensable to have a habit of 
 observation and reflection; and this habit our 
 steam friend acquired, no doubt, from those 
 who, to him, were old fogies. But for the dif- 
 ference in habit of observation, why did Yan- 
 kees almost instantly discover gold in Califor- 
 nia, which had been trodden upon and over- 
 looked by Indians and Mexican greasers for 
 centuries? Gold-mines are not the only mines 
 overlooked in the same way. There are more 
 mines above the earth's surface than below it. 
 All nature — the whole world, material, moral, 
 and intellectual — is a mine; and in Adam's day 
 
104 Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 22 
 
 it was a wholly unexplored mine. Now, it was 
 the destined work of Adam's race to develop, by 
 discoveries, inventions, and improvements, the 
 hidden treasures of this mine. But Adam had 
 nothing to turn his attention to the work. If he 
 should do anything in the way of inventions, he 
 had first to invent the art of invention, the in- 
 stance, at least, if not the habit, of observation 
 and reflection. As might be expected, he seems 
 not to have been a very observing man at first; 
 for it appears he went about naked a consider- 
 able length of time before he ever noticed that 
 obvious fact. But when he did observe it, the 
 observation was not lost upon him; for it imme- 
 diately led to the first of all inventions of which 
 we have any direct account — the fig-leaf apron. 
 The inclination to exchange thoughts with one 
 another is probably an original impulse of our 
 nature. If I be in pain, I wish to let you know 
 it, and to ask your sympathy and assistance; and 
 my pleasurable emotions also I wish to com- 
 municate to and share with you. But to carry 
 on such communications, some instrumentality 
 is indispensable. Accordingly, speech — articu- 
 late sounds rattled off from the tongue — was 
 used by our first parents, and even by Adam 
 before the creation of Eve. He gave names to 
 the animals while she was still a bone in his side ; 
 and he broke out quite volubly when she first 
 
1859] Lecture 105 
 
 stood before him, the best present of his Maker. 
 From this it would appear that speech was not 
 an invention of man, but rather the direct gift 
 of his Creator. But whether divine gift or in- 
 vention, it is still plain that if a mode of com- 
 munication had been left to invention, speech 
 must have been the first, from the superior adap- 
 tation to the end of the organs of speech over 
 every other means within the whole range of 
 nature. Of the organs of speech the tongue is 
 the principal; and if we shall test it, we shall 
 find the capacities of the tongue, in the utterance 
 of articulate sounds, absolutely wonderful. You 
 can count from one to one hundred quite dis- 
 tinctly in about forty seconds. In doing this 
 two hundred and eighty-three distinct sounds or 
 syllables are uttered, being seven to each sound, 
 and yet there should be enough difference be- 
 tween every two to be easily recognized by the 
 ear of the hearer. What other signs to repre- 
 sent things could possibly be produced so rapid- 
 ly? or, even if ready made, could be arranged so 
 rapidly to express the sense? Motions with the 
 hands are no adequate substitute. Marks for 
 the recognition of the eye, — writing, — although 
 a wonderful auxiliary of speech, is no worthy 
 substitute for it. In addition to the more slow 
 and laborious process of getting up a communi- 
 cation in writing, the materials — pen, ink, and 
 
io6 Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 22 
 
 paper — are not always at hand. But one always 
 has his tongue with him, and the breath of his 
 life is the ever-ready material with which it 
 works. Speech, then, by enabling different in- 
 dividuals to interchange thoughts, and thereby 
 to combine their powers of observation and re- 
 flection, greatly facilitates useful discoveries and 
 inventions. What one observes, and would him- 
 self infer nothing from, he tells to another, and 
 that other at once sees a valuable hint in it. A 
 result is thus reached which neither alone would 
 have arrived at. And this reminds me of what 
 I passed unnoticed before, that the very first 
 invention was a joint operation, Eve having 
 shared with Adam the getting up of the apron. 
 And, indeed, judging from the fact that sewing 
 has come down to our times as "woman's work," 
 it is very probable she took the leading part, — 
 he, perhaps, doing no more than to stand by and 
 thread the needle. That proceeding may be 
 reckoned as the mother of all "sewing-societies," 
 and the first and most perfect "World's Fair," 
 all inventions and all inventors then in the world 
 being on the spot. 
 
 But speech alone, valuable as it ever has been 
 and is, has not advanced the condition of the 
 world much. This is abundantly evident when 
 we look at the degraded condition of all those 
 tribes of human creatures who have no consid- 
 
1859] Lecture 107 
 
 erable additional means of communicating 
 thoughts. Writing, the art of communicating 
 thoughts to the mind through the eye, is the 
 great invention of the world. Great is the as- 
 tonishing range of analysis and combination 
 which necessarily underlies the most crude and 
 general conception of it — great, very great, in 
 enabling us to converse with the dead, the absent, 
 and the unborn, at all distances of time and 
 space; and great, not only in its direct benefits, 
 but greatest help to all other inventions. Sup- 
 pose the art, with all conceptions of it, were this 
 day lost to the world, how long, think you, would 
 it be before Young America could get up the 
 letter A with any adequate notion of using it to 
 advantage? The precise period at which writ- 
 ing was invented is not known, but it certainly 
 was as early as the time of Moses; from which 
 we may safely infer that its inventors were very 
 old fogies. 
 
 Webster, at the time of writing his dictionary, 
 speaks of the English language as then consist- 
 ing of seventy or eighty thousand words. If so, 
 the language in which the five books of Moses 
 were written must at that time, now thirty-three 
 or thirty-four hundred years ago, have consisted 
 of at least one quarter as many, or twenty thou- 
 sand. When we remember that words are 
 sounds merely, we shall conclude that the idea 
 
108 Abraham Lincoln T Feb - 22 
 
 of representing those sounds by marks, so that 
 whoever should at any time after see the marks 
 would understand what sounds they meant, was 
 a bold and ingenious conception, not likely to 
 occur to one man in a million in the run of a 
 thousand years. And when it did occur, a dis- 
 tinct mark for each word, giving twenty thou- 
 sand different marks first to be learned, and 
 afterward to be remembered, would follow as 
 the second thought, and would present such a 
 difficulty as would lead to the conclusion that 
 the whole thing was impracticable. But the 
 necessity still would exist; and we may readily 
 suppose that the idea was conceived, and lost, 
 and reproduced, and dropped, and taken up 
 again and again, until at last the thought of di- 
 viding sounds into parts, and making a mark, not 
 to represent a whole sound, but only a part of 
 one, and then of combining those marks, not very 
 many in number, upon principles of permuta- 
 tion, so as to represent any and all of the whole 
 twenty thousand words, and even any additional 
 number, was somehow conceived and pushed 
 into practice. This was the invention of pho- 
 netic writing, as distinguished from the clumsy 
 picture-writing of some of the nations. That it 
 was difficult of conception and execution is ap- 
 parent, as well by the foregoing reflection, as the 
 fact that so many tribes of men have come down 
 
1859] Lecture 109 
 
 from Adam's time to our own without ever hav- 
 ing possessed it. Its utility may be conceived 
 by the reflection that to it we owe everything 
 which distinguishes us from savages. Take it 
 from us, and the Bible, all history, all science, 
 all government, all commerce, and nearly all so- 
 cial intercourse go with it. 
 
 The great activity of the tongue in articulat- 
 ing sounds has already been mentioned, and it 
 may be of some passing interest to notice the 
 wonderful power of the eye in conveying ideas 
 to the mind from writing. Take the same ex- 
 ample of the numbers from one to one hundred 
 written down, and you can run your eye over 
 the list, and be assured that every number is in 
 it, in about one half the time it would require 
 to pronounce the words with the voice; and not 
 only so, but you can in the same short time de- 
 termine whether every word is spelled correctly, 
 by which it is evident that every separate letter, 
 amounting to eight hundred and sixty-four, has 
 been recognized and reported to the mind with- 
 in the incredibly short space of twenty seconds, 
 or one third of a minute. 
 
 I have already intimated my opinion that in 
 the world's history certain inventions and dis- 
 coveries occurred of peculiar value, on account 
 of their great efficiency in facilitating all other 
 inventions and discoveries. Of these were the 
 
no Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 22 
 
 art of writing and of printing, the discovery of 
 America, and the introduction of patent laws. 
 The date of the first, as already stated, is un- 
 known; but it certainly was as much as fifteen 
 hundred years before the Christian era; the sec- 
 ond — printing — came in 1436, or nearly three 
 thousand years after the first. The others fol- 
 lowed more rapidly — the discovery of America 
 in 1492, and the first patent laws in 1624. 
 Though not apposite to my present purpose, it 
 is but justice to the fruitfulness of that period 
 to mention two other important events — the Lu- 
 theran Reformation in 15 17, and, still earlier, the 
 invention of negroes, or of the present mode of 
 using them, in 1434. 
 
 But to return to the consideration of print- 
 ing, it is plain that it is but the other half, 
 and in reality the better half, of writing; and 
 that both together are but the assistants of 
 speech in the communication of thoughts be- 
 tween man and man. When man was pos- 
 sessed of speech alone, the chances of inven- 
 tion, discovery, and improvement were very 
 limited; but by the introduction of each of these 
 they were greatly multiplied. When writing 
 was invented, any important observation likely 
 to lead to a discovery had at least a chance of 
 being written down, and consequently a little 
 chance of never being forgotten, and of being 
 
1859] Lecture 
 
 in 
 
 seen and reflected upon by a much greater num- 
 ber of persons; and thereby the chances of a 
 valuable hint being caught proportionately aug- 
 mented. By this means the observation of a sin- 
 gle individual might lead to an important in- 
 vention years, and even centuries, after he was 
 dead. In one word, by means of writing, the 
 seeds of invention were more permanently pre- 
 served and more widely sown. And yet for 
 three thousand years during which printing re- 
 mained undiscovered after writing was in use, 
 it was only a small portion of the people who 
 could write, or read writing; and consequently 
 the field of invention, though much extended, 
 still continued very limited. At lengfh printing 
 came. It gave ten thousand copies of any writ- 
 ten matter quite as cheaply as ten were given 
 before; and consequently a thousand minds were 
 brought into the field were there was' but one be- 
 fore. This was a great gain — and history shows 
 a great change corresponding to it — in point of 
 time. 
 
 I will venture to consider it the true termina- 
 tion of that period called "the dark ages." Dis- 
 coveries, inventions, and improvements fol- 
 lowed rapidly and have been increasing their 
 rapidity ever since. The effects could not come 
 all at once. It required time to bring them out; 
 and they are still coming. The capacity to read 
 
ii2 Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 22 
 
 could not be multiplied as fast as the means of 
 reading. Spelling-books just began to go into 
 the hands of the children, but the teachers were 
 not very numerous or very competent, so that it 
 is safe to infer they did not advance so speedily 
 as they do nowadays. It is very probable — al- 
 most certain — that the great mass of men at that 
 time were utterly unconscious that their condi- 
 tion or their minds were capable of improve- 
 ment. They not only looked upon the educated 
 few as superior beings, but they supposed them- 
 selves to be naturally incapable of rising to 
 equality. To emancipate the mind from this 
 false underestimate of itself is the great task 
 which printing came into the world to perform. 
 It is difficult for us now and here to conceive 
 how strong this slavery of the mind was, and 
 how long it did of necessity take to break its 
 shackles, and to get a habit of freedom of 
 thought established. It is, in this connection, a 
 curious fact that a new country is most favorable 
 — almost necessary — to the emancipation of 
 thought, and the consequent advancement of 
 civilization and the arts. 
 
 : The human family originated, as is thought, 
 somewhere in Asia, and have worked their way 
 principally westward. Just now in civiliza- 
 tion and the arts the people of Asia are entire- 
 ly behind those of Europe ; those of the east of 
 
i8s9] Lecture 
 
 113 
 
 Europe behind those of the west of it; while 
 we, here, in America, think we discover, and 
 invent, and improve faster than any of them. 
 They may think this is arrogance; but they can- 
 not deny that Russia has called on us to show 
 her how to build steamboats and railroads, 
 while in the older parts of Asia they scarcely 
 know that such things as steamboats and rail- 
 roads exist. In anciently inhabited countries, the 
 dust of ages — a real, downright old-fogyism — 
 seems to settle upon and smother the intellects 
 and energies of man. It is in this view that I 
 have mentioned the discovery of America as 
 an event greatly favoring and facilitating use- 
 ful discoveries and inventions. 
 
 Next came the patent laws. These began 
 in England in 1624, and in this country with 
 the adoption of our Constitution. Before then 
 any man [might] instantly use what another 
 man had invented, so that the inventor had no 
 special advantage from his invention. The pat- 
 ent system changed this, secured to the inventor 
 for a limited time exclusive use of his inven- 
 tions, and thereby added the fuel of interest to 
 the fire of genius in the discovery and produc- 
 tion of new and useful things. 
 
ii4 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. i 
 
 Speech at Chicago on the Night of the 
 Municipal Election, March i, 1859 
 
 I UNDERSTAND that you have to-day 
 rallied around your principles, and they 
 have again triumphed in the city of 
 Chicago. I am exceedingly happy to meet you 
 under such cheering auspices on this occasion — 
 the first on which I have appeared before an 
 audience since the campaign of last year. It is 
 unsuitable to enter into a lengthy discourse, as 
 is quite apparent, at a moment like this. I shall 
 therefore detain you only a very short while. 
 
 It gives me peculiar pleasure to find an op- 
 portunity under such favorable circumstances to 
 return my thanks for the gallant support that 
 the Republicans of the city of Chicago and of 
 the State gave to the cause in which we were all 
 engaged in the late momentous struggle in Illi- 
 nois. 
 
 I remember in that canvass but one instance 
 of dissatisfaction with my course, and I allude 
 to that now not for the purpose of reviving any 
 matter of dispute or producing any unpleasant 
 feeling, but in order to help to get rid of the 
 point upon which that matter of disagreement 
 
i8s9] Speech at Chicago 115 
 
 or dissatisfaction arose. I understand that in 
 some speeches I made I said something, or was 
 supposed to have said something, that some very 
 good people, as I really believe them to be, com- 
 mented upon unfavorably, and said that rather 
 than support one holding such sentiments as I 
 had expressed, the real friends of liberty could 
 afford to wait a while. I don't want to say any- 
 thing that shall excite unkind feeling, and I 
 mention this simply to suggest that I am afraid 
 of the effect of that sort of argument. I do not 
 doubt that it comes from good men, but I am 
 afraid of the result upon organized action where 
 great results are in view, if any of us allow our- 
 selves to seek out minor or separate points, on 
 which there may be difference of views as to 
 policy and right, and let them keep us from 
 uniting in action upon a great principle in a 
 cause on which we all agree; or are deluded into 
 the belief that all can be brought to consider 
 alike and agree upon every minor point before 
 we unite and press forward in organization, ask- 
 ing the cooperation of all good men in that re- 
 sistance to the extension of slavery upon which 
 we all agree. I am afraid that such methods 
 would result in keeping the friends of liberty 
 waiting longer than we ought to. I say this for 
 the purpose of suggesting that we consider 
 whether it would not be better and wiser, so long 
 
u6 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. i 
 
 as we all agree that this matter of slavery is a 
 moral, political, and social wrong, and ought to 
 be treated as a wrong, not to let anything minor 
 or subsidiary to that main principle and purpose 
 make us fail to cooperate. 
 
 One other thing, — and that again I say in no 
 spirit of unkindness. There was a question 
 amongst Republicans all the time of the canvass 
 of last year, and it has not quite ceased yet, 
 whether it was not the true and better policy for 
 the Republicans to make it their chief object to 
 reelect Judge Douglas to the Senate of the 
 United States. Now, I differ with those who 
 thought that the true policy, but I have never 
 said an unkind word of any one entertaining that 
 opinion. I believe most of them were as sin- 
 cerely the friends of our cause as I claim to be 
 myself; yet I thought they were mistaken, and I 
 speak of this now for the purpose of justifying 
 the course that I took and the course of those 
 who supported me. In what I say now there is 
 no unkindness, even toward Judge Douglas. I 
 have believed that in the Republican situation 
 in Illinois, if we, the Republicans of this State, 
 had made Judge Douglas our candidate for the 
 Senate of the United States last year, and had 
 elected him, there would to-day be no Republi- 
 can party in this Union. I believe that the prin- 
 ciples around which we have rallied and organ- 
 
1859] Speech at Chicago 117 
 
 ized that party would live; they will live under 
 all circumstances, while we will die. They 
 would reproduce another party in the future. 
 But in the mean time all the labor that has been 
 done to build up the present Republican party 
 would be entirely lost, and perhaps twenty years 
 of time, before we would again have formed 
 around that principle as solid, extensive, and 
 formidable an organization as we have, stand- 
 ing shoulder to shoulder, to-night, in harmony 
 and strength around the Republican banner. 
 
 It militates not at all against this view to tell 
 us that the Republicans could make something 
 in the State of New York by electing to Con- 
 gress John B. Haskin, who occupied a position 
 similar to Judge Douglas; or that they could 
 make something by electing Hickman of Penn- 
 sylvania, or Davis of Indiana. I think it likely 
 that they could and do make something by it; 
 but it is false logic to assume that for that reason 
 anything could be gained by us in electing Judge 
 Douglas in Illinois. And for this reason: It 
 is no disparagement to these men, Hickman and 
 Davis, to say that individually they were com- 
 paratively small men, and the Republican party 
 could take hold of them, use them, elect them, 
 absorb them, expel them, or do whatever it 
 pleased with them, and the Republican organi- 
 zation be in no wise shaken. But it is not so with 
 
u8 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. i 
 
 Judge Douglas. Let the Republican party of 
 Illinois dally with Judge Douglas; let them fall 
 in behind him and make him their candidate, 
 and they do not absorb him — he absorbs them. 
 They would come out at the end all Douglas 
 men, claimed by him as having indorsed every 
 one of his doctrines upon the great subject with 
 which the whole nation is engaged at this hour 
 — that the question of negro slavery is simply a 
 question of dollars and cents; that the Almighty 
 has drawn a line across the continent, on one 
 side of which labor — the cultivation of the soil 
 — must always be performed by slaves. It 
 would be claimed that we, like him, do not care 
 whether slavery is voted up or voted down. Had 
 we made him our candidate and given him a 
 great majority, we should never have heard an 
 end of declarations by him that we had indorsed 
 all these dogmas. 
 
 You all remember that at the last session of 
 Congress there was a measure introduced in the 
 Senate by Mr. Crittenden which proposed that 
 the pro-slavery Lecompton constitution should 
 be left to a vote to be taken in Kansas, and if 
 it and slavery were adopted, Kansas should be 
 at once admited as a slave State. That same 
 measure was introduced into the House by Mr. 
 Montgomery, and therefore got the name of the 
 Crittenden-Montgomery bill; and in the House 
 
1859] Speech at Chicago 119 
 
 of Representatives the Republicans all voted for 
 it under the peculiar circumstances in which 
 they found themselves placed. You may re- 
 member also that the New York "Tribune," 
 which was so much in favor of our electing 
 Judge Douglas to the Senate of the United 
 States, has not yet got through the task of de- 
 fending the Republican party, after that one 
 vote in the House of Representatives, from the 
 charge of having gone over to the doctrine of 
 popular sovereignty. Now, how long would 
 the New York "Tribune" have been in getting 
 rid of the charge that the Republicans had aban- 
 doned their principles, if we had taken up Judge 
 Douglas, adopted all his doctrines, and elected 
 him to the Senate, when the single vote upon 
 that one point so confused and embarrassed the 
 position of the Republicans that it has kept 
 them for one entire year arguing against the 
 effect of it? 
 
 This much being said on that point, I wish 
 now to add a word that has a bearing on the 
 future. The Republican principle, the pro- 
 found central truth that slavery is wrong and 
 ought to be dealt with as a wrong, — though we 
 are always to remember the fact of its actual 
 existence amongst us and faithfully observe all 
 the constitutional guarantees, — the unalterable 
 principle never for a moment to be lost sight of, 
 
120 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. i 
 
 that it is a wrong and ought to be dealt with as 
 such, cannot advance at all upon Judge Doug- 
 las's ground; that there is a portion of the coun- 
 try in which slavery must always exist; that he 
 does not care whether it is voted up or voted 
 down, as it is simply a question of dollars and 
 cents. Whenever in any compromise, or ar- 
 rangement, or combination that may promise 
 some temporary advantage we are led upon that 
 ground, then and there the great living principle 
 upon which we have organized as a party is 
 surrendered. The proposition now in our minds 
 that this thing is wrong being once driven out 
 and surrendered, then the institution of slavery 
 necessarily becomes national. 
 
 One or two words more of what I did not 
 think of when I rose. Suppose it is true that the 
 Almighty has drawn a line across this continent, 
 on the south side of which part of the people 
 will hold the rest as slaves; that the Almighty 
 ordered this; that it is right, unchangeably right, 
 that men ought there to be held as slaves; that 
 their fellow-men will always have the right to 
 hold them as slaves. I ask you, this once ad- 
 mitted, how can you believe that it is not right 
 for us, or for them coming here, to hold slaves 
 on this other side of the line? Once we come to 
 acknowledge that it is right, that it is the law of 
 the Eternal Being for slavery to exist on one 
 
1859] Speech at Chicago 121 
 
 side of that line, have we any sure ground to ob- 
 ject to slaves being held on the other side? Once 
 admit the position that a man rightfully holds 
 another man as property on one side of the line, 
 and you must, when it suits his convenience to 
 come to the other side, admit that he has the 
 same right to hold his property there. Once 
 admit Judge Douglas's proposition, and we must 
 all finally give way. Although we may not 
 bring ourselves to the idea that it is to our in- 
 terest to have slaves in this Northern country, 
 we shall soon bring ourselves to admit that while 
 we may not want them, if any one else does, he 
 has the moral right to have them. Step by step, 
 south of the judge's moral climate line in the 
 States, in the Territories everywhere, and then 
 in all the States — it is thus that Judge Douglas 
 would lead us inevitably to the nationalization 
 of slavery. 
 
 Whether by his doctrine of squatter sovereign- 
 ty, or by the ground taken by him in his re- 
 cent speeches in Memphis and through the 
 South, — that wherever the climate makes it the 
 interest of the inhabitants to encourage slave 
 property they will pass a slave code, — whether 
 it is covertly nationalized by congressional legis- 
 lation, or by Dred Scott decision, or by the 
 sophistical and misleading doctrine he has last 
 advanced, the same goal is inevitably reached 
 
122 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. i 
 
 by the one or the other device. It is only travel- 
 ing to the same place by different roads. 
 
 It is in this direction lies all the danger that 
 now exists to the great Republican cause. I 
 take it that so far as concerns forcibly establish- 
 ing slavery in the Territories by congressional 
 legislation, or by virtue of the Dred Scott deci- 
 sion, that day has passed. Our only serious dan- 
 ger is that we shall be led upon this ground of 
 Judge Douglas, on the delusive assumption that 
 it is a good way of whipping our opponents, 
 when in fact it is a way that leads straight to final 
 surrender. The Republican party should not 
 dally with Judge Douglas when it knows where 
 his proposition and his leadership would take 
 us, nor be disposed to listen to it because it was 
 best somewhere else to support somebody occu- 
 pying his ground. That is no just reason why 
 we ought to go over to Judge Douglas, as we 
 were called upon to do last year. Never forget 
 that we have before us this whole matter of the 
 right or wrong of slavery in this Union, though 
 the immediate question is as to its spreading out 
 into new Territories and States. 
 
 I do not wish to be misunderstood upon this 
 subject of slavery in this country. I suppose it 
 may long exist; and perhaps the best way for it 
 to come to an end peaceably is for it to exist for 
 a length of time. But I say that the spread and 
 
1859] Speech at Chicago 123 
 
 strengthening and perpetuation of it is an entire- 
 ly different proposition. There we should in 
 every way resist it as a wrong, treating it as a 
 wrong, with the fixed idea that it must and will 
 come to an end. If we do not allow ourselves 
 to be allured from the strict path of our duty by 
 such a device as shifting our ground and throw- 
 ing us into the rear of a leader who denies our 
 first principle, denies that there is an absolute 
 wrong in the institution of slavery, then the fu- 
 ture of the Republican cause is safe, and victory 
 is assured. You Republicans of Illinois have 
 deliberately taken your ground; you have heard 
 the whole subject discussed again and again; 
 you have stated your faith in platforms laid 
 down in a State convention and in a national 
 convention; you have heard and talked over and 
 considered it until you are now all of opinion 
 that you are on a ground of unquestionable 
 right. 
 
 All you have to do is to keep the faith, to 
 remain steadfast to the right, to stand by your 
 banner. Nothing should lead you to leave your 
 guns. Stand together, ready, with match in 
 hand. Allow nothing to turn you to the right 
 or to the left. Remember how long you have 
 been in setting out on the true course; how long 
 you have been in getting your neighbors to un- 
 derstand and believe as you now do. Stand by 
 
124 Abraham Lincoln [Apr. 6 
 
 your principles, stand by your guns, and victory, 
 complete and permanent, is sure at the last. 
 
 Letter to W. M. Morris. 
 
 Springfield, March 28, 1859. 
 Dear Sir: Your kind note inviting me to de- 
 liver a lecture at Galesburg is received. I re- 
 gret to say I cannot do so now; I must stick to 
 the courts awhile. I read a sort of lecture to 
 three different audiences during the last month 
 and this ; but I did so under circumstances which 
 made it a waste of no time whatever. 
 
 Yours very truly, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
 Letter to H. L. Pierce and others 
 
 Springfield, III., April 6, 1859. 
 
 Gentlemen: Your kind note inviting me to 
 attend a festival in Boston, on the 28th instant, 
 in honor of the birthday of Thomas Jefferson, 
 was duly received. My engagements are such 
 that I cannot attend. 
 
 Bearing in mind that about seventy years ago 
 two great political parties were first formed in 
 this country, that Thomas Jefferson was the head 
 of one of them and Boston the headquarters of 
 the other, it is both curious and interesting that 
 those supposed to descend politically from the 
 
1859] Letter to Pierce 125 
 
 party opposed to Jefferson should now be cele- 
 brating his birthday in their own original seat 
 of empire, while those claiming political descent 
 from him have nearly ceased to breathe his name 
 everywhere. 
 
 Remembering, too, that the Jefferson party 
 was formed upon its supposed superior devotion 
 to the personal rights of men, holding the rights 
 of property to be secondary only, and greatly in- 
 ferior, and assuming that the so-called Democ- 
 racy of to-day are the Jefferson, and their oppo- 
 nents the anti-Jefferson, party, it will be equally 
 interesting to note how completely the two have 
 changed hands as to the principle upon which 
 they were originally supposed to be divided. 
 The Democracy of to-day hold the liberty of 
 one man to be absolutely nothing, when in con- 
 flict with another man's right of property; Re- 
 publicans, on the contrary, are for both the man 
 and the dollar, but in case of conflict the man 
 before the dollar. 
 
 I remember being once much amused at see- 
 ing two partially intoxicated men engaged in a 
 fight with their great-coats on, which fight, after 
 a long and rather harmless contest, ended in 
 each having fought himself out of his own coat 
 and into that of the other. If the two leading 
 parties of this day are really identical with the 
 two in the days of Jefferson and Adams, they 
 
i26 Abraham Lincoln [Apr. 16 
 
 have performed the same feat as the two drunk- 
 en men. 
 
 But, soberly, it is now no child's play to save 
 the principles of Jefferson from total overthrow 
 in this nation. One would state with great con- 
 fidence that he could convince any sane child 
 that the simpler propositions of Euclid are true; 
 but nevertheless he would fail, utterly, with one 
 who should deny the definitions and axioms. 
 The principles of Jefferson are the definitions 
 and a|ixioms of free society. And yet they are 
 denied and evaded, with no small show of suc- 
 cess. One dashingly calls them "glittering gen- 
 eralities." Another bluntly calls them "self- 
 evident lies." And others insidiously argue that 
 they apply to "superior races." These expres- 
 sions, differing in form, are identical in object 
 and effect — the supplanting the principles of 
 free government, and restoring those of classi- 
 fication, caste, and legitimacy. They would de- 
 light a convocation of crowned heads plotting 
 against the people. They are the vanguard, the 
 miners and sappers of returning despotism. We 
 must repulse them, or they will subjugate us. 
 This is a world of compensation; and he who 
 would be no slave must consent to have no slave. 
 Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not 
 for themselves, and, under a just God, cannot 
 long retain it. All honor to Jefferson — to the 
 
1859] Letter to Pickett 127 
 
 man, who, in the concrete pressure of a struggle 
 for national independence by a single people, 
 had the coolness, forecast, and capacity to intro- 
 duce into a merely revolutionary document an 
 abstract truth, applicable to all men and all 
 times, and so to embalm it there that to-day and 
 in all coming days it shall be a rebuke and a 
 stumbling-block to the very harbingers of reap- 
 pearing tyranny and oppression. 
 
 Your obedient servant, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
 Letter to T. J. Pickett * 
 
 Springfield, April 16, 1859. 
 My dear Sir: Yours of the 13th is just re- 
 ceived. My engagements are such that I can- 
 not at any very early day visit Rock Island to 
 deliver a lecture, or for any other object. As 
 to the other matter you kindly mention, I must 
 in candor say I do not think myself fit for the 
 presidency. I certainly am flattered and grati- 
 fied that some partial friends think of me in that 
 connection; but I really think it best for our 
 
 1 Pickett was a newspaper editor and a warm personal friend 
 of Lincoln, and among the first that were eager to launch a 
 " presidential boom " for him. Pickett wrote : " I would like 
 to have a talk with you on political matters, as to the policy 
 of announcing your name for the Presidency, while you are 
 in our city. My partner and myself are about addressing the 
 Republican editors of the State on the subject of a simultaneous 
 announcement of your name for the Presidency." 
 
128 Abraham Lincoln [May 17 
 
 cause that no concerted effort, such as you sug- 
 gest, should be made. Let this be considered 
 confidential. 
 
 Yours very truly, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
 Letter to M. W. Delahay 
 
 May 14, 1859. 
 . . . You will probably adopt resolutions 
 in the nature of a platform. I think the only 
 temptation will be to lower the Republican 
 standard in order to gather recruits. In my 
 judgment such a step would be a serious mistake, 
 and open a gap through which more would pass 
 out than pass in. And this would be the same 
 whether the letting down should be in deference 
 to Douglasism or to the Southern opposition ele- 
 ment; either would surrender the object of the 
 Republican organization — the preventing of the 
 spread and nationalization of slavery. This ob- 
 ject surrendered, the organization would go to 
 pieces. I do not mean by this that no Southern 
 man must be placed upon our national ticket in 
 i860. There are many men in the slave States 
 for any one of whom I could cheerfully vote to 
 be either President or Vice-President, provided 
 he would enable me to do so with safety to the 
 Republican cause, without lowering the Repub- 
 lican standard. This is the indispensable con- 
 
1859] Letter to Canisius 129 
 
 dition of a union with us ; it is idle to talk of any 
 other. Any other would be as fruitless to the 
 South as distasteful to the North, the whole 
 ending in common defeat. Let a union be at- 
 tempted on the basis of ignoring the slavery 
 question, and magnifying other questions which 
 the people are just now not caring about, and 
 it will result in gaining no single electoral vote 
 in the South, and losing every one in the 
 North. . . . 
 
 Letter to Dr. Theodore Canisius 
 
 Springfield, May 17, 1859. 
 
 Dear Sir: Your note asking, in behalf of 
 yourself and other German citizens, whether I 
 am for or against the constitutional provision in 
 regard to naturalized citizens, lately adopted by 
 Massachusetts, and whether I am for or against 
 a fusion of the Republicans, and other opposi- 
 tion elements, for the canvass of i860, is re- 
 ceived. 
 
 Massachusetts is a sovereign and independent 
 State; and it is no privilege of mine to scold her 
 for what she does. Still, if from what she has 
 done an inference is sought to be drawn as to 
 what I would do, I may without impropriety 
 speak out. I say, then, that, as I understand the 
 Massachusetts provision, I am against its adop- 
 
130 Abraham Lincoln [July 6 
 
 tion in Illinois, or in any other place where I 
 have a right to oppose it. Understanding the 
 spirit of our institutions to aim at the elevation 
 of men, I am opposed to whatever tends to de- 
 grade them. I have some little notoriety for 
 commiserating the oppressed negro; and I 
 should be strangely inconsistent if I could favor 
 any project for curtailing the existing rights of 
 white men, even though born in different lands, 
 and speaking different languages from myself. 
 As to the matter of fusion, I am for it, if it can 
 be had on Republican grounds; and I am not 
 for it on any other terms. A fusion on any other 
 terms would be as foolish as unprincipled. It 
 would lose the whole North, while the common 
 enemy would still carry the whole South. The 
 question of men is a different one. There are 
 good patriotic men and able statesmen in the 
 South whom I would cheerfully support, if they 
 would now place themselves on Republican 
 ground, but I am against letting down the Re- 
 publican standard a hair's-breadth. 
 
 I have written this hastily, but I believe it an- 
 swers your questions substantially. 
 
 Yours truly, 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
deon WelMs 
 Wood Engraving from a Pholograph by Brady. 
 
■;;'" sir 1 ™,'! 
 
 ; 
 
 
1859] Letter to Colfax 131 
 
 Letter to Schuyler Colfax * 
 
 Springfield, III., July 6, 1859. 
 My dear Sir: I much regret not seeing yen 
 while you were here among us. Before learn- 
 ing that you were to be at Jacksonville on the 
 4th, I had given my word to be at another place. 
 Besides a strong desire to make your personal ac- 
 quaintance, I was anxious to speak with you on 
 politics a little more fully than I can well do in 
 a letter. My main object in such conversation 
 would be to hedge against divisions in the Re- 
 publican ranks generally, and particularly for 
 the contest of i860. The point of danger is the 
 temptation in different localities to "platform" 
 for something which will be popular just there, 
 but which, nevertheless, will be a firebrand else- 
 where, and especially in a national convention. 
 As instances, the movement against foreigners in 
 Massachusetts; in New Hampshire, to make 
 obedience to the fugitive-slave law punishable 
 as a crime; in Ohio, to repeal the fugitive-slave 
 
 1 Schuyler Colfax, who was vice-president during Grant's first 
 term, was in Congress at the time he received this letter. In 
 replying to Lincoln he agreed that there existed a great majority 
 opposed to slavery, but it was composed of elements almost 
 defying coalition. "How this mass of mind," he wrote, "shall 
 be consolidated into a victorious phalanx in i860 is the great 
 problem, I think, of our eventful times, and he who could ac- 
 complish it is worthier of fame than Napoleon or Victor 
 Emmanuel." 
 
132 Abraham Lincoln [July u 
 
 law; and squatter sovereignty, in Kansas. In 
 these things there is explosive enough to blow 
 up half a dozen national conventions, if it gets 
 into them; and what gets very rife outside of 
 conventions is very likely to find its way into 
 them. What is desirable, if possible, is that in 
 every local convocation of Republicans a point 
 should be made to avoid everything which will 
 disturb Republicans elsewhere. Massachusetts 
 Republicans should have looked beyond their 
 noses, and then they could not have failed to see 
 that tilting against foreigners would ruin us in 
 the whole Northwest. New Hampshire and 
 Ohio should forbear tilting against the fugitive- 
 slave law in such a way as to utterly overwhelm 
 us in Illinois with the charge of enmity to the 
 Constitution itself. Kansas, in her confidence 
 that she can be saved to freedom on "squatter 
 sovereignty," ought not to forget that to prevent 
 the spread and nationalization of slavery is a na- 
 tional concern, and must be attended to by the 
 nation. 
 
 In a word, in every locality we should look 
 beyond our noses; and at least say nothing on 
 points where it is probable we shall disagree. 
 I write this for your eye only; hoping, however, 
 if you see danger as I think I do, you will do 
 what you can to avert it. Could not sugges- 
 tions be made to leading men in the State and 
 
1859] Letter to Miller 133 
 
 congressional conventions, and so avoid, to some 
 extent at least, these apples of discord? 
 Yours very truly, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
 Letter to James Miller, Treasurer of the 
 State of Illinois. 
 
 Springfield, III., July n, 1859. 
 Dear Sir: We suppose you are persistently 
 urged to pay something upon the new McCallis- 
 ter and Stebbins bonds. As friends of yours and 
 of the people, we advise you to pay nothing upon 
 them under any possible circumstances. The 
 holders of them did a great wrong, and are now 
 persisting in it in a way which deserves severe 
 punishment. They know the legislature has 
 again and again refused to fully recognize the 
 old bonds. Seizing upon an act never intended 
 to apply to them, they besieged Governor Bis- 
 sell more than a year ago to fund the old bonds; 
 he refused. They sought a mandamus upon him 
 from the Supreme Court; the court refused. 
 Again they besieged the governor last winter; 
 he sought to have them go before the legisla- 
 ture; they refused. Still they persisted, and 
 dogged him in his afflicted condition till they 
 got from him what the agent in New York 
 acted upon and issued the new bonds. Now 
 they refuse to surrender them, hoping to force 
 
134 Abraham Lincoln [July 27 
 
 an acquiescence, for Governor Bissell's sake. 
 "That cock won't fight," and they may as well 
 so understand at once. If the news of the sur- 
 render of the new bonds does not reach here in 
 ten days from this date, we shall do what we can 
 to have them repudiated in toto, finally and for- 
 ever. If they were less than demons they would 
 at once relieve Governor Bissell from the pain- 
 ful position they have dogged him into; and if 
 they still persist, they shall never see even the 
 twenty-six cents to the dollar, if we can prevent 
 it. Yours very truly, 
 
 A. Lincoln, 
 S. T. Logan, 
 O. M. Hatch. 
 
 Letter to Samuel Galloway 
 
 Springfield, III., July 27, 1859. 
 My dear Sir: Your letter in relation to the 
 claim of Mr. Ambos for the Columbus Machine 
 Manufacturing Company against Barret and 
 others is received. This has been a somewhat 
 disagreeable matter to me. As I remember, you 
 first wrote me on the general subject, Barret 
 having a great deal of property, owing a good 
 dollars, and there was some question about his 
 taking the machinery. I think you inquired as 
 to Barret's responsibility; and that I answered 
 I considered him an honest and honorable man, 
 
1859] Letter to Galloway 135 
 
 having a great deal of property, owing a good 
 many debts, and hard pressed for ready cash. I 
 was a little surprised soon after to learn that they 
 had enlarged the credit to near ten thousand 
 dollars, more or less. They wrote me to take 
 notes and a mortgage, and to hold on to the notes 
 awhile to fix amounts. I inferred the notes and 
 mortgage were both to be held up for a time, and 
 did so; Barret gave a second mortgage on part 
 of the premises which was first recorded, and 
 then I was blamed for not having recorded the 
 other mortgage when first executed. My chief 
 annoyance with the case now is that the parties 
 at Columbus seem to think it is by my neglect 
 that they do not get their money. There is an 
 older mortgage on the real estate mortgaged, 
 though not on the machinery. I got a decree 
 of foreclosure in this present month; but I con- 
 sented to delay advertising for sale till Septem- 
 ber, on a reasonable prospect that something 
 will then be paid on a collateral Barret has put 
 in my hands. When we come to sell en the 
 decree, what will we do about the older mort- 
 gage? Barret has offered one or two other good 
 notes — that is, notes on good men — if we would 
 take them, pro tanto, as payment, but I notified 
 Mr. Ambos, and he declined. My impression 
 is that the whole of the money cannot be got very 
 soon, anyway, but that it all will be ultimately 
 
136 Abraham Lincoln [July 28 
 
 collected, and that it could be got faster by turn- 
 ing in every little parcel we can, than by trying 
 to force it through by the law in a lump. There 
 are no special personal relations between Barret 
 and myself. We are personal friends in a gen- 
 eral way — no business transactions between us — 
 not akin, and opposed on politics. 
 Yours truly, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
 Letter to Samuel Galloway 
 
 Springfield, III., July 28, 1859. 
 
 My dear Sir: Your very complimentary, not 
 to say flattering, letter of the 23d inst. is re- 
 ceived. Dr. Reynolds had induced me to ex- 
 pect you here; and I was disappointed not a 
 little by your failure to come. And yet I fear 
 you have formed an estimate of me which can 
 scarcely be sustained on a personal acquaint- 
 ance. 
 
 Two things done by the Ohio Republican con- 
 vention — the repudiation of Judge Swan, and 
 the "plank" for a repeal of the fugitive-slave 
 law — I very much regretted. These two things 
 are of a piece; and they are viewed by many 
 good men, sincerely opposed to slavery, as a 
 struggle against, and in disregard of, the Con- 
 stitution itself. And it is the very thing that 
 will greatly endanger our cause, if it be not kept 
 
1 859] Letter to Galloway 137 
 
 out of our national convention. There is an- 
 other thing our friends are doing which gives 
 me some uneasiness. It is their leaning toward 
 "popular sovereignty." There are three sub- 
 stantial objections to this. First, no party can 
 command respect which sustains this year what 
 it opposed last. Secondly, Douglas (who is the 
 most dangerous enemy of liberty, because the 
 most insidious one) would have little support 
 in the North, and by consequence, no capital to 
 trade on in the South, if it were not for his 
 friends thus magnifying him and his humbug. 
 But lastly, and chiefly, Douglas's popular sov- 
 ereignty, accepted by the public mind as a just 
 principle, nationalizes slavery, and revives the 
 African slave-trade inevitably. Taking slaves 
 into new Territories, and buying slaves in Africa, 
 are identical things, identical rights or identical 
 wrongs, and the argument which establishes one 
 will establish the other. Try a thousand years 
 for a sound reason why Congress shall not hin- 
 der the people of Kansas from having slaves, 
 and when you have found it, it will be an equally 
 good one why Congress should not hinder the 
 people of Georgia from importing slaves from 
 Africa. 
 
 As to Governor Chase, I have a kind side for 
 him. He was one of the few distinguished men 
 of the nation who gave us, in Illinois, their sym- 
 
138 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 6 
 
 pathy last year. I never saw him, but suppose 
 him to be able and right-minded; but still he 
 may not be the most suitable as a candidate for 
 the presidency. 
 
 I must say I do not think myself fit for the 
 presidency. As you propose a correspondence 
 with me, I shall look for your letters anxiously. 
 
 I have not met Dr. Reynolds since receiving 
 your letter; but when I shall, I will present 
 your respects as requested. 
 
 Yours very truly, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
 *Letter to Hawkins Taylor 
 
 Springfield, III., September 6, 1859. 
 
 My dear Sir: Yours of the 3d is just received. 
 There is some mistake about my expected at- 
 tendance of the U. S. Court in your city on the 
 3d Tuesday of this month. I have had no 
 thought of being there. It is bad to be poor. 
 I shall go to the wall for bread and meat, if I 
 neglect my business this year as well as last. It 
 would please me much to see the city, and good 
 people, of Keokuk, but for this year it is little 
 less than an impossibility. 
 
 I am constantly receiving invitations which 
 I am compelled to decline. I was pressingly 
 urged to go to Minnesota; and I now have two 
 invitations to go to Ohio, These last are 
 
1859] Letter to Taylor 
 
 139 
 
 prompted by Douglas going there; and I am 
 really tempted to make a flying trip to Colum- 
 bus and Cincinnati. 
 
 I do hope you will have no serious trouble 
 in Iowa. What thinks Grimes about it? I have 
 not known him to be mistaken about an election 
 in Iowa. Present my respects to Colonel Car- 
 ter, and any other friends; and believe me, 
 Yours truly, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
40 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 Speech at Columbus, Ohio, September 16, 
 1859 1 
 
 FELLOW-CITIZENS of the State of 
 Ohio: I cannot fail to remember that I 
 appear for the first time before an aud- 
 ience in this now great State — an audience that 
 is accustomed to hear such speakers as Corwin, 
 and Chase, and Wade, and many other re- 
 nowned men; and remembering this, I feel that 
 it will be well for you, as for me, that you should 
 not raise your expectations to that standard to 
 which you would have been justified in raising 
 them had one of these distinguished men ap- 
 peared before you. You would perhaps be only 
 preparing a disappointment for yourselves, and, 
 as a consequence of your disappointment, morti- 
 fication to me. I hope, therefore, that you will 
 commence with very moderate expectations ; and 
 
 1 Interest in Lincoln increased daily from the close of the 
 joint debates and the senatorial contest in Illinois. Douglas, 
 himself, helped to keep Lincoln before the public by constantly 
 using him as a target while touring the South. The Ohio 
 Democrats called Douglas into their gubernatorial canvass in 
 1859. The Republicans naturally sought and secured Lincoln as 
 the most capable antagonist. Each of Lincoln's speeches in the 
 Ohio Campaign attracted wide attention. They were made at 
 places where Douglas had but recently preceded him. 
 
1859] Speech at Columbus 141 
 
 perhaps, if you will give me your attention, I 
 shall be able to interest you to a moderate 
 degree. 
 
 Appearing here for the first time in my life, 
 I have been somewhat embarrassed for a topic 
 by way of introduction to my speech ; but I have 
 been relieved from that embarrassment by an 
 introduction which the "Ohio Statesman" news- 
 paper gave me this morning. In this paper I 
 have read an article in which, among other 
 statements, I find the following: 
 
 In debating with Senator Douglas during the 
 memorable contest last fall, Mr. Lincoln declared in 
 favor of negro suffrage, and attempted to defend that 
 vile conception against the Little Giant. 
 
 I mention this now, at the opening of my re- 
 marks, for the purpose of making three com- 
 ments upon it. The first I have already an- 
 nounced — it furnished me an introductory topic; 
 the second is to show that the gentleman is mis- 
 taken; thirdly, to give him an opportunity to 
 correct it. 
 
 In the first place, in regard to this matter be- 
 ing a mistake. I have found that it is not en- 
 tirely safe, when one is misrepresented under 
 his very nose, to allow the misrepresentation to 
 go uncontradicted. I therefore propose, here 
 at the outset, not only to say that this is a mis- 
 
142 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 representation, but to show conclusively that it 
 is so; and you will bear with me while I read 
 a couple of extracts from that very "memora- 
 ble" debate with Judge Douglas last year, to 
 which this newspaper refers. In the first 
 pitched battle which Senator Douglas and my- 
 self had, at the town of Ottawa, I used the lan- 
 guage which I will now read. Having been 
 previously reading an extract, I continued as 
 follows : 
 
 Now, gentlemen, I don't want to read at any 
 greater length, but this is the true complexion of all 
 I have ever said in regard to the institution of slavery 
 and the black race. This is the whole of it, and any- 
 thing that argues me into his idea of perfect social 
 and political equality with the negro is but a specious 
 and fantastic arrangement of words, by which a man 
 can prove a horse-chestnut to be a chestnut horse. I 
 will say here, while upon this subject, that I have no 
 purpose either directly or indirectly to interfere with 
 the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. 
 I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have 
 no inclination to do so. I have no purpose to intro- 
 duce political and social equality between the white 
 and the black races. There is a physical difference 
 between the two which, in my judgment, will prob- 
 ably forever forbid their living together upon the foot- 
 ing of perfect equality, and inasmuch as it becomes a 
 necessity that there must be a difference, I, as well as 
 Judge Douglas, am in favor of the race to which I 
 
1859] Speech at Columbus 143 
 
 belong having the superior position. I have never 
 said anything to the contrary, but I hold that, not- 
 withstanding all this, there is no reason in the world 
 why the negro is not entitled to all the natural rights 
 enumerated in the Declaration of Independence, the 
 right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. I 
 hold that he is as much entitled to these as the white 
 man. I agree with Judge Douglas, he is not my 
 equal in many respects — certainly not in color, per- 
 haps not in moral or intellectual endowments. But 
 in the right to eat the bread, without leave of any- 
 body else, which his own hand earns, he is my equal, 
 and the equal of Judge Douglas, and the equal of 
 every living man. 
 
 Upon a subsequent occasion, when the reason 
 for making a statement like this recurred, I 
 said: 
 
 While I was at the hotel to-day an elderly gentle- 
 man called upon me to know whether I was really in 
 favor of producing a perfect equality between the 
 negroes and white people. While I had not pro- 
 posed to myself on this occasion to say much on that 
 subject, yet as the question was asked me I thought 
 I would occupy perhaps five minutes in saying some- 
 thing in regard to it. I will say, then, that I am not, 
 nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any 
 way the social and political equality of the white and 
 the black races — that I am not, nor ever have been, 
 in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of 
 qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with 
 
144 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 white people; and I will say in addition to this, that 
 there is a physical difference between the white and 
 the black races, which, I believe, will forever forbid 
 the two races living together on terms of social and 
 political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so 
 live, while they do remain together there must be the 
 position of superior and inferior, and I, as much as 
 any other man, am in favor of having the superior 
 position assigned to the white race. I say upon this 
 occasion I do not perceive that because the white man 
 is to have the superior position, the negro should be 
 denied everything. I do not understand that because 
 I do not want a negro woman for a slave, I must 
 necessarily want her for a wife. My understanding 
 is that I can just let her alone. I am now in my 
 fiftieth year; and I certainly never have had a black 
 woman for either a slave or a wife. So it seems to 
 me quite possible for us to get along without making 
 either slaves or wives of negroes. I will add to this, 
 that I have never seen to my knowledge a man, 
 woman, or child who was in favor of producing a 
 perfect equality, social and political, between negroes 
 and white men. I recollect of but one distinguished 
 instance that I ever heard of so frequently as to be 
 entirely satisfied of its correctness — and that is the 
 case of Judge Douglas's old friend, Colonel Richard 
 M. Johnson. I will also add to the remarks I have 
 made (for I am not going to enter at large upon this 
 subject), that I have never had the least apprehen- 
 sion that I or my friends would marry negroes, 
 if there was no law to keep them from it; but as 
 
1859] Speech at Columbus 145 
 
 Judge Douglas and his friends seem to be in great 
 apprehension that they might, if there were no law 
 to keep them from it, I give him the most solemn 
 pledge that I will to the very last stand by the law 
 of the State, which forbids the marrying of white 
 people with negroes. 
 
 There, my friends, you have briefly what I 
 have, upon former occasions, said upon the sub- 
 ject to which this newspaper, to the extent of its 
 ability, has drawn the public attention. In it 
 you not only perceive, as a probability, that in 
 that contest I did not at any time say I was in 
 favor of negro suffrage; but the absolute proof 
 that twice — once substantially and once express- 
 ly — I declared against it. Having shown you 
 this, there remains but a word of comment upon 
 that newspaper article. It is this: that I pre- 
 sume the editor of that paper is an honest and 
 truth-loving man, and that he will be greatly 
 obliged to me for furnishing him thus early an 
 opportunity to correct the misrepresentation he 
 has made, before it has run so long that malicious 
 people can call him a liar. 
 
 The giant himself has been here recently. I 
 have seen a brief report of his speech. If it 
 were otherwise unpleasant to me to introduce 
 the subject of the negro as a topic for discussion, 
 I might be somewhat relieved by the fact that 
 he dealt exclusively in that subject while he was 
 
146 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 here. I shall, therefore, without much hesita- 
 tion or diffidence, enter upon this subject. 
 
 The American people, on the first day of Jan- 
 uary, 1854, found the African slave-trade pro- 
 hibited by a law of Congress. In a majority 
 of the States of this Union, they found African 
 slavery, or any other sort of slavery, prohibited 
 by State constitutions. They also found a law 
 existing, supposed to be valid, by which slavery 
 was excluded from almost all the territory the 
 United States then owned. This was the con- 
 dition of the country, with reference to the in- 
 stitution of slavery, on the first of January, 1854. 
 A few days after that, a bill was introduced into 
 Congress, which ran through its regular course 
 in the two branches of the national legislature, 
 and finally passed into a law in the month of 
 May, by which the act of Congress prohibiting 
 slavery from going into the Territories of the 
 United States was repealed. In connection 
 with the law itself, and, in fact, in the terms 
 of the law, the then existing prohibition was 
 not only repealed, but there was a declaration 
 of a purpose on the part of Congress never there- 
 after to exercise any power that they might have, 
 real or supposed, to prohibit the extension or 
 spread of slavery. This was a very great 
 change; for the law thus repealed was of more 
 than thirty years' standing. Following rapidly 
 
1859] Speech at Columbus 147 
 
 upon the heels of this action of Congress, a de- 
 cision of the Supreme Court is made, by which 
 it is declared that Congress, if it desires to pro- 
 hibit the spread of slavery into the Territories, 
 has no constitutional power to do so. Not only 
 so, but that decision lays down the principles, 
 which, if pushed to their logical conclusion, — I 
 say pushed to their logical conclusion, — would 
 decide that the constitutions of free States, for- 
 bidding slavery, are themselves unconstitutional. 
 Mark me, I do not say the judges said this, and 
 let no man say I affirm the judges used these 
 words; but I only say it is my opinion that what 
 they did say, if pressed to its logical conclusion, 
 will inevitably result thus. 
 
 Looking at these things, the Republican par- 
 ty, as I understand its principles and policy, 
 believes that there is great danger of the insti- 
 tution of slavery being spread out and extended, 
 until it is ultimately made alike lawful in all 
 the States of this Union; so believing, to pre- 
 vent that incidental and ultimate consummation 
 is the original and chief purpose of the Repub- 
 lican organization. I say " chief purpose" of 
 the Republican organization; for it is certainly 
 true that if the national house shall fall into the 
 hands of the Republicans, they will have to at- 
 tend to all the other matters of national house- 
 keeping as well as this. The chief and real 
 
148 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 purpose of the Republican party is eminently 
 conservative. It proposes nothing save and ex- 
 cept to restore this government to its original 
 tone in regard to this element of slavery, and 
 there to maintain it, looking for no further 
 change in reference to it than that which the 
 original framers of the government themselves 
 expected and looked forward to. 
 
 The chief danger to this purpose of the Re- 
 publican party is not just now the revival of the 
 African slave-trade, or the passage of a con- 
 gressional slave-code, or the declaring of a sec- 
 ond Dred Scott decision, making slavery lawful 
 in all the States. These are not pressing us 
 just now. They are not quite ready yet. The 
 authors of these measures know that we are too 
 strong for them; but they will be upon us in due 
 time, and we will be grappling with them hand 
 to hand, if they are not now headed off. They 
 are not now the chief danger to the purpose of 
 the Republican organization; but the most im- 
 minent danger that now threatens that purpose 
 is that insidious Douglas popular sovereignty. 
 This is the miner and sapper. While it does 
 not propose to revive the African slave-trade, 
 nor to pass a slave-code, nor to make a second 
 Dred Scott decision, it is preparing us for the 
 onslaught and charge of these ultimate enemies 
 when they shall be ready to come on, and the 
 
1859] Speech at Columbus 149 
 
 word of command for them to advance shall be 
 given. I say this Douglas popular sovereignty 
 — for there is a broad distinction, as I now un- 
 derstand it, between that article and a genuine 
 popular sovereignty. 
 
 I believe there is a genuine popular sover- 
 eignty. I think a definition of genuine popular 
 sovereignty, in the abstract, would be about this: 
 That each man shall do precisely as he pleases 
 with himself, and with all those things which ex- 
 clusively concern him. Applied to government, 
 this principle would be, that a general govern- 
 ment shall do all those things which pertain to 
 it, and all the local governments shall do pre- 
 cisely as they please in respect to those matters 
 which exclusively concern them. I understand 
 that this government of the United States, under 
 which we live, is based upon this principle; and 
 I am misunderstood if it is supposed that I have 
 any war to make upon that principle. 
 
 Now, what is Judge Douglas's popular sov- 
 ereignty? It is, as a principle, no other than 
 that if one man chooses to make a slave of an- 
 other man, neither that other man nor anybody 
 else has a right to object. Applied in govern- 
 ment, as he seeks to apply it, it is this: If, in a 
 new Territory into which a few people are be- 
 ginning to enter for the purpose of making their 
 homes, they choose to either exclude slavery 
 
150 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 from their limits or to establish it there, how- 
 ever one or the other may affect the persons to 
 be enslaved, or the infinitely greater number of 
 persons who are afterward to inhabit that Ter- 
 ritory, or the other members of the families of 
 communities, of which they are but an incipient 
 member, or the general head of the family of 
 States as parent of all — however their action 
 may affect one or the other of these, there is no 
 power or right to interfere. That is Douglas's 
 popular sovereignty applied. 
 
 He has a good deal of trouble with popular 
 sovereignty. His explanations explanatory of 
 explanations explained are interminable. The 
 most lengthy and, as I suppose, the most ma- 
 turely considered of his long series of explana- 
 tions is his great essay in "Harper's Magazine." 1 
 I will not attempt to enter on any very thorough 
 investigation of his argument as there made and 
 presented. I will nevertheless occupy a good 
 portion of your time here in drawing your at- 
 tention to certain points in it. Such of you as 
 may have read this document will have per- 
 ceived that the judge, early in the document, 
 quotes from two persons as belonging to the 
 Republican party, without naming them, but 
 who can readily be recognized as being Gov- 
 ernor Seward, of New York, and myself. It is 
 
 1 " Harper's Magazine " for September, 1859. 
 
1859] Speech at Columbus 151 
 
 true that exactly fifteen months ago this day, I 
 believe, I for the first time expressed a senti- 
 ment upon this subject, and in such a manner 
 that it should get into print, that the public 
 might see it beyond the circle of my hearers, 
 and my expression of it at that time is the quota- 
 tion that Judge Douglas makes. He has not 
 made the quotation with accuracy, but justice 
 to him requires me to say that it is sufficiently 
 accurate not to change its sense. 
 
 The sense of that quotation condensed is this 
 — that this slavery element is a durable element 
 of discord among us, and that we shall probably 
 not have perfect peace in this country with it 
 until it either masters the free principle in our 
 government, or is so far mastered by the free 
 principle as for the public mind to rest in the 
 belief that it is going to its end. This senti- 
 ment which I now express in this way was, at 
 no great distance of time, perhaps in different 
 language, and in connection with some collateral 
 ideas, expressed by Governor Seward. Judge 
 Douglas has been so much annoyed by the ex- 
 pression of that sentiment that he has constantly, 
 I believe, in almost all his speeches since it was 
 uttered, been referring to it. I find he alluded 
 to it in his speech here, as well as in the copy- 
 right essay. I do not now enter upon this for 
 the purpose of making an elaborate argument 
 
152 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 to show that we were right in the expression of 
 that sentiment. I only ask your attention to 
 this matter for the purpose of making one or 
 two points upon it. 
 
 If you will read the copyright essay, you will 
 discover that Judge Douglas himself says a con- 
 troversy between the American colonies and the 
 government of Great Britain began on the slav- 
 ery question in 1699, and continued from that 
 time until the Revolution; and, while he did 
 not say so, we all know that it has continued 
 with more or less violence ever since the Revo- 
 lution. 
 
 Then we need not appeal to history, to the 
 declaration of the framers of the government, 
 but we know from Judge Douglas himself that 
 slavery began to be an element of discord among 
 the white people of this country as far back as 
 1699, or one hundred and sixty years ago, or 
 five generations of men — counting thirty years 
 to a generation. Now it would seem to me that 
 it might have occurred to Judge Douglas, or to 
 anybody who had turned his attention to these 
 facts, that there was something in the nature of 
 that thing, slavery, somewhat durable for mis- 
 chief and discord. 
 
 There is another point I desire to make in 
 regard to this matter before I leave it. From 
 the adoption of the Constitution down to 1820 
 
1859] Speech at Columbus 153 
 
 is the precise period of our history when we had 
 comparative peace upon this question — the pre- 
 cise period of time when we came nearer to 
 having peace about it than any other time of that 
 entire one hundred and sixty years, in which he 
 says it began, or of the eighty years of our own 
 Constitution. Then it would be worth our 
 while to stop and examine into the probable rea- 
 son of our coming nearer to having peace then 
 than at any other time. This was the precise 
 period of time in which our fathers adopted, 
 and during which they followed, a policy re- 
 stricting the spread of slavery, and the whole 
 Union was acquiescing in it. The whole coun- 
 try looked forward to the ultimate extinction of 
 the institution. It was when a policy had been 
 adopted and was prevailing, which led all just 
 and right-minded men to suppose that slavery 
 was gradually coming to an end, and that they 
 might be quiet about it, watching it as it ex- 
 pired. I think Judge Douglas might have per- 
 ceived that too, and, whether he did or not, it 
 is worth the attention of fair-minded men, here 
 and elsewhere, to consider whether that is not 
 the truth of the case. If he had looked at these 
 two facts, that this matter has been an element 
 of discord for one hundred and sixty years 
 among this people, and that the only compara- 
 tive peace we have had about it was when that 
 
154 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 policy prevailed in this government, which he 
 now wars upon, he might then, perhaps, have 
 been brought to a more just appreciation of 
 what I said fifteen months ago — that "a house 
 divided against itself cannot stand. I believe 
 this government cannot endure permanently 
 half slave and half free. I do not expect the 
 Union to be dissolved — I do not expect the 
 house to fall ; but I do expect it will cease to be 
 divided. It will become all one thing or all 
 the other. Either the opponents of slavery will 
 arrest the further spread of it, and place it 
 where the public mind will rest in the belief 
 that it is in the course of ultimate extinction, or 
 its advocates will push it forward, until it shall 
 become alike lawful in all the States, old as well 
 as new, North as well as South." 
 
 That was my sentiment at that time. In con- 
 nection with it I said, "We are now far into the 
 fifth year since a policy was initiated with the 
 avowed object and confident promise of putting 
 an end to slavery agitation. Under Jhe opera- 
 tion of that policy, that agitation has not only not 
 ceased, but has constantly augmented." I now 
 say to you here that we are advanced still farther 
 into the sixth year since that policy of Judge 
 Douglas — that popular sovereignty of his for 
 quieting the slavery question — was made the 
 national policy. Fifteen months more have 
 
1859] Speech at Columbus 155 
 
 been added since I uttered that sentiment, and 
 I call upon you, and all other right-minded 
 men, to say whether those fifteen months have 
 belied or corroborated my words. 
 
 While I am here upon this subject, I cannot 
 but express gratitude that the true view of this 
 element of discord among us — as I believe it is 
 — is attracting more and more attention. I do 
 not believe that Governor Seward uttered that 
 sentiment because I had done so before, but be- 
 cause he reflected upon this subject, and saw the 
 truth of it. Nor do I believe, because Governor 
 Seward or I uttered it, that Mr. Hickman, of 
 Pennsylvania, in different language, since that 
 time, has declared his belief in the utter antago- 
 nism which exists between the principles of lib- 
 erty and slavery. You see we are multiplying. 
 Now, while I am speaking of Hickman, let me 
 say, I know but little about him. I have never 
 seen him, and know scarcely anything about the 
 man; but I will say this much about him: Of 
 all the anti-Lecompton Democracy that have 
 been brought to my notice, he alone has the true, 
 genuine ring of the metal. And now, without 
 indorsing anything else he has said, I will ask 
 this audience to give three cheers for Hickman. 
 [The audience responded with three rousing 
 cheers for Hickman.] 
 
 Another point in the copyright essay to which 
 
156 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 I would ask your attention is rather a feature to 
 be extracted from the whole thing, than from 
 any express declaration of it at any point. It 
 is a general feature of that document, and in- 
 deed, of all of Judge Douglas's discussions of 
 this question, that the Territories of the United 
 States and the States of this Union are exactly 
 alike — that there is no difference between them 
 at all — that the Constitution applies to the Ter- 
 ritories precisely as it does to the States — and 
 that the United States Government, under the 
 Constitution, may not do in a State what it may 
 not do in a Territory, and what it must do in a 
 State, it must do in a Territory. Gentlemen, is 
 that a true view of the case? It is necessary 
 for this squatter sovereignty; but is it true? 
 
 Let us consider. What does it depend upon? 
 It depends altogether upon the proposition that 
 the States must, without the interference of the 
 General Government, do all those things that 
 pertain exclusively to themselves — that are local 
 in their nature, that have no connection with 
 the General Government. After Judge Doug- 
 las has established this proposition, which no- 
 body disputes or ever has disputed, he proceeds 
 to assume, without proving it, that slavery is 
 one of those little, unimportant, trivial matters, 
 which are of just about as much consequence 
 as the question would be to me whether my 
 
1859] Speech at Columbus 157 
 
 neighbor should raise horned cattle or plant to- 
 bacco; that there is no moral question about it, 
 but that it is altogether a matter of dollars and 
 cents ; that when a new Territory is opened for 
 settlement, the first man who goes into it may 
 plant there a thing which, like the Canada this- 
 tle, or some other of those pests of the soil, can- 
 not be dug out by the millions of men who will 
 come thereafter; that it is one of those little 
 things that is so trivial in its nature that it has 
 no effect upon anybody save the few men who 
 first plant upon the soil; that it is not a thing 
 which in any way affects the family of com- 
 munities composing these States, nor any way 
 endangers the General Government. Judge 
 Douglas ignores altogether the very well-known 
 fact that we have never had a serious menace 
 to our political existence, except it sprang from 
 this thing, which he chooses to regard as only 
 upon a par with onions and potatoes. 
 
 Turn it, and contemplate it in another view. 
 He says that, according to his popular sover- 
 eignty, the General Government may give to 
 the Territories governors, judges, marshals, sec- 
 retaries, and all the other chief men to govern 
 them, but they must not touch upon this other 
 question. Why? The question of who shall 
 be governor of a Territory for a year or two, and 
 pass away, without his track being left upon the 
 
158 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 soil, or an act which he did for good or for evil 
 being left behind, is a question of vast national 
 magnitude. It is so much opposed in its nature 
 to locality that the nation itself must decide it; 
 while this other matter of planting slavery upon 
 a soil — a thing which, once planted, cannot be 
 eradicated by the succeeding millions who have 
 as much right there as the first comers, or if 
 eradicated, not without infinite difficulty and a 
 long struggle — he considers the power to pro- 
 hibit it as one of these little, local, trivial things 
 that the nation ought not to say a word about; 
 that it affects nobody save the few men who are 
 there. 
 
 Take these two things and consider them to- 
 gether, present the question of planting a State 
 with the institution of slavery by the side of a 
 question of who shall be governor of Kansas 
 for a year or two, and is there a man here — is 
 there a man on earth — who would not say the 
 governor question is the little one, and the slav- 
 ery question is the great one? I ask any honest 
 Democrat if the small, the local, and the trivial 
 and temporary question is not, Who shall be 
 governor? — while the durable, the important, 
 and the mischievous one is, Shall this soil be 
 planted with slavery? 
 
 This is an idea, I suppose, which has arisen 
 in Judge Douglas's mind from his peculiar 
 
1859] Speech at Columbus 159 
 
 structure. I suppose the institution of slavery 
 really looks small to him. He is so put up by 
 nature that a lash upon his back would hurt him, 
 but a lash upon anybody else's back does not 
 hurt him. That is the build of the man, and 
 consequently he looks upon the matter of slavery 
 in this unimportant light. 
 
 Judge Douglas ought to remember, when he 
 is endeavoring to force this policy upon the 
 American people, that while he is put up in 
 that way, a good many are not. He ought to 
 remember that there was once in this country a 
 man by the name of Thomas Jefferson, supposed 
 to be a Democrat — a man whose principles and 
 policy are not very prevalent amongst Demo- 
 crats to-day, it is true; but that man did not take 
 exactly this view of the insignificance of the ele- 
 ment of slavery which our friend Judge Doug- 
 las does. In contemplation of this thing, we 
 all know he was led to exclaim, "I tremble for 
 my country when I remember that God is just!" 
 We know how he looked upon it when he thus 
 expressed himself. There was danger to this 
 country, danger of the avenging justice of God, 
 in that little unimportant popular-sovereignty 
 question of Judge Douglas. He supposed there 
 was a question of God's eternal justice wrapped 
 up in the enslaving of any race of men, or any 
 man, and that those who did so braved the arm 
 
160 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 of Jehovah — that when a nation thus dared the 
 Almighty, every friend of that nation had cause 
 to dread his wrath. Choose ye between Jeffer- 
 son and Douglas as to what is the true view of 
 this element among us. 
 
 There is another little difficulty about this 
 matter of treating the Territories and States 
 alike in all things, to which I ask your attention, 
 and I shall leave this branch of the case. If 
 there is no difference between them, why not 
 make the Territories States at once? What is 
 the reason that Kansas was not fit to come into 
 the Union when it was organized into a Terri- 
 tory, in Judge Douglas's view? Can any of you 
 tell any reason why it should not have come into 
 the Union at once? 
 
 They are fit, as he thinks, to decide upon the 
 slavery question — the largest and most impor- 
 tant with which they could possibly deal ; what 
 could they do by coming into the Union that they 
 are not fit to do, according to his view, by stay- 
 ing out of it? Oh, they are not fit to sit in 
 Congress and decide upon the rates of postage, 
 or questions of ad valorem or specific duties on 
 foreign goods, or live-oak timber contracts; they 
 are not fit to decide these vastly important mat- 
 ters, which are national in their import, but they 
 are fit, "from the jump," to decide this little 
 negro question. But, gentlemen, the case is too 
 
1859] Speech at Columbus 161 
 
 plain; I occupy too much time on this head, and 
 I pass on. 
 
 Near the close of the copyright essay, the 
 judge, I think, comes very near kicking his own 
 fat into the fire. I did not think when I com- 
 menced these remarks that I would read from 
 that article, but I now believe I will: 
 
 This exposition of the history of these measures 
 shows conclusively that the authors of the compro- 
 mise measures of 1850, and of the Kansas-Nebraska 
 act of 1854, as well as the members of the Continen- 
 tal Congress in 1774, and the founders of our sys- 
 tem of government subsequent to the Revolution, re- 
 garded the people of the Territories and Colonies as 
 political communities which were entitled to a free 
 and exclusive power of legislation in their provincial 
 legislatures, where their representation could alone 
 be preserved, in all cases of taxation and internal 
 polity. 
 
 When the judge saw that putting in the word 
 "slavery" would contradict his own history, he 
 put in what he knew would pass as synonymous 
 with it — "internal polity." Whenever we find 
 that in one of his speeches, the substitute is used 
 in this manner; and I can tell you the reason. 
 It would be too bald a contradiction to say slav- 
 ery, but "internal polity" is a general phrase 
 which would pass in some quarters, and which 
 
1 62 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 he hopes will pass with the reading community, 
 for the same thing. 
 
 This right pertains to the people collectively, as a 
 law-abiding and peaceful community, and not to the 
 isolated individuals who may wander upon the pub- 
 lic domain in violation of law. It can only be exer- 
 cised where there are inhabitants sufficient to consti- 
 tute a government, and capable of performing its 
 various functions and duties, a fact to be ascertained 
 and determined by — 
 
 Who do you think? Judge Douglas says, "By 
 Congress." 
 
 Whether the number shall be fixed at ten, fifteen, 
 or twenty thousand inhabitants does not affect the 
 principle. 
 
 Now I have only a few comments to make. 
 Popular sovereignty, by his own words, does not 
 pertain to the few persons who wander upon 
 the public domain in violation of law. We have 
 his words for that. When it does pertain to 
 them is when they are sufficient to be formed 
 into an organized political community, and he 
 fixes the minimum for that at 10,000, and the 
 maximum at 20,000. Now I would like to know 
 what is to be done with the 9,000? Are they 
 all to be treated, until they are large enough to 
 be organized into a political community, as 
 
1859] Speech at Columbus 163 
 
 wanderers upon the public land in violation of 
 law? And if so treated and driven out, at what 
 point of time would there ever be ten thousand? 
 If they were not driven out, but remained there 
 as trespassers upon the public land in violation 
 of the law, can they establish slavery there? 
 No; the judge says popular sovereignty don't 
 pertain to them then. Can they exclude it then? 
 No; popular sovereignty don't pertain to them 
 then. I would like to know, in the case covered 
 by the essay, what condition the people of the 
 Territory are in before they reach the number 
 of ten thousand? 
 
 But the main point I wish to ask attention to 
 is that the question as to when they shall have 
 reached a sufficient number to be formed into a 
 regular organized community is to be decided 
 "by Congress." Judge Douglas says so. Well, 
 gentlemen, that is about all we want. No; that 
 is all the Southerners want. That is what all 
 those who are for slavery want. They do not 
 want Congress to prohibit slavery from coming 
 into the new Territories, and they do not want 
 popular sovereignty to hinder it; and as Con- 
 gress is to say when they are ready to be organ- 
 ized, all that the South has to do is to get Con- 
 gress to hold off. Let Congress hold off until 
 they are ready to be admitted as a State, and the 
 South has all it wants in taking slavery into and 
 
164 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 planting it in all the Territories that we now 
 have, or hereafter may have. In a word, the 
 whole thing, at a dash of the pen, is at last put 
 in the power of Congress; for if they do not 
 have this popular sovereignty until Congress 
 organizes them, I ask if it at last does not come 
 from Congress? If, at last, it amounts to any- 
 thing at all, Congress gives it to them. I sub- 
 mit this rather for your reflection than for com- 
 ment. After all that is said, at last, by a dash 
 of the pen, everything that has gone before is 
 undone, and he puts the whole question under 
 the control of Congress. After fighting through 
 more than three hours, if you will undertake to 
 read it, he at last places the whole matter under 
 the control of that power which he had been 
 contending against, and arrives at a result di- 
 rectly contrary to what he had been laboring to 
 do. He at last leaves the whole matter to the 
 control of Congress. 
 
 There are two main objects, as I understand 
 it, of this "Harper's Magazine" essay. One was 
 to show, if possible, that the men of our Revo- 
 lutionary times were in favor of his popular sov- 
 ereignty; and the other was to show that the 
 Dred Scott decision had not entirely squelched 
 out this popular sovereignty. I do not propose, 
 in regard to this argument drawn from the his- 
 tory of former times, to enter into a detailed ex- 
 
1859] Speech at Columbus 165 
 
 amination of the historical statements he has 
 made. I have the impression that they are in- 
 accurate in a great many instances; sometimes 
 in positive statement, but very much more in- 
 accurate by the suppression of statements that 
 really belong to the history. But I do not pro- 
 pose to affirm that this is so to any very great 
 extent, or to enter into a very minute examina- 
 tion of his historical statements. I avoid doing 
 so upon this principle — that if it were impor- 
 tant for me to pass out of this lot in the least 
 period of time possible, and I came to that fence 
 and saw by a calculation of my own strength 
 and agility that I could clear it at a bound, it 
 would be folly for me to stop and consider 
 whether I could or could not crawl through a 
 crack. So I say of the whole history contained 
 in his essay, where he endeavored to link the 
 men of the Revolution to popular sovereignty. 
 It only requires an effort to leap out of it — a 
 single bound to be entirely successful. If you 
 read it over you will find that he quotes here and 
 there from documents of the Revolutionary 
 times, tending to show that the people of the 
 colonies were desirous of regulating their own 
 concerns in their own way, that the British Gov- 
 ernment should not interfere; that at one time 
 they struggled with the British Government to 
 be permitted to exclude the African slave-trade; 
 
1 66 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 if not directly, to be permitted to exclude it in- 
 directly by taxation sufficient to discourage and 
 destroy it. From these and many things of this 
 sort, Judge Douglas argues that they were in 
 favor of the people of our own Territories ex- 
 cluding slavery if they wanted to, or planting 
 it there if they wanted to, doing just as they 
 pleased from the time they settled upon the Ter- 
 ritory. Now, however his history may apply, 
 and whatever of his argument there may be that 
 is sound and accurate or unsound and inaccurate, 
 if we can find out what these men did them- 
 selves do upon this very question of slavery in 
 the Territories, does it not end the whole thing? 
 If, after all this labor and effort to show that the 
 men of the Revolution were in favor of his pop- 
 ular sovereignty and his mode of dealing with 
 slavery in the Territories, we can show that these 
 very men took hold of that subject, and dealt 
 with it, we can see for ourselves how they dealt 
 with it. It is not a matter of argument or in- 
 ference, but we know what they thought about 
 it. 
 
 It is precisely upon that part of the history 
 of the country that one important omission is 
 made by Judge Douglas. He selects parts of 
 the history of the United States upon the sub- 
 ject of slavery, and treats it as the whole, omit- 
 ting from his historical sketch the legislation of 
 
1859] Speech at Columbus 167 
 
 Congress in regard to the admission of Missouri, 
 by which the Missouri Compromise was estab- 
 lished, and slavery excluded from a country half 
 as large as the present United States. All this 
 is left out of his history, and in no wise alluded 
 to by him, so far as I can remember, save once, 
 when he makes a remark, that upon his prin- 
 ciple the Supreme Court was authorized to pro- 
 nounce a decision that the act called the Mis- 
 souri Compromise was unconstitutional. All 
 that history has been left out. But this part of 
 the history of the country was not made by the 
 men of the Revolution. 
 
 There was another part of our political his- 
 tory made by the very men who were the actors 
 in the Revolution, which has taken the name of 
 the ordinance of '87. Let me bring that history 
 to your attention. In 1784, I believe, this same 
 Mr. Jefferson drew up an ordinance for the 
 government of the country upon which we now 
 stand; or rather a frame or draft of an ordinance 
 for the government of this country, here in Ohio, 
 our neighbors in Indiana, us who live in Illinois, 
 and our neighbors in Wisconsin and Michigan. 
 In that ordinance, drawn up not only for the 
 government of that Territory, but for the Terri- 
 tories south of the Ohio River, Mr. Jefferson ex- 
 pressly provided for the prohibition of slavery. 
 Judge Douglas says, and perhaps he is right, that 
 
1 68 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 that provision was lost from that ordinance. I 
 believe that is true. When the vote was taken 
 upon it, a majority of all present in the Congress 
 of the Confederation voted for it; but there were 
 so many absentees that those voting for it did not 
 make the clear majority necessary, and it was 
 lost. But three years after that the Congress 
 of the Confederation were together again, and 
 they adopted a new ordinance for the govern- 
 ment of this Northwest Territory, not contem- 
 plating territory south of the river, for the States 
 owning that territory had hitherto refrained 
 from giving it to the General Government; 
 hence they made the ordinance to apply only to 
 what the government owned. In that, the pro- 
 vision excluding slavery was inserted and passed 
 unanimously, or at any rate it passed and be- 
 came a part of the law of the land. Under that 
 ordinance we live. First, here, in Ohio, you 
 were a Territory, then an enabling act 
 was passed, authorizing you to form a 
 constitution and State government, provided 
 it was Republican, and not in conflict 
 with the ordinance of '87. When you framed 
 your constitution and presented it for admission, 
 I think you will find the legislation upon the 
 subject will show that, "whereas you had formed 
 a constitution that was Republican, and not in 
 conflict with the ordinance of '87," therefore 
 
1859] Speech at Columbus 169 
 
 you were admitted upon equal footing with the 
 original States. The same process in a few years 
 was gone through with Indiana, and so with 
 Illinois, and the same substantially with Michi- 
 gan and Wisconsin. 
 
 Not only did that ordinance prevail, but it 
 was constantly looked to whenever a step was 
 taken by a new Territory to become a State. 
 Congress always turned their attention to it, and 
 in all their movements upon this subject they 
 traced their course by that ordinance of '87. 
 When they admitted new States they advised 
 them of this ordinance as a part of the legis- 
 lation of the country. They did so because they 
 had traced the ordinance of '87 throughout the 
 history of this country. Begin with the men 
 of the Revolution, and go down for sixty entire 
 years, and until the last scrap of that Territory 
 comes into the Union in the form of the State 
 of Wisconsin, everything was made to conform 
 to the ordinance of '87, excluding slavery from 
 that vast extent of country. 
 
 I omitted to mention in the right place that 
 the Constitution of the United States was in 
 process of being framed when that ordinance 
 was made by the Congress of the Confederation; 
 and one of the first acts of Congress itself, un- 
 der the new Constitution itself, was to give force 
 to that ordinance by putting power to carry it 
 
170 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 out into the hands of new officers under the Con- 
 stitution, in the place of the old ones, who had 
 been legislated out of existence by the change 
 in the government from the Confederation to 
 the Constitution. Not only so, but I believe 
 Indiana once or twice, if not Ohio, petitioned 
 the General Government for the privilege of 
 suspending that provision and allowing them to 
 have slaves. A report made by Mr. Randolph, 
 of Virginia, himself a slaveholder, was directly 
 against it, and the action was to refuse them the 
 privilege of violating the ordinance of '87. 
 
 This period of history, which I have run over 
 briefly, is, I presume, as familiar to most of this 
 assembly as any other part of the history of our 
 country. I suppose that few of my hearers are 
 not as familiar with that part of history as I am, 
 and I only mention it to recall your attention to 
 it at this time. And hence I ask how extraor- 
 dinary a thing it is that a man who has occupied 
 a position upon the floor of the Senate of the 
 United States, who is now in his third term, and 
 who looks to see the government of this whole 
 country fall into his own hands, pretending to 
 give a truthful and accurate history of the sla- 
 very question in this country, should so entirely 
 ignore the whole of that portion of our history 
 — the most important of all. Is it not a most 
 extraordinary spectacle, that a man should stand 
 
1 859] Speech at Columbus 171 
 
 up and ask for any confidence in his statements, 
 who sets out as he does with portions of history, 
 calling upon the people to believe that it is a 
 true and fair representation, when the leading 
 part and controlling feature of the whole history 
 is carefully suppressed? 
 
 But the mere leaving out is not the most re- 
 markable feature of this most remarkable essay. 
 His proposition is to establish that the leading 
 men of the Revolution were for his great prin- 
 ciple of non-intervention by the government in 
 the question of slavery in the Territories; while 
 history shows that they decided in the cases actu- 
 ally brought before them in exactly the con- 
 trary way, and he knows it. Not only did they 
 so decide at that time, but they stuck to it during 
 sixty years, through thick and thin, as long as 
 there was one of the Revolutionary heroes upon 
 the stage of political action. Through their 
 whole course, from first to last, they clung to 
 freedom. And now he asks the community to 
 believe that the men of the Revolution were in 
 favor of his great principle, when we have the 
 naked history that they themselves dealt with 
 this very subject-matter of his principle, and ut- 
 terly repudiated his principle, acting upon a 
 precisely contrary ground. It is as impudent 
 and absurd as if a prosecuting attorney should 
 stand up before a jury, and ask them to convict 
 
172 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 A as the murderer of B, while B was walking 
 alive before them. 
 
 I say again, if Judge Douglas asserts that the 
 men of the Revolution acted upon principles by 
 which, to be consistent with themselves, they 
 ought to have adopted his popular sovereignty, 
 then, upon a consideration of his own argument, 
 he had a right to make you believe that they 
 understood the principles of government, but 
 misapplied them — that he has arisen to enlighten 
 the world as to the just application of this prin- 
 ciple. He has a right to try to persuade you 
 that he understands their principles better than 
 they did, and therefore he will apply them now, 
 not as they did, but as they ought to have done. 
 He has a right to go before the community, and 
 try to convince them of this ; but he has no right 
 to attempt to impose upon any one the belief 
 that these men themselves approved of his great 
 principles. There are two ways of establishing 
 a proposition. One is by trying to demonstrate 
 it upon reason, and the other is, to show that 
 great men in former times have thought so and 
 so, and thus to pass it by the weight of pure au- 
 thority. Now, if Judge Douglas will demon- 
 strate somehow that this is popular sovereignty 
 — the right of one man to make a slave of an- 
 other, without any right in that other, or any 
 one else, to object, — demonstrate it as Euclid de- 
 
1859] Speech at Columbus 173 
 
 monstrated propositions, — there is no objection. 
 But when he comes forward, seeking to carry a 
 principle by bringing to it the authority of men 
 who themselves utterly repudiate that principle, 
 I ask that he shall not be permitted to do it. 
 
 I see, in the judge's speech here, a short sen- 
 tence in these words: "Our fathers, when they 
 formed this government under which we live, 
 understood this question just as well and even 
 better than we do now." This is true; I stick 
 to that. I will stand by Judge Douglas in that 
 to the bitter end. And now, Judge Douglas, 
 come and stand by me, and truthfully show how 
 they acted, understanding it better than we do. 
 All I ask of you, Judge Douglas, is to stick to 
 the proposition that the men of the Revolution 
 understood this subject better than we do now, 
 and with that better understanding they acted 
 better than you are trying to act now. 
 
 I wish to say something now in regard to the 
 Dred Scott decision, as dealt with by Judge 
 Douglas. In that "memorable debate" between 
 Judge Douglas and myself, last year, the judge 
 thought fit to commence a process of catechizing 
 me, and at Freeport I answered his questions, 
 and propounded some to him. Among others 
 propounded to him was one that I have here 
 now. The substance, as I remember it, is: "Can 
 the people of a United States Territory, under 
 
174 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 the Dred Scott decision, in any lawful way, 
 against the wish of any citizen of the United 
 States, exclude slavery from its limits, prior to 
 the formation of a State constitution?" He an- 
 swered that they could lawfully exclude slavery 
 from the United States Territories, notwith- 
 standing the Dred Scott decision. There was 
 something about that answer that has probably 
 been a trouble to the judge ever since. 
 
 The Dred Scott decision expressly gives every 
 citizen of the United States a right to carry his 
 slaves into the United States Territories. And 
 now there was some inconsistency in saying that 
 the decision was right, and saying, too, that the 
 people of the Territory could lawfully drive 
 slavery out again. When all the trash, the words, 
 the collateral matter, was cleared away from it, 
 — all the chaff was fanned out of it, — it was a 
 bare absurdity; no less than that a thing may be 
 lawfully driven away from where it has a law- 
 ful right to be. Clear it of all the verbiage, 
 and that is the naked truth of his proposition — 
 that a thing may be lawfully driven from the 
 place where it has a lawful right to stay. Well, 
 it was because the judge could n't help seeing 
 this that he has had so much trouble with it; 
 and what I want to ask your especial attention 
 to, just now, is to remind you, if you have not 
 noticed the fact, that the judge does not any 
 
1859] Speech at Columbus 175 
 
 longer say that the people can exclude slavery. 
 He does not say so in the copyright essay; he did 
 not say so in the speech that he made here; and, 
 so far as I know, since his reelection to the Sen- 
 ate, he has never said, as he did at Freeport, that 
 the people of the Territories can exclude slavery. 
 He desires that you, who wish the Territories 
 to remain free, should believe that he stands by 
 that position, but he does not say it himself. He 
 escapes, to some extent, the absurd position I 
 have stated by changing his language entirely. 
 What he says now is something different in lan- 
 guage, and we will consider whether it is not 
 different in sense too. 
 
 It is now that the Dred Scott decision, or 
 rather the Constitution under that decision, does 
 not carry slavery into the Territories beyond 
 the power of the people of the Territories to 
 control it as other property. He does not say 
 the people can drive it out, but they can con- 
 trol it as other property. The language is dif- 
 ferent; we should consider whether the sense 
 is different. Driving a horse out of this lot 
 is too plain a proposition to be mistaken about; 
 it is putting him on the other side of the fence. 
 Or it might be a sort of exclusion of him from 
 the lot if you were to kill him and let the 
 worms devour him; but neither of these things 
 is the same as "controlling him as other prop- 
 
176 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 erty." That would be to feed him, to pamper 
 him, to ride him, to use and abuse him, to make 
 the most money out of him, "as other property" ; 
 but, please you, what do the men who are in 
 favor of slavery want more than this? What 
 do they really want, other than that slavery, be- 
 ing in the Territories, shall be controlled as other 
 property? 
 
 If they want anything else, I do not compre- 
 hend it. I ask your attention to this, first, for 
 the purpose of pointing out the change of ground 
 the judge has made; and, in the second place, 
 the importance of the change — that that change 
 is not such as to give you gentlemen who want 
 his popular sovereignty the power to exclude the 
 institution or drive it out at all. I know the 
 judge sometimes squints at the argument that 
 in controlling it as other property by unfriendly 
 legislation they may control it to death, as you 
 might in the case of a horse, perhaps, feed him 
 so lightly and ride him so much that he would 
 die. But when you come to legislative control, 
 there is something more to be attended to. I 
 have no doubt, myself, that if the Territories 
 should undertake to control slave property as 
 other property — that is, control it in such a way 
 that it would be the most valuable as property, 
 and make it bear its just proportion in the way 
 of burdens as property, — really deal with it as 
 
18S9] Speech at Columbus 177 
 
 property, — the Supreme Court of the United 
 States will say, "God speed you, and amen." 
 But I undertake to give the opinion, at least, 
 that if the Territories attempt by any direct leg- 
 islation to drive the man with his slave out of 
 the Territory, or to decide that his slave is free 
 because of his being taken in there, or to 
 tax him to such an extent that he cannot keep 
 him there, the Supreme Court will unhesita- 
 tingly decide all such legislation unconstitu- 
 tional, as long as that Supreme Court is con- 
 structed as the Dred Scott Supreme Court is. 
 The first two things they have already decided, 
 except that there is a little quibble among law- 
 yers between the words dicta and decision. 
 They have already decided that a negro cannot 
 be made free by territorial legislation. 
 
 What is that Dred Scott decision? Judge 
 Douglas labors to show that it is one thing, 
 while I think it is altogether different. It is a 
 long opinion, but it is all embodied in this short 
 statement: "The Constitution of the United 
 States forbids Congress to deprive a man of his 
 property without due process of law; the right 
 of property in slaves is distinctly and expressly 
 affirmed in that Constitution; therefore if Con- 
 gress shall undertake to say that a man's slave 
 is no longer his slave when he crosses a certain 
 line into a Territory, that is depriving him of 
 
178 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 his property without due process of law, and is 
 unconstitutional." There is the whole Dred 
 Scott decision. They add that if Congress can- 
 not do so itself, Congress cannot confer any 
 power to do so, and hence any effort by the ter- 
 ritorial legislature to do either of these things 
 is absolutely decided against. It is a foregone 
 conclusion by that court. 
 
 Now, as to this indirect mode by "unfriendly 
 legislation," all lawyers here will readily un- 
 derstand that such a proposition cannot be toler- 
 ated for a moment, because a legislature cannot 
 indirectly do that which it cannot accomplish 
 directly. Then I say any legislation to control 
 this property, as property, for its benefit as prop- 
 erty, would be hailed by this Dred Scott Su- 
 preme Court, and fully sustained; but any leg- 
 islation driving slave property out, or destroy- 
 ing it as property, directly or indirectly, will 
 most assuredly by that court be held unconsti- 
 tutional. 
 
 Judge Douglas says that if the Constitution 
 carries slavery into the Territories, beyond the 
 power of the people of the Territories to control 
 it as other property, then it follows logically 
 that every one who swears to support the Con- 
 stitution of the United States must give that sup- 
 port to that property which it needs. And if 
 the Constitution carries slavery into the Terri- 
 
i8s9] Speech at Columbus 179 
 
 tories beyond the power of the people to control 
 it as other property, then it also carries it into 
 the States, because the Constitution is the su- 
 preme law of the land. Now, gentlemen, if it 
 were not for my excessive modesty I would say 
 that I told that very thing to Judge Douglas 
 quite a year ago. This argument is here in 
 print, and if it were not for my modesty, as I 
 said, I might call your attention to it. If you 
 read it, you will find that I not only made that 
 argument, but made it better than he has made 
 it since. 
 
 There is, however, this difference. I say now, 
 and said then, there is no sort of question that 
 the Supreme Court has decided that it is the 
 right of the slaveholder to take his slave and 
 hold him in the Territory; and, saying this, 
 Judge Douglas himself admits the conclusion. 
 He says if that is so, this consequence will fol- 
 low; and because this consequence would follow, 
 his argument is, the decision cannot therefore be 
 that way — "that would spoil my popular sov- 
 ereignty, and it cannot be possible that this great 
 principle has been squelched out in this extra- 
 ordinary way. It might be, if it were not for 
 the extraordinary consequences of spoiling my 
 humbug." 
 
 Another feature of the judge's argument 
 about the Dred Scott case is an effort to show 
 
180 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 that that decision deals altogether in declarations 
 of negatives; that the Constitution does not af- 
 firm anything as expounded by the Dred Scott 
 decision, but it only declares a want of power, 
 a total absence of power, in reference to the Ter- 
 ritories. It seems to be his purpose to make 
 the whole of that decision to result in a mere 
 negative declaration of a want of power in Con- 
 gress to do anything in relation to this matter 
 in the Territories. I know the opinion of the 
 judges states that there is a total absence of 
 power; but that is, unfortunately, not all it 
 states; for the judges add that the right of prop- 
 erty in a slave is distinctly and expressly affirmed 
 in the Constitution. It does not stop at saying 
 that the right of property in a slave is recog- 
 nized in the Constitution, is declared to exist 
 somewhere in the Constitution, but says it is af- 
 firmed in the Constitution. Its language is 
 equivalent to saying that it is embodied and so 
 woven into that instrument that it cannot be de- 
 tached without breaking the Constitution itself, 
 — in a word, it is a part of the Constitution. 
 
 Douglas is singularly unfortunate in his ef- 
 fort to make out that decision to be altogether 
 negative, when the express language at the vital 
 part is that this is distinctly affirmed in the Con- 
 stitution. I think myself, and I repeat it here, 
 that this decision does not merely carry slavery 
 
1859] Speech at Columbus 181 
 
 into the Territories, but by its logical conclu- 
 sion it carries it into the States in which we live. 
 One provision of that Constitution is, that it 
 shall be the supreme law of the land, — I do not 
 quote the language, — any constitution or law of 
 any State to the contrary notwithstanding. This 
 Dred Scott decision says that the right of prop- 
 erty in a slave is affirmed in that Constitution 
 which is the supreme law of the land, any State 
 constitution or law notwithstanding. Then I 
 say that to destroy a thing which is distinctly 
 affirmed and supported by the supreme law of 
 the land, even by a State constitution or law, is 
 a violation of that supreme law, and there is 
 no escape from it. In my judgment there is no 
 avoiding that result, save that the American peo- 
 ple shall see that State constitutions are better 
 construed than our Constitution is construed in 
 that decision. They must take care that it is 
 more faithfully and truly carried out than it 
 is there expounded. 
 
 I must hasten to a conclusion. Near the be- 
 ginning of my remarks I said that this insidious 
 Douglas popular sovereignty is the measure that 
 now threatens the purpose of the Republican 
 party to prevent slavery from being nationalized 
 in the United States. I propose to ask your at- 
 tention for a little while to some propositions 
 in affirmance of that statement. Take it just 
 
1 82 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 as it stands, and apply it as a principle; extend 
 and apply that principle elsewhere, and consider 
 where it will lead you. I now put this propo- 
 sition, that Judge Douglas's popular sover- 
 eignty applied will reopen the African slave- 
 trade; and I will demonstrate it by any variety 
 of ways in which you can turn the subject or 
 look at it. 
 
 The judge says that the people of the Terri- 
 tories have the right, by his principle, to have 
 slaves if they want them. Then I say that the 
 people in Georgia have the right to buy slaves 
 in Africa if they want them, and I defy any man 
 on earth to show any distinction between the 
 two things — to show that the one is either more 
 wicked or more unlawful; to show, on original 
 principles, that one is better or worse than the 
 other; or to show by the Constitution that one 
 differs a whit from the other. He will tell me, 
 doubtless, that there is no constitutional provis- 
 ion against people taking slaves into the new 
 Territories, and I tell him that there is equally 
 no constitutional provision against buying slaves 
 in Africa. He will tell you that a people in 
 the exercise of popular sovereignty ought to do 
 as they please about that thing, and have slaves 
 if they want them ; and I tell you that the peo- 
 ple of Georgia are as much entitled to popular 
 sovereignty, and to buy slaves in Africa, if they 
 
1859] Speech at Columbus 183 
 
 want them, as the people of the Territory are 
 to have slaves if they want them. I ask any man, 
 dealing honestly with himself, to point out a 
 distinction. 
 
 I have recently seen a letter of Judge Doug- 
 las's, in which, without stating that to be the 
 object, he doubtless endeavors to make a distinc- 
 tion between the two. He says he is unalterably 
 opposed to the repeal of the laws against the 
 African slave-trade. And why? He then 
 seeks to give a reason that would not apply to 
 his popular sovereignty in the Territories. 
 What is that reason? "The abolition of the 
 African slave-trade is a compromise of the Con- 
 stitution." I deny it. There is no truth in the 
 proposition that the abolition of the African 
 slave-trade is a compromise of the Constitution. 
 No man can put his finger on anything in the 
 Constitution, or on the line of history, which 
 shows it. It is a mere barren assertion, made 
 simply for the purpose of getting up a distinc- 
 tion between the revival of the African slave- 
 trade and his "great principle." 
 
 At the time the Constitution of the United 
 States was adopted it was expected that the 
 slave-trade would be abolished. I should as- 
 sert, and insist upon that, if Judge Douglas de- 
 nied it. But I know that it was equally ex- 
 pected that slavery would be excluded from the 
 
184 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 Territories, and I can show by history that in 
 regard to these two things public opinion was 
 exactly alike, while in regard to positive action, 
 there was more done in the ordinance of '87 to 
 resist the spread of slavery than was ever done 
 to abolish the foreign slave-trade. Lest I be 
 misunderstood, I say again that at the time of 
 the formation of the Constitution, public expec- 
 tation was that the slave-trade would be abol- 
 ished, but no more so than that the spread of 
 slavery in the Territories should be restrained. 
 They stand alike, except that in the ordinance 
 of '87 there was a mark left by public opinion, 
 showing that it was more committed against the 
 spread of slavery in the Territories than against 
 the foreign slave-trade. 
 
 Compromise! What word of compromise was 
 there about it? Why, the public sense was then 
 in favor of the abolition of the slave-trade; but 
 there was at the time a very great commercial 
 interest involved in it, and extensive capital in 
 that branch of trade. There were doubtless the 
 incipient stages of improvement in the South 
 in the way of farming, dependent on the slave- 
 trade, and they made a proposition to Congress 
 to abolish the trade after allowing it twenty 
 years, a sufficient time for the capital and com- 
 merce engaged in it to be transferred to other 
 channels. They made no provision that it should 
 
1859] Speech at Columbus 185 
 
 be abolished in twenty years ; I do not doubt that 
 they expected it would be; but they made no 
 bargain about it. The public sentiment left no 
 doubt in the minds of any that it would be done 
 away. I repeat, there is nothing in the history 
 of those times in favor of that matter being a 
 compromise of the Constitution. It was the 
 public expectation at the time, manifested in a 
 thousand ways, that the spread of slavery should 
 also be restricted. 
 
 Then I say if this principle is established, that 
 there is no wrong in slavery, and whoever wants 
 it has a right to have it; that it is a matter of 
 dollars and cents; a sort of question as to how 
 they shall deal with brutes; that between us and 
 the negro here there is no sort of question, but 
 that at the South the question is between the 
 negro and the crocodile; that it is a mere mat- 
 ter of policy; that there is a perfect right, ac- 
 cording to interest, to do just as you please — 
 when this is done, where this doctrine prevails, 
 the miners and sappers will have formed public 
 opinion for the slave-trade. They will be ready 
 for Jeff Davis and Stephens, and other leaders 
 of that company, to sound the bugle for the re- 
 vival of the slave-trade, for the second Dred 
 Scott decision, for the flood of slavery to be 
 poured over the free States, while we shall be 
 
1 86 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 here tied down and helpless, and run over like 
 sheep. 
 
 It is to be a part and parcel of this same idea 
 to say to men who want to adhere to the Demo- 
 cratic party, who have always belonged to that 
 party, and are only looking about for some ex- 
 cuse to stick to it, but nevertheless hate slavery, 
 that Douglas's popular sovereignty is as good a 
 way as any to oppose slavery. They allow them- 
 selves to be persuaded easily, in accordance with 
 their previous dispositions, into this belief, that 
 it is about as good a way of opposing slavery as 
 any, and we can do that without straining our 
 old party ties or breaking up old political asso- 
 ciations. We can do so without being called 
 negro-worshippers. We can do that without 
 being subjected to the gibes and sneers that are 
 so readily thrown out in place of argument 
 where no argument can be found. So let us 
 stick to this popular sovereignty — this insidious 
 popular sovereignty. Now let me call your at- 
 tention to one thing that has really happened, 
 which shows this gradual and steady debauch- 
 ing of public opinion, this course of prepara- 
 tion for the revival of the slave-trade, for the 
 territorial slave-code, and the new Dred Scott 
 decision that is to carry slavery into the free 
 States. Did you ever, five years ago, hear of 
 anybody in the world saying that the negro had 
 
1859] Speech at Columbus 187 
 
 no share in the Declaration of National Inde- 
 pendence; that it did not mean negroes at all, 
 and when "all men" were spoken of negroes 
 were not included? 
 
 I am satisfied that five years ago that propo- 
 sition was not put upon paper by any living 
 being anywhere. I have been unable at any 
 time to find a man in an audience who would 
 declare that he had ever known anybody say- 
 ing so five years ago. But last year there was 
 not a "Douglas popular sovereignty" man in Il- 
 linois who did not say it. Is there one in Ohio 
 but declares his firm belief that the Declaration 
 of Independence did not mean negroes at all? 
 I do not know how this is; I have not been here 
 much; but I presume you are very much alike 
 everywhere. Then I suppose that all now ex- 
 press the belief that the Declaration of Inde- 
 pendence never did mean negroes. I call upon 
 one of them to say that he said it five years ago. 
 
 If you think that now, and did not think it 
 then, the next thing that strikes me is to remark 
 that there has been a change wrought in you, 
 and a very significant change it is, being no less 
 than changing the negro, in your estimation, 
 from the rank of a man to that of a brute. 
 They are taking him down, and placing him, 
 when spoken of, among reptiles and crocodiles, 
 as Judge Douglas himself expresses it. 
 
1 88 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 16 
 
 Is not this change wrought in your minds a 
 very important change? Public opinion in this 
 country is everything. In a nation like ours 
 this popular sovereignty and squatter sover- 
 eignty have already wrought a change in the 
 public mind to the extent I have stated. There 
 is no man in this crowd who can contradict it. 
 
 Now, if you are opposed to slavery honestly, 
 as much as anybody, I ask you to note that fact, 
 and the like of which is to follow, to be plastered 
 on, layer after layer, until very soon you are 
 prepared to deal with the negro everywhere as 
 with the brute. If public sentiment has not been 
 debauched already to this point, a new turn of 
 the screw in that direction is all that is want- 
 ing; and this is constantly being done by the 
 teachers of this insidious popular sovereignty. 
 You need but one or two turns further until your 
 minds, now ripening under these teachings, will 
 be ready for all these things, and you will re- 
 ceive and support, or submit to, the slave-trade 
 revived with all its horrors, a slave-code en- 
 forced in our Territories, and a new Dred Scott 
 decision to bring slavery up into the very heart 
 of the free North. This, I must say, is but car- 
 rying out those words prophetically spoken by 
 Mr. Clay many, many years ago, — I believe 
 more than thirty years, — when he told an audi- 
 ence that if they would repress all tendencies 
 
1859] Speech at Columbus 189 
 
 to liberty and ultimate emancipation, they must 
 go back to the era of our independence and muz- 
 zle the cannon which thundered its annual joy- 
 ous return on the Fourth of July; they must 
 blow out the moral lights around us; they must 
 penetrate the human soul, and eradicate the love 
 of liberty; but until they did these things, and 
 others eloquently enumerated by him, they could 
 not repress all tendencies to ultimate emanci- 
 pation. 
 
 I ask attention to the fact that in a preeminent 
 degree these popular sovereigns are at this work: 
 blowing out the moral lights around us ; teaching 
 that the negro is no longer a man, but a brute; 
 that the Declaration has nothing to do with him ; 
 that he ranks with the crocodile and the reptile ; 
 that man, with body and soul, is a matter of dol- 
 lars and cents. I suggest to this portion of the 
 Ohio Republicans, or Democrats, if there be any 
 present, the serious consideration of this fact, 
 that there is now going on among you a steady 
 process of debauching public opinion on this 
 subject. With this, my friends, I bid you adieu. 
 
190 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 17 
 
 Speech at Cincinnati, Ohio, September 17, 
 1859 
 
 MY FELLOW-CITIZENS of the State 
 of Ohio : This is the first time in my 
 life that I have appeared before an 
 audience in so great a city as this. I there- 
 fore — though I am no longer a young man — 
 make this appearance under some degree of 
 embarrassment. But I have found that when 
 one is embarrassed, usually the shortest way to 
 get through with it is to quit talking or think- 
 ing about it, and go at something else. 
 
 I understand that you have had recently with 
 you my very distinguished friend, Judge Doug- 
 las, of Illinois, and I understand, without hav- 
 ing had an opportunity (not greatly sought, to 
 be sure) of seeing a report of the speech that he 
 made here, that he did me the honor to mention 
 my humble name. I suppose that he did so for 
 the purpose of making some objection to some 
 sentiment at some time expressed by me. I 
 should expect, it is true, that Judge Douglas 
 had reminded you, or informed you, if you had 
 never before heard it, that I had once in my 
 life declared it as my opinion that this govern- 
 
Wendell Phillips 
 From an Engraving by Augustus Robin. 
 
J9» 
 
1859] Speech at Cincinnati 191 
 
 ment cannot "endure permanently half slave and 
 half free; that a house divided against itself can- 
 not stand," and, as I had expressed it, I did not 
 expect the house to fall; that I did not expect 
 the Union to be dissolved, but that I did expect 
 it would cease to be divided; that it would be- 
 come all one thing or all the other; that either 
 the opposition of slavery will arrest the further 
 spread of it, and place it where the public mind 
 would rest in the belief that it was in the course 
 of ultimate extinction, or the friends of slavery 
 will push it forward until it becomes alike law- 
 ful in all the States, old or new, free as well as 
 slave. I did, fifteen months ago, express that 
 opinion, and upon many occasions Judge Doug- 
 las has denounced it, and has greatly, intention- 
 ally or unintentionally, misrepresented my pur- 
 pose in the expression of that opinion. 
 
 I presume, without having seen a report of 
 his speech, that he did so here. I presume that 
 he alluded also to that opinion in different lan- 
 guage, having been expressed at a subsequent 
 time by Governor Seward, of New York, and 
 that he took the two in a lump and denounced 
 them; that he tried to point out that there was 
 something couched in this opinion which led to 
 the making of an entire uniformity of the local 
 institutions of the various States of the Union, 
 in utter disregard of the different States, which 
 
192 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 17 
 
 in their nature would seem to require a variety 
 of institutions, and a variety of laws conforming 
 to the differences in the nature of the different 
 States. 
 
 Not only so; I presume he insisted that this 
 was a declaration of war between the free and 
 slave States — that it was the sounding to the 
 onset of continual war between the different 
 States, the slave and free States. 
 
 This charge, in this form, was made by Judge 
 Douglas on, I believe, the 9th of July, 1858, in 
 Chicago, in my hearing. On the next evening 
 I made some reply to it. I informed him that 
 many of the inferences he drew from that ex- 
 pression of mine were altogether foreign to any 
 purpose entertained by me, and in so far as he 
 should ascribe these inferences to me, as my pur- 
 pose, he was entirely mistaken; and in so far as 
 he might argue that whatever might be my pur- 
 pose, actions, conforming to my views, would 
 lead to these results, he might argue and estab- 
 lish if he could; but, so far as purposes were 
 concerned, he was totally mistaken as to me. 
 
 When I made that reply to him, I told him, 
 on the question of declaring war between the dif- 
 ferent States of the Union, that I had not said 
 I did not expect any peace upon this question 
 until slavery was exterminated; that I had only 
 said I expected peace when that institution was 
 
1859] Speech at Cincinnati 193 
 
 put where the public mind should rest in the 
 belief that it was in course of ultimate extinc- 
 tion; that I believed, from the organization of 
 our government until a very recent period of 
 time, the institution had been placed and con- 
 tinued upon such a basis; that we had compar- 
 ative peace upon that question through a portion 
 of that period of time, only because the public 
 mind rested in that belief in regard to it, and 
 that when we returned to that position in rela- 
 tion to that matter, I supposed we should again 
 have peace as we previously had. I assured 
 him, as I now assure you, that I neither then had, 
 nor have, nor ever had, any purpose in any way 
 of interfering with the institution of slavery 
 where it exists. I believe we have no power, 
 under the Constitution of the United States, or 
 rather under the form of government under 
 which we live, to interfere with the institution 
 of slavery, or any other of the institutions of 
 our sister States, be they free or slave States. I 
 declared then, and I now re-declare, that I have 
 as little inclination, to interfere with the insti- 
 tution of slavery where it now exists, through 
 the instrumentality of the General Government, 
 or any other instrumentality, as I believe we 
 have no power to do so. I accidentally used 
 this expression: I had no purpose of entering 
 into the slave States to disturb the institution of 
 
194 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 17 
 
 slavery. So, upon the first occasion that Judge 
 Douglas got an opportunity to reply to me, he 
 passed by the whole body of what I had said 
 upon that subject, and seized upon the particu- 
 lar expression of mine, that I had no purpose 
 of entering into the slave States to disturb the 
 institution of slavery. "Oh, no," said he; "he 
 [Lincoln] won't enter into the slave States to 
 disturb the institution of slavery; he is too pru- 
 dent a man to do such a thing as that; he only 
 means that he will go on to the line between 
 the free and slave States, and shoot over at them. 
 This is all he means to do. He means to do 
 them all the harm he can, to disturb them all 
 he can, in such a way as to keep his own hide in 
 perfect safety." 
 
 Well, now, I did not think, at that time, that 
 that was either a very dignified or very logical 
 argument; but so it was, and I had to get along 
 with it as well as I could. 
 
 It has occurred to me here to-night that if I 
 ever do shoot over the line at the people on the 
 other side of the line, into the slave State, and 
 propose to do so keeping my skin safe, that I 
 have now about the best chance I shall ever 
 have. I should not wonder if there are some 
 Kentuckians about this audience; we are close 
 to Kentucky; and whether that be so or not, we 
 are on elevated ground, and by speaking dis- 
 
1859] Speech at Cincinnati 195 
 
 tinctly I should not wonder if some of the Ken- 
 tuckians would hear me on the other side of the 
 river. For that reason I propose to address a 
 portion of what I have to say to the Kentuck- 
 ians. 
 
 I say, then, in the first place, to the Kentuck- 
 ians, that I am what they call, as I understand 
 it, a "Black Republican." I think slavery is 
 wrong, morally and politically. I desire that 
 it should be no further spread in these United 
 States, and I should not object if it should grad- 
 ually terminate in the whole Union. While I 
 say this for myself, I say to you Kentuckians 
 that I understand you differ radically with me 
 upon this proposition ; that you believe slavery is 
 a good thing; that slavery is right; that it ought 
 to be extended and perpetuated in this Union. 
 Now, there being this broad difference between 
 us, I do not pretend, in addressing myself to you 
 Kentuckians, to attempt proselyting you; that 
 would be a vain effort. I do not enter upon 
 it. I only propose to try to show you that you 
 ought to nominate for the next presidency, at 
 Charleston, my distinguished friend, Judge 
 Douglas. In all that there is no real difference 
 between you and him; I understand he is as sin- 
 cerely for you, and more wisely for you, than 
 you are for yourselves. I will try to demon- 
 strate that proposition. Understand now, I say 
 
196 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 17 
 
 that I believe he is as sincerely for you, and 
 more wisely for you, than you are for yourselves. 
 
 What do you want more than anything else 
 to make successful your views of slavery — to ad- 
 vance the outspread of it, and to secure and per- 
 petuate the nationality of it? What do you 
 want more than anything else? What is needed 
 absolutely? What is indispensable to you? 
 Why, if I may be allowed to answer the question, 
 it is to retain a hold upon the North — it is to 
 retain support and strength from the free States. 
 If you can get this support and strength from 
 the free States, you can succeed. If you do not 
 get this support and this strength from the free 
 States, you are in the minority, and you are 
 beaten at once. 
 
 If that proposition be admitted, — and it is 
 undeniable, — then the next thing I say to you is, 
 that Douglas of all the men in this nation is the 
 only man that affords you any hold upon the 
 free States ; that no other man can give you any 
 strength in the free States. This being so, if 
 you doubt the other branch of the proposition, 
 whether he is for you, — whether he is really for 
 you, as I have expressed it, — I propose asking 
 your attention for a while to a few facts. 
 
 The issue between you and me, understand, 
 is that I think slavery is wrong, and ought not to 
 be outspread, and you think it is right, and ought 
 
1859] Speech at Cincinnati 197 
 
 to be extended and perpetuated. I now proceed 
 to try to show to you that Douglas is as sin- 
 cerely for you, and more wisely for you, than 
 you are for yourselves. 
 
 In the first place, we know that in a govern- 
 ment like this, a government of the people, 
 where the voice of all the men of the country, 
 substantially, enters into the administration of 
 the government, what lies at the bottom of all 
 of it is public opinion. I lay down the propo- 
 sition that Judge Douglas is not only the man 
 that promises you in advance a hold upon the 
 North, and support in the North, but that he 
 constantly molds public opinion to your ends; 
 that in every possible way he can, he molds the 
 public opinion of the North to your ends; and 
 if there are a few things in which he seems to 
 be against you, — a few things which he says that 
 appear to be against you, and a few that he for- 
 bears to say which you would like to have him 
 say, — you ought to remember that the saying 
 of the one, or the forbearing to say the other, 
 would lose his hold upon the North, and, by 
 consequence, would lose his capacity to serve 
 you. 
 
 Upon this subject of molding public opinion, 
 I call your attention to the fact — for a well-es- 
 tablished fact it is — that the judge never says 
 your institution of slavery is wrong; he never 
 
198 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 17 
 
 says it is right, to be sure, but he never says it 
 is wrong. There is not a public man in the 
 United States, I believe, with the exception of 
 Senator Douglas, who has not, at some time in 
 his life, declared his opinion whether the thing 
 is right or wrong; but Senator Douglas never 
 declares it is wrong. He leaves himself at per- 
 fect liberty to do all in your favor which he 
 would be hindered from doing if he were to de- 
 clare the thing to be wrong. On the contrary, 
 he takes all the chances that he has for inveig- 
 ling the sentiment of the North, opposed to sla- 
 very, into your support, by never saying it is 
 right. This you ought to set down to his credit. 
 You ought to give him full credit for this much, 
 little though it be in comparison to the whole 
 which he does for you. 
 
 Some other things I will ask your attention 
 to. He said upon the floor of the United States 
 Senate, and he has repeated it, as I understand, 
 a great many times, that he does not care whether 
 slavery is "voted up or voted down.'' This again 
 shows you, or ought to show you, if you would 
 reason upon it, that he does not believe it to be 
 wrong; for a man may say, when he sees noth- 
 ing wrong in a thing, that he does not care 
 whether it be voted up or voted down ; but no 
 man can logically say that he cares not whether 
 a thing goes up or goes down which appears to 
 
1859] Speech at Cincinnati 
 
 199 
 
 him to be wrong. You therefore have a demon- 
 stration in this, that to Judge Douglas's mind 
 your favorite institution, which you desire to 
 have spread out and made perpetual, is no 
 wrong. 
 
 Another thing he tells you, in a speech made 
 at Memphis, in Tennessee, shortly after the can- 
 vass in Illinois, last year. He there distinctly 
 told the people that there was a "line drawn by 
 the Almighty across this continent, on the one 
 side of which the soil must always be cultivated 
 by slaves"; that he did not pretend to know ex- 
 actly where that line was, but that there was 
 such a line. I want to ask your attention to that 
 proposition again — that there is one portion of 
 this continent where the Almighty has designed 
 the soil shall always be cultivated by slaves ; that 
 its being cultivated by slaves at that place is 
 right; that it has the direct sympathy and au- 
 thority of the Almighty. Whenever you can 
 get these Northern audiences to adopt the opin- 
 ion that slavery is right on the other side of the 
 Ohio; whenever you can get them, in pursuance 
 of Douglas's views, to adopt that sentiment, they 
 will very readily make the other argument, 
 which is perfectly logical, that that which is 
 right on that side of the Ohio cannot be wrong 
 on this, and that if you have that property on 
 that side of the Ohio, under the seal and stamp 
 
200 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 17 
 
 of the Almighty, when by any means it escapes 
 over here, it is wrong to have constitutions and 
 laws "to devil" you about it. So Douglas is 
 molding the public opinion of the North, first 
 to say that the thing is right in your State over 
 the Ohio River, and hence to say that that which 
 is right there is not wrong here, and that all laws 
 and constitutions here, recognizing it as being 
 wrong, are themselves wrong, and ought to be 
 repealed and abrogated. He will tell you, men 
 of Ohio, that if you choose here to have laws 
 against slavery, it is in conformity to the idea 
 that your climate is not suited to it; that your 
 climate is not suited to slave labor, and there- 
 fore you have constitutions and laws against it. 
 Let us attend to that argument for a little 
 while, and see if it be sound. You do not raise 
 sugar-cane (except the new-fashioned sugar- 
 cane, and you won't raise that long), but they 
 do raise it in Louisiana. You don't raise it in 
 Ohio because you can't raise it profitably, be- 
 cause the climate don't suit it. They do raise 
 it in Louisiana because there it is profitable. 
 Now Douglas will tell you that is precisely the 
 slavery question; that they do have slaves there 
 because they are profitable, and you don't have 
 them here because they are not profitable. If 
 that is so, then it leads to dealing with the one 
 precisely as with the other. Is there, then, any- 
 
1859] Speech at Cincinnati 201 
 
 thing in the constitution or laws of Ohio against 
 raising sugar-cane? Have you found it neces- 
 sary to put any such provision in your law? 
 Surely not! No man desires to raise sugar-cane 
 in Ohio; but if any man did desire to do so, you 
 would say it was a tyrannical law that forbids 
 his doing so; and whenever you shall agree with 
 Douglas, whenever your minds are brought to 
 adopt his argument, as surely you will have 
 reached the conclusion that although slavery is 
 not profitable in Ohio, if any man want it, it is 
 wrong to him not to let him have it. 
 
 In this matter Judge Douglas is preparing the 
 public mind for you of Kentucky, to make per- 
 petual that good thing in your estimation, about 
 which you and I differ. 
 
 In this connection let me ask your attention to 
 another thing. I believe it is safe to assert that, 
 five years ago, no living man had expressed the 
 opinion that the negro had no share in the Dec- 
 laration of Independence. Let me state that 
 again: Five years ago no living man had ex- 
 pressed the opinion that the negro had no share 
 in the Declaration of Independence. If there 
 is in this large audience any man who ever knew 
 of that opinion being put upon paper as much 
 as five years ago, I will be obliged to him now, 
 or at a subsequent time, to show it. 
 
 If that be true, I wish you then to note the 
 
202 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 17 
 
 next fact — that within the space of five years 
 Senator Douglas, in the argument of this ques- 
 tion, has got his entire party, so far as I know, 
 without exception, to join in saying that the ne- 
 gro has no share in the Declaration of Inde- 
 pendence. If there be now in all these United 
 States one Douglas man that does not say this, 
 I have been unable upon any occasion to scare 
 him up. Now, if none of you said this five years 
 ago, and all of you say it now, that is a matter 
 that you Kentuckians ought to note. That is a 
 vast change in the Northern public sentiment 
 upon that question. 
 
 Of what tendency is that change? The ten- 
 dency of that change is to bring the public mind 
 to the conclusion that when men are spoken of, 
 the negro is not meant; that when negroes are 
 spoken of, brutes alone are contemplated. That 
 change in public sentiment has already degraded 
 the black man, in the estimation of Douglas and 
 his followers, from the condition of a man of 
 some sort, and assigned him to the condition of 
 a brute. Now you Kentuckians ought to give 
 Douglas credit for this. That is the largest 
 possible stride that can be made in regard to the 
 perpetuation of your good thing of slavery. 
 
 In Kentucky, perhaps, — in many of the slave 
 States certainly, — you are trying to establish the 
 rightfulness of slavery by reference to the Bible. 
 
1859] Speech at Cincinnati 203 
 
 You are trying to show that slavery existed in 
 the Bible times by divine ordinance. Now 
 Douglas is wiser than you for your own benefit, 
 upon that subject. Douglas knows that when- 
 ever you establish that slavery was right by the 
 Bible, it will occur that that slavery was the 
 slavery of the white man, — of men without ref- 
 erence to color, — and he knows very well that 
 you may entertain that idea in Kentucky as much 
 as you please, but you will never win any North- 
 ern support upon it. He makes a wiser argu- 
 ment for you; he makes the argument that the 
 slavery of the black man, the slavery of the man 
 who has a skin of a different color from your 
 own, is right. He thereby brings to your sup- 
 port Northern voters who could not for a mo- 
 ment be brought by your own argument of the 
 Bible-right of slavery. Will you not give him 
 credit for that? Will you not say that in this 
 matter he is more wisely for you than you are 
 for yourselves? 
 
 Now, having established with his entire party 
 this doctrine, — having been entirely successful 
 in that branch of his efforts in your behalf, — he 
 is ready for another. 
 
 At this same meeting at Memphis, he declared 
 that in all contests between the negro and the 
 white man, he was for the white man, but that 
 in all questions between the negro and the croco- 
 
204 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 17 
 
 dile he was for the negro. He did not make 
 that declaration accidentally at Memphis. He 
 made it a great many times in the canvass in 
 Illinois last year (though I don't know that it 
 was reported in any of his speeches there; but 
 he frequently made it). I believe he repeated 
 it at Columbus, and I should not wonder if he 
 repeated it here. It is, then, a deliberate way of 
 expressing himself upon that subject. It is a 
 matter of mature deliberation with him thus to 
 express himself upon that point of his case. It 
 therefore requires some deliberate attention. 
 
 The first inference seems to be that if you do 
 not enslave the negro you are wronging the white 
 man in some way or other; and that who- 
 ever is opposed to the negro being enslaved is, 
 in some way or other, against the white man. 
 Is not that a falsehood? If there was a neces- 
 sary conflict between the white man and the 
 negro, I should be for the white man as much 
 as Judge Douglas; but I say there is no such 
 necessary conflict. I say that there is room 
 enough for us all to be free, and that it not only 
 does not wrong the white man that the negro 
 should be free, but it positively wrongs the mass 
 of the white men that the negro should be en- 
 slaved ; that the mass of white men are really in- 
 jured by the effects of slave-labor in the vicinity 
 of the fields of their own labor. 
 
1859] Speech at Cincinnati 205 
 
 But I do not desire to dwell upon this branch 
 of the question more than to say that this as- 
 sumption of his is false, and I do hope that that 
 fallacy will not long prevail in the minds of 
 intelligent white men. At all events, you ought 
 to thank Judge Douglas for it. It is for your 
 benefit it is made. 
 
 The other branch of it is, that in a struggle 
 between the negro and the crocodile, he is for the 
 negro. Well, I don't know that there is any 
 struggle between the negro and the crocodile, 
 either. I suppose that if a crocodile (or, as we 
 old Ohio River boatmen used to call them, al- 
 ligators) should come across a white man, he 
 would kill him if he could, and so he would a 
 negro. But what, at last, is this proposition? I 
 believe that it is a sort of proposition in propor- 
 tion, which may be stated thus: "As the negro 
 is to the white man, so is the crocodile to the 
 negro; and as the negro may rightfully treat the 
 crocodile as a beast or reptile, so the white man 
 may rightfully treat the negro as a beast or rep- 
 tile." That is really the point of all that argu- 
 ment of his. 
 
 Now, my brother Kentuckians, who believe 
 in this, you ought to thank Judge Douglas for 
 having put that in a much more taking way than 
 any of yourselves have done. 
 
 Again, Douglas's great principle, "popular 
 
206 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 17 
 
 sovereignty," as he calls it, gives you by natural 
 consequence the revival of the slave-trade when- 
 ever you want it. If you are disposed to ques- 
 tion this, listen awhile, consider awhile, what 
 I shall advance in support of that proposition. 
 
 He says that it is the sacred right of the man 
 who goes into the Territories to have slavery if 
 he wants it. Grant that for argument's sake. Is 
 it not the sacred right of the man who don't go 
 there, equally to buy slaves in Africa, if he wants 
 them? Can you point out the difference? The 
 man who goes into the Territories of Kansas and 
 Nebraska, or any other new Territory, with the 
 sacred right of taking a slave there which be- 
 longs to him, would certainly have no more 
 right to take one there than I would who own 
 no slave, but who would desire to buy one and 
 take him there. You will not say — you, the 
 friends of Judge Douglas — but that the man who 
 does not own a slave, has an equal right to buy 
 one and take him to the Territory as the other 
 does? 
 
 I say that Douglas's popular sovereignty, es- 
 tablishing his sacred right in the people, if you 
 please, if carried to its logical conclusion, gives 
 equally the sacred right to the people of the 
 States or the Territories themselves to buy slaves, 
 wherever they can buy them cheapest; and if 
 any man can show a distinction, I should like to 
 
1859] Speech at Cincinnati 207 
 
 hear him try it. If any man can show how the 
 people of Kansas have a better right to slaves 
 because they want them, than the people of 
 Georgia have to buy them in Africa, I want him 
 to do it. I think it cannot be done. If it is 
 "popular sovereignty" for the people to have 
 slaves because they want them, it is popular sov- 
 ereignty for them to buy them in Africa, because 
 they desire to do so. 
 
 I know that Douglas has recently made a lit- 
 tle effort — not seeming to notice that he had a 
 different theory — has made an effort to get rid 
 of that. He has written a letter, addressed to 
 somebody, I believe, who resides in Iowa, de- 
 claring his opposition to the repeal of the laws 
 that prohibit the African slave-trade. He bases 
 his opposition to such repeal upon the ground 
 that these laws are themselves one of the com- 
 promises of the Constitution of the United 
 States. Now it would be very interesting to see 
 Judge Douglas, or any of his friends, turn to 
 the Constitution of the United States and point 
 out that compromise, to show where there is any 
 compromise in the Constitution, or provision in 
 the Constitution, expressed or implied, by which 
 the administrators of that Constitution are under 
 any obligation to repeal the African slave-trade. 
 I know, or at least I think I know, that the 
 framers of that Constitution did expect that the 
 
208 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 17 
 
 African slave-trade would be abolished at the 
 end of twenty years, to which time their prohi- 
 bition against its being abolished extended. I 
 think there is abundant contemporaneous his- 
 tory to show that the framers of the Constitu- 
 tion expected it to be abolished. But while they 
 so expected, they gave nothing for that expec- 
 tation, and they put no provision in the Consti- 
 tution requiring it should be so abolished. The 
 migration or importation of such persons as the 
 States shall see.fTt to admit shall not -be prohib- 
 ited, but a certain- tax might be levied upon such 
 importation. But . what was to.be done after 
 that time? The Constitution is as silent about 
 that as it is silent, personally, about myself. 
 There is absolutely nothing in it about that sub- 
 ject — there is only the expectation of the framers 
 of the Constitution that the slave-trade would 
 be abolished at the end of that time, and they 
 expected it would be abolished, owing to public 
 sentiment, before that time, and they put that 
 provision in, in order that it should not be abol- 
 ished before that time, for reasons which I sup- 
 pose they thought to be sound ones, but which I 
 will not now try to enumerate before you. 
 
 But while they expected the slave-trade would 
 be abolished at that time, they expected that 
 the spread of slavery into the new Territories 
 should also be restricted. It is as easy to prove 
 
1859] Speech at Cincinnati 209 
 
 that the framers of the Constitution of the 
 United States expected that slavery should be 
 prohibited from extending into the new Terri- 
 tories, as it is to prove that it was expected that 
 the slave-trade should be abolished. Both these 
 things were expected. One was no more ex- 
 pected than the other, and one was no more a 
 compromise of the Constitution than the other. 
 There was nothing said in the Constitution in 
 regard to the spread of slavery into the Terri- 
 tories. I grant that, but there was something 
 very important said about it by the same genera- 
 tion of men in the adoption of the old ordinance 
 of '87, through the influence of which you here 
 in Ohio, our neighbors in Indiana, we in Illi- 
 nois, our neighbors in Michigan and Wiscon- 
 sin, are happy, prosperous, teeming millions of 
 free men. That generation of men, though not 
 to the full extent members of the convention 
 that framed the Constitution, were to some ex- 
 tent members of that convention, holding seats 
 at the same time in one body and the other, so 
 that if there was any compromise on either of 
 these subjects, the strong evidence is that that 
 compromise was in favor of the restriction of 
 slavery from the new Territories. 
 
 But Douglas says that he is unalterably op- 
 posed to the repeal of those laws; because, in his 
 view, it is a compromise of the Constitution. 
 
210 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 17 
 
 You Kentuckians, no doubt, are somewhat of- 
 fended with that! You ought not to be! You 
 ought to be patient! You ought to know that if 
 he said less than that, he would lose the power 
 of "lugging" the Northern States to your sup- 
 port. Really, what you would push him to do 
 would take from him his entire power to serve 
 you. And you ought to remember how long, 
 by precedent, Judge Douglas holds himself 
 obliged to stick by compromises. You ought 
 to remember that by the time you yourselves 
 think you are ready to inaugurate measures for 
 the revival of the African slave-trade, that suf- 
 ficient time will have arrived, by precedent, for 
 Judge Douglas to break through that compro- 
 mise. He says now nothing more strong than 
 he said in 1849 when he declared in favor of the 
 Missouri Compromise — that precisely four 
 years and a quarter after he declared that com- 
 promise to be a sacred thing, which "no ruthless 
 hand would ever dare to touch," he, himself, 
 brought forward the measure ruthlessly to de- 
 stroy it. By a mere calculation of time it will 
 only be four years more until he is ready to taKe 
 back his profession about the sacredness of the 
 compromise abolishing the slave-trade. Pre- 
 cisely as soon as you are ready to have his ser- 
 vices in that direction, by fair calculation, you 
 may be sure of having them. 
 
1859] Speech at Cincinnati 211 
 
 But you remember and set down to Judge 
 Douglas's debt, or discredit, that he, last year, 
 said the people of Territories can, in spite of the 
 Dred Scott decision, exclude your slaves from 
 those Territories; that he declared by "un- 
 friendly legislation" the extension of your prop- 
 erty into the new Territories may be cut off in 
 the teeth of that decision of the Supreme Court 
 of the United States. 
 
 He assumed that position at Freeport, on the 
 27th of August, 1858. He said that the people 
 of the Territories can exclude slavery, in so 
 many words. You ought, however, to bear in 
 mind that he has never said it since. You may 
 hunt in every speech that he has since made, and 
 he has never used that expression once. He has 
 never seemed to notice that he is stating his views 
 differently from what he did then; but by some 
 sort of accident, he has always really stated it 
 differently. He has always since then declared 
 that "the Constitution does not carry slavery 
 into the Territories of the United States beyond 
 the power of the people legally to control it, as 
 other property." Now there is a difference in 
 the language used upon that former occasion 
 and in this latter day. There may or may not 
 be a difference in the meaning, but it is worth 
 while considering whether there is not also a 
 difference in meaning. 
 
212 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 17 
 
 What is it to exclude? Why, it is to drive it 
 out. It is in some way to put it out of the Ter- 
 ritory. It is to force it across the line, or change 
 its character, so that as property it is out of ex- 
 istence. But what is the controlling of it "as 
 other property"? Is controlling it as other 
 property the same thing as destroying it, or driv- 
 ing it away? I should think not. I should 
 think the controlling of it as other property 
 would be just about what you in Kentucky 
 should want. I understand the controlling of 
 property means the controlling of it for the bene- 
 fit of the owner of it. While I have no doubt 
 the Supreme Court of the United States would 
 say "God speed" to any of the territorial leg- 
 islatures that should thus control slave property, 
 they would sing quite a different tune if by the 
 pretense of controlling it they were to under- 
 take to pass laws which virtually excluded it, 
 and that upon a very well known principle to all 
 lawyers, that what a legislature cannot directly 
 do, it cannot do by indirection ; that as the leg- 
 islature has not the power to drive slaves out, 
 they have no power by indirection, by tax, or 
 by imposing burdens in any way on that prop- 
 erty, to effect the same end, and that any attempt 
 to do so would be held by the Dred Scott court 
 unconstitutional. 
 
 Douglas is not willing to stand by his first 
 
1859] Speech at Cincinnati 213 
 
 proposition that they can exclude it, because we 
 have seen that that proposition amounts to noth- 
 ing more nor less than the naked absurdity that 
 you may lawfully drive out that which has a 
 lawful right to remain. He admitted at first 
 that the slave might be lawfully taken into the 
 Territories under the Constitution of the United 
 States, and yet asserted that he might be lawfully 
 driven out. That being the proposition, it is 
 the absurdity I have stated. He is not willing 
 to stand in the face of that direct, naked, and im- 
 pudent absurdity; he has, therefore, modified his 
 language into that of being "controlled as other 
 property." 
 
 The Kentuckians don't like this in Douglas! 
 I will tell you where it will go. He now swears 
 by the court. He was once a leading man in 
 Illinois to break down a court because it had 
 made a decision he did not like. But he now 
 not only swears by the court, the courts having 
 got to working for you, but he denounces all 
 men that do not swear by the courts as unpa- 
 triotic, as bad citizens. When one of these acts 
 of unfriendly legislation shall impose such 
 heavy burdens as to, in effect, destroy property 
 in slaves in a Territory, and show plainly 
 enough that there can be no mistake in the pur- 
 pose of the legislature to make them so burden- 
 some, this same Supreme Court will decide that 
 
214 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 17 
 
 law to be unconstitutional, and he will be ready 
 to say for your benefit, "I swear by the court; I 
 give it up"; and while that is going on he has 
 been getting all his men to swear by the courts, 
 and to give it up with him. In this again he 
 serves you faithfully, and, as I say, more wisely 
 than you serve yourselves. 
 
 Again, I have alluded in the beginning of 
 these remarks to the fact that Judge Douglas 
 has made great complaint of my having ex- 
 pressed the opinion that this government "can- 
 not endure permanently half slave and half 
 free." He has complained of Seward for using 
 different language, and declaring that there is 
 an "irrepressible conflict" between the princi- 
 ples of free and slave labor. [A voice: "He 
 says it is not original with Seward. That is 
 original with Lincoln."] I will attend to that 
 immediately, sir. Since that time, Hickman, of 
 Pennsylvania, expressed the same sentiment. 
 He has never denounced Mr. Hickman. Why? 
 There is a little chance, notwithstanding that 
 opinion in the mouth of Hickman, that he may 
 yet be a Douglas man. That is the difference. 
 It is not unpatriotic to hold that opinion, if a 
 man is a Douglas man. 
 
 But neither I, nor Seward, nor Hickman is 
 entitled to the enviable or unenviable distinction 
 of having first expressed that idea. That same 
 
1859T Speech at Cincinnati 215 
 
 idea was expressed by the Richmond "Enquirer" 
 in Virginia, in 1856, quite two years before it 
 was expressed by the first of us. And while 
 Douglas was pluming himself that in his con- 
 flict with my humble self, last year, he had 
 "squelched out" that fatal heresy, as he de- 
 lighted to call it, and had suggested that if he 
 only had had a chance to be in New York and 
 meet Seward he would have "squelched" it there 
 also, it never occurred to him to breathe a word 
 against Pryor. I don't think that you can dis- 
 cover that Douglas ever talked of going to Vir- 
 ginia to "squelch" out that idea there. No. 
 More than that. That same Roger A. Pryor 
 was brought to Washington City and made the 
 editor of the par excellence Douglas paper after 
 making use of that expression, which, in us, is 
 so unpatriotic and heretical. From all this my 
 Kentucky friends may see that this opinion is 
 heretical in his view only when it is expressed 
 by men suspected of a desire that the country 
 shall all become free, and not when expressed 
 by those fairly known to entertain the desire 
 that the whole country shall become slave. 
 When expressed by that class of men, it is in no 
 wise offensive to him. In this again, my friends 
 of Kentucky, you have Judge Douglas with you. 
 There is another reason why you Southern 
 people ought to nominate Douglas at your con- 
 
216 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 17 
 
 vention at Charleston. That reason is the won- 
 derful capacity of the man; the power he has of 
 doing what would seem to be impossible. Let 
 me call your attention to one of these apparently 
 impossible things. 
 
 Douglas had three or four very distinguished 
 men, of the most extreme antislavery views of 
 any men in the Republican party, expressing 
 their desire for his reelection to the Senate last 
 year. That would, of itself, have seemed to be 
 a little wonderful, but that wonder is height- 
 ened when we see that Wise, of Virginia, a man 
 exactly opposed to them, a man who believes 
 in the divine right of slavery, was also express- 
 ing his desire that Douglas should be reelected; 
 that another man that may be said to be kindred 
 to Wise, Mr. Breckinridge, the Vice-President, 
 and of your own State, was also agreeing with 
 the antislavery men in the North that Douglas 
 ought to be reelected. Still, to heighten the 
 wonder, a senator from Kentucky, whom I have 
 always loved with an affection as tender and 
 endearing as I have ever loved any man, who 
 was opposed to the antislavery men for reasons 
 which seemed sufficient to him, and equally op- 
 posed to Wise and Breckinridge, was writing 
 letters into Illinois to secure the reelection of 
 Douglas. Now that all these conflicting ele- 
 ments should be brought, while at daggers' 
 
1859] Speech at Cincinnati 217 
 
 points with one another, to support him, is a 
 feat that is worthy for you to note and consider. 
 It is quite probable that each of these classes of 
 men thought, by the reelection of Douglas, their 
 peculiar views would gain something; it is prob- 
 able that the antislavery men thought their views 
 would gain something; that Wise and Breckin- 
 ridge thought so too, as regards their opinions; 
 that Mr. Crittenden thought that his views 
 would gain something, although he was opposed 
 to both these other men. It is probable that each 
 and all of them thought that they were using 
 Douglas, and it is yet an unsolved problem 
 whether he was not using them all. If he was, 
 then it is for you to consider whether that power 
 to perform wonders is one for you lightly to 
 throw away. 
 
 There is one other thing that I will say to you 
 in this relation. It is but my opinion; I give it 
 to you without a fee. It is my opinion that it 
 is for you to take him or be defeated; and that 
 if you do take him you may be beaten. You 
 will surely be beaten if you do not take him. 
 We, the Republicans and others forming the 
 opposition of the country, intend to "stand by 
 our guns," to be patient and firm, and in the 
 long run to beat you whether you take him or 
 not. We know that before we fairly beat you, 
 we have to beat you both together. We know 
 
2i 8 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 17 
 
 that "you are all of a feather," and that we have 
 to beat you all together, and we expect to do it. 
 We don't intend to be very impatient about it. 
 We mean to be as deliberate and calm about it 
 as it is possible to be, but as firm and resolved 
 as it is possible for men to be. When we do as 
 we say, beat you, you perhaps want to know 
 what we will do with you. 
 
 I will tell you, so far as I am authorized to 
 speak for the opposition, what we mean to do 
 with you. We mean to treat you, as near as 
 we possibly can, as Washington, Jefferson, and 
 Madison treated you. We mean to leave you 
 alone, and in no way to interfere with your in- 
 stitution; to abide by all and every compromise 
 of the Constitution, and, in a word, coming back 
 to the original proposition, to treat you, so far 
 as degenerated men (if we have degenerated) 
 may, according to the example of those noble 
 fathers — Washington, Jefferson, and Madison. 
 We mean to remember that you are as good as 
 we; that there is no difference between us other 
 than the difference of circumstances. We mean 
 to recognize and bear in mind always that you 
 have as good hearts in your bosoms as other peo- 
 ple, or as we claim to have, and treat you ac- 
 cordingly. We mean to marry your girls when 
 we have a chance — the white ones, I mean, and 
 
1859] Speech at Cincinnati 219 
 
 I have the honor to inform you that I once did 
 have a chance in that way. 
 
 I have told you what we mean to do. I want 
 to know, now, when that thing takes place, what 
 do you mean to do? I often hear it intimated 
 that you mean to divide the Union whenever a 
 Republican or anything like it is elected Presi- 
 dent of the United States. [A voice: "That is 
 so."] "That is so," one of them says; I won- 
 der if he is a Kentuckian? [A voice: "He is a 
 Douglas man."] Well, then, I want to know 
 what you are going to do with your half of it? 
 Are you going to split the Ohio down through, 
 and push your half off a piece? Or are you 
 going to keep it right alongside of us outrageous 
 fellows? Or are you going to build up a wall 
 some way between your country and ours, by 
 which that movable property of yours can't 
 come over here any more, to the danger of 
 your losing it? Do you think you can better 
 yourselves on that subject by leaving us here 
 under no obligation whatever to return those 
 specimens of your movable property that come 
 hither? You have divided the Union because 
 we would not do right with you, as you think, 
 upon that subject; when we cease to be under 
 obligations to do anything for you, how much 
 better off do you think you will be? Will 
 you make war upon us and kill us all? Why, 
 
220 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 17 
 
 gentlemen, I think you are as gallant and as 
 brave men as live; that you can fight as bravely 
 in a good cause, man for man, as any other peo- 
 ple living; that you have shown yourselves ca- 
 pable of this upon various occasions; but man 
 for man, you are not better than we are, and 
 there are not so many of you as there are of us. 
 You will never make much of a hand at whip- 
 ping us. If we were fewer in numbers than 
 you, I think that you could whip us; if we were 
 equal it would likely be a drawn battle; but be- 
 ing inferior in numbers, you will make nothing 
 by attempting to master us. 
 
 But perhaps I have addressed myself as long, 
 or longer, to the Kentuckians than I ought to 
 have done, inasmuch as I have said that what- 
 ever course you take, we intend in the end to 
 beat you. I propose to address a few remarks 
 to our friends, by way of discussing with them 
 the best means of keeping that promise that I 
 have in good faith made. 
 
 It may appear a little episodical for me to 
 mention the topic of which I shall speak now. 
 It is a favorite proposition of Douglas's that 
 the interference of the General Government, 
 through the ordinance of '87, or through any 
 other act of the General Government, never has 
 made, nor ever can make, a free State; that the 
 ordinance of '87 did not make free States of 
 
1859] Speech at Cincinnati 221 
 
 Ohio, Indiana, or Illinois; that these States are 
 free upon his "great principle" of popular sov- 
 ereignty, because the people of those several 
 States have chosen to make them so. At Co- 
 lumbus, and probably here, he undertook to 
 compliment the people that they themselves had 
 made the State of Ohio free, and that the ordi- 
 nance of '87 was not entitled in any degree to 
 divide the honor with him. I have no doubt 
 that the people of the State of Ohio did make 
 her free according to their own will and judg- 
 ment; but let the facts be remembered. 
 
 In 1802, I believe, it was you who made your 
 first constitution, with the clause prohibiting 
 slavery, and you did it, I suppose, very nearly 
 unanimously; but you should bear in mind that 
 you — speaking of you as one people — that you 
 did so unembarrassed by the actual presence of 
 the institution amongst you; that you made it a 
 free State, not with the embarrassment upon you 
 of already having among you many slaves, 
 which, if they had been here, and you had sought 
 to make a free State, you would not know what 
 to do with. If they had been among you, em- 
 barrassing difficulties, most probably, would 
 have induced you to tolerate a slave Constitu- 
 tion instead of a free one; as, indeed, these very 
 difficulties have constrained every people on this 
 continent who have adopted slavery. 
 
222 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 17 
 
 Pray, what was it that made you free? What 
 kept you free? Did you not find your country 
 free when you came to decide that Ohio should 
 be a free State? It is important to inquire by 
 what reason you found it so. Let us take an il- 
 lustration between the States of Ohio and Ken- 
 tucky. Kentucky is separated by this river 
 Ohio, not a mile wide. A portion of Kentucky 
 by reason of the course of the Ohio, is further 
 north than this portion of Ohio in which we now 
 stand. Kentucky is entirely covered with sla- 
 very — Ohio is entirely free from it. What made 
 that difference? Was it climate? No! A por- 
 tion of Kentucky was further north than this 
 portion of Ohio. Was it soil? No! There is 
 nothing in the soil of the one more favorable 
 to slave-labor than the other. It was not cli- 
 mate or soil that caused one side of the line to 
 be entirely covered with slavery and the other 
 side free of it. What was it? Study over it. 
 Tell us, if you can, in all the range of conjec- 
 ture, if there be anything you can conceive of 
 that made that difference, other than that there 
 was no law of any sort keeping it out of Ken- 
 tucky, while the ordinance of '87 kept it out of 
 Ohio. If there is any other reason than this, I 
 confess that it is wholly beyond my power to 
 conceive of it. This, then, I offer to combat 
 
1859] Speech at Cincinnati 223 
 
 the idea that that ordinance has never made any- 
 State free. 
 
 •I don't stop at this illustration. I come to 
 the State of Indiana; and what I have said as 
 between Kentucky and Ohio, I repeat as between 
 Indiana and Kentucky; it is equally applicable. 
 One additional argument is applicable also to 
 Indiana. In her territorial condition she more 
 than once petitioned Congress to abrogate the 
 ordinance entirely, or at least so far as to suspend 
 its operation for a time, in order that they should 
 exercise the "popular sovereignty" of having 
 slaves if they wanted them. The men then con- 
 trolling the General Government, imitating the 
 men of the Revolution, refused Indiana that 
 privilege. And so we have the evidence that 
 Indiana supposed she could have slaves, if it 
 were not for that ordinance; that she besought 
 Congress to put that barrier out of the way; that 
 Congress refused to do so, and it all ended at 
 last in Indiana being a free State. Tell me not 
 then that the ordinance of '87 had nothing to do 
 with making Indiana a free State, when we find 
 some men chafing against and only restrained 
 by that barrier. 
 
 Come down again to our State of Illinois. 
 The great Northwest Territory, including Ohio, 
 Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin, 
 was acquired first, I believe, by the British gov- 
 
224 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 17 
 
 ernment, in part, at least, from the French. Be- 
 fore the establishment of our independence, it 
 became a part of Virginia, enabling Virginia 
 afterward to transfer it to the General Gov- 
 ernment. There were French settlements in 
 what is now Illinois, and at the same time there 
 were French settlements in what is now Mis- 
 souri — in the tract of country that was not pur- 
 chased till about 1803. In these French settle- 
 ments negro slavery had existed for many years 
 — perhaps more than a hundred, if not as much 
 as two hundred, years — at Kaskaskia, in Illinois, 
 and at St. Genevieve, or Cape Girardeau, per- 
 haps, in Missouri. The number of slaves was 
 not very great, but there was about the same 
 number in each place. They were there when 
 we acquired the Territory. There was no ef- 
 fort made to break up the relation of master 
 and slave, and even the ordinance of '87 was 
 not so enforced as to destroy that slavery in Il- 
 linois; nor did the ordinance apply to Missouri 
 at all. 
 
 What I want to ask your attention to, at this 
 point, is that Illinois and Missouri came into the 
 Union about the same time, Illinois in the lat- 
 ter part of 1818, and Missouri, after a struggle, 
 I believe, some time in 1820. They had been 
 filling up with American people about the same 
 period of time, their progress enabling them to 
 
1859] Speech at Cincinnati 225 
 
 come into the Union about the same. At the 
 end of that ten years, in which they had been so 
 preparing (for it was about that period of 
 time), the number of slaves in Illinois had ac- 
 tually decreased; while in Missouri, beginning 
 with very few, at the end of that ten years there 
 were about ten thousand. This being so, and it 
 being remembered that Missouri and Illinois 
 are, to a certain extent, in the same parallel of 
 latitude, — that the northern half of Missouri 
 and the southern half of Illinois are in the same 
 parallel of latitude, — so that climate would 
 have the same effect upon one as upon the other; 
 and that in the soil there is no material differ- 
 ence so far as bears upon the question of slavery 
 being settled upon one or the other; there being 
 none of those natural causes to produce a differ- 
 ence in filling them, and yet there being a broad 
 difference in their filling up, we are led again 
 to inquire what was the cause of that difference. 
 
 It is most natural to say that in Missouri 
 there was no law to keep that country from fill- 
 ing up with slaves, while in Illinois there was 
 the ordinance of '87. The ordinance being 
 there, slavery decreased during that ten years— 
 the ordinance not being in the other, it increased 
 from a few to ten thousand. Can anybody doubt 
 the reason of the difference? 
 
 I think all these facts most abundantly prove 
 
226 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 17 
 
 that my friend Judge Douglas's proposition, that 
 the ordinance of '87, or the national restriction 
 of slavery, never had a tendency to make a free 
 State, is a fallacy — a proposition without the 
 shadow or substance of truth about it. 
 
 Douglas sometimes says that all the States 
 (and it is part of that same proposition I have 
 been discussing) that have become free, have 
 become so upon his "great principle"; that the 
 State of Illinois itself came into the Union as a 
 slave State, and that the people, upon the "great 
 principle" of popular sovereignty, have since 
 made it a free State. Allow me but a little 
 while to state to you what facts there are to jus- 
 tify him in saying that Illinois came into the 
 Union as a slave State. 
 
 I have mentioned to you that there were a 
 few old French slaves there. They numbered, 
 I think, one or two hundred. Besides that, 
 there had been a territorial law for indenturing 
 black persons. Under that law, in violation of 
 the ordinance of '87, but without any enforce- 
 ment of the ordinance to overthrow the system, 
 there had been a small number of slaves intro- 
 duced as indentured persons. Owing to this, 
 the clause for the prohibition of slavery was 
 slightly modified. Instead of running like 
 yours, that neither slavery nor involuntary servi- 
 tude, except for crime, of which the party shall 
 
1859] Speech at Cincinnati 227 
 
 have been duly convicted, should exist in the 
 State, they said that neither slavery nor invol- 
 untary servitude should thereafter be intro- 
 duced, and that the children of indentured serv- 
 ants should be born free; and nothing was said 
 about the few old -French slaves. Out of this 
 fact, that the clause for prohibiting slavery was 
 modified because of the actual presence of it, 
 Douglas asserts again and again that Illinois 
 came into the Union as a slave State. How far 
 the facts sustain the conclusion that he draws, 
 it is for intelligent and impartial men to de- 
 cide. I leave it with you, with these remarks, 
 worthy of being remembered, that that little 
 thing, those few indentured servants being there, 
 was of itself sufficient to modify a constitution 
 made by a people ardently desiring to have a 
 free constitution; showing the power of the ac- 
 tual presence of the institution of slavery to pre- 
 vent any people, however anxious to make a 
 free State from making it perfectly so. I have 
 been detaining you longer perhaps than I ought 
 to do. 
 
 I am in some doubt whether to introduce 
 another topic upon which I could talk awhile. 
 [Cries of "Go on," and "Give us it."] It is 
 this then — Douglas's popular sovereignty, as a 
 principle, is simply this: If one man chooses 
 to make a slave of another man, neither that man 
 
228 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 17 
 
 nor anybody else has a right to object. Apply 
 it to government, as he seeks to apply it, and it 
 is this: If, in a new Territory, into which a few 
 people are beginning to enter for the purpose 
 of making their homes, they choose to either 
 exclude slavery from their limits, or to establish 
 it there, however one or the other may affect 
 the persons to be enslaved, or the infinitely 
 greater number of persons who are afterward to 
 inhabit that Territory, or the other members of 
 the family of communities, of which they are 
 but an incipient member, or the general head 
 of the family of States as parent of all — however 
 their action may affect one or the other of these, 
 there is no power or right to interfere. That is 
 Douglas's popular sovereignty applied. Now 
 I think that there is a real popular sovereignty 
 in the world. I think a definition of popular 
 sovereignty, in the abstract, would be about this 
 — that each man shall do precisely as he pleases 
 with himself, and with all those things which 
 exclusively concern him. Applied in govern- 
 ment, this principle would be, that a general 
 government shall do all those things which per- 
 tain to it, and all the local governments shall do 
 precisely as they please in respect to those mat- 
 ters which exclusively concern them. 
 
 Douglas looks upon slavery as so insignificant 
 that the people must decide that question for 
 
1859] Speech at Cincinnati 229 
 
 themselves, and yet they are not fit to decide who 
 shall be their governor, judge, or secretary, or 
 who shall be any of their officers. These are 
 vast national matters, in his estimation; but the 
 little matter in his estimation is that of planting 
 slavery there. That is purely of local interest, 
 which nobody should be allowed to say a word 
 about. 
 
 Labor is the great source from which nearly 
 all, if not all, human comforts and necessities 
 are drawn. There is a difference in opinion 
 about the elements of labor in society. Some 
 men assume that there is a necessary connection 
 between capital and labor, and that connection 
 draws within it the whole of the labor of the 
 community. They assume that nobody works 
 unless capital excites them to work. They be- 
 gin next to consider what is the best way. They 
 say there are but two ways — one is to hire men 
 and to allure them to labor by their consent; the 
 other is to buy the men and drive them to it, and 
 that is slavery. Having assumed that, they pro- 
 ceed to discuss the question of whether the labor- 
 ers themselves are better off in the condition of 
 slaves or of hired laborers, and they usually de- 
 cide that they are better off in the condition of 
 slaves. 
 
 In the first place, I say that the whole thing 
 is a mistake. That there is a certain relation 
 
230 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 17 
 
 between capital and labor, I admit. That it 
 does exist, and rightfully exists, I think is true. 
 That men who are industrious and sober and 
 honest in the pursuit of their own interests 
 should after a while accumulate capital, and 
 after that should be allowed to enjoy it in peace, 
 and also if they should choose, when they have 
 accumulated it, to use it to save themselves from 
 actual labor, and hire other people to labor for 
 them, is right. In doing so, they do not wrong 
 the man they employ, for they find men who 
 have not their own land to work upon, or shops 
 to work in, and who are benefited by working 
 for others — hired laborers, receiving their cap- 
 ital for it. Thus a few men that own capital 
 hire a few others, and these establish the rela- 
 tion of capital and labor rightfully — a relation 
 of which I make no complaint. But I insist 
 that that relation, after all, does not embrace 
 more than one eighth of the labor of the country. 
 
 [The speaker proceeded to argue that the 
 hired laborer, with his ability to become an em- 
 ployer, must have every precedence over him 
 who labors under the inducement of force. He 
 continued:] 
 
 I have taken upon myself, in the name of some 
 of you, to say that we expect upon these princi- 
 ples to ultimately beat them. In order to do so, 
 I think we want and must have a national policy 
 
1859] Speech at Cincinnati 231 
 
 in regard to the institution of slavery that ac- 
 knowledges and deals with that institution as 
 being wrong. Whoever desires the prevention 
 of the spread of slavery and the nationalization 
 of that institution, yields all when he yields to 
 any policy that either recognizes slavery as be- 
 ing right, or as being an indifferent thing. 
 Nothing will make you successful but setting 
 up a policy which shall treat the thing as being 
 wrong. When I say this, I do not mean to say 
 that this General Government is charged with 
 the duty of redressing or preventing all the 
 wrongs in the world; but I do think that it is 
 charged with preventing and redressing all 
 wrongs which are wrongs to itself. This govern- 
 ment is expressly charged with the duty of pro- 
 viding for the general welfare. We believe that 
 the spreading out and perpetuity of the institu- 
 tion of slavery impairs the general welfare. We 
 believe — nay, we know — that that is the only 
 thing that has ever threatened the perpetuity 
 of the Union itself. The only thing which has 
 ever menaced the destruction of the government 
 under which we live, is this very thing. To re- 
 press this thing, we think, is providing for the 
 general welfare. Our friends in Kentucky dif- 
 fer from us. We need not make our argument 
 for them; but we who think it is wrong in all its 
 relations, or in some of them at least, must de- 
 
232 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 17 
 
 cide as to our own actions, and our own course, 
 upon our own judgment. 
 
 I say that we must not interfere with the insti- 
 tution of slavery in the States where it exists, 
 because the Constitution forbids it, and the gen- 
 eral welfare does not require us to do so. We 
 must not withhold an efficient fugitive-slave 
 law, because the Constitution requires us, as I 
 understand it, not to withhold such a law. But 
 we must prevent the outspreading of the insti- 
 tution, because neither the Constitution nor gen- 
 eral welfare requires us to extend it. We must 
 prevent the revival of the African slave-trade, 
 and the enacting by Congress of a territorial 
 slave-code. We must prevent each of these 
 things being done by either congresses or courts. 
 The people of these United States are the right- 
 ful masters of both congresses and courts, not to 
 overthrow the Constitution, but to overthrow the 
 men who pervert the Constitution. 
 
 To do these things we must employ instru- 
 mentalities. We must hold conventions; we 
 must adopt platforms, if we conform to ordi- 
 nary custom; we must nominate candidates; and 
 we must carry elections. In all these things, I 
 think that we ought to keep in view our real 
 purpose, and in none do anything that stands 
 adverse to our purpose. If we shall adopt a 
 platform that fails to recognize or express our 
 
1859] Speech at Cincinnati 233 
 
 purpose, or elect a man that declares himself 
 inimical to our purpose, we not only take noth- 
 ing by our success, but we tacitly admit that we 
 act upon no other principle than a desire to have 
 "the loaves and fishes," by which, in the end, 
 our apparent success is really an injury to us. 
 I know that it is very desirable with me, as 
 with everybody else, that all the elements of the 
 Opposition shall unite in the next presidential 
 election, and in all future time. I am anxious 
 that that should be, but there are things seriously 
 to be considered in relation to that matter. If 
 the terms can be arranged, I am in favor of the 
 union. But suppose we shall take up some man, 
 and put him upon one end or the other of the 
 ticket, who declares himself against us in re- 
 gard to the prevention of the spread of slavery, 
 who turns up his nose and says he is tired of 
 hearing anything more about it, who is more 
 against us than against the enemy — what will 
 be the issue? Why, he will get no slave States 
 after all — he has tried that already until being 
 beat is the rule for him. If we nominate him 
 upon that ground, he will not carry a slave 
 State, and not only so, but that portion of our 
 men who are high strung upon the principle we 
 really fight for will not go for him, and he won't 
 get a single electoral vote anywhere, except, per- 
 haps, in the State of Maryland. There is no use 
 
234 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 17 
 
 in saying to us that we are stubborn and obsti- 
 nate because we won't do some such thing as this. 
 We cannot do it. We cannot get our men to 
 vote it. I speak by the card, that we cannot give 
 the State of Illinois in such case by fifty thou- 
 sand. We would be flatter down than the "Ne- 
 gro Democracy" themselves have the heart to 
 wish to see us. 
 
 After saying this much, let me say a little on 
 the other side. There are plenty of men in the 
 slave States that are altogether good enough for 
 me to be either President or Vice-President, pro- 
 vided they will profess their sympathy with our 
 purpose, and will place themselves on such 
 ground that our men, upon principle, can vote 
 for them. There are scores of them — good men 
 in their character for intelligence, and talent, 
 and integrity. If such an one will place him- 
 self upon the right ground, I am for his occupy- 
 ing one place upon the next Republican or Op- 
 position ticket. I will heartily go for him. 
 But unless he does so place himself, I think it is 
 a matter of perfect nonsense to attempt to bring 
 about a union upon any other basis; that if a 
 union be made, the elements will scatter so that 
 there can be no success for such a ticket, nor 
 anything like success. The good old maxims 
 of the Bible are applicable, and truly appli- 
 cable, to human affairs, and in this, as in other 
 
1859] Speech at Cincinnati 235 
 
 things, we may say here that he who is not for 
 us is against us; he who gathereth not with us 
 scattereth. I should be glad to have some of the 
 many good, and able, and noble men of the 
 South to place themselves where we can confer 
 upon them the high honor of an election upon 
 one or the other end of our ticket. It would do 
 my soul good to do that thing. It would enable 
 us to teach them that, inasmuch as we select one 
 of their own number to carry out our principles, 
 we are free from the charge that we mean more 
 than we say. 
 
 But, my friends, I have detained you much 
 longer than I expected to do. I believe I may 
 allow myself the compliment to say that you 
 have stayed and heard me with great patience, 
 for which I return you my most sincere thanks. 
 
236 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 30 
 
 Annual 'Address Before the Wisconsin 
 State Agricultural Society, at Milwau- 
 kee, Wisconsin, September 30, 1859 
 
 MEMBERS of the Agricultural Society 
 and Citizens of Wisconsin: Agri- 
 cultural fairs are becoming an insti- 
 tution of the country. They are useful in more 
 ways than one. They bring us together, and 
 thereby make us better acquainted and better 
 friends than we otherwise would be. From 
 the first appearance of man upon the earth down 
 to very recent times, the words "stranger" and 
 "enemy" were quite or almost synonymous. 
 Long after civilized nations had defined rob- 
 bery and murder as high crimes, and had af- 
 fixed severe punishments to them, when prac- 
 tised among and upon their own people re- 
 spectively, it was deemed no offense, but even 
 meritorious, to rob and murder and enslave 
 strangers, whether as nations or as individuals. 
 Even yet, this has not totally disappeared. 
 The man of the highest moral cultivation, in 
 spite of all which abstract principle can do, 
 likes him whom he does know much better 
 than him whom he does not know. To correct 
 
1 859] Agricultural Address 237 
 
 evils, great and small, which spring from want 
 of sympathy, and from positive enmity among 
 strangers, as nations or as individuals, is one of 
 the highest functions of civilization. To this 
 end our agricultural fairs contribute in no small 
 degree. They render more pleasant, and more 
 strong and more durable, the bond of social and 
 political union among us. Again, if, as Pope 
 declares, "happiness is our being's end and 
 aim," our fairs contribute much to that end 
 and aim, as occasions of recreation, as holidays. 
 Constituted as man is, he has positive need of 
 occasional recreation, and whatever can give 
 him this associated with virtue and advantage, 
 and free from vice and disadvantage, is a posi- 
 tive good. Such recreation our fairs afford. 
 They are a present pleasure, to be followed by 
 no pain as a consequence; they are a present 
 pleasure, making the future more pleasant. 
 
 But the chief use of agricultural fairs is to 
 aid in improving the great calling of agricul- 
 ture in all its departments and minute divisions; 
 to make mutual exchange of agricultural dis- 
 covery, information, and knowledge; so that, 
 at the end, all may know everything which may 
 have been known to but one or to but few, at the 
 beginning; to bring together especially all 
 which is supposed to be not generally known 
 because of recent discovery or invention. 
 
238 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 30 
 
 And not only to bring together and to impart 
 all which has been accidentally discovered and 
 invented upon ordinary motive, but by exciting 
 emulation for premiums, and for the pride and 
 honor of success, — of triumph, in some sort, — 
 to stimulate that discovery and invention into ex- 
 traordinary activity. In this these fairs are kin- 
 dred to the patent clause in the Constitution of 
 the United States, and to the department and 
 practical system based upon that clause. 
 
 One feature, I believe, of every fair is a regu- 
 lar address. The Agricultural Society of the 
 young, prosperous, and soon to be great State of 
 Wisconsin has done me the high honor of select- 
 ing me to make that address upon this occasion 
 — an honor for which I make my profound and 
 grateful acknowledgment. 
 
 I presume I am not expected to employ the 
 time assigned me in the mere flattery of the 
 farmers as a class. My opinion of them is that, 
 in proportion to numbers, they are neither bet- 
 ter nor worse than other people. In the nature 
 of things they are more numerous than any other 
 class; and I believe there really are more at- 
 tempts at flattering them than any other, the 
 reason for which I cannot perceive, unless it be 
 that they can cast more votes than any other. On 
 reflection, I am not quite sure that there is not 
 cause of suspicion against you in selecting me, in 
 
1859] Agricultural Address 239 
 
 some sort a politician and in no sort a farmer, 
 to address you. 
 
 But farmers being the most numerous class, 
 it follows that their interest is the largest inter- 
 est. It also follows that that interest is most 
 worthy of all to be cherished and cultivated — 
 that if there be inevitable conflict between that 
 interest and any other, that other should yield. 
 
 Again, I suppose it is not expected of me to 
 impart to you much specific information on ag- 
 riculture. You have no reason to believe, and 
 do not believe, that I possess it; if that were 
 what you seek in this address, any one of your 
 own number or class would be more able to fur- 
 nish it. You, perhaps, do expect me to give 
 some general interest to the occasion, and to 
 make some general suggestions on practical mat- 
 ters. I shall attempt nothing more. And in 
 such suggestions by me, quite likely very little 
 will be new to you, and a large part of the rest 
 will be possibly already known to be erroneous. 
 
 My first suggestion is an inquiry as to the 
 effect of greater thoroughness in all the depart- 
 ments of agriculture than now prevails in the 
 Northwest — perhaps I might say in America. 
 To speak entirely within bounds, it is known 
 that fifty bushels of wheat, or one hundred bush- 
 els of Indian corn, can be produced from 
 an acre. Less than a year ago I saw it stated 
 
240 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 30 
 
 that a man, by extraordinary care and labor, 
 had produced of wheat what was equal to two 
 hundred bushels from an acre. But take fifty 
 of wheat, and one hundred of corn, to be the 
 possibility, and compare it with the actual crops 
 of the country. Many years ago I saw it stated, 
 in a patent-office report, that eighteen bushels 
 was the average crop throughout the United 
 States; and this year an intelligent farmer of 
 Illinois assures me that he did not believe the 
 land harvested in that State this season had 
 yielded more than an average of eight bushels 
 to the acre ; much was cut, and then abandoned 
 as not worth threshing, and much was aban- 
 doned as not worth cutting. As to Indian corn, 
 and indeed, most other crops, the case has not 
 been much better. For the last four years I do 
 not believe the ground planted with corn in Illi- 
 nois has produced an average of twenty bushels 
 to the acre. It is true that heretofore we have 
 had better crops with no better cultivation, but I 
 believe it is also true that the soil has never been 
 pushed up to one half of its capacity. 
 
 What would be the effect upon the farming 
 interest to push the soil up to something near 
 its full capacity? Unquestionably it will take 
 more labor to produce fifty bushels from an acre 
 than it will to produce ten bushels from the same 
 acre; but will it take more labor to produce fifty 
 
1859] Agricultural Address 241 
 
 bushels from one acre than from five? Unques- 
 tionably thorough cultivation will require more 
 labor to the acre; but will it require more to the 
 bushel? If it should require just as much to the 
 bushel, there are some probable, and several cer- 
 tain, advantages in favor of the thorough prac- 
 tice. It is probable it would develop those un- 
 known causes which of late years have cut down 
 our crops below their former average. It is 
 almost certain, I think, that by deeper plowing, 
 analysis of the soils, experiments with manures 
 and varieties of seeds, observance of seasons, and 
 the like, these causes would be discovered and 
 remedied. It is certain that thorough cultiva- 
 tion would spare half, or more than half, the 
 cost of land, simply because the same product 
 would be got from half, or from less than half, 
 the quantity of land. This proposition is self- 
 evident, and can be made no plainer by repeti- 
 tions or illustrations. The cost of land is a great 
 item, even in new countries, and it constantly 
 grows greater and greater, in comparison with 
 other items, as the country grows older. 
 
 It also would spare the making and maintain- 
 ing of inclosures for the same, whether these 
 inclosures should be hedges, ditches, or fences. 
 This again is a heavy item — heavy at first, and 
 heavy in its continual demand for repairs. I 
 remember once being greatly astonished by an 
 
242 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 30 
 
 apparently authentic exhibition of the propor- 
 tion the cost of an inclosure bears to all the other 
 expenses of the farmer, though I cannot remem- 
 ber exactly what that proportion was. Any 
 farmer, if he will, can ascertain it in his own 
 case for himself. 
 
 Again, a great amount of locomotion is spared 
 by thorough cultivation. Take fifty bushels of 
 wheat ready for harvest, standing upon a single 
 acre, and it can be harvested in any of the known 
 ways with less than half the labor which would 
 be required if it were spread over five acres. 
 This would be true if cut by the old hand-sickle ; 
 true, to a greater extent, if by the scythe and 
 cradle; and to a still greater extent, if by the 
 machines now in use. These machines are 
 chiefly valuable as a means of substituting ani- 
 mal-power for the power of men in this branch 
 of farm-work. In the highest degree of perfec- 
 tion yet reached in applying the horse-power to 
 harvesting, fully nine-tenths of the power is 
 expended by the animal in carrying himself and 
 dragging the machine over the field, leaving cer- 
 tainly not more than one-tenth to be applied 
 directly to the only end of the whole operation 
 — the gathering in of the grain, and clipping of 
 the straw. When grain is very thin on the 
 ground, it is always more or less intermingled 
 with weeds, chess, and the like, and a large part 
 
1859] Agricultural Address 243 
 
 of the power is expended in cutting these. It is 
 plain that when the crop is very thick upon the 
 ground, a larger proportion of the power is di- 
 rectly applied to gathering in and cutting it ; and 
 the smaller to that which is totally useless as an 
 end. And what I have said of harvesting is true 
 in a greater or less degree of mowing, plowing, 
 gathering in of crops generally, and indeed of 
 almost all farm-work. 
 
 The effect of thorough cultivation upon the 
 farmer's own mind, and in reaction through his 
 mind back upon his business, is perhaps quite 
 equal to any other of its effects. Every man is 
 proud of what he does well, and no man is proud 
 to that he does not well. With the former his 
 heart is in his work, and he will do twice as 
 much of it with less fatigue; the latter he per- 
 forms a little imperfectly, looks at it in disgust, 
 turns from it, and imagines himself exceedingly 
 tired — the little he has done comes to nothing 
 for want of finishing. 
 
 The man who produces a good full crop will 
 scarcely ever let any part of it go to waste; he 
 will keep up the inclosure about it, and allow 
 neither man nor beast to trespass upon it; he 
 will gather it in due season, and store it in per- 
 fect security. Thus he labors with satisfaction, 
 and saves himself the whole fruit of his labor. 
 The other, starting with no purpose for a full 
 
244 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 30 
 
 crop, labors less, and with less satisfaction, 
 allows his fences to fall, and cattle to trespass, 
 gathers not in due season, or not at all. Thus the 
 labor he has performed is wasted away, little 
 by little, till in the end he derives scarcely any- 
 thing from it. 
 
 The ambition for broad acres leads to poor 
 farming, even with men of energy. I scarcely 
 ever knew a mammoth farm to sustain itself, 
 much less to return a profit upon the outlay. I 
 have more than once known a man to spend a 
 respectable fortune upon one, fail, and leave it, 
 and then some man of modest aim get a small 
 fraction of the ground, and makes a good living 
 upon it. Mammoth farms are like tools or 
 weapons which are too heavy to be handled; ere 
 long they are thrown aside at a great loss. 
 
 The successful application of steam-power to 
 farm-work is a desideratum — especially a steam- 
 plow. It is not enough that a machine operated 
 by steam will really plow. To be successful, it 
 must, all things considered, plow better than can 
 be done with animal-power. It must do all the 
 work as well, and cheaper; or more rapidly, so 
 as to get through more perfectly in season; or in 
 some way afford an advantage over plowing 
 with animals, else it is no success. I have never 
 seen a machine intended for a steam-plow. 
 Much praise and admiration are bestowed upon 
 
1859] Agricultural Address 245 
 
 some of them, and they may be, for aught I 
 know, already successful; but I have not per- 
 ceived the demonstration of it. I have thought 
 a good deal, in an abstract way, about a steam- 
 plow. That one which shall be so contrived as 
 to apply the larger proportion of its power to 
 the cutting and turning of the soil, and the small- 
 est, to the moving itself over the field, will be the 
 best one. A very small stationary-engine would 
 draw a large gang of plows through the ground 
 from a short distance to itself; but when it is not 
 stationary, but has to move along like a horse, 
 dragging the plows after it, it must have addi- 
 tional power to carry itself; and the difficulty 
 grows by what is intended to overcome it; for 
 what adds power also adds size and weight to the 
 machine, thus increasing again the demand for 
 power. 
 
 Suppose you construct the machine so as to 
 cut a succession of short furrows, say a rod 
 in length, transversely to the course the machine 
 is locomoting, something like the shuttle in 
 weaving. In such case the whole machine 
 would move north only the width of a furrow, 
 while in length the furrow would be a rod from 
 east to west. In such case a very large propor- 
 tion of the power would be applied to the actual 
 plowing. But in this, too, there would be diffi- 
 culty, which would be the getting of the plow 
 
246 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 30 
 
 into and out of the ground, at the end of all these 
 short furrows. 
 
 I delieve, however, ingenious men will, if they 
 have not already, overcome the difficulty I have 
 suggested. But there is still another, about 
 which I am less sanguine. It is the supply of 
 fuel, and especially water, to make steam. Such 
 supply is clearly practicable; but can the ex- 
 pense of it be borne? Steamboats live upon the 
 water, and find their fuel at stated places. 
 Steam-mills and other stationary steam-machin- 
 ery have their stationary supplies of fuel and 
 water. Railroad locomotives have their regular 
 wood and water stations. But the steam plow is 
 less fortunate. It does not live upon the water, 
 and if it be once at a water-station, it will work 
 away from it, and when it gets away cannot re- 
 turn without leaving its work, at a great expense 
 of its time and strength. It will occur that a 
 wagon-and-horse team might be employed to 
 supply it with fuel and water; but this, too, is 
 expensive; and the question recurs, "Can the 
 expense be borne?" When this is added to all 
 other expenses, will not plowing cost more than 
 in the old way? 
 
 It is to be hoped that the steam-plow will 
 be finally successful, and if it shall be, "thorough 
 cultivation" — putting the soil to the top of its 
 capacity, producing the largest crop possible 
 
1859] Agricultural Address 247 
 
 from a given quantity of ground — will be most 
 favorable for it. Doing a large amount of work 
 upon a small quantity of ground, it will be as 
 nearly as possible stationary while working, and 
 as free as possible from locomotion, thus ex- 
 pending its strength as much as possible upon 
 its work, and as little as possible in traveling. 
 Our thanks, and something more substantial than 
 thanks, are due to every man engaged in the ef- 
 fort to produce a successful steam-plow. Even 
 the unsuccessful will bring something to light 
 which, in the hands of others, will contribute 
 to the final success. I have not pointed out dif- 
 ficulties in order to discourage, but in order 
 that, being seen, they may be the more readily 
 overcome. 
 
 The world is agreed that labor is the source 
 from which human wants are mainly supplied. 
 There is no dispute upon this point. From this 
 point, however, men immediately diverge. 
 Much disputation is maintained as to the best 
 way of applying and controlling the labor ele- 
 ment. By some it is assumed that labor is avail- 
 able only in connection with capital — that no- 
 body labors, unless somebody else owning capi- 
 tal, somehow, by the use of it, induces him to 
 do it. Having assumed this, they proceed to 
 consider whether it is best that capital shall hire 
 laborers, and thus induce them to work by their 
 
248 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 30 
 
 own consent, or buy them, and drive them to it, 
 without their consent. Having proceeded so 
 far, they naturally conclude that all laborers 
 are naturally either hired laborers or slaves. 
 They further assume that whoever is once a 
 hired laborer, is fatally fixed in that condition 
 for life; and thence again, that his condition 
 is as bad as, or worse than, that of a slave. 
 This is the "mud-sill" theory. But another 
 class of reasoners hold the opinion that there 
 is no such relation between capital and labor 
 as assumed; that there is no such thing as a 
 free man being fatally fixed for life in the con- 
 dition of a hired laborer; that both these as- 
 sumptions are false, and all inferences from 
 them groundless. They hold that labor is prior 
 to, and independent of, capital; that, in fact, 
 capital is the fruit of labor, and could never 
 have existed if labor had not first existed; that 
 labor can exist without capital, but that capi- 
 tal could never have existed without labor. 
 Hence they hold that labor is the superior — 
 greatly the superior — of capital. 
 
 They do not deny that there is, and probably 
 always will be, a relation between labor and 
 capital. The error, as they hold, is in assum- 
 ing that the whole labor of the world exists 
 within that relation. A few men own capital ; 
 and that few avoid labor themselves, and with 
 
1859] Agricultural Address 249 
 
 their capital hire or buy another few to labor 
 for them. A large majority belong to neither 
 class — neither work for others, nor have others 
 working for them. Even in all our slave States 
 except South Carolina, a majority of the whole 
 people of all colors are neither slaves nor mas- 
 ters. In these free States, a large majority are 
 neither hirers nor hired. Men, with their 
 families — wives, sons and daughters — work for 
 themselves, on their farms, in their houses, and 
 in their shops, taking the whole product to 
 themselves, and asking no favors of capital on 
 the one hand, nor of hirelings or slaves on the 
 other. It is not forgotten that a considerable 
 number of persons mingle their own labor with 
 capital — that is, labor with their own hands and 
 also buy slaves or hire free men to labor for 
 them; but this is only a mixed, and not a dis- 
 tinct, class. No principle stated is disturbed 
 by the existence of this mixed class. Again, as 
 has already been said, the opponents of the 
 "mud-sill" theory insist that there is not, of ne- 
 cessity, any such thing as the free hired laborer 
 being fixed to that condition for life. There 
 is demonstration for saying this. Many inde- 
 pendent men in this assembly doubtless a few 
 years ago were hired laborers. And their case 
 is almost, if not quite, the general rule. 
 
 The prudent, penniless beginner in the world 
 

 250 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 30 
 
 labors for wages awhile, saves a surplus with 
 which to buy tools or land for himself, then la- 
 bors on his own account another while, and at 
 length hires another new beginner to help him. 
 This, say its advocates, is free labor — the just, 
 and generous, and prosperous system, which 
 opens the way for all, gives hope to all, and 
 energy, and progress, and improvement of con- 
 dition to all. If any continue through life 
 in the condition of the hired laborer, it is not 
 the fault of the system, but because of either a 
 dependent nature which prefers it, or improvi- 
 dence, folly, or singular misfortune. I have 
 said this much about the elements of labor gen- 
 erally, as introductory to the consideration of 
 a new phase which that element is in process of 
 assuming. The old general rule was that edu- 
 cated people did not perform manual labor. 
 They managed to eat their bread, leaving the 
 toil of producing it to the uneducated. This 
 was not an insupportable evil to the working 
 bees, so long as the class of drones remained 
 very small. But now, especially in these free 
 States, nearly all are educated — quite too nearly 
 all to leave the labor of the uneducated in any 
 wise adequate to the support of the whole. It 
 follows from this that henceforth educated peo- 
 ple must labor. Otherwise, education itself 
 would become a positive and intolerable evil. 
 
1 859] Agricultural Address 251 
 
 No country can sustain in idleness more than 
 a small percentage of its numbers. The great 
 majority must labor at something productive. 
 From these premises the problem springs, 
 "How can labor and education be the most sat- 
 isfactorily combined?" 
 
 By the "mud-sill" theory it is assumed that 
 labor and education are incompatible, and any 
 practical combination of them impossible. Ac- 
 cording to that theory, a blind horse upon a 
 tread-mill is a perfect illustration of what a 
 laborer should be — all the better for being 
 blind, that he could not kick understandingly. 
 According to that theory, the education of la- 
 borers is not only useless but pernicious and 
 dangerous. In fact, it is, in some sort, deemed 
 a misfortune that laborers should have heads at 
 all. Those same heads are regarded as explo- 
 sive materials, only to be safely kept in damp 
 places, as far as possible from that peculiar 
 sort of fire which ignites them. A Yankee who 
 could invent a strong-handed man without a 
 head would receive the everlasting gratitude of 
 the "mud-sill" advocates. 
 
 But free labor says, "No." Free labor argues 
 that as the Author of man makes every individ- 
 ual with one head and one pairs of hands, it 
 was probably intended that heads and hands 
 should cooperate as friends, and that that par- 
 
252 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 30 
 
 ticular head should direct and control that pair 
 of hands. As each man has one mouth to be 
 fed, and one pair of hands to furnish food, it 
 was probably intended that that particular pair 
 of hands should feed that particular mouth — 
 that each head is the natural guardian, director, 
 and protector of the hands and mouth insepa- 
 rably connected with it; and that being so, every 
 head should be cultivated and improved by 
 whatever will add to its capacity for perform- 
 ing its charge. In one word, free labor insists 
 on universal education. 
 
 I have so far stated the opposite theories of 
 "mud-sill" and "free labor," without declaring 
 any preference of my own between them. On 
 an occasion like this, I ought not to declare any. 
 I suppose, however, I shall not be mistaken in 
 assuming as a fact that the people of Wiscon- 
 sin prefer free labor, with its natural compan- 
 ion, education. 
 
 This leads to the further reflection that no 
 other human occupation opens so wide a field 
 for the profitable and agreeable combination of 
 labor with cultivated thought, as agriculture. 
 I know nothing so pleasant to the mind as the 
 discovery of anything that is at once new and 
 valuable — nothing that so lightens and sweetens 
 toil as the hopeful pursuit of such discovery. 
 And how vast and how varied a field is agricul- 
 
1859] Agricultural Address 253 
 
 ture for such discovery! The mind, already 
 trained to thought in the country school, or 
 higher school, cannot fail to find there an ex- 
 haustless source of enjoyment. Every blade of 
 grass is a study; and to produce two where there 
 was but one is both a profit and a pleasure. And 
 not grass alone, but soils, seeds, and seasons — 
 hedges, ditches, and fences — draining, droughts, 
 and irrigation — plowing, hoeing, and harrow- 
 ing — reaping, mowing, and threshing — saving 
 crops, pests of crops, diseases of crops, and what 
 will prevent or cure them — implements, uten- 
 sils, and machines, their relative merits, and 
 how to improve them — hogs, horses, and cattle 
 — sheep, goats, and poultry — trees, shrubs, 
 fruits, plants, and flowers — the thousand things 
 of which these are specimens — each a world 
 of study within itself. 
 
 In all this, book-learning is available. A ca- 
 pacity and taste for reading gives access to what- 
 ever has already been discovered by others. It 
 is the key, or one of the keys, to the already 
 solved problems. And not only so: it gives a 
 relish and facility for successfully pursuing the 
 unsolved ones. The rudiments of science are 
 available, and highly available. Some knowl- 
 edge of botany assists in dealing with the vege- 
 table world — with all growing crops. Chem- 
 istry assists in the analysis of soils, selection and 
 
254 Abraham Lincoln [Sept. 30 
 
 application of manures, and in numerous other 
 ways. The mechanical branches of natural 
 philosophy are ready help in almost everything, 
 but especially in reference to implements and 
 machinery. 
 
 The thought recurs that education — cultivat- 
 ed thought — can best be combined with agricul- 
 tural labor, or any labor, on the principle of 
 thorough work; that careless, half performed, 
 slovenly work makes no place for such combin- 
 ation; and thorough work, again, renders suf- 
 ficient the smallest quantity of ground to each 
 man; and this, again, conforms to what must 
 occur in a world less inclined to wars and more 
 devoted to the arts of peace than heretofore. 
 Population must increase rapidly, more rapidly 
 than in former times, and ere long the most 
 valuable of all arts will be the art of deriving 
 a comfortable subsistence from the smallest area 
 of soil. No community whose every member 
 possesses this art, can ever be the victim of op- 
 pression in any of its forms. Such community 
 will be alike independent of crowned kings, 
 money kings, and land kings. 
 
 But, according to your program, the award- 
 ing of premiums awaits the closing of this ad- 
 dress. Considering the deep interest necessa- 
 rily pertaining to that performance, it would be 
 no wonder if I am already heard with some im- 
 
1859] Agricultural Address 255 
 
 patience. I will detain you but a moment 
 longer. Some of you will be successful, and 
 such will need but little philosophy to take 
 them home in cheerful spirits; others will be 
 disappointed, and will be in a less happy mood. 
 To such let it be said, "Lay it not too much to 
 heart." Let them adopt the maxim, "Better 
 luck next time," and then by renewed exertion 
 make that better luck for themselves. 
 
 And by the successful and unsuccessful let it 
 be remembered that while occasions like the 
 present bring their sober and durable benefits, 
 the exultations and mortifications of them are 
 but temporary; that the victor will soon be van- 
 quished if he relax in his exertion; and that the 
 vanquished this year may be victor the next, in 
 spite of all competition. 
 
 It is said an Eastern monarch once charged 
 his wise men to invent him a sentence to be 
 ever in view, and which should be true and ap- 
 propriate in all times and situations. They 
 presented him the words, "And this, too, shall 
 pass away." How much it expresses! How 
 chastening in the hour of pride! How consol- 
 ing in the depths of affliction! "And this, too, 
 shall pass away." And yet, let us hope, it is 
 not quite true. Let us hope, rather, that by 
 the best cultivation of the physical world be- 
 neath and around us, and the best intellectual 
 
256 Abraham Lincoln [Nov. i 
 
 and moral world within us, we shall secure an 
 individual, social, and political prosperity and 
 happiness, whose course shall be onward and 
 upward, and which, while the earth endures, 
 shall not pass away. 
 
 Letter to Dr. Edward Wallace 
 
 Clinton, October n, 1859. 
 
 My dear Sir: I am here just now attending 
 court. Yesterday, before I left Springfield, 
 your brother, Dr. William S. Wallace, showed 
 me a letter of yours, in which you kindly men- 
 tion my name, inquire for my tariff views, and 
 suggest the propriety of my writing a letter up- 
 on the subject. I was an old Henry Clay-Tar- 
 iff- Whig. In old times I made more speeches 
 on that subject than any other. 
 
 I have not since changed my views. I be- 
 lieve yet, if we could have a moderate, carefully 
 adjusted protective tariff, so far acquiesced in 
 as not to be a perpetual subject of political 
 strife, squabbles, changes, and uncertainties, it 
 would be better for us. Still it is my opinion 
 that just now the revival of that question will 
 not advance the cause itself, or the man who re- 
 vives it. 
 
 I have not thought much on the subject re- 
 cently, but my general impression is that the 
 necessity for a protective tariff will ere long 
 
1859] Letter to Frazer 
 
 257 
 
 force its old opponents to take it up; and then 
 its old friends can join in and establish it on a 
 more firm and durable basis. We, the Old 
 Whigs, have been entirely beaten out of the 
 tariff question, and we shall not be able to re- 
 establish the policy until the absence of it shall 
 have demonstrated the necessity for it in the 
 minds of men heretofore opposed to it. With 
 this view, I should prefer to not now write a 
 public letter on the subject. I therefore wish 
 this to be considered confidential. I shall be 
 very glad to receive a letter from you. 
 Yours truly, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
 Letter to W. E. Frazer 
 
 Springfield, Illinois, November 1, 1859. 
 Dear Sir: Yours of the 24th ult. was forward- 
 ed to me from Chicago. It certainly is impor- 
 tant to secure Pennsylvania for the Republicans 
 in the next presidential contest, and not unim- 
 portant to also secure Illinois. As to the ticket 
 you name, I shall be heartily for it after it shall 
 have been fairly nominated by a Republican 
 national convention; and I cannot be commit- 
 ted to it before. For my single self, I have en- 
 listed for the permanent success of the Repub- 
 lican cause; and for this object I shall labor 
 faithfully in the ranks, unless, as I think not 
 
258 Abraham Lincoln [Nov. 13 
 
 probable, the judgment of the party shall assign 
 me a different position. If the Republicans of 
 the great State of Pennsylvania shall present 
 Mr. Cameron as their candidate for the presi- 
 dency, such an indorsement for his fitness for 
 the place could scarcely be deemed insufficient. 
 Still, as I would not like the public to know, so 
 I would not like myself to know, I had entered 
 a combination with any man to the prejudice 
 of all others whose friends respectively may con- 
 sider them preferable. 
 
 Yours truly, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
 ♦Letter to Dr. 
 
 Springfield, November 2, 1859. 
 Dear Doctor: Your business makes it conven- 
 ient for you to do a good deal in the way of 
 getting all our friends to the polls next Tues- 
 day. Please do it. We begin to hope we can 
 elect Palmer. He is a good man, and deserves 
 to be elected, both for his own, and the Cause's 
 sake. Yours truly, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
 Letter to James A. Briggs 
 
 Danville, Illinois, November 13, 1859. 
 Dear Sir: Yours of the 1st, closing with my 
 proposition for compromise, was duly received. 
 
1859] Letter to Briggs 259 
 
 I will be on hand, and in due time notify you 
 of the exact day. I believe, after all, I shall 
 make a political speech of it. You have no 
 objection? I would like to know in advance 
 whether I am also to speak or lecture in New 
 York. Very, very glad your election went 
 right. 
 
 Yours truly, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
260 Abraham Lincoln [Dec. 1-5 
 
 Speeches in Kansas, December 1-5, 1859 ' 
 
 Introduction. 
 
 PURPOSE of the Republican organiza- 
 tion. — The Republican party believe 
 there is danger that slavery will be fur- 
 ther extended, and ultimately made national in 
 the United States; and to prevent this incidental 
 and final consummation, is the purpose of this 
 organization. 
 
 Chief danger to that purpose. — A congres- 
 sional slave code for the Territories, and the re- 
 vival of the African trade, and a second Dred 
 Scott decision, are not just now the chief dan- 
 ger to our purpose. These will press us in due 
 time, but they are not quite ready yet — they 
 know that, as yet, we are too strong for them. 
 The insidious Douglas popular sovereignty, 
 
 1 In response to invitations from Republicans of the then 
 Territory, Mr. Lincoln made a visit to Kansas in December, 
 1859, and made speeches at Elwood (opposite St. Joseph, Mo.), 
 at Troy, Doniphan, Atchison, and Leavenworth, Kansas. Among 
 his papers were a number of disconnected sheets of autograph 
 manuscript, which contained internal evidence that they were 
 portions of the addresses made by him on these occasions. 
 Though the fragments seem to belong to different addresses, 
 the topics treated in them justify their presentation in the order 
 here arranged, as the general line of argument followed by him. 
 — N. and H. 
 
1859] Speeches in Kansas 261 
 
 which prepares the way for this ultimate dan- 
 ger, it is which just now constitutes our chief 
 danger. 
 
 Popular Sovereignty. — I say Douglas popu- 
 lar sovereignty; for there is a broad distinction 
 between real popular sovereignty and Douglas 
 popular sovereignty. That the nation shall 
 control what concerns it; that a State, or any 
 minor political community, shall control what 
 exclusively concerns it; and that an individual 
 shall control what exclusively concerns him, — 
 is a real popular sovereignty, which no Repub- 
 lican opposes. 
 
 But this is not Douglas popular sovereignty. 
 Douglas popular sovereignty, as a matter of 
 principle, simply is: "If one man would en- 
 slave another, neither that other nor any third 
 man has a right to object." 
 
 Douglas popular sovereignty, as he practi- 
 cally applies it, is: "If any organized political' 
 community, however new and small, would en- 
 slave men or forbid their being enslaved within 
 its own territorial limits; however the doing 
 the one or the other may affect the men sought 
 to be enslaved, or the vastly superior number 
 of men who are afterward to come within those 
 limits, or the family of communities of which 
 it is but a member, or the head of that family, 
 as the present and common guardian of the 
 
262 Abraham Lincoln [Dec. 1-5 
 
 whole — however any or all these are to be affect- 
 ed, neither any nor all may interfere." 
 
 This is Douglas popular sovereignty. He 
 has great difficulty with it. His speeches and 
 letters and essays and explanations explanatory 
 of explanations explained upon it, are legion. 
 The most lengthy, and as I suppose the most 
 maturely considered, is that recently published 
 in "Harper's Hagazine." It has two leading 
 objects: the first, to appropriate the authority 
 and reverence due the great and good men of 
 the Revolution to his popular sovereignty; and, 
 secondly, to show that the Dred Scott decision 
 has not entirely squelched his popular sover- 
 eignty. 
 
 Before considering these mains objects, I 
 wish to consider a few minor points of the 
 copyright essay. 
 
 Last year Governor Seward and myself, at 
 different times and occasions, expressed the 
 opinion that slavery is a durable element of 
 discord, and that we shall not have peace with 
 it until it either masters or is mastered by the 
 free principle. This gave great offense to 
 Judge Douglas, and his denunciations of it, and 
 absurd inferences from it, have never ceased. 
 Almost at the very beginning of the copyright 
 essay he quotes the language respectively of 
 Seward and myself — not quite accurately, but 
 
1859] Speeches in Kansas 263 
 
 substantially, in my case — upon this point, and 
 repeats his absurd and extravagant inference. 
 For lack of time I omit much which I might 
 say here with propriety, and content myself 
 with two remarks only upon this point. The 
 first is, that inasmuch as Douglas in this very 
 essay tells us slavery agitation began in this 
 country in 1699, and has not yet ceased; has 
 lasted through a hundred and sixty years, 
 through ten entire generations of men, — it 
 might have occurred to even him that slavery 
 in its tendency to agitation and discord has 
 something slightly durable about it. The sec- 
 ond remark is that Judge Douglas might have 
 noted, if he would, while he was diving so deep- 
 ly into history, the historical fact that the only 
 comparative peace we have had with slavery 
 during that hundred and sixty years was in the 
 period from the Revolution to 1820, precisely 
 the period through which we were closing out 
 the African slave-trade, abolishing slavery in 
 several of the States, and restraining the spread 
 of it into new ones by the ordinance of '87, pre- 
 cisely the period in which the public mind had 
 reason to rest, and did rest, in the belief that 
 slavery was in course of ultimate extinction. 
 
 Another point, which for the present I shall 
 touch only hastily, is Judge Douglas's assump- 
 tion that the States and Territories differ only 
 
264 Abraham Lincoln [Dec. 1-5 
 
 in the fact that the States are in the Union, and 
 the Territories are not in it. But if this be 
 the only difference, why not instantly bring the 
 Territories in? Why keep them out? Do you 
 say they are unfitted for it? What unfits them? 
 Especially what unfits them for any duty in the 
 Union, after they are fit, if they choose, to plant 
 the soil they sparsely inhabit with slavery, be- 
 yond the power of their millions of successors 
 to eradicate it, and to the durable discord of 
 the Union? What function of sovereignty, out 
 of the Union or in it, is so portentous as this? 
 What function of government requires such per- 
 fect maturity, in numbers and everything else, 
 among those who exercise it? It is a concealed 
 assumption of Douglas's popular sovereignty 
 that slavery is a little, harmless, indifferent 
 thing, having no wrong in it, and no power for 
 mischief about it. If all men looked upon it 
 as he does, his policy in regard to it might do. 
 But neither all, nor half the world, so look upon 
 it. 
 
 Near the close of the essay in "Harper's Mag- 
 azine" Douglas tells us that his popular sov- 
 ereignty pertains to a people only after they are 
 regularly organized into a political community; 
 and that Congress in its discretion must decide 
 when they are fit in point of numbers to be so 
 organized. Now I should like for him to point 
 
1859] Speeches in Kansas 265 
 
 out in the Constitution any clause conferring 
 that discretion upon Congress, which, when 
 pointed out, will not be equally a power in 
 Congress to govern them, in its discretion, till 
 they are admitted as a State. Will he try? He 
 intimates that before the exercise of that dis- 
 cretion, their number must be ten, fifteen, or 
 twenty thousand. Well, what is to be done for 
 them, or with them, or by them, before they 
 number ten thousand? If any one of them de- 
 sires to have slaves, is any other one bound to 
 help him or at liberty to hinder him? Is it 
 his plan that any time before they reach the re- 
 quired numbers, those who are on hand shall 
 be driven out as trespassers? If so, it will prob- 
 ably be a good while before a sufficient number 
 to organize will get in. 
 
 But plainly enough this conceding to Con- 
 gress the discretion as to when a community 
 shall be organized, is a total surrender of his 
 popular sovereignty. He says himself it does 
 not pertain to a people until they are organized; 
 and that when they shall be organized is in 
 the discretion of Congress. Suppose Congress 
 shall choose to not organize them until they are 
 numerous enough to come into the Union as 
 a State. By his own rule, his popular sover- 
 eignty is derived from Congress, and cannot be 
 exercised by the people till Congress chooses 
 
266 Abraham Lincoln [Dec 1-5 
 
 to confer it. After toiling through nineteen 
 mortal pages of "Harper," to show that Con- 
 gress cannot keep the people of a new country 
 from excluding slavery, in a single closing para- 
 graph he makes the whole thing depend on Con- 
 gress at last. And should Congress refuse to 
 organize, how will that affect the question of 
 planting slavery in a new country? If indi- 
 viduals choose to plant it, the people cannot 
 prevent them, for they are not yet clothed with 
 popular sovereignty. If it be said that it can- 
 not be planted, in fact, without protective law, 
 that assertion is already falsified by history; for 
 it was originally planted on this continent with- 
 out protective law. 
 
 And, by the way, it is probable that no act 
 of territorial organization could be passed by 
 the present Senate; and almost certainly not by 
 both the Senate and House of Representatives. 
 If an act declared the right of Congress to ex- 
 clude slavery, the Republicans would vote for 
 it, and both wings of the Democracy against it. 
 If it denied the power to either exclude or pro- 
 tect it, the Douglasites would vote for it, and 
 both the Republicans and slave-coders against 
 it. If it denied the power to exclude, and as- 
 serted the power to protect, the slave-coders 
 would vote for it, and the Republicans and 
 Douglasites against it. 
 
1859] Speeches in Kansas 267 
 
 You are now a part of a people of a Terri- 
 tory, but that Territory is soon to be a State of 
 the Union. Both in your individual and col- 
 lective capacities, you have the same interest 
 in the past, the present, and the future of the 
 United States as any other portion of the people. 
 Most of you came from the States, and all of 
 you soon will be citizens of the common Union. 
 What I shall now address to you will have 
 neither greater nor less application to you than 
 to any other people of the Union. 
 
 You are gathered to-day as a Republican 
 convention — Republican in the party sense, and, 
 as w r e hope, in the true, original sense of the 
 word republican. 
 
 I assume that Republicans throughout the 
 nation believe they are right, and are earnest 
 and determined in their cause. 
 
 Let them then keep constantly in view that 
 the chief object of their organization is to pre- 
 vent the spread and nationalization of slavery. 
 With this ever distinctly before us, we can al- 
 ways better see at what point our cause is most 
 in danger. 
 
 We are, as I think, in the present temper or 
 state of public sentiment, in no danger from the 
 open advocates of a congressional slave code for 
 the Territories, and of the revival of the Afri- 
 can slave-trade. As yet we are strong enough 
 
268 Abraham Lincoln [Dec. 1-5 
 
 to meet and master any combination openly 
 formed on those grounds. It is only the insidi- 
 ous position of Douglas that endangers our 
 cause. That position is simply an ambuscade. 
 By entering into contest with our open enemies, 
 we are to be lured into his train; and then, hav- 
 ing lost our own organization and arms, we are 
 to be turned over to those same open enemies. 
 
 Douglas's position leads to the nationaliza- 
 tion of slavery as surely as does that of Jeff 
 Davis and Mason of Virginia. The two posi- 
 tions are but slightly different roads to the same 
 place — with this difference, that the nationali- 
 zation of slavery can be reached by Douglas's 
 route, and never can be by the other. 
 
 I have said that in our present moral tone 
 and temper we are strong enough for our open 
 enemies, and so we are. But the chief effect 
 of Douglasism is to change that tone and tem- 
 per. Men who support the measures of a po- 
 litical leader do, almost of necessity, adopt the 
 reasoning and sentiments the leader advances in 
 support of them. The reasoning and sentiments 
 advanced by Douglas in support of his policy 
 as to slavery all spring from the view that 
 slavery is not wrong. In the first place, he 
 never says it is wrong. He says he does 
 not care whether it shall be voted down or 
 voted up. He says whoever wants slavery 
 
1859] Speeches in Kansas 269 
 
 has a right to have it. He says the question 
 whether people will have it or not is simply 
 a question of dollars and cents. He says the 
 Almighty has drawn a line across the conti- 
 nent, on one side of which the soil must be cul- 
 tivated by slave labor. 
 
 Now let the people of the free States adopt 
 these sentiments, and they will be unable to see 
 a single reason for maintaining their prohibi- 
 tions of slavery in their own States. "What! 
 do you mean to say that anything in these sen- 
 timents requires us to believe it will be the in- 
 terest of Northern States to have slavery?" 
 No. But I do mean to say that although it 
 is not the interest of Northern States to grow 
 cotton, none of them have, or need, any law 
 against it; and it would be tyranny to deprive 
 any one man of the privilege to grow cotton 
 in Illinois. There are many individual men 
 in all the free States who desire to have slaves; 
 and if you admit that slavery is not wrong, it 
 is also but tyranny to deny them the privilege. 
 It is no just function of government to prohibit 
 what is not wrong. 
 
 Again, if slavery is right — ordained by the 
 Almighty — on one side of a line dividing sister 
 States of a common Union, then it is positively 
 wrong to harass and bedevil the owners of it 
 with constitutions and laws and prohibitions of 
 
270 Abraham Lincoln [Dec. 1-5 
 
 it on the other side of the line. In short, there 
 is no justification for prohibiting slavery any- 
 where, save only in the assumption that slavery 
 is wrong; and whenever the sentiment that sla- 
 very is wrong shall give way in the North, all 
 legal prohibitions of it will also give way. 
 
 If it be insisted that men may support Doug- 
 las's measures without adopting his sentiments, 
 let it be tested by what is actually passing be- 
 fore us. You can even now find no Douglas 
 man who will disavow any one of these senti- 
 ments; and none but will actually indorse them 
 if pressed to the point. 
 
 Five years ago no living man had placed on 
 record, nor, as I believe, verbally expressed, a 
 denial that negroes have a share in the Decla- 
 ration of Independence. Two or three years 
 since, Douglas began to deny it; and now every 
 Douglas man in the nation denies it. 
 
 To the same effect is the absurdity compound- 
 ed of support to the Dred Scott decision, and 
 legislation unfriendly to slavery by the Ter- 
 ritories — the absurdity which asserts that a 
 thing may be lawfully driven from a place, at 
 which place it has a lawful right to remain. 
 That absurd position will not be long main- 
 tained by any one. The Dred Scott half of 
 it will soon master the other half. The process 
 will probably be about this: some territorial 
 
1 859] Speeches in Kansas 27 r 
 
 legislature will adopt unfriendly legislation; 
 the Supreme Court will decide that legislation 
 to be unconstitutional, and then the advocates 
 of the present compound absurdity will ac- 
 quiesce in the decision. The only effect of that 
 position now is to prepare its advocates for such 
 acquiescence when the time comes. Like wood 
 for ox-bows, they are merely being soaked in it 
 preparatory to the bending. The advocates of 
 a slave code are not now strong enough to mas- 
 ter us; and they never will be, unless recruits 
 enough to make them so be tolled in through 
 the gap of Douglasism. Douglas, on the sly, 
 is affecting more for them than all their open 
 advocates. He has reason to be provoked that 
 they will not understand him, and recognize 
 him as their best friend. He cannot be more 
 plain, without being so plain as to lure no one 
 into their trap — so plain as to lose his power 
 to serve them profitably. Take other instances. 
 Last year both Governor Seward and myself 
 expressed the belief that this government can- 
 not endure permanently half slave and half 
 free. This gave great offense to Douglas, and 
 after the fall election in Illinois he became 
 quite rampant upon it. At Chicago, St. Louis, 
 Memphis and New Orleans, he denounced it as 
 a "fatal heresy." With great pride he claimed 
 that he had crushed it in Illinois, and modestly 
 
272 Abraham Lincoln [Dec. 1-5 
 
 regretted that he could not have been in New 
 York to crush it there too. How the heresy is 
 fatal to anything, or what the thing is to which it 
 is fatal, he has never paused to tell us. At all 
 events, it is a fatal heresy in his view when ex- 
 pressed by a Northern man. Not so when ex- 
 pressed by men of the South. In 1856, Roger 
 A. Pryor, editor of the Richmond "Enquirer," 
 expressed the same belief in that paper, quite 
 two years before it was expressed by either Sew- 
 ard or me. But Douglas perceived no " heresy " 
 in him — talked not of going to Virginia to 
 crush it out; nay, more, he now has that same 
 Mr. Pryor at Washington, editing the "States" 
 newspaper as his especial organ. 
 
 This brings us to see that in Douglas's view 
 this opinion is a "fatal heresy" when expressed 
 by men wishing to have the nation all free, and 
 it is no heresy at all when expressed by men 
 wishing to have it all slave. Douglas has cause 
 to complain that the South will not note this 
 and give him credit for it. 
 
 At Memphis Douglas told his audience that 
 he was for the negro against the crocodile, but 
 for the white man against the negro. This was 
 not a sudden thought hastily thrown off at Mem- 
 phis. He said the same thing many times in 
 Illinois last summer and autumn, though I am 
 not sure it was reported then. 
 
1859] Speeches in Kansas 273 
 
 It is a carefully formed illustration of the 
 estimate he places upon the negro and the man- 
 ner he would have him dealt with. It is a sort 
 of proposition in proportion. "As the negro is 
 to the crocodile, so the white man is to the ne- 
 gro." As the negro ought to treat the crocodile 
 as a beast, so the white man ought to treat the 
 negro as a beast. Gentlemen of the South, is 
 not that satisfactory? Will you give Douglas 
 no credit for impressing that sentiment on the 
 Northern mind for your benefit? Why, you 
 should magnify him to the utmost, in order that 
 he may impress it the more deeply, broadly, and 
 surely. 
 
 A hope is often expressed that all the ele- 
 ments of opposition to the so-called Democracy 
 may unite in the next presidential election; and 
 to favor this it is suggested that at least one can- 
 didate on the opposition national ticket must 
 be resident in the slave States. I strongly sym- 
 pathize with this hope; and the particular sug- 
 gestion presents no difficulty to me. There are 
 very many men in the slave States who as men 
 and statesmen and patriots are quite acceptable 
 to me for either President or Vice-President. 
 But there is a difficulty of another sort; and I 
 think it most prudent for us to face that dif- 
 ficulty at once. Will those good men of the 
 South occupy any ground upon which we of 
 
274 Abraham Lincoln [Dec. 1-5 
 
 the free States can vote for them? There is the 
 rub. They seem to labor under a huge mistake 
 in regard to us. They say they are tired of slav- 
 ery agitation. We think the slaves, and free 
 white laboring-men too, have more reason to be 
 tired of slavery than masters have to be tired of 
 agitation about it. In Kentucky a Democratic 
 candidate for Congress takes ground against a 
 congressional slave-code for the Territories, 
 whereupon his opponent, in full hope to unite 
 with Republicans in i860, takes ground in favor 
 of such slave-code. Such hope, under such cir- 
 cumstances, is delusion gross as insanity itself. 
 Rational men can only entertain it in the strange 
 belief that Republicans are not in earnest for 
 their principles; that they are really devoted to 
 no principle of their own, but are ready for, and 
 anxious to jump to, any position not occupied by 
 the Democracy. This mistake must be dispelled. 
 For the sake of their principles, in forming their 
 party, they broke and sacrificed the strongest 
 mere party ties and advantages which can exist. 
 Republicans believe that slavery is wrong; and 
 they insist, and will continue to insist, upon a 
 national policy which recognizes it and deals 
 with it as a wrong. There can be no letting down 
 about this. Simultaneously with such letting 
 down the Republican organization would go to 
 pieces, and half its elements would go in a dif- 
 
1 859] Speeches in Kansas 275 
 
 ferent direction, leaving an easy victory to the 
 common enemy. No ingenuity of political trad- 
 ing could possibly hold it together. About this 
 there is no joke, and can be no trifling. Under- 
 standing this, that Republicanism can never mix 
 with territorial slave-codes becomes self-evident. 
 
 In this contest mere men are nothing. We 
 could come down to Douglas quite as well as to 
 any other man standing with him, and better 
 than to any other standing below or beyond him. 
 The simple problem is: will any good and 
 capable man of the South allow the Republi- 
 cans to elect him on their own platform? If 
 such man can be found, I believe the thing can 
 be done. It can be done in no other way. 
 
 What do we gain, say some, by such a union? 
 Certainly not everything; but still something, 
 and quite all that we for our lives can possibly 
 give. In yielding a share of the high honors and 
 offices to you, you gain the assurance that ours 
 is not a mere struggle to secure those honors and 
 offices for one section. You gain the assurance 
 that we mean no more than we say in our plat- 
 forms, else we would not intrust you to execute 
 them. You gain the assurance that we intend no 
 invasion of your rights or your honor, else we 
 would not make one of you the executor of the 
 laws and commander of the army and navy. 
 
 As a matter of mere partizan policy, there is 
 
276 Abraham Lincoln [Dec. 1-5 
 
 no reason for and much against any letting down 
 of the Republican party in order to form a union 
 with the Southern opposition. By no pos- 
 sibility can a union ticket secure a simple elec- 
 toral vote in the South, unless the Republican 
 platform be so far let down as to lose every 
 electoral vote in the North ; and even at that, not 
 a single vote would be secured in the South, un- 
 less by bare possibility those of Maryland. 
 There is no successful basis of union but for 
 some good Southern man to allow us of the 
 North to elect him square on our platform. 
 Plainly it is that or nothing. 
 
 The St. Louis "Intelligencer" is out in favor 
 of a good man for President, to be run without 
 a platform. Well, I am not wedded to the 
 formal written platform system; but a thousand 
 to one the editor is not himself in favor of his 
 plan, except with the qualification that he and 
 his sort are to select and name the "good man." 
 To bring him to the test, is he willing to take 
 Seward without a platform? Oh, no; Seward's 
 antecedents exclude him, say you. Well, is your 
 good man without antecedents? If he is, how 
 shall the nation know that he is a good man? 
 The sum of the matter is that, in the absence of 
 formal written platforms, the antecedents of can- 
 didates become their platforms. On just such 
 platforms all our earlier and better Presidents 
 
1859] Speeches in Kansas 277 
 
 were elected, but this by no means facilitates a 
 union of men who differ in principles. 
 
 Nor do I believe we can ever advance our prin- 
 ciples by supporting men who oppose our prin- 
 ciples. Last year, as you know, we Republicans 
 in Illinois were advised by numerous and re- 
 spectable outsiders to reelect Douglas to the 
 Senate by our votes. I never questioned the 
 motives of such advisers, nor the devotion to the 
 Republican cause of such as professed to be Re- 
 publicans. But I never for a moment thought 
 of following the advice, and have never yet re- 
 gretted that we did not follow it. True, Douglas 
 is back in the Senate in spite of us; but we are 
 clear of him and his principles, and we are un- 
 crippled and ready to fight both him and them 
 straight along till they shall be finally "closed 
 out." Had we followed the advice, there would 
 now be no Republican party in Illinois, and 
 none to speak of anywhere else. The whole 
 thing would now be floundering along after 
 Douglas upon the Dred Scott and crocodile 
 theory. It would have been the grandest "haul" 
 for slavery ever yet made. Our principles would 
 still live, and ere long would produce a party; 
 but we should have lost all our past labor and 
 twenty years of time by the folly. 
 
 Take an illustration. About a year ago all the 
 Republicans in Congress voted for what was 
 
278 Abraham Lincoln [Dec. 1-5 
 
 called the Crittenden-Montgomery bill; and 
 forthwith Douglas claimed, and still claims, 
 that they were all committed to his "gur-reat 
 pur-rinciple." And Republicans have been so 
 far embarrassed by the claim that they have ever 
 since been protesting that they were not so com- 
 mitted, and trying to explain why. Some of the 
 very newspapers which advised Douglas's return 
 to the Senate by Republican votes have been 
 largely and continuously engaged in these protests 
 and explanations. For such let us state a ques- 
 tion in the rule of three. If voting for the Crit- 
 tenden-Montgomery bill entangle the Republi- 
 cans with Douglas's dogmas for one year, how 
 long would voting for Douglas himself so en- 
 tangle them? 
 
 It is nothing to the contrary that Republicans 
 gained something by electing Haskins, Hick- 
 man, and Davis. They were comparatively 
 small men. I mean no disrespect; they may have 
 large merit; but Republicans can dally with 
 them, and absorb or expel them at pleasure. If 
 they dally with Douglas, he absorbs them. 
 
 We want, and must have, a national policy 
 as to slavery which deals with it as being a 
 wrong. Whoever would prevent slavery be- 
 coming national and perpetual yields all when 
 he yields to a policy which treats it either as 
 being right, or as being a matter of indifference. 
 
1859] Speeches in Kansas 279 
 
 We admit that the United States General 
 Government is not charged with the duty of re- 
 dressing or preventing all the wrongs in the 
 world. But the government rightfully may, and 
 subject to the Constitution ought to, redress and 
 prevent all wrongs which are wrongs to the 
 nation itself. 
 
 It is expressly charged with the duty of pro- 
 viding for the general welfare. We think 
 slavery impairs and endangers the general wel- 
 fare. Those who do not think this are not of 
 us, and we cannot agree with them. We must 
 shape our own course by our own judgment. 
 
 We must not disturb slavery in the States 
 where it exists, because the Constitution and the 
 peace of the country both forbid us. We must 
 not withhold an efficient fugitive-slave law, be- 
 cause the Constitution demands it. 
 
 But we must, by a national policy, prevent the 
 spread of slavery into new Territories, or free 
 States, because the Constitution does not forbid 
 us, and the general welfare does demand such 
 prevention. We must prevent the revival of the 
 African slave-trade, because the Constitution 
 does not forbid us, and the general welfare does 
 require the prevention. We must prevent these 
 things being done by either congresses or courts. 
 The people — the people — are the rightful mas- 
 ters of both congresses and courts, — not to over- 
 
280 Abraham Lincoln [Dec. 9 
 
 throw the Constitution, but to overthrow the 
 men who pervert it. 
 
 To effect our main object we have to employ 
 auxiliary means. We must hold conventions, 
 adopt platforms, select candidates, and carry 
 elections. At every step we must be true to the 
 main purpose. 
 
 If we adopt a platform falling short of our 
 principle, or elect a man rejecting our prin- 
 ciple, we not only take nothing affirmative by our 
 success, but we draw upon us the positive em- 
 barrassment of seeming ourselves to have aban- 
 doned our principle. 
 
 That our principle, however baffled or de- 
 layed, will finally triumph, I do not permit my- 
 self to doubt. Men will pass away — die, die 
 politically and naturally; but the principle will 
 live, and live forever. Organizations rallied 
 around that principle may, by their own derelic- 
 tion, go to pieces, thereby losing all their time 
 and labor; but the principle will remain, and 
 will reproduce another, and another, till the 
 final triumph will come. 
 
 But to bring it soon, we must save our labor 
 already performed — our organization, which 
 has cost us so much time and toil to create. We 
 must keep our principle constantly in view, and 
 never be false to it. 
 
 And as to men for leaders, we must remember 
 
1859] Letter to Judd 281, 
 
 that " He that is not for us is against us; and he 
 that gathereth not with us scattereth." 
 
 Letter to N. B. Judd 
 
 Springfield, December 9, 1859. 
 My dear Sir: I have just reached home 
 from Kansas and found your long letter of the 
 1 st inst. It has a tone of blame toward myself 
 which I think is not quite just; but I will not 
 stand upon that, but will consider a day or two, 
 and put something in the best shape I can, and 
 send it to you. A great difficulty is that they 
 make no distinct charge against you which I can 
 contradict. You did vote for Trumbull against 
 me; and, although I think, and have said a 
 thousand times, that was no injustice to me, I 
 cannot change the fact, nor compel people to 
 cease speaking of it. Ever since that matter 
 occurred, I have constantly labored, as I believe 
 you know, to have all recollection of it dropped. 
 The vague charge that you played me false 
 last year I believe to be false and outrageous; 
 but it seems I can make no impression by ex- 
 pressing that belief. I made a special job of try- 
 ing to impress that upon Baker, Bridges, and 
 Wilson here last winter. They all well know 
 that I believe no such charge against you. But 
 they chose to insist that they know better about it 
 than I do. 
 
282 Abraham Lincoln [Dec. 14 
 
 As to the charge of your intriguing for Trum- 
 bull against me, I believe as little of that as any 
 other charge. If Trumbull and I were candi- 
 dates for the same office, you would have a 
 right to prefer him, and I should not blame you 
 for it; but all my acquaintance with you induces 
 me to believe you would not pretend to be for 
 me while really for him. But I do not under- 
 stand Trumbull and myself to be rivals. You 
 know I am pledged to not enter a struggle with 
 him for the seat in the Senate now occupied by 
 him; and yet I would rather have a full term 
 in the Senate than in the presidency. 
 
 Your friend as ever, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
 P. S. — I omitted to say that I have, in no 
 single instance, permitted a charge such as al- 
 luded to above to go uncontradicted when made 
 in my presence. A. L. 
 
 Letter to N. B. Judd 
 
 Springfield, December 14, 1859. 
 Dear Judd: Herewith is the letter of our 
 old Whig friends, and my answer, sent as you 
 requested. I showed both to Dubois, and he 
 feared the clause about leave to publish, in the 
 answer, would not be quite satisfactory to you. 
 I hope it will be satisfactory, as I would rather 
 not seem to come before the public as a volun- 
 
1859] Letter to Judd 283 
 
 teer; still if, after considering this, you still 
 deem it important, you may substitute the in- 
 closed slip by pasting it down over the original 
 clause. 
 
 I find some of our friends here attach more 
 consequence to getting the national convention 
 into our State than I did, or do. Some of them 
 made me promise to say so to you. As to the 
 time, it must certainly be after the Charleston 
 fandango; and I think, within bounds of reason, 
 the later the better. 
 
 As to that matter about the committee, in rela- 
 tion to appointing delegates by general conven- 
 tion, or by districts, I shall attend to it as well 
 as I know how, which, God knows, will not be 
 very well. Write me if you can find anything 
 to write. Yours as ever, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
 [Inclosure.] 
 
 Letter to Messrs. George W. Dole, G. S. 
 
 Hubbard, and W. H. Brown 
 
 Springfield, Illinois, December 14, 1859. 
 Gentlemen: Your letter of the 12th instant 
 is received. To your question: "In the election 
 of senator in 1854 [1855 you mean], when Mr. 
 Trumbull was the successful candidate, was 
 there any unfairness in the conduct of Mr. Judd 
 toward you, or anything blamable on his part?' 
 
284 Abraham Lincoln [Dec. 19 
 
 I answer, I have never believed, and do not now 
 believe, that on that occasion there was any un- 
 fairness in the conduct of Mr. Judd toward me, 
 or anything blamable on his part. Without de- 
 ception, he preferred Judge Trumbull to myself, 
 which was his clear right, morally as well as 
 legally. 
 
 To your question: "During the canvass of 
 last year, did he do his whole duty toward you 
 and the Republican party?" I answer, I have 
 always believed, and now believe that during 
 that canvass he did his whole duty toward me 
 and the Republican party. 
 
 To your question: "Do you know of anything 
 unfair in his conduct toward yourself in any 
 way?" I answer, I neither know nor suspect 
 anything unfair in his conduct toward myself 
 in any way. 
 
 I take pleasure in adding that of all the 
 avowed friends I had in the canvass of last year, 
 I do not suspect a single one of having acted 
 treacherously to me, or to our cause; and that 
 there is not one of them in whose honor and in- 
 tegrity I have more confidence to-day than in 
 that of Mr. Judd. 
 
 You can use your discretion as to whether you 
 make this public. 
 
 Yours very truly, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
1859] Letter to Parsons 285 
 
 Letter to G. M. Parsons and Others 
 
 Springfield, Illinois, December 19, 1859. 
 Gentlemen: Your letter of the 7th instant, 
 accompanied by a similar one from the govern- 
 or-elect, the Republican State officers, and the 
 Republican members of the State Board of 
 Equalization of Ohio, both requesting of me, for 
 publication in permanent form, copies of the 
 political debates between Senator Douglas and 
 myself last year, has been received. With my 
 grateful acknowledgments to both you and them 
 for the very flattering terms in which the re- 
 quest is communicated, I transmit you the copies. 
 The copies I send you are as reported and 
 printed by the respective friends of Senator 
 Douglas and myself, at the time — that is, his by 
 his friends, and mine by mine. It would be an 
 unwarrantable liberty for us to change a word 
 or a letter in his, and the changes I have made 
 in mine, you perceive, are verbal only, and very 
 few in number. I wish the reprint to be pre- 
 cisely as the copies I send, without any comment 
 whatever. 
 
 Yours very truly, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
286 Abraham Lincoln [Dec. 20 
 
 Letter to J. W. Fell 
 
 Springfield, December 20, 1859. 
 My dear Sir: Herewith is a little sketch, as 
 you requested. There is not much of it, for the 
 reason, I suppose, that there is not much of me. 
 If anything be made out of it, I wish it to be 
 modest, and not to go beyond the material. If 
 it were thought necessary to incorporate any- 
 thing from any of my speeches, I suppose there 
 would be no objection. Of course it must not 
 appear to have been written by myself. 
 Yours very truly, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
 I was born February 12, 1809, in Hardin 
 County, Kentucky. My parents were both born 
 in Virginia, of undistinguished families — 
 second families, perhaps I should say. My 
 mother, who died in my tenth year, was of a 
 family of the name of Hanks, some of whom 
 now reside in Adams, and others in Macon 
 County, Illinois. My paternal grandfather, 
 Abraham Lincoln, emigrated from Rockingham 
 County, Virginia, to Kentucky about 1781 or 
 1782, where a year or two later he was killed by 
 the Indians, not in battle, but by stealth, when he 
 was laboring to open a farm in the forest. His 
 ancestors, who were Quakers, went to Virginia 
 
1859] Autobiographical Sketch 287 
 
 from Berks County, Pennsylvania. An effort to 
 identify them with the New England family of 
 the same name ended in nothing more definite 
 than a similarity of Christian names in both 
 families, such as Enoch, Levi, Mordecai, Solo- 
 mon, Abraham, and the like. 
 
 My father, at the death of his father, was but 
 six years of age, and he grew up literally with- 
 out education. He removed from Kentucky to 
 what is now Spencer County, Indiana, in my 
 eighth year. We reached our new home about 
 the time the State came into the Union. It was 
 a wild region, with many bears and other wild 
 animals still in the woods. There I grew up. 
 There were some schools, so called, but no quali- 
 fication was ever required of a teacher beyond 
 "readin,' writin', and cipherin' " to the rule of 
 three. If a straggler supposed to understand 
 Latin happen to sojourn in the neighborhood, 
 he was looked upon as a wizard. There was ab- 
 solutely nothing to excite ambition for educa- 
 tion. Of course, when I came of age I did not 
 know much. Still, somehow, I could read, 
 write, and cipher to the rule of three, but that 
 was all. I have not been to school since. The 
 little advance I now have upon this store of 
 education, I have picked up from time to time 
 under the pressure of necessity. 
 
 I was raised to farm work, which I continued 
 
288 Abraham Lincoln [Jan. 24 
 
 till I was twenty-two. At twenty-one I came to 
 Illinois, Macon County. Then I got to New 
 Salem, at that time in Sangamon, now in 
 Menard County, where I remained a year as a 
 sort of clerk in a store. Then came the Black 
 Hawk war; and I was elected a captain of volun- 
 teers, a success which gave me more pleasure 
 than any I have had since. I went the campaign, 
 was elated, ran for the legislature the same year 
 (1832), and was beaten — the only time I ever 
 have been beaten by the people. The next and 
 three succeeding biennial elections I was elected 
 to the legislature. I was not a candidate after- 
 ward. During this legislative period I had 
 studied law, and removed to Springfield to prac- 
 tise it. In 1846 I was once elected to the lower 
 House of Congress. Was not a candidate for re- 
 election. From 1849 to 1854, DOtn inclusive, 
 practised law more assiduously than ever before. 
 Always a Whig in politics; and generally on the 
 Whig electoral tickets, making active canvasses. 
 I was losing interest in politics when the repeal 
 of the Missouri compromise aroused me again. 
 What I have done since then is pretty well 
 known. 
 
 If any personal description of me is thought 
 desirable, it may be said I am, in height, six feet 
 four inches, nearly; lean in flesh, weighing on 
 an average one hundred and eighty pounds; 
 
i860] Letter to Sheahan 289 
 
 dark complexion, with coarse black hair and 
 gray eyes. No other marks or brands recol- 
 lected. Yours truly, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
 Letter to J. W. Sheahan 
 
 Springfield, January 24, i860. 
 
 Dear Sir: Yours of the 21st, requesting 
 copies of my speeches now in progress of pub- 
 lication in Ohio, is received. I have no such 
 copies now at my control, having sent the only 
 set I ever had to Ohio. Mr. George M. Parsons 
 has taken an active part among those who have 
 the matter in charge in Ohio; and I understand 
 Messrs. Follett, Foster & Co. are to be the pub- 
 lishers. I make no objection to any satisfactory 
 arrangement you may make with Mr. Parsons 
 and the publishers; and if it will facilitate you, 
 you are at liberty to show them this note. 
 
 You labor under a mistake somewhat injuri- 
 ous to me, if you suppose I have revised the 
 speeches in any just sense of the word. I only 
 made some small verbal corrections, mostly such 
 as an intelligent reader would make for himself, 
 not feeling justified to do more when publish- 
 ing the speeches along with those of Senator 
 Douglas, his and mine being mutually answers 
 and replies to one another. Yours truly, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
290 Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 9 
 
 Letter to N. B. Judd 
 
 Springfield, February 5, i860. 
 
 My dear Sir: Your two letters were duly 
 received. Whether Mr. Storrs shall come to 
 Illinois and assist in our approaching campaign, 
 is a question of dollars and cents. Can we pay 
 him? If we can, that is the sole question. I 
 consider his services very valuable. 
 
 A day or so before you wrote about Mr. Hern- 
 don, Dubois told me that he (Herndon) had 
 been talking to William Jayne in the way you 
 indicate. At first sight afterward, I mentioned 
 it to him; he rather denied the charge, and I 
 did not press him about the past, but got his 
 solemn pledge to say nothing of the sort in the 
 future. I had done this before I received your 
 letter. I impressed upon him as well as I could, 
 first, that such [sic] was untrue and unjust to 
 you; and, second, that I would be held respon- 
 sible for what he said. Let this be private. 
 
 Some folks are pretty bitter toward me about 
 the Dole, Hubbard, and Brown letter. 
 Yours as ever, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
 Letter to N. B. Judd 
 
 Springfield, February 9, i860. 
 Dear Sir: I am not in a position where it 
 would hurt much for me to not be nominated on 
 
i860] Letter to Lucas 291 
 
 the national ticket; but I am where it would 
 hurt some for me to not get the Illinois dele- 
 gates. What I expected when I wrote the letter 
 to Messrs. Dole and others is now happening. 
 Your discomfited assailants are most bitter 
 against me; and they will, for revenge upon me, 
 lay to the Bates egg in the South, and to the 
 Seward egg in the North, and go far toward 
 squeezing me out in the middle with nothing. 
 Can you not help me a little in this matter in 
 your end of the vineyard? I mean this to be 
 private. Yours as ever, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
 Letter to J. M. Lucas. 
 
 Springfield, February 9, i860. 
 My dear Sir: Your late letter, suggesting, 
 among other things, that I might aid your elec- 
 tion as postmaster, by writing to Mr. Burlin- 
 game, was duly received the day the Speaker 
 was elected; so that I had no hope a letter of 
 mine could reach Mr. B. before your case would 
 be decided, as it turned out in fact it could not. 
 We are all much gratified here to see you are 
 elected. We consider you our peculiar friend 
 at court. 
 
 I shall be glad to receive a letter from you at 
 any time you can find leisure to write one. 
 Yours very truly, A. LINCOLN. 
 
292 Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 27 
 
 *Letter to Mr. White.. 
 
 Springfield, February 13, i860. 
 
 Friend White: Your kind note, inclosing the 
 letter of Mr. Billinghurst is just received. It 
 so happens that I am engaged to be at Brooklyn, 
 on the evening of the 27th, so that, of course, I 
 cannot be in Wisconsin on the 28th, and I have 
 so written Mr. B. 
 
 Thank you for your anticipations of the future 
 for me, as well as for your many past kind- 
 nesses. Your friend as ever, 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
Lincoln's Home, Springfield, Ills. 
 Where he lived when elected President. 
 
i860] Cooper Institute Address 293 
 
 Address at Cooper Institute, New York, 
 February 27, 1860/ 
 
 MR. PRESIDENT and Fellow-citi- 
 zens of New York : The facts with 
 which I shall deal this evening are 
 mainly old and familiar; nor is there anything 
 new in the general use I shall make of them. 
 If there shall be any novelty, it will be in the 
 mode of presenting the facts, and the inferences 
 and observations following that presentation. 
 In his speech last autumn at Columbus, Ohio, 
 as reported in the "New-York Times," Senator 
 Douglas said: 
 
 1 Originally Lincoln had been invited to lecture in Plymouth 
 Church, Brooklyn, but financial or other difficulties arose and the 
 engagement was taken over by " The Young Men's Central Re- 
 publican Union " of New York City, which had determined upon 
 a series of political addresses. It was not until he reached 
 New York that Lincoln became fully aware of the change. The 
 audience he faced in Cooper Institute was made up of the culture 
 and wealth of the great metropolis. Horace Greeley and David 
 Dudley Field escorted Lincoln to the platform and William 
 Cullen Bryant introduced him. The speech he delivered is now 
 acknowledged one of the greatest efforts of his life, and won 
 instant recognition for him in the East. It is supposed to have 
 been largely instrumental in securing his nomination for the 
 Presidency. 
 
294 Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 27 
 
 Our fathers, when they framed the government 
 under which we live, understood this question just 
 as well, and even better, than we do now. 
 
 I fully indorse this, and I adopt it as a text 
 for this discourse. I so adopt it because it fur- 
 nishes a precise and an agreed starting-point for 
 a discussion between Republicans and that wing 
 of the Democracy headed by Senator Douglas. 
 It simply leaves the inquiry: What was the 
 understanding those fathers had of the question 
 mentioned? 
 
 What is the frame of government under which 
 we live? The answer must be, "The Constitution 
 of the United States." That Constitution con- 
 sists of the original, framed in 1787, and under 
 which the present government first went into 
 operation, and twelve subsequently framed 
 amendments, the first ten of which were framed 
 in 1789. 
 
 Who were our fathers that framed the Con- 
 stitution? I suppose the "thirty-nine" who 
 signed the original instrument may be fairly 
 called our fathers who framed that part of the 
 present government. It is almost exactly true 
 to say they framed it, and it is altogether true to 
 say they fairly represented the opinion and 
 sentiment of the whole nation at that time. 
 Their names, being familiar to nearly all, 
 
i860] Cooper Institute Address 295 
 
 and accessible to quite all, need not now be re- 
 peated. 
 
 I take these "thirty-nine," for the present, as 
 being "our fathers who framed the government 
 under which we live." What is the question 
 which, according to the text, those fathers un- 
 derstood "just as well, and even better, than we 
 do now"? 
 
 It is this: Does the proper division of local 
 from Federal authority, or anything in the Con- 
 stitution, forbid our Federal Government to 
 control as to slavery in our Federal Territories? 
 
 Upon this, Senator Douglas holds the affirma- 
 tive, and Republicans the negative. This affir- 
 mation and denial form an issue; and this issue 
 — this question — is precisely what the text de- 
 clares our fathers understood "better than we." 
 Let us now inquire whether the "thirty-nine," 
 or any of them, ever acted upon this question; 
 and if they did, how they acted upon it — how 
 they expressed that better understanding. In 
 1784, three years before the Constitution, the 
 United States then owning the Northwestern 
 Territory, and no other, the Congress of the 
 Confederation had before them the question of 
 prohibiting slavery in that Territory; and four 
 of the "thirty-nine" who afterward framed the 
 Constitution were in that Congress, and voted on 
 that question. Of these, Roger Sherman, 
 
296 Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 27 
 
 Thomas Mifflin, and Hugh Williamson voted 
 for the prohibition, thus showing that, in their 
 understanding, no line dividing local from 
 Federal authority, nor anything else, properly 
 forbade the Federal Government to control as 
 to slavery in Federal territory. The other of 
 the four, James McHenry, voted against the 
 prohibition, showing that for some cause he 
 thought it improper to vote for it. 
 
 In 1787, still before the Constitution, but 
 while the convention was in session framing it, 
 and while the Northwestern Territory still w r as 
 the only Territory owned by the United States, 
 the same question of prohibiting slavery in the 
 Territory again came before the Congress of the 
 Confederation; and two more of the "thirty- 
 nine" who afterward signed the Constitution 
 were in that Congress, and voted on the question. 
 They were William Blount and William Few; 
 and they both voted for the prohibition — thus 
 showing that in their understanding no line 
 dividing local from Federal authority, nor any- 
 thing else, properly forbade the Federal Govern- 
 ment to control as to slavery in Federal territory. 
 This time the prohibition became a law, being 
 part of what is now well known as the ordinance 
 of '87. 
 
 The question of Federal control of slavery in 
 the Territories seems not to have been directly 
 
i860] Cooper Institute Address 297 
 
 before the convention which framed the original 
 Constitution; and hence it is not recorded that 
 the "thirty-nine," or any of them, while engaged 
 on that instrument, expressed any opinion on 
 that precise question. 
 
 In 1789, by the first Congress which sat under 
 the Constitution, an act was passed to enforce the 
 ordinance of '87, including the prohibition of 
 slavery in the Northwestern Territory. The 
 bill for this act was reported by one of the 
 "thirty-nine" — Thomas Fitzsimmons, then a 
 member of the House of Representatives from 
 Pennsylvania. It went through all its stages 
 without a word of opposition, and finally passed 
 both branches without ayes and nays, which is 
 equivalent to a unanimous passage. In this Con- 
 gress there were sixteen of the thirty-nine fathers 
 who framed the original Constitution. They 
 were John Langdon, Nicholas Gilman, Wm. S. 
 Johnson, Roger Sherman, Robert Morris, Thos. 
 Fitzsimmons, William Few, Abraham Baldwin, 
 Rufus King, William Paterson, George Clymer, 
 Richard Bassett, George Read, Pierce Butler, 
 Daniel Carroll and James Madison. 
 
 This shows that, in their understanding, no 
 line dividing local from Federal authority, nor 
 anything in the Constitution, properly forbade 
 Congress to prohibit slavery in the Federal ter- 
 ritory; else both their fidelity to correct prin- 
 
298 Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 27 
 
 ciple, and their oath to support the Constitution, 
 would have constrained them to oppose the pro- 
 hibition. 
 
 Again, George Washington, another of the 
 "thirty-nine," was then President of the United 
 States and as such approved and signed the bill, 
 thus completing its validity as a law, and thus 
 showing that, in his understanding, no line 
 dividing local from Federal authority, nor any- 
 thing in the Constitution, forbade the Federal 
 Government to control as to slavery in Federal 
 territory. 
 
 No great while after the adoption of the orig- 
 inal Constitution, North Carolina ceded to the 
 Federal Government the country now constitut- 
 ing the State of Tennessee; and a few years 
 later Georgia ceded that which now constitutes 
 the States of Mississippi and Alabama. In both 
 deeds of cession it was made a condition by the 
 ceding States that the Federal Government 
 should not prohibit slavery in the ceded country. 
 Besides this, slavery was then actually in the 
 ceded country. Under these circumstances, Con- 
 gress, on taking charge of these countries, did 
 not absolutely prohibit slavery within them. 
 But they did interfere with it — take control of it 
 — even there, to a certain extent. In 1798 Con- 
 gress organized the Territory of Mississippi. In 
 the act of organization they prohibited the bring- 
 
i860] Cooper Institute Address 299 
 
 ing of slaves into the Territory from any place 
 without the United States, by fine, and giving 
 freedom to slaves so brought. This act passed 
 both branches of Congress without yeas and nays. 
 In that Congress were three of the "thirty-nine" 
 who framed the original Constitution. They 
 were John Langdon, George Read, and Abra- 
 ham Baldwin. They all probably voted for it. 
 Certainly they would have placed their opposi- 
 tion to it upon record if, in their understanding, 
 any line dividing local from Federal authority, 
 or anything in the Constitution, properly for- 
 bade the Federal Government to control as to 
 slavery in Federal territory. 
 
 In 1803 the Federal Government purchased 
 the Louisiana country. Our former territorial 
 acquisitions came from certain of our own 
 States; but this Louisiana country was acquired 
 from a foreign nation. In 1804 Congress gave a 
 territorial organization to that part of it which 
 now constitutes the State of Louisiana. New 
 Orleans, lying within that part, was an old and 
 comparatively large city. There were other con- 
 siderable towns and settlements, and slavery was 
 extensively and thoroughly intermingled with 
 the people. Congress did not, in the Territorial 
 Act, prohibit slavery ; but they did interfere with 
 it — take control of it — in a more marked and 
 extensive way than they did in the case of Mis- 
 
300 Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 27 
 
 sissippi. The substance of the provision therein 
 made in relation to slaves was: 
 
 1st. That no slave should be imported into the 
 Territory from foreign parts. 
 
 2d. That no slave should be carried into it 
 who had been imported into the United States 
 since the first day of May, 1798. 
 
 3d. That no slave should be carried into it, 
 except by the owner, and for his own use as a 
 settler; the penalty in all the cases being a fine 
 upon the violator of the law, and freedom to the 
 slave. 
 
 This act also was passed without ayes or nays. 
 In the Congress which passed it there were 
 two of the "thirty-nine." They were Abraham 
 Baldwin and Jonathan Dayton. As stated in the 
 case of Mississippi, it is probable they both voted 
 for it. They would not have allowed it to pass 
 without recording their opposition to it if, in 
 their understanding, it violated either the line 
 properly dividing local from Federal authority, 
 or any provision of the Constitution. 
 
 In 1819-20 came and passed the Missouri 
 question. Many votes were taken, by yeas and 
 nays, in both branches of Congress, upon the 
 various phases of the general question. Two of 
 the "thirty-nine" — Rufus King and Charles 
 Pinckney — were members of that Congress. 
 Mr. King steadily voted for slavery prohibition 
 
i860] Cooper Institute Address 301 
 
 and against all compromises, while Mr. Pinck- 
 ney as steadily voted against slavery prohibition 
 and against all compromises. By this, Mr. King 
 showed that, in his understanding, no line divid- 
 ing local from Federal authority, nor anything 
 in the Constitution, was violated by Congress 
 prohibiting slavery in Federal territory; while 
 Mr. Pinckney, by his votes, showed that, in his 
 understanding, there was some sufficient reason 
 for opposing such prohibition in that case. 
 
 The cases I have mentioned are the only acts 
 of the "thirty-nine," or of any of them, upon the 
 direct issue, which I have been able to discover. 
 
 To enumerate the persons who thus acted as 
 being four in 1784, two in 1787, seventeen in 
 1789, three in 1798, two in 1804, and two in 
 1819-20, there would be thirty of them. But this 
 would be counting John Langdon, Roger Sher- 
 man, William Few, Rufus King, and George 
 Read each twice, and Abraham Baldwin three 
 times. The true number of those of the "thirty- 
 nine" whom I have shown to have acted upon the 
 question which, by the text, they understood 
 better than we, is twenty-three, leaving sixteen 
 not shown to have acted upon it in any way. 
 
 Here, then, we have twenty-three out of our 
 thirty-nine fathers "who framed the government 
 under which we live," who have, upon their 
 official responsibility and their corporal oaths, 
 
302 Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 27 
 
 acted upon the very question which the text af- 
 firms they "understood just as well, and even 
 better, than we do now"; and twenty-one of 
 them — a clear majority of the whole "thirty- 
 nine" — so acting upon it as to make them guilty 
 of gross political impropriety and wilful perjury 
 if, in their understanding, any proper division 
 between local and Federal authority, or any- 
 thing in the Constitution they had made them- 
 selves, and sworn to support, forbade the Fed- 
 eral Government to control as to slavery in the 
 Federal Territories. Thus the twenty-one 
 acted; and, as actions speak louder than words, 
 so actions under such responsibility speak still 
 louder. 
 
 Two of the twenty-three voted against con- 
 gressional prohibition of slavery in the Federal 
 Territories, in the instances in which they acted 
 upon the question. But for what reasons they 
 so voted is not known. They may have done 
 so because they thought a proper division of 
 local from Federal authority, or some provision 
 or principle of the Constitution, stood in the 
 way; or they may, without any such question, 
 have voted against the prohibition on what ap- 
 peared to them to be sufficient grounds of ex- 
 pediency. No one who has sworn to support 
 the Constitution can conscientiously vote for 
 what he understands to be an unconstitutional 
 
i860] Cooper Institute Address 303 
 
 measure, however expedient he may think it; 
 but one may and ought to vote against a 
 measure which he deems constitutional if, 
 at the same time, he deems it inexpedient. It, 
 therefore, would be unsafe to set down even the 
 two who voted against the prohibition as having 
 done so because, in their understanding, any 
 proper division of local from Federal authority, 
 or anything in the Constitution, forbade the 
 Federal Government to control as to slavery in 
 Federal territory. 
 
 The remaining sixteen of the "thirty-nine," so 
 far as I have discovered, have left no record of 
 their understanding upon the direct question of 
 Federal control of slavery in the Federal Terri- 
 tories. But there is much reason to believe that 
 their understanding upon that question would 
 not have appeared different from that of their 
 twenty-three compeers, had it been manifested 
 at all. 
 
 For the purpose of adhering rigidly to the 
 text, I have purposely omitted whatever under- 
 standing may have been manifested by any per- 
 son, however distinguished, other than the 
 thirty-nine fathers who framed the original Con- 
 stitution; and, for the same reason, I have also 
 omitted whatever understanding may have been 
 manifested by any of the "thirty-nine" even on 
 any other phase of the general question of slav- 
 
304 Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 27 
 
 ery. If we should look into their acts and 
 declarations on those other phases, as the foreign 
 slave-trade, and the morality and policy of slav- 
 ery generally, it would appear to us that on 
 the direct question of Federal control of slavery 
 in Federal Territories, the sixteen, if they had 
 acted at all, would probably have acted just as 
 the twenty-three did. Among that sixteen were 
 several of the most noted antislavery men of 
 those times, — as Dr. Franklin, Alexander Ham- 
 ilton, and Gouverneur Morris, — while there 
 was not one now known to have been otherwise, 
 unless it may be John Rutledge, of South Car- 
 olina. 
 
 The sum of the whole is that of our thirty-nine 
 fathers who framed the original Constitution, 
 twenty-one — a clear majority of the whole — cer- 
 tainly understood that no proper division of lo- 
 cal from Federal authority, nor any part of the 
 Constitution, forbade the Federal Government 
 to control slavery in the Federal Territories; 
 while all the rest had probably the same under- 
 standing. Such, unquestionably, was the un- 
 derstanding of our fathers who framed the orig- 
 inal Constitution; and the text affirms that they 
 understood the question "better than we." 
 
 But, so far, I have been considering the un- 
 derstanding of the question manifested by the 
 framers of the original Constitution. In and 
 
i860] Cooper Institute Address 305 
 
 by the original instrument, a mode was provided 
 for amending it; and, as I have already stated, 
 the present frame of "the government under 
 which we live" consists of that original, and 
 twelve amendatory articles framed and adopt- 
 ed since. Those who now insist that Federal 
 control of slavery in Federal Territories vio- 
 lates the Constitution, point us to the provisions 
 which they suppose it thus violates; and, as I 
 understand, they all fix upon provisions in these 
 amendatory articles, and not in the original in- 
 strument. The Supreme Court, in the Dred 
 Scott case, plant themselves upon the Fifth 
 Amendment, which provides that no person 
 shall be deprived of "life, liberty, or property 
 without due process of law"; while Senator 
 Douglas and his peculiar adherents plant them- 
 selves upon the Tenth Amendment, providing 
 that "the powers not delegated to the United 
 States by the Constitution" "are reserved to the 
 States respectively, or to the people." 
 
 Now, it so happens that these amendments 
 were framed by the first Congress which sat un- 
 der the Constitution— the identical Congress 
 which passed the act, already mentioned, en- 
 forcing the prohibition of slavery in the North- 
 western Territory. Not only was it the same 
 Congress, but they were the identical, same in- 
 dividual men who, at the same session, and at 
 
306 Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 27 
 
 the same time within the session, had under 
 consideration, and in progress toward maturity, 
 these constitutional amendments, and this act 
 prohibiting slavery in all the territory the na- 
 tion then owned. The constitutional amend- 
 ments were introduced before, and passed after, 
 the act enforcing the ordinance of '87; so that, 
 during the whole pendency of the act to en- 
 force the ordinance, the constitutional amend- 
 ments were also pending. 
 
 The seventy-six members of that Congress, in- 
 cluding sixteen of the framers of the original 
 Constitution, as before stated, were preeminent- 
 ly our fathers who framed that part of "the 
 government under which we live" which is now 
 claimed as forbidding the Federal Government 
 to control slavery in the Federal Territories. 
 
 Is it not a little presumptuous in any one at 
 this day to affirm that the two things which that 
 Congress deliberately framed, and carried to 
 maturity at the same time, are absolutely incon- 
 sistent with each other? And does not such 
 affirmation become impudently absurd when 
 coupled with the other affirmation, from the 
 same mouth, that those who did the two things 
 alleged to be inconsistent, understood whether 
 they really were inconsistent better than we — 
 better than he who affirms that they are incon- 
 sistent? 
 
i860] Cooper Institute Address 307 
 
 It is surely safe to assume that the thirty-nine 
 framers of the original Constitution, and the 
 seventy-six members of the Congress which 
 framed the amendments thereto, taken together, 
 do certainly include those who may be fairly 
 called "our fathers who framed the government 
 under which we live." And so assuming, I defy 
 any man to show that any one of them ever, in 
 his whole life, declared that, in his understand- 
 ing, any proper division of local from Federal 
 authority, or any part of the Constitution, for- 
 bade the Federal Government to control as to 
 slavery in the Federal Territories. I go a step 
 further. I defy any one to show that any living 
 man in the whole world ever did, prior to the 
 beginning of the present century (and I might 
 almost say prior to the beginning of the last 
 half of the present century), declare that, in his 
 understanding, any proper division of local 
 from Federal authority, or any part of the Con- 
 stitution, forbade the Federal Government to 
 control as to slavery in the Federal Territories. 
 To those who now so declare I give not only 
 "our fathers who framed the government under 
 which we live," but with them all other living 
 men within the century in which it was framed, 
 among whom to search, and they shall not be 
 able to find the evidence of a single man agree- 
 ing with them. 
 
308 Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 27 
 
 Now, and here, let me guard a little against 
 being misunderstood. I do not mean to say we 
 are bound to follow implicitly in whatever our 
 fathers did. To do so would be to discard all 
 the lights of current experience — to reject all 
 progress, all improvement. What I do say is 
 that if we would supplant the opinions and 
 policy of our fathers in any case, we should do 
 so upon evidence so conclusive, and argument 
 so clear, that even their great authority, fairly 
 considered and weighed, cannot stand; and most 
 surely not in a case whereof we ourselves de- 
 clare they understood the question better than 
 we. 
 
 If any man at this day sincerely believes that 
 a proper division of local from Federal author- 
 ity, or any part of the Constitution, forbids the 
 Federal Government to control as to slavery in 
 the Federal Territories, he is right to say so, and 
 to enforce his position by all truthful evidence 
 and fair argument which he can. But he has no 
 right to mislead others, who have less access to 
 history, and less leisure to study it, into the false 
 belief that "our fathers who framed the govern- 
 ment under which we live" were of the same 
 opinion — thus substituting falsehood and decep- 
 tion for truthful evidence and fair argument. If 
 any man at this day sincerely believes "our 
 fathers who framed the government under which 
 
i860] Cooper Institute Address 309 
 
 we live" used and applied principles, in other 
 cases, which ought to have led them to under- 
 stand that a proper division of local from Fed- 
 eral authority, or some part of the Constitution, 
 forbids the Federal Government to control as to 
 slavery in the Federal Territories, he is right to 
 say so. But he should, at the same time, brave 
 the responsibility of declaring that, in his opin- 
 ion, he understands their principles better than 
 they did themselves; and especially should he 
 not shirk that responsibility by asserting that 
 they "understood the question just as well, and 
 even better, than we do now." 
 
 But enough! Let all who believe that "our 
 fathers who framed the government under which 
 we live understood this question just as well, and 
 even better, than we do now," speak as they 
 spoke, and act as they acted upon it. This is all 
 Republicans ask — all Republicans desire — in re- 
 lation to slavery. As those fathers marked it, so 
 let it be again marked, as an evil not to be ex- 
 tended, but to be tolerated and protected only 
 because of and so far as its actual presence 
 among us makes that toleration and protection 
 a necessity. Let all the guaranties those fathers 
 gave it be not grudgingly, but fully and fairly, 
 maintained. For this Republicans contend, and 
 with this, so far as I know or believe, they will 
 be content. 
 
310 Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 27 
 
 And now, if they would listen, — as I suppose 
 they will not, — I would address a few words to 
 the Southern people. 
 
 I would say to them: You consider yourselves 
 a reasonable and a just people; and I consider 
 that in the general qualities of reason and justice 
 you are not inferior to any other people. Still, 
 when you speak of us Republicans, you do so 
 only to denounce us as reptiles, or, at the best, as 
 no better than outlaws. You will grant a hear- 
 ing to pirates or murderers, but nothing like it 
 to "Black Republicans." In all your conten- 
 tions with one another, each of you deems an un- 
 conditional condemnation of "Black Republi- 
 canism" as the first thing to be attended to. In- 
 deed, such condemnation of us seems to be an 
 indispensable prerequisite — license, so to speak 
 — among you to be admitted or permitted to 
 speak at all. Now can you or not be prevailed 
 upon to pause and to consider whether this is 
 quite just to us, or even to yourselves? Bring 
 forward your charges and specifications, and 
 then be patient long enough to hear us deny or 
 justify. 
 
 You say we are sectional. We deny it. That 
 makes an issue; and the burden of proof is upon 
 you. You produce your proof; and what is it? 
 Why, that our party has no existence in your sec- 
 tion — gets no votes in your section. The fact is 
 
i860] Cooper Institute Address 311 
 
 substantially true; but does it prove the issue? 
 If it does, then in case we should, without change 
 of principle, begin to get votes in your section, 
 we should thereby cease to be sectional. You 
 cannot escape this conclusion; and yet, are you 
 willing to abide by it? If you are, you will 
 probably soon find that we have ceased to be 
 sectional, for we shall get votes in your section 
 this very year. You will then begin to discover, 
 as the truth plainly is, that your proof does not 
 touch the issue. The fact that we get no votes in 
 your section is a fact of your making, and not of 
 ours. And if there be fault in that fact, that 
 fault is primarily yours, and remains so until you 
 show that we repel you by some wrong principle 
 or practice. If we do repel you by any wrong 
 principle or practice, the fault is ours; but this 
 brings you to where you ought to have started 
 — to a discussion of the right or wrong of our 
 principle. If our principle, put in practice, 
 would wrong your section for the benefit of ours, 
 or for any other object, then our principle, and 
 we with it, are sectional, and are justly opposed 
 and denounced as such. Meet us, then, on the 
 question of whether our principle, put in prac- 
 tice, would wrong your section; and so meet us 
 as if it were possible that something may be said 
 on our side. Do you accept the challenge ? No ! 
 Then you really believe that the principle which 
 
312 Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 27 
 
 "our fathers who framed the government under 
 which we live" thought so clearly right as to 
 adopt it, and indorse it again and again, upon 
 their official oaths, is in fact so clearly wrong as 
 to demand your condemnation without a mo- 
 ment's consideration. 
 
 Some of you delight to flaunt in our faces the 
 warning against sectional parties given by Wash- 
 ington in his Farewell Address. Less than 
 eight years before Washington gave that warn- 
 ing, he had, as President of the United States, 
 approved and signed an act of Congress enforc- 
 ing the prohibition of slavery in the North- 
 western Territory, which act embodied the 
 policy of the government upon that subject up 
 to and at the very moment he penned that warn- 
 ing; and about one year after he penned it, he 
 wrote Lafayette that he considered that prohibi- 
 tion a wise measure, expressing in the same 
 connection his hope that we should at some time 
 have a confederacy of free States. 
 
 Bearing this in mind, and seeing that section- 
 alism has since arisen upon this same subject, is 
 that warning a weapon in your hands against us, 
 or in our hands against you? Could Washing- 
 ton himself speak, would he cast the blame of 
 that sectionalism upon us, who sustain his policy, 
 or upon you, who repudiate it? We respect that 
 warning of Washington, and we commend it to 
 
i860] Cooper Institute Address 313 
 
 you, together with his example pointing to the 
 right application of it. 
 
 But you say you are conservative — eminently 
 conservative — while we are revolutionary, de- 
 structive, or something of the sort. What is 
 conservatism? Is it not adherence to the old and 
 tried, against the new and untried? We stick 
 to, contend for, the identical old policy on the 
 point in controversy which was adopted by "our 
 fathers who framed the government under which 
 we live" ; while you with one accord reject, and 
 scout, and spit upon that old policy, and insist 
 upon substituting something new. True, you 
 disagree among yourselves as to what that sub- 
 stitute shall be. You are divided on new propo- 
 sitions and plans, but you are unanimous in 
 rejecting and denouncing the old policy of the 
 fathers. Some of you are for reviving the for- 
 eign slave-trade; some for a congressional slave 
 code for the Territories; some for Congress for- 
 bidding the Territories to prohibit slavery with- 
 in their limits; some for maintaining slavery in 
 the Territories through the judiciary; some for 
 the "gur-reat pur-rinciple" that "if one man 
 would enslave another, no third man should ob- 
 ject," fantastically called "popular sovereignty" ; 
 but never a man among you is in favor of Federal 
 prohibition of slavery in Federal Territories, 
 according to the practice of "our fathers who 
 
3 H Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 27 
 
 framed the government under which we live." 
 Not one of all your various plans can show a 
 precedent or an advocate in the century within 
 which our government originated. Consider, 
 then, whether your claim of conservatism for 
 yourselves, and your charge of destructiveness 
 against us, are based on the most clear and 
 stable foundations. 
 
 Again, you say we have made the slavery 
 question more prominent than it formerly was. 
 We deny it. We admit that it is more promi- 
 nent, but we deny that we made it so. It was not 
 we, but you, who discarded the old policy of the 
 fathers. We resisted, and still resist, your in- 
 novation; and thence comes the greater promi- 
 nence of the question. Would you have that 
 question reduced to its former proportions? Go 
 back to that old policy. What has been will be 
 again, under the same conditions. If you would 
 have the peace of the old times, readopt the 
 precepts and policy of the old times. 
 
 You charge that we stir up insurrections 
 among your slaves. We deny it; and what is 
 your proof? Harper's Ferry! John Brown! ! 
 John Brown was no Republican; and you have 
 failed to implicate a single Republican in his 
 Harper's Ferry enterprise. If any member of 
 our party is guilty in that matter, you know it, 
 or you do not know it. If you do know it, you 
 
i860] Cooper Institute Address 315 
 
 are inexcusable for not designating the man and 
 proving the fact. If you do not know it, you are 
 inexcusable for asserting it, and especially for 
 persisting in the assertion after you have tried 
 and failed to make the proof. You need not 
 be told that persisting in a charge which one 
 does not know to be true, is simply malicious 
 slander. 
 
 Some of you admit that no Republican de- 
 signedly aided or encouraged the Harper's 
 Ferry affair, but still insist that our doctrines 
 and declarations necessarily lead to such results. 
 We do not believe it. We know we hold no 
 doctrine, and make no declaration, which were 
 not held to and made by "our fathers who 
 framed the government under which we live." 
 You never dealt fairly by us in relation to this 
 affair. When it occurred, some important State 
 elections were near at hand, and you were in 
 evident glee with the belief that, by charging 
 the blame upon us, you could get an advantage 
 of us in those elections. The elections came, 
 and your expectations were not quite fulfilled. 
 Every Republican man knew that, as to himself 
 at least, your charge was a slander, and he was 
 not much inclined by it to cast his vote in your 
 favor. Republican doctrines and declarations 
 are accompanied with a continual protest 
 against any interference whatever with your 
 
316 Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 27 
 
 slaves, or with you about your slaves. Surely, 
 this does not encourage them to revolt. True, 
 we do, in common with "our fathers who framed 
 the government under which we live," declare 
 our belief that slavery is wrong; but the slaves 
 do not hear us declare even this. For anything 
 we say or do, the slaves would scarcely know 
 there is a Republican party. I believe they 
 would not, in fact, generally know it but for 
 your misrepresentations of us in their hearing. 
 In your political contests among yourselves, 
 each faction charges the other with sympathy 
 with Black Republicanism; and then, to give 
 point to the charge, defines Black Republican- 
 ism to simply be insurrection, blood, and 
 thunder among the slaves. 
 
 Slave insurrections are no more common now 
 than they were before the Republican party 
 was organized. What induced the Southamp- 
 ton insurrection, twenty-eight years ago, in 
 which at least three times as many lives were 
 lost as at Harper's Ferry? You can scarcely 
 stretch your very elastic fancy to the conclusion 
 that Southampton was "got up by Black Re- 
 publicanism." In the present state of things in 
 the United States, I do not think a general, or 
 even a very extensive, slave insurrection is pos- 
 sible. The indispensable concert of action can- 
 not be attained. The slaves have no means of 
 
i860] Cooper Institute Address 317 
 
 rapid communication; nor can incendiary free- 
 men, black or white, supply it. The explosive 
 materials are everywhere in parcels; but there 
 neither are, nor can be supplied, the indispens- 
 able connecting trains. 
 
 Much is said by Southern people about the 
 affection of slaves for their masters and mis- 
 tresses; and a part of it, at least, is true. A 
 plot for an uprising could scarcely be devised 
 and communicated to twenty individuals before 
 some one of them, to save the life of a favorite 
 master or mistress, would divulge it. This is 
 the rule; and the slave revolution in Hayti was 
 not an exception to it, but a case occurring 
 under peculiar circumstances. The gunpowder 
 plot of British history, though not connected 
 with slaves, was more in point. In that case, 
 only about twenty were admitted to the secret; 
 and yet one of them, in his anxiety to save a 
 friend, betrayed the plot to that friend, and, by 
 consequence, averted the calamity. Occasional 
 poisonings from the kitchen, and open or 
 stealthy assassinations in the field, and local re- 
 volts extending to a score or so, will continue to 
 occur as the natural results of slavery; but no 
 general insurrection of slaves, as I think, can 
 happen in this country for a long time. Who- 
 ever much fears, or much hopes, for such an 
 event, will be alike disappointed. 
 
318 Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 27 
 
 In the language of Mr. Jefferson, uttered 
 many years ago, "It is still in our power to 
 direct the process of emancipation and depor- 
 tation peaceably, and in such slow degrees, as 
 that the evil will wear off insensibly; and their 
 places be, pari passu, filled up by free white 
 laborers. If, on the contrary, it is left to force 
 itself on, human nature must shudder at the 
 prospect held up." 
 
 Mr. Jefferson did not mean to say, nor do I, 
 that the power of emancipation is in the Federal 
 Government. He spoke of Virginia; and, as to 
 the power of emancipation, I speak of the slave- 
 holding States only. The Federal Government, 
 however, as we insist, has the power of restrain- 
 ing the extension of the institution — the power 
 to insure that a slave insurrection shall never 
 occur on any American soil which is now free 
 from slavery. 
 
 John Brown's effort was peculiar. It was not 
 a slave insurrection. It was an attempt by white 
 men to get up a revolt among slaves, in which 
 the slaves refused to participate. In fact, it was 
 so absurd that the slaves, with all their ignor- 
 ance, saw plainly enough it could not succeed. 
 That affair, in its philosophy, corresponds with 
 the many attempts, related in history, at the 
 assassination of kings and emperors. An en- 
 thusiast broods over the oppression of a people 
 
i860] Cooper Institute Address 319 
 
 till he fancies himself commissioned by Heaven 
 to liberate them. He ventures the attempt, 
 which ends in little else than his own execution. 
 Orsini's attempt on Louis Napoleon, and John 
 Brown's attempt at Harper's Ferry, were, in 
 their philosophy, precisely the same. The 
 eagerness to cast blame on old England in the 
 one case, and on New England in the other, 
 does not disprove the sameness of the two things. 
 And how much would it avail you, if you 
 could, by the use of John Brown, Helper's 
 Book, and the like, break up the Republican 
 organization? Human action can be modified 
 to some extent, but human nature cannot be 
 changed. There is a judgment and a feeling 
 against slavery in this nation, which cast at least 
 a million and a half of votes. You cannot 
 destroy that judgment and feeling — that senti- 
 ment — by breaking up the political organiza- 
 tion which rallies around it. You can scarcely 
 scatter and disperse an army which has been 
 formed into order in the face of your heaviest 
 fire; but if you could, how much would you 
 gain by forcing the sentiment which created it 
 out of the peaceful channel of the ballot-box 
 into some other channel? What would that 
 other channel probably be? Would the number 
 of John Browns be lessened or enlarged by the 
 operation? 
 
320 Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 27 
 
 But you will break up the Union rather than 
 submit to a denial of your constitutional rights. 
 
 That has a somewhat reckless sound; but it 
 would be palliated, if not fully justified, were 
 we proposing, by the mere force of numbers, to 
 deprive you of some right plainly written down 
 in the Constitution. But we are proposing no 
 such thing. 
 
 When you make these declarations you have 
 a specific and well-understood allusion to an 
 assumed constitutional right of yours to take 
 slaves into the Federal Territories, and to hold 
 them there as property. But no such right is 
 specifically written in the Constitution. That 
 instrument is literally silent about any such 
 right. We, on the contrary, deny that such a 
 right has any existence in the Constitution, even 
 by implication. 
 
 Your purpose, then, plainly stated, is that 
 you will destroy the government, unless you be 
 allowed to construe and force the Constitution 
 as you please, on all points in dispute between 
 you and us. You will rule or ruin in all events. 
 
 This, plainly stated, is your language. Per- 
 haps you will say the Supreme Court has de- 
 cided the disputed constitutional question in 
 your favor. Not quite so. But waiving the 
 lawyer's distinction between dictum and deci- 
 sion, the court has decided the question for you 
 
i860] Cooper Institute Address 321 
 
 in a sort of way. The court has substantially 
 said, it is your constitutional right to take slaves 
 into the Federal Territories, and to hold them 
 there as property. When I say the decision was 
 made in a sort of way, I mean it was made in a 
 divided court, by a bare majority of the judges, 
 and they not quite agreeing with one another in 
 the reasons for making it; that it is so made as 
 that its avowed supporters disagree with one 
 another about its meaning, and that it was main- 
 ly based upon a mistaken statement of fact — 
 the statement in the opinion that "the right of 
 property in a slave is distinctly and expressly 
 affirmed in the Constitution." 
 
 An inspection of the Constitution will show 
 that the right of property in a slave is not "dis- 
 tinctly and expressly affirmed" in it. Bear in 
 mind, the judges do not pledge their judicial 
 opinion that such right is impliedly affirmed in 
 the Constitution; but they pledge their veracity 
 that it is "distinctly and expressly" affirmed 
 there — "distinctly," that is, not mingled with 
 anything else — "expressly," that is, in words 
 meaning just that, without the aid of any infer- 
 ence, and susceptible of no other meaning. 
 
 If they had only pledged their judicial opin- 
 ion that such right is affirmed in the instru- 
 ment by implication, it would be open to others 
 to show that neither the word "slave" nor 
 
322 Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 27 
 
 "slavery" is to be found in the Constitution, nor 
 the word "property" even, in any connection 
 with language alluding to the things slave, or 
 slavery; and that wherever in that instrument 
 the slave is alluded to, he is called a "person"; 
 and wherever his master's legal right in relation 
 to him is alluded to, it is spoken of as "service 
 or labor which may be due" — as a debt payable 
 in service or labor. Also it would be open to 
 show, by contemporaneous history, that this 
 mode of alluding to slaves and slavery, instead 
 of speaking of them, was employed on purpose 
 to exclude from the Constitution the idea that 
 there could be property in man. 
 
 To show all this is easy and certain. 
 
 When this obvious mistake of the judges shall 
 be brought to their notice, is it not reasonable 
 to expect that they will withdraw the mistaken 
 statement, and reconsider the conclusion based 
 upon it? 
 
 And then it is to be remembered that "our 
 fathers who framed the government under 
 which we live" — the men who made the Con- 
 stitution — decided this same constitutional ques- 
 tion in our favor long ago: decided it without 
 division among themselves when making the 
 decision; without division among themselves 
 about the meaning of it after it was made, and, 
 
i860] Cooper Institute Address 323 
 
 so far as any evidence is left, without basing it 
 upon any mistaken statement of facts. 
 
 Under all these circumstances, do you really 
 feel yourselves justified to break up this govern- 
 ment unless such a court decision as yours is 
 shall be at once submitted to as a conclusive and 
 final rule of political action? But you will not 
 abide the election of a Republican president I 
 In that supposed event, you say, you will destroy 
 the Union; and then, you say, the great crime 
 of having destroyed it will be upon us! That 
 is cool. A highwayman holds a pistol to my 
 ear, and mutters through his teeth, "Stand and 
 deliver, or I shall kill you, and then you will be 
 a murderer I" 
 
 To be sure, what the robber demanded of me 
 — my money — was my own; and I had a clear 
 right to keep it; but it was no more my own than 
 my vote is my own; and the threat of death to 
 me, to extort my money, and the threat of de- 
 struction to the Union, to extort my vote, can 
 scarcely be distinguished in principle. 
 
 A few words now to Republicans. It is ex- 
 ceedingly desirable that all parts of this great 
 Confederacy shall be at peace, and in harmony 
 one with another. Let us Republicans do our 
 part to have it so. Even though much pro- 
 voked, let us do nothing through passion and ill 
 temper. Even though the Southern people will 
 
324 Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 27 
 
 not so much as listen to us, let us calmly consider 
 their demands, and yield to them if, in our de- 
 liberate view of our duty, we possibly can. 
 Judging by all they say and do, and by the sub- 
 ject and nature of their controversy with us, let 
 us determine, if we can, what will satisfy them. 
 
 Will they be satisfied if the Territories be un- 
 conditionally surrendered to them? We know 
 they will not. In all their present complaints 
 against us, the Territories are scarcely men- 
 tioned. Invasions and insurrections are the 
 rage now. Will it satisfy them if, in the future, 
 we have nothing to do with invasions and insur- 
 rections? We know it will not. We so know., 
 because we know we never had anything to do 
 with invasions and insurrections; and yet this 
 total abstaining does not exempt us from the 
 charge and the denunciation. 
 
 The question recurs, What will satisfy them? 
 Simply this: we must not only let them alone, 
 but we must somehow convince them that we do 
 let them alone. This, we know by experience, 
 is no easy task. We have been so trying to con- 
 vince them from the very beginning of our or- 
 ganization, but with no success. In all our 
 platforms and speeches we have constantly pro- 
 tested our purpose to let them alone; but this 
 has had no tendency to convince them. Alike 
 unavailing to convince them is the fact that they 
 
i860] Cooper Institute Address 325 
 
 have never detected a man of us in any attempt 
 to disturb them. 
 
 These natural and apparently adequate means 
 all failing, what will convince them? This, and 
 this only: cease to call slavery wrong, and join 
 them in calling it right. And this must be done 
 thoroughly — done in acts as well as in words. 
 Silence will not be tolerated — we must place 
 ourselves avowedly with them. Senator Doug- 
 las's new sedition law must be enacted and en- 
 forced, suppressing all declarations that slavery 
 is wrong, whether made in politics, in presses, 
 in pulpits, or in private. We must arrest and 
 return their fugitive slaves with greedy pleasure. 
 We must pull down our free-State constitutions. 
 The whole atmosphere must be disinfected from 
 all taint of opposition to slavery, before they 
 will cease to believe that all their troubles pro- 
 ceed from us. 
 
 I am quite aware they do not state their case 
 precisely in this way. Most of them would 
 probably say to us, "Let us alone; do nothing to 
 us, and say what you please about slavery." But 
 we do let them alone, — have never disturbed 
 them, — so that, after all, it is what we say which 
 dissatisfies them. They will continue to accuse 
 us of doing, until we cease saying. 
 
 I am also aware they have not as yet in terms 
 demanded the overthrow of our free-State con- 
 
326 Abraham Lincoln [Feb. 27 
 
 stitutions. Yet those constitutions declare the 
 wrong of slavery with more solemn emphasis 
 than do all other sayings against it; and when 
 all these other sayings shall have been silenced, 
 the overthrow of these constitutions will be de- 
 manded, and nothing be left to resist the demand. 
 It is nothing to the contrary that they do not 
 demand the whole of this just now. Demanding 
 what they do, and for the reason they do, they 
 can voluntarily stop nowhere short of this con- 
 summation. Holding, as they do, that slavery 
 is morally right and socially elevating, they can- 
 not cease to demand a full national recognition 
 of it as a legal right and a social blessing. 
 
 Nor can we justifiably withhold this on any 
 ground save our conviction that slavery is 
 wrong. If slavery is right, all words, acts, laws, 
 and constitutions against it are themselves 
 wrong, and should be silenced and swept away. 
 If it is right, we cannot justly object to its 
 nationality — its universality; if it is wrong, they 
 cannot justly insist upon its extension — its en- 
 largement. All they ask we could readily grant, 
 if we thought slavery right; all we ask they 
 could as readily grant, if they thought it wrong. 
 Their thinking it right and our thinking it 
 wrong is the precise fact upon which depends 
 the whole controversy. Thinking it right, as 
 they do, they are not to blame for desiring its 
 
i860] Cooper Institute Address 327 
 
 full recognition as being right; but thinking it 
 wrong, as we do, can we yield to them? Can we 
 cast our votes with their view, and against our 
 own? In view of our moral, social, and politi- 
 cal responsibilities, can we do this? 
 
 Wrong as we think slavery is, we can yet 
 afford to let it alone where it is, because that 
 much is due to the necessity arising from its 
 actual presence in the nation; but can we, while 
 our votes will prevent it, allow it to spread into 
 the national Territories, and to overrun us here 
 in these free States? If our sense of duty for- 
 bids this, then let us stand by our duty fearlessly 
 and effectively. Let us be diverted by none of 
 those sophistical contrivances wherewith we are 
 so industriously plied and belabored — contriv- 
 ances such as groping for some middle ground 
 between the right and the wrong: vain as the 
 search for a man who should be neither a living 
 man nor a dead man; such as a policy of "don't 
 care" on a question about which all true men do 
 care; such as Union appeals beseeching true 
 Union men to yield to Disunionists, reversing 
 the divine rule, and calling, not the sinners, but 
 the righteous to repentance; such as invocations 
 to Washington, imploring men to unsay what 
 Washington said and undo what Washington 
 did. 
 
 Neither let us be slandered from our duty by 
 
328 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. 5 
 
 false accusations against us, nor frightened from 
 it by menaces of destruction to the government, 
 nor of dungeons to ourselves. Let us have faith 
 that right makes might, and in that faith let us 
 to the end dare to do our duty as we under- 
 stand it. 
 
Abraham Lincoln 
 Reproduced from a Rare Engraving 
 
 Leipzig, after a Photograph by Brady, prob- 
 ably the one taken in New York Cit 
 i860. 
 
[86o] Hartford Speech 329 
 
 Abstract of Speech at Hartford, Connec- 
 ticut, March 5, i860 
 
 SLAVERY is the great political question of 
 the nation. Though all desire its settle- 
 ment, it still remains the all-pervading 
 question of the day. It has been so especially 
 for the past six years. It is indeed older than 
 the Revolution — rising, subsiding, then rising 
 again, till '54, since which time it has been con- 
 stantly augmenting. Those who occasioned the 
 Lecompton imbroglio now admit that they see 
 no end to it. It had been their cry that the 
 vexed question was just about to be settled — 
 "the tail of this hideous creature is just going 
 out of sight." That cry is played out, and has 
 ceased. 
 
 Why, when all desire to have this controversy 
 settled, can we not settle it satisfactorily? One 
 reason is, we want it settled in different ways. 
 Each faction has a different plan— they pull 
 different ways, and neither has a decided ma- 
 jority. In my humble opinion, the importance 
 and magnitude of the question is underrated, 
 even by our wisest men. If I be right, the first 
 
33° Abraham Lincoln [Mar. 5 
 
 thing is to get a just estimate of the evil; then 
 we can provide a cure. 
 
 One sixth, and a little more, of the population 
 of the United States are slaves, looked upon as 
 property, as nothing but property. The cash 
 value of these slaves, at a moderate estimate, is 
 $2,000,000,000. This amount of property value 
 has a vast influence on the minds of its owners, 
 very naturally. The same amount of property 
 would have an equal influence upon us if owned 
 in the North. Human nature is the same — 
 people at the South are the same as those at the 
 North, barring the difference in circumstances. 
 Public opinion is founded, to a great extent, on 
 a property basis. What lessens the value of 
 property is opposed; what enhances its value is 
 favored. Public opinion at the South regards 
 slaves as property, and insists upon treating 
 them like other property. 
 
 On the other hand, the free States carry on 
 their government on the principle of the equal- 
 ity of men. We think slavery is morally wrong, 
 and a direct violation of that principle. We all 
 think it wrong. It is clearly proved, I think, by 
 natural theology, apart from revelation. Every 
 man, black, white, or yellow, has a mouth to be 
 fed, and two hands with which to feed it — and 
 bread should be allowed to go to that mouth 
 without controversy. 
 
i860] Hartford Speech 331 
 
 Slavery is wrong in its effect upon white 
 people and free labor. It is the only thing that 
 threatens the Union. It makes what Senator 
 Seward has been much abused for calling an 
 "irrepressible conflict." When they get ready 
 to settle it, we hope they will let us know. Pub- 
 lic opinion settles every question here; any 
 policy to be permanent must have public opinion 
 at the bottom — something in accordance with 
 the philosophy of the human mind as it is. The 
 property basis will have its weight. The love of 
 property and a consciousness of right or wrong 
 have conflicting places in our organization, 
 which often make a man's course seem crooked, 
 his conduct a riddle. 
 
 Some men would make it a question of indif- 
 ference, neither right nor wrong, merely a ques- 
 tion of dollars and cents; — the Almighty has 
 drawn a line across the land, below which it 
 must be cultivated by slave labor, above which 
 by free labor. They would say: "If the ques- 
 tion is between the white man and the negro, I 
 am for the white man; if between the negro and 
 the crocodile, I am for the negro." There is a 
 strong effort to make this policy of indifference 
 prevail, but it cannot be a durable one. A "don't 
 care" policy won't prevail, for everybody does 
 care. 
 
 Is there a Democrat, especially one of the 
 
332 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. 5 
 
 Douglas wing, but will declare that the 
 Declaration of Independence has no application 
 to the negro? It would be safe to offer a moder- 
 ate premium for such a man. I have asked this 
 question in large audiences where they were in 
 the habit of answering right out, but no one 
 would say otherwise. Not one of them said it 
 five years ago. I never heard it till I heard it 
 from the lips of Judge Douglas. True, some 
 men boldly took the bull by the horns and said 
 the Declaration of Independence was not true! 
 The didn't sneak around the question. I say I 
 heard first from Douglas that the Declaration 
 did not apply to the black man. Not a man of 
 them said it till then — they all say it now. This 
 is a long stride toward establishing the policy 
 of indifference — one more such stride, I think, 
 would do it. 
 
 The proposition that there is a struggle be- 
 tween the white man and the negro contains a 
 falsehood. There is no struggle. If there was, 
 I should be for the white man. If two men are 
 adrift at sea on a plank which will bear up but 
 one, the law justifies either in pushing the other 
 off. I never had to struggle to keep a negro 
 from enslaving me, nor did a negro ever have 
 to fight to keep me from enslaving him. They 
 say, between the crocodile and the negro, they 
 go for the negro. The logical proportion is, 
 
i860] Hartford Speech 333 
 
 therefore, as a white man is to a negro, so is a 
 negro to a crocodile, or as a negro may treat the 
 crocodile, so the white man may treat the negro. 
 The "don't care" policy leads just as surely to 
 nationalizing slavery as Jeff Davis himself, but 
 the doctrine is more dangerous because more 
 insidious. 
 
 If the Republicans, who think slavery is 
 wrong, get possession of the General Govern- 
 ment, we may not root out the evil at once, but 
 may at least prevent its extension. If I find a 
 venomous snake lying on the open prairie, I 
 seize the first stick and kill him at once; but if 
 that snake is in bed with my children, I must be 
 more cautious; — I shall, in striking the snake, 
 also strike the children, or arouse the reptile to 
 bite the children. Slavery is the venomous 
 snake in bed with the children. But if the ques- 
 tion is whether to kill it on the prairie or put it 
 in bed with other children, I am inclined to 
 think we'd kill it. 
 
 Another illustration. When for the first time 
 I met Mr. Clay, the other day in the cars, in 
 front of us sat an old gentleman with an enor- 
 mous wen upon his neck. Everybody would 
 say the wen was a great evil, and would cause 
 the man's death after a while; but you couldn't 
 cut it out, for he'd bleed to death in a minute. 
 But would you ingraft the seeds of that wen on 
 
334 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. 5 
 
 the necks of sound and healthy men? He must 
 endure and be patient, hoping for possible relief. 
 The wen represents slavery on the neck of this 
 country. This only applies to those who think 
 slavery is wrong. Those who think it right 
 would consider the snake a jewel and the wen 
 an ornament. 
 
 We want those Democrats who think slavery 
 wrong, to quit voting with those who think it 
 right. They don't treat it as they do other 
 wrongs — they won't oppose it in the free States, 
 for it isn't there; nor in the slave States, for it is 
 there; — don't want it in politics, for it makes 
 agitation; not in the pulpit, for it isn't religion; 
 not in a tract society, for it makes a fuss — there 
 is no place for its discussion. Are they quite 
 consistent in this? 
 
 If those Democrats really think slavery 
 wrong, they will be much pleased when earnest 
 men in the slave States take up a plan of gradual 
 emancipation, and go to work energetically and 
 very kindly to get rid of the evil. Now let us 
 test them. Frank Blair tried it; and he ran for 
 Congress in '58, and got beaten. Did the De- 
 mocracy feel bad about it? I reckon not. I 
 guess you all flung up your hats and shouted, 
 "Hurrah for the Democracy!" 
 
 He went on to speak of the manner in which 
 
i860] Hartford Speech 335 
 
 slavery was treated by the Constitution. The 
 word "slave" is nowhere used; the supply of 
 slaves was to be prohibited after 1808; they 
 stopped the spread of it in the Territories; seven 
 of the States abolished it. He argued very con- 
 clusively that it was then regarded as an evil 
 which would eventually be got rid of, and that 
 they desired, once rid of it, to have nothing in 
 the Constitution to remind them of it. The Re- 
 publicans go back to first principles, and deal 
 with it as a wrong. Mason, of Virginia, said 
 openly that the f ramers of our government were 
 anti-slavery. Hammond, of South Carolina, 
 said, "Washington set this evil example." Bully 
 Brooks said, "At the time the Constitution was 
 formed, no one supposed slavery would last till 
 now." We stick to the policy of our fathers. 
 
 The Democracy are given to bushwhacking. 
 After having their errors and misstatements 
 continually thrust in their faces, they pay no 
 heed, but go on howling about Seward and the 
 "irrepressible conflict." That is bushwhacking. 
 So with John Brown and Harper's Ferry. They 
 charge it upon the Republican party, and igno- 
 miniously fail in all attempts to substantiate the 
 charge. Yet they go on with their bushwhack- 
 ing, the pack in full cry after John Brown. The 
 Democrats had just been whipped in Ohio and 
 Pennsylvania, and seized upon the unfortunate 
 
336 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. 5 
 
 Harper's Ferry affair to influence other elec- 
 tions then pending. They said to each other, 
 "Jump in; now's your chance"; and were sorry 
 there were not more killed. But they didn't 
 succeed well. Let them go on with their howl- 
 ing. They will succeed when by slandering 
 women you get them to love you, and by slander- 
 ing men you get them to vote for you. 
 
 Mr. Lincoln then took up the Massachusetts 
 shoemakers' strike, treating it in a humorous 
 and philosophical manner, and exposing to 
 ridicule the foolish pretense of Senator Douglas 
 — that the strike arose from "this unfortunate 
 sectional warfare." Mr. Lincoln thanked God 
 that we have a system of labor where there can 
 be a strike. Whatever the pressure, there is a 
 point where the workman may stop. He didn't 
 pretend to be familiar with the subject of the 
 shoe strike — probably knew as little about it as 
 Senator Douglas himself. Shall we stop mak- 
 ing war upon the South? We never have made 
 war upon them. If any one has, he had better 
 go and hang himself and save Virginia the 
 trouble. If you give up your convictions and 
 call slavery right, as they do, you let slavery in 
 upon you — instead of white laborers who can 
 strike, you'll soon have black laborers who can't 
 strike. 
 
 I have heard that in consequence of this "sec- 
 
i860] Hartford Speech 337 
 
 tional warfare," as Douglas calls it, Senator 
 Mason, of Virginia, had appeared in a suit of 
 homespun. Now, up in New Hampshire, the 
 woolen and cotton mills are all busy, and there 
 is no strike — they are busy making the very 
 goods Senator Mason has quit buying! To carry 
 out his idea, he ought to go barefoot! If that's 
 the plan, they should begin at the foundation, 
 and adopt the well-known "Georgia costume" 
 of a shirt-collar and pair of spurs. 
 
 It reminded him of the man who had a poor, 
 old, lean, bony, spavined horse, with swelled 
 legs. He was asked what he was going to do 
 with such a miserable beast — the poor creature 
 would die. "Do?" said he. "I'm going to fat 
 him up ; don't you see that I have got him seal 
 fat as high as the knees?" Well, they have got 
 the Union dissolved up to the ankle, but no 
 further! 
 
 All portions of this Confederacy should act 
 in harmony and with careful deliberation. The 
 Democrats cry "John Brown invasion." We 
 are guiltless of it, but our denial does not satisfy 
 them. Nothing will satisfy them but disinfect- 
 ing the atmosphere entirely of all opposition to 
 slavery. They have not demanded of us to yield 
 the guards of liberty in our State constitutions, 
 but it will naturally come to that after a while. 
 If we give up to them, we cannot refuse even 
 
338 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. 6 
 
 their utmost request. If slavery is right, it 
 ought to be extended ; if not, if ought to be re- 
 stricted — there is no middle ground. Wrong as 
 we think it, we can afford to let it alone where 
 it of necessity now exists ; but we cannot afford 
 to extend it into free territory and around our 
 own homes. Let us stand against it! 
 
 The "Union" arrangements are all a humbug 
 — they reverse the scriptural order, calling the 
 righteous, and not sinners, to repentance. Let 
 us not be slandered or intimidated to turn from 
 our duty. Eternal right makes might; as we 
 understand our duty, let us do it! 
 
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[ 86o] New Haven Speech 339 
 
 Speech at New Haven, Connecticut, 
 March 6, i860 
 
 MR. PRESIDENT and Fellow-citi- 
 zens OF New Haven: If the Re- 
 publican party of this nation shall 
 ever have the national house intrusted to its 
 keeping, it will be the duty of that party to 
 attend to' all the affairs of national housekeep- 
 ing. Whatever matters of importance may 
 come up, whatever difficulties may arise, in the 
 way of its administration of the government, 
 that party will then have to attend to: it will 
 then be compelled to attend to other questions 
 besides this question which now assumes an 
 overwhelming importance — the question of 
 slavery. It is true that in the organization of 
 the Republican party this question of slavery 
 was more important than any other; indeed, so 
 much more important has it become that no 
 other national question can even get a hearing 
 just at present. The old question of tariff — a 
 matter that will remain one of the chief affairs 
 of national housekeeping to all time; the ques- 
 tion of the management of financial affairs; the 
 question of the disposition of the public domain: 
 
340 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. 6 
 
 how shall it be managed for the purpose of 
 getting it well settled, and of making there the 
 homes of a free and happy people — these will 
 remain open and require attention for a great 
 while yet, and these questions will have to be 
 attended to by whatever party has the control of 
 the government. Yet just now they cannot even 
 obtain a hearing, and I do not purpose to detain 
 you upon these topics, or what sort of hearing 
 they should have when opportunity shall come. 
 For whether we will or not, the question of 
 slavery is the question, the all-absorbing topic, 
 of the day. It is true that all of us — and by that 
 I mean not the Republican party alone, but the 
 whole American people here and elsewhere — - 
 all of us wish this question settled; wish it out 
 of the way. It stands in the way and prevents 
 the adjustment and the giving of necessary at- 
 tention to other questions of national housekeep- 
 ing. The people of the whole nation agree that 
 this question ought to be settled, and yet it is not 
 settled; and the reason is that they are not yet 
 agreed how it shall be settled. All wish it done, 
 but some wish one way and some another, and 
 some a third, or fourth, or fifth; different bodies 
 are pulling in different directions, and none of 
 them having a decided majority are able to ac- 
 complish the common object. 
 
 In the beginning of the year 1854, a new 
 
i860] New Haven Speech 341 
 
 policy was inaugurated with the avowed object 
 and confident promise that it would entirely and 
 forever put an end to the slavery agitation. It 
 was again and again declared that under this 
 policy, when once successfully established, the 
 country would be forever rid of this whole ques- 
 tion. Yet under the operation of that policy 
 this agitation has not only not ceased, but it has 
 been constantly augmented. And this, too, al- 
 though from the day of its introduction its 
 friends, who promised that it would wholly end 
 all agitation, constantly insisted, down to the 
 time that the Lecompton bill w r as introduced, 
 that it was working admirably, and that its in- 
 evitable tendency was to remove the question 
 forever from the politics of the country. Can 
 you call to mind any Democratic speech, made 
 after the repeal of the Missouri Compromise 
 down to the time of the Lecompton bill, in which 
 it was not predicted that the slavery agitation 
 was just at an end; that "the Abolition excite- 
 ment was played out," "the Kansas question was 
 dead," "they have made the most they can out 
 of this question and it is now forever settled"? 
 But since the Lecompton bill, no Democrat 
 within my experience has ever pretended that 
 he could see the end. That cry has been 
 dropped. They themselves do not pretend now 
 that the agitation of this subject has come to an 
 
342 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. 6 
 
 end yet. The truth is that this question is one of 
 national importance, and we cannot help deal- 
 ing with it; we must do something about it, 
 whether we will or not. We cannot avoid it; 
 the subject is one we cannot avoid considering; 
 we can no more avoid it that a man can live 
 without eating. It is upon us; it attaches to the 
 body politic as much and as closely as the 
 natural wants attach to our natural bodies. 
 Now I think it important that this matter should 
 be taken up in earnest and really settled. And 
 one way to bring about a true settlement of the 
 question is to understand its true magnitude. 
 
 There have been many efforts to settle it. 
 Again and again it has been fondly hoped that 
 it was settled, but every time it breaks out afresh, 
 and more violently than ever. It was settled, 
 our fathers hoped, by the Missouri Compromise, 
 but it did not stay settled. Then the compro- 
 mises of 1850 were declared to be a full and 
 final settlement of the question. The two great 
 parties, each in national convention, adopted 
 resolutions declaring that the settlement made 
 by the compromise of 1850 was a finality — that 
 it would last forever. Yet how long before it 
 was unsettled again? It broke out again in 
 1854, anQl blazed higher and raged more furi- 
 ously than ever before, and the agitation has not 
 rested since. 
 
i860] New Haven Speech 343 
 
 These repeated settlements must have some 
 fault about them. There must be some inade- 
 quacy in their very nature to the purpose for 
 which they were designed. We can only specu- 
 late as to where that fault— that inadequacy is, 
 but we may perhaps profit by past experience. 
 
 I think that one of the causes of these repeated 
 failures is that our best and greatest men have 
 greatly underestimated the size of this question. 
 They have constantly brought forward small 
 cures for great sores — plasters too small to cover 
 the wound. That is one reason that all settle- 
 ments have proved so temporary, so evanescent. 
 
 Look at the magnitude of this subject. One 
 sixth of our population, in round numbers — not 
 quite one sixth, and yet more than a seventh — 
 about one sixth of the whole population of the 
 United States, are slaves. The owners of these 
 slaves consider them property. The effect upon 
 the minds of the owners is that of property, and 
 nothing else; it induces them to insist upon all 
 that will favorably affect its value as property, 
 to demand laws and institutions and a public 
 policy that shall increase and secure its value, 
 and make it durable, lasting, and universal. The 
 effect on the minds of the owners is to persuade 
 them that there is no wrong in it. The slave- 
 holder does not like to be considered a mean 
 fellow for holding that species of property, and 
 
344 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. 6 
 
 hence he has to struggle within himself, and sets 
 about arguing himself into the belief that slav- 
 ery is right. The property influences his mind. 
 The dissenting minister who argued some theo- 
 logical point with one of the established church 
 was always met by the reply, "I can't see it so." 
 He opened the Bible and pointed him to a pass- 
 age, but the orthodox minister replied, "I can't 
 see it so." Then he showed him a single word 
 — "Can you see that?" "Yes, I see it," was the 
 reply. The dissenter laid a guinea over the 
 word, and asked, "Do you see it now?" So here. 
 Whether the owners of this species of property 
 do really see it as it is, it is not for me to say; 
 but if they do, they see it as it is through two 
 billions of dollars, and that is a pretty thick 
 coating. Certain it is that they do not see it as 
 we see it. Certain it is that this two thousand 
 million of dollars invested in this species of 
 property is all so concentrated that the mind 
 can grasp it at once. This immense pecuniary 
 interest has its influence upon their minds. 
 
 But here in Connecticut and at the North 
 slavery does not exist, and we see it through no 
 such medium. To us it appears natural to think 
 that slaves are human beings; men, not prop- 
 erty; that some of the things, at least, stated 
 about men in the Declaration of Independence 
 apply to them as well as to us. I say we think, 
 
i860] New Haven Speech 345 
 
 most of us, that this charter of freedom applies 
 to the slave as well as to ourselves; that the class 
 of arguments put forward to batter down that 
 idea are also calculated to break down the very 
 idea of free government, even for white men, 
 and to undermine the very foundations of free 
 society. We think slavery a great moral wrong, 
 and while we do not claim the right to touch it 
 where it exists, we wish to treat it as a wrong in 
 the Territories, where our votes will reach it. 
 We think that a respect for ourselves, a regard 
 for future generations and for the God that made 
 us, require that we put down this wrong where 
 our votes will properly reach it. We think that 
 species of labor an injury to free white men — 
 in short, we think slavery a great moral, social, 
 and political evil, tolerable only because, and 
 so far as, its actual existence makes it necessary 
 to tolerate it, and that beyond that it ought to 
 be treated as a wrong. 
 
 Now these two ideas — the property idea that 
 slavery is right and the idea that it is wrong- 
 come into collision, and do actually produce 
 that irrepressible conflict which Mr. Seward 
 has been so roundly abused for mentioning. The 
 two ideas conflict, and must forever conflict. 
 
 Again, in its political aspect does anything in 
 any way endanger the perpetuity of this Union 
 but that single thing— slavery? Many of our 
 
346 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. 6 
 
 adversaries are anxious to claim that they are 
 specially devoted to the Union, and take pains 
 to charge upon us hostility to the Union. Now 
 we claim that we are the only true Union men, 
 and we put to them this one proposition: What 
 ever endangered this Union save and except 
 slavery? Did any other thing ever cause a mo- 
 ment's fear? All men must agree that this thing 
 alone has ever endangered the perpetuity of the 
 Union. But if it was threatened by any other 
 influence, would not all men say that the best 
 thing that could be done, if we could not or 
 ought not to destroy it, would be at least to keep 
 it from growing any larger? Can any man be- 
 lieve that the way to save the Union is to extend 
 and increase the only thing that threatens the 
 Union, and to suffer it to grow bigger and 
 bigger? 
 
 Whenever this question shall be settled, it 
 must be settled on some philosophical basis. No 
 policy that does not rest upon philosophical 
 public opinion can be permanently maintained. 
 And hence there are but two policies in regard 
 to slavery that can be at all maintained. The 
 first, based on the property view that slavery is 
 right, conforms to that idea throughout, and de- 
 mands that we shall do everything for it that we 
 ought to do if it were right. We must sweep 
 away all opposition, for opposition to the right 
 
i860] New Haven Speech 347 
 
 is wrong; we must agree that slavery is right, 
 and we must adopt the idea that property has 
 persuaded the owner to believe, that slavery is 
 morally right and socially elevating. This 
 gives a philosophical basis for a permanent 
 policy of encouragement. 
 
 The other policy is one that squares with the 
 idea that slavery is wrong, and it consists in do- 
 ing everything that we ought to do if it is wrong. 
 Now I don't wish to be misunderstood, nor to 
 leave a gap down to be misrepresented, even. I 
 don't mean that we ought to attack it where it 
 exists. To me it seems that if we were to form 
 a government anew, in view of the actual pres- 
 ence of slavery we should find it necessary to 
 frame just such a government as our fathers did : 
 giving to the slaveholder the entire control 
 where the system was established, while we pos- 
 sess the power to restrain it from going outside 
 those limits. From the necessities of the case we 
 should be compelled to form just such a govern- 
 ment as our blessed fathers gave us; and surely 
 if they have so made it, that adds another reason 
 why we should let slavery alone where it exists. 
 
 If I saw a venomous snake crawling in the 
 road, any man would say I might seize the near- 
 est stick and kill it; but if I found that snake 
 in bed with my children, that would be another 
 question. I might hurt the children more than 
 
348 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. 6 
 
 the snake, and it might bite them. Much more, 
 if I found it in bed with my neighbor's children, 
 and I had bound myself by a solemn compact 
 not to meddle with his children under any circum- 
 stances, it would become me to let that particu- 
 lar mode of getting rid of the gentleman alone. 
 But if there was a bed newly made up, to which 
 the children were to be taken, and it was pro- 
 posed to take a batch of young snakes and put 
 them there with them, I take it no man would 
 say there was any question how I ought to 
 decide! 
 
 That is just the case. The new Territories are 
 the newly made bed to which our children are to 
 go, and it lies with the nation to say whether 
 they shall have snakes mixed up with them or 
 not. It does not seem as if there could be much 
 hesitation what our policy should be. 
 
 Now I have spoken of a policy based on the 
 idea that slavery is wrong, and a policy based 
 upon the idea that it is right. But an effort has 
 been made for a policy that shall treat it as 
 neither right nor wrong. It is based upon utter 
 indifference. Its leading advocate has said: "I 
 don't care whether it be voted up or down." "It 
 is merely a matter of dollars and cents." "The 
 Almighty has drawn a line across this continent, 
 on one side of which all soil must forever be 
 cultivated by slave labor, and on the other by 
 
i860] New Haven Speech 349 
 
 free." * 'When the struggle is between the white 
 man and the negro, I am for the white man; 
 when it is between the negro and the crocodile, 
 I am for the negro." Its central idea is indif- 
 ference. It holds that it makes no more differ- 
 ence to us whether the Territories become free 
 or slave States, than whether my neighbor stocks 
 his farm with horned cattle or puts it into to- 
 bacco. All recognize this policy, the plausible 
 sugar-coated name of which is "popular 
 sovereignty." 
 
 This policy chiefly stands in the way of a per- 
 manent settlement of the question. I believe 
 there is no danger of its becoming the perma- 
 nent policy of the country, for it is based on a 
 public indifference. There is nobody that 
 "don't care." All the people do care, one way 
 or the other. I do not charge that its author, 
 when he says he "don't care," states his indivi- 
 dual opinion; he only expresses his policy for 
 the government. I understand that he has never 
 said, as an individual, whether he thought slav- 
 ery right or wrong — and he is the only man in 
 the nation that has not. Now such a policy may 
 have a temporary run ; it may spring up as neces- 
 sary to the political prospects of some gentleman 
 — but it is utterly baseless; the people are not 
 indifferent, and it can therefore have no dura- 
 bility or permanence. 
 
350 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. 6 
 
 But suppose it could! Then it can be main- 
 tained only by public opinion that shall say, 
 "We don't care." There must be a change in 
 public opinion; the public mind must be so far 
 debauched as to square with this policy of caring 
 not at all. The people must come to consider 
 this as "merely a question of dollars and cents," 
 and to believe that in some places the Almighty 
 has made slavery necessarily eternal. This 
 policy can be brought to prevail if the people 
 can be brought round to say honestly, "We don't 
 care"; if not, it can never be maintained. It is 
 for you to say whether that can be done. 
 
 You are ready to say it cannot; but be not too 
 fast. Remember what a long stride has been 
 taken since the repeal of the Missouri Com- 
 promise! Do you know of any Democrat, of 
 either branch of the party — do you know one 
 who declares that he believes that the Declara- 
 tion of Independence has any application to the 
 negro? Judge Taney declares that it has not, 
 and Judge Douglas even vilifies me personally 
 and scolds me roundly for saying that the Decla- 
 ration applies to all men, and that negroes are 
 men. Is there a Democrat here who does not 
 deny that the Declaration applies to a negro? 
 Do any of you know of one? Well, I have tried 
 before perhaps fifty audiences, some larger and 
 some smaller than this, to find one such Demo- 
 
i860] New Haven Speech 351 
 
 crat, and never yet have I found one who said 
 I did not place him right in that. I must assume 
 that Democrats hold that; and now not one of 
 these Democrats can show that he said that five 
 years ago! I venture to defy the whole party to 
 produce one man that ever uttered the belief 
 that the Declaration did not apply to negroes 
 before the repeal of the Missouri Compromise! 
 Four or five years ago we all thought negroes 
 were men, and that when "all men" were named, 
 negroes were included. But the whole Demo- 
 cratic party has deliberately taken negroes from 
 the class of men and put them in the class of 
 brutes. Turn it as you will, it is simply the 
 truth ! Don't be too hasty then in saying that the 
 people cannot be brought to this new doctrine, 
 but note that long stride. One more as long com- 
 pletes the journey from where negroes are esti- 
 mated as men to where they are estimated as 
 mere brutes — as right property! 
 
 That saying, "In the struggle between the 
 white man and the negro," etc., which, I know, 
 came from the same source as this policy — that 
 saying marks another step. There is a falsehood 
 wrapped up in that statement. "In the struggle 
 between the white man and the negro," assumes 
 that there is a struggle, in which either the white 
 man must enslave the negro or the negro must 
 enslave the white. There is no such struggle. 
 
352 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. 6 
 
 It is merely an ingenious falsehood to degrade 
 and brutalize the negro. Let each let the other 
 alone, and there is no struggle about it. If it 
 was like two wrecked seamen on a narrow plank, 
 where each must push the other off or drown 
 himself, I would push the negro off — or a white 
 man either; but it is not: the plank is large 
 enough for both. This good earth is plenty 
 broad enough for white man and negro both, 
 and there is no need of either pushing the other 
 off. 
 
 So that saying, "In the struggle between the 
 negro and the crocodile," etc., is made up from 
 the idea that down where the crocodile inhabits, 
 a white man can't labor; it must be nothing else 
 but crocodile or negro; if the negro does not, 
 the crocodile must possess the earth; in that 
 case he declares for the negro. The meaning 
 of the whole is just this : As a white man is to a 
 negro, so is a negro to a crocodile; and as the 
 negro may rightfully treat the crocodile, so may 
 the white man rightfully treat the negro. This 
 very dear phrase coined by its author, and so 
 dear that he deliberately repeats it in many 
 speeches, has a tendency to still further brutal- 
 ize the negro, and to bring public opinion to the 
 point of utter indifference whether men so bru- 
 talized are enslaved or not. When that time 
 shall come, if ever, I think that policy to which 
 
i860] New Haven Speech 353 
 
 I refer may prevail. But I hope the good free 
 men of this country will never allow it to come, 
 and until then the policy can never be main- 
 tained. 
 
 Now, consider the effect of this policy. We 
 in the States are not to care whether freedom 
 or slavery gets the better, but the people in the 
 Territories may care. They are to decide, and 
 they may think what they please; it is a matter 
 of dollars and cents! But are not the people of 
 the Territories detailed from the States? If this 
 feeling of indifference — this absence of moral 
 sense about the question — prevails in the States, 
 will it not be carried into the Territories? Will 
 not every man say, "I don't care; it is nothing to 
 me" ? If any one comes that wants slavery, must 
 they not say, "I don't care whether freedom or 
 slavery be voted up or voted down"? It results 
 at last in nationalizing the institution of slav- 
 ery. Even if fairly carried out, that policy is 
 just as certain to nationalize slavery as the doc- 
 trine of Jeff Davis himself. These are only two 
 roads to the same goal, and "popular sover- 
 eignty" is just as sure, and almost as short, as 
 the other. 
 
 What we want, and all we want, is to have 
 with us the men who think slavery wrong. But 
 those who say they hate slavery, and are op- 
 posed to it, but yet act with the Democratic 
 
354 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. 6 
 
 party — where are they? Let us apply a few 
 tests. You say that you think slavery a wrong, 
 but you renounce all attempts to restrain it. Is 
 there anything else that you think wrong, that 
 you are not willing to deal with as a wrong? 
 Why are you so careful, so tender of this one 
 wrong and no other? You will not let us do a 
 single thing as if it was wrong; there is no place 
 where you will allow it to be even called wrong. 
 We must not call it wrong in the free States, 
 because it is not there, and we must not call it 
 wrong in the slave States, because it is there; 
 we must not call it wrong in politics, be- 
 cause that is bringing morality into politics, 
 and we must not call it wrong in the 
 pulpit, because that is bringing politics into re- 
 ligion; we must not bring it into the tract so- 
 ciety, or other societies, because those are such 
 unsuitable places, and there is no single place, 
 according to you, where this wrong thing can 
 properly be called wrong. 
 
 Perhaps you will plead that if the people of 
 slave States should of themselves set on foot an 
 effort for emancipation, you would wish them 
 success and bid them God-speed. Let us test 
 that! In 1858 the emancipation party of Mis- 
 souri, with Frank Blair at their head, tried to get 
 up a movement for that purpose; and, having 
 started a party, contested the State. Blair was 
 
i860] New Haven Speech 355 
 
 beaten, apparently if not truly, and when the 
 news came to Connecticut, you, who knew that 
 Frank Blair was taking hold of this thing by 
 the right end, and doing the only thing that 
 you say can properly be done to remove this 
 wrong — did you bow your heads in sorrow be- 
 cause of that defeat? Do you, any of you, know 
 one single Democrat that showed sorrow over 
 that result? Not one! On the contrary, every 
 man threw up his hat, and hallooed at the top 
 of his lungs, "Hooray for Democracy!" 
 
 Now, gentleman, the Republicans desire to 
 place this great question of slavery on the very 
 basis on which our fathers placed it, and no 
 other. It is easy to demonstrate that "our fath- 
 ers who framed this government under which 
 we live" looked on slavery as wrong, and so 
 framed it and everything about it as to square 
 with the idea that it was wrong, so far as the 
 necessities arising from its existence permitted. 
 In forming the Constitution they found the 
 slave-trade existing, capital invested in it, fields 
 depending upon it for labor, and the whole sys- 
 tem resting upon the importation of slave labor. 
 They therefore did not prohibit the slave trade 
 at once, but they gave the power to prohibit it 
 after twenty years. Why was this? What other 
 foreign trade did they treat in that way? Would 
 
356 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. 6 
 
 they have done this if they had not thought 
 slavery wrong? 
 
 Another thing was done by some of the same 
 men who framed the Constitution, and after- 
 ward adopted as their own act by the first Con- 
 gress held under that Constitution, of which 
 many of the framers were members — they pro- 
 hibited the spread of slavery in the Territories. 
 Thus the same men, the framers of the Con- 
 stitution, cut off the supply and prohibited the 
 spread of slavery; and both acts show conclu- 
 sively that they considered that the thing was 
 wrong. 
 
 If additional proof is wanting, it can be 
 found in the phraseology of the Constitution. 
 When men are framing a supreme law and chart 
 of government to secure blessings and prosper- 
 ity to untold generations yet to come, they use 
 language as short and direct and plain as can 
 be found to express their meaning. In all mat- 
 ters but this of slavery the framers of the Con- 
 stitution used the very clearest, shortest, and 
 most direct language. But the Constitution al- 
 ludes to slavery three times without mentioning 
 it once! The language used becomes ambig- 
 uous, roundabout, and mystical. They speak of 
 the "immigration of persons," and mean the 
 importation of slaves, but do not say so. In 
 establishing a basis of representation they say 
 
i860] New Haven Speech 357 
 
 "all other persons," when they mean to say 
 slaves. Why did they not use the shortest 
 phrase? In providing for the return of fugi- 
 tives they say "persons held to service or labor." 
 If they had said "slaves," it would have been 
 plainer and less liable to misconstruction. Why 
 didn't they do it? We cannot doubt that it was 
 done on purpose. Only one reason is possible, 
 and that is supplied us by one of the framers 
 of the Constitution — and it is not possible for 
 man to conceive of any other. They expected 
 and desired that the system would come to an 
 end, and meant that when it did the Constitu- 
 tion should not show that there ever had been 
 a slave in this good free country of ours. 
 
 I will dwell on that no longer. I see the 
 signs of the approaching triumph of the Re- 
 publicans in the bearing of their political ad- 
 versaries. A great deal of this war with us 
 nowadays is mere bushwhacking. At the battle 
 of Waterloo, when Napoleon's cavalry had 
 charged again and again upon the unbroken 
 squares of British infantry, at last they were 
 giving up the attempt, and going off in disor- 
 der, when some of the officers, in mere vexation 
 and complete despair, fired their pistols at those 
 solid squares. The Democrats are in that sort 
 of extreme desperation ; it is nothing else. I will 
 take up a few of these arguments. 
 
358 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. 6 
 
 There is "the irrepressible conflict." How 
 they rail at Seward for that saying! They re- 
 peat it constantly; and although the proof has 
 been thrust under their noses again and again 
 that almost every good man since the formation 
 of our government has uttered that same senti- 
 ment, from General Washington, who "trusted 
 that we should yet have a confederacy of free 
 States," with Jefferson, Jay, Monroe, down to 
 the latest days, yet they refuse to notice that at 
 all, and persist in railing at Seward for saying 
 it. Even Roger A. Pryor, editor of the Rich- 
 mond "Enquirer," uttered the same sentiment 
 in almost the same language, and yet so little 
 offense did it give the Democrats that he was 
 sent for to Washington to edit the "States" — the 
 Douglas organ there, while Douglas goes into 
 hydrophobia and spasms of rage because Sew- 
 ard dared to repeat it. That is what I call 
 bushwhacking — a sort of argument that they 
 must know any child can see through. 
 
 Another is John Brown! You stir up insur- 
 rections; you invade the South! John Brown! 
 Harper's Ferry! Why, John Brown was not 
 a Republican! You have never implicated a 
 single Republican in that Harper's Ferry en- 
 terprise. We tell you if any member of the 
 Republican party is guilty in that matter, you 
 know it or you do not know it. If you do know 
 
i860] New Haven Speech 359 
 
 it, you are inexcusable not to designate the man 
 and prove the fact. If you do not know it, you 
 are inexcusable to assert it, and especially to 
 persist in the assertion after you have tried and 
 failed to make the proof. You need not be told 
 that persisting in a charge which one does not 
 know to be true is simply malicious slander. 
 Some of you admit that no Republican design- 
 edly aided or encouraged the Harper's Ferry 
 affair; but still insist that our doctrines and dec- 
 larations necessarily lead to such results. We 
 do not believe it. We know we hold to no doc- 
 trines and make no declarations which were not 
 held to and made by our fathers who framed 
 the government under which we live, and we 
 cannot see how declarations that were patriotic 
 when they made them are villainous when we 
 make them. You never dealt fairly by us in re- 
 lation to that affair — and I will say frankly that 
 I know of nothing in your character that should 
 lead us to suppose that you would. You had 
 just been soundly thrashed in elections in sev- 
 eral States, and others were soon to come. You 
 rejoiced at the occasion, and only were troubled 
 that there were not three times as many killed 
 in the affair. You were in evident glee; there 
 was no sorrow for the killed nor for the peace 
 of Virginia disturbed; you were rejoicing that 
 by charging Republicans with this thing you 
 
u 
 
 360 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. 6 
 
 might get an advantage of us in New York and 
 the other States. You pulled that string as 
 tightly as you could, but your very generous and 
 worthy expectations were not quite fulfilled. 
 Each Republican knew that the charge was a 
 slander as to himself at least, and was not in- 
 clined by it to cast his vote in your favor. It 
 was mere bushwhacking, because you had noth- 
 ing else to do. You are still on that track, and 
 I say, Go on! If you think you can slander a 
 woman into loving you, or a man into voting 
 for you, try it till you are satisfied. 
 
 Another specimen of this bushwhacking — 
 that "shoe strike." Now be it understood that 
 I do not pretend to know all about the matter. 
 I am merely going to speculate a little about 
 some of its phases, and at the outset I am glad 
 to see that a system of labor prevails in New 
 England under which laborers can strike when 
 they want to, where they are not obliged to work 
 under all circumstances, and are not tied down 
 and obliged to labor whether you pay them or 
 not! I like the system which lets a man quit 
 when he wants to, and wish it might prevail 
 everywhere. One of the reasons why I am op- 
 posed to slavery is just here. What is the true 
 " condition of the laborer? I take it that it is 
 best for all to leave each man free to acquire 
 property as fast as he can. Some will get 
 
i860] New Haven Speech 361 
 
 wealthy. I don't believe in a law to prevent a 
 man from getting rich; it would do more harm 
 than good. So while we do not propose any 
 war upon capital, we do wish to allow the hum- 
 blest man an equal chance to get rich with every- 
 body else. When one starts poor, as most do in 
 the race of life, free society is such that he knows 
 he can better his condition ; he knows that there 
 is no fixed condition of labor for his whole life. 
 I am not ashamed to confess that twenty-five 
 years ago I was a hired laborer, mauling rails, 
 at work on a flatboat — just what might happen 
 to any poor man's son. I want every man to 
 have a chance — and I believe a black man is 
 entitled to it — in which he can better his con- 
 dition — when he may look forward and hope 
 to be a hired laborer this year and the next, 
 work for himself afterward, and finally to hire 
 men to work for him. That is the true system. 
 Up here in New England you have a soil that 
 scarcely sprouts black-eyed beans, and yet where 
 will you find wealthy men so wealthy, and pov- 
 erty so rarely in extremity? There is not an- 
 other such place on earth! I desire that if you 
 get too thick here, and find it hard to better 
 your condition on this soil, you may have a 
 chance to strike and go somewhere else, where 
 you may not be degraded, nor have your family 
 corrupted by forced rivalry with negro slaves. 
 
362 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. 6 
 
 I want you to have a clean bed and no snakes in 
 it! Then you can better your condition, and so 
 it may go on and on in one ceaseless round so 
 long as man exists on the face of the earth. 
 
 Now to come back to this shoe strike. If, 
 as the senator from Illinois asserts, this is caused 
 by withdrawal of Southern votes, consider 
 briefly how you will meet the difficulty. You 
 have done nothing, and have protested that you 
 have done done nothing, to injure the South; 
 and yet to get back the shoe trade, you must 
 leave off doing something that you are now 
 doing. What is it? You must stop thinking 
 slavery wrong. Let your institutions be wholly 
 changed; let your State constitutions be sub- 
 verted; glorify slavery; and so you will get back 
 the shoe trade — for what? You have brought 
 owned labor with it to compete with your own 
 labor, to underwork you, and degrade you. Are 
 you ready to get back the trade on these terms? 
 
 But the statement is not correct. You have 
 not lost that trade ; orders were never better than 
 now. Senator Mason, a Democrat, comes into 
 the Senate in homespun, a proof that the disso- 
 lution of the Union has actually begun. But 
 orders are the same. Your factories have not 
 struck work, neither those where they make any- 
 thing for coats, nor for pants, nor for shirts, nor 
 for ladies' dresses. Mr. Mason has not reached 
 
i860] New Haven Speech 363 
 
 the manufacturers who ought to have made him 
 a coat and pants. To make his proof good for 
 anything, he should have come into the Senate 
 barefoot. 
 
 Another bushwhacking contrivance — simply 
 that, nothing else! I find a good many people 
 who are very much concerned about the loss of 
 Southern trade. Now, either these people are 
 sincere, or they are not. I will speculate a lit- 
 tle about that. If they are sincere, and are 
 moved by any real danger of the loss of the 
 Southern trade, they will simply get their names 
 on the white list, and then instead of persuading 
 Republicans to do likewise, they will be glad 
 to keep you away. Don't you see they thus shut 
 off competition? They would not be whisper- 
 ing around to Republicans to come in and share 
 the profits with them. But if they are not sin- 
 cere, and are merely trying to fool Republi- 
 cans out of their votes, they will grow very 
 anxious about your pecuniary prospects; they 
 are afraid you are going to get broken up and 
 ruined; they did not care about Democratic 
 votes — oh, no, no, no! You must judge which 
 class those belong to whom you meet. I leave 
 it to you to determine from the facts. 
 
 Let us notice some more of the stale charges 
 against Republicans. You say we are sectional. 
 We deny it. That makes an issue; and the bur- 
 
364 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. 6 
 
 den of proof is upon you. You produce your 
 proof; and what is it? Why, that our party has 
 no existence in your section — gets no votes in 
 your section. The fact is substantially true ; but 
 does it prove the issue? If it does, then in case 
 we should, without change of principle, begin 
 to get votes in your section, we should thereby 
 cease to be sectional. You cannot escape 
 this conclusion; and yet, are you willing to 
 abide by it? If you are, you will prob- 
 ably soon find that we have ceased to be 
 sectional, for we shall get votes in your section 
 this very year. The fact that we get no votes 
 in your section is a fact of your making, and not 
 of ours. And if there be fault in that fact, that 
 fault is primarily yours, and remains so until 
 you show that we repel you by some wrong prin- 
 ciple or practice. If we do repel you by any 
 wrong principle or practice, the fault is ours; 
 but this brings you to where you ought to have 
 started — to a discussion of the right or wrong 
 of our principle. If our principle, put in prac- 
 tice, would wrong your section for the benefit 
 of ours, or for any other object, then our prin- 
 ciple and we with it, are sectional, and are justly 
 opposed and denounced as such. Meet us, then, 
 on the question of whether our principle, put 
 in practice would wrong your section; and so 
 meet it as if it were possible that something may 
 
i860] New Haven Speech 365 
 
 be said on our side. Do you accept the chal- 
 lenge? No? Then you really believe that the 
 principle which our fathers who framed the 
 government under which we live thought so 
 clearly right as to adopt it, and indorse it again 
 and again, upon their official oaths, is, in fact, 
 so clearly wrong as to demand your condem- 
 nation without a moment's consideration. 
 
 Some of you delight to flaunt in our faces the 
 warning against sectional parties given by 
 Washington in his Farewell Address. Less than 
 eight years before Washington gave that warn- 
 ing, he had, as President of the United States, 
 approved and signed an act of Congress enforc- 
 ing the prohibition of slavery in the Northwest- 
 ern Territory, which act embodied the policy of 
 government upon that subject up to and at the 
 very moment he penned that warning ; and about 
 one year after he penned it, he wrote Lafayette 
 that he considered that prohobition a wise meas- 
 use, expressing in the same connection his hope 
 that we should some time have a confederacy of 
 free States. 
 
 Bearing this in mind, and seeing that section- 
 alism has since arisen upon this same subject, is 
 that warning a weapon in your hands against 
 us, or in our hands against you? Could Wash- 
 ington himself speak, would he cast the blame 
 of that sectionalism upon us who sustain his 
 
366 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. 6 
 
 policy, or upon you who repudiate it? We re- 
 spect that warning of Washington, and we com- 
 mend it to you, together with his example point- 
 ing to the right application of it. 
 
 But you say you are conservative — eminently 
 conservative — while we are revolutionary, de- 
 structive, or something of that sort. What is 
 conservatism? Is it not adherence to the old and 
 tried against the new and untried? We stick to, 
 contend for, the identical old policy on the point 
 in controversy which was adopted by our fath- 
 ers who framed the government under which 
 we live; while you with one accord reject, and 
 scout, and spit upon that old policy, and insist 
 upon substituting something new. True, you 
 disagree among yourselves as to what that sub- 
 stitute shall be; you have considerable variety 
 of new propositions and plans, but you are unan- 
 imous in rejecting and denouncing the old policy 
 of the fathers. Some of you are for reviving the 
 foreign slave-trade; some for a congressional 
 slave code for the Territories ; some for Congress 
 forbidding the Territories to prohibit slavery 
 within their limits ; some for maintaining slavery 
 in the Territories through the judiciary; some 
 for the "great principle" that if one man would 
 enslave another, no third man should object, 
 fantastically called "popular sovereignty"; but 
 never a man among you in favor of Federal pro- 
 
i860] New Haven Speech 367 
 
 hibition of slavery in Federal Territories ac- 
 cording to the practice of our fathers who 
 framed the government under which we live. 
 Not one of all your various plans can show a 
 precedent or an advocate in the century within 
 which our government originated. And yet you 
 draw yourselves up and say, "We are eminently 
 conservative." 
 
 It is exceedingly desirable that all parts of 
 this great Confederacy shall be at peace and in 
 harmony one with another. Let us Republicans 
 do our part to have it so. Even though much 
 provoked, let us do nothing through passion and 
 ill temper. Even though the Southern people 
 will not so much as listen to us, let us calmly con- 
 sider their demands, and yield to them if, in our 
 deliberate view of our duty, we possibly can. 
 Judging by all they say and do, and by the 
 subject and nature of their controversy with us, 
 let us determine, if we can, what will satisfy 
 them. 
 
 Will they be satisfied if the Territories be un- 
 conditionally surrendered to them? We know 
 they will not. In all their present complaints 
 against us the Territories are scarcely men- 
 tioned. Invasions and insurrections are the rage 
 now. Will it satisfy them if in the future we 
 have nothing to do with invasions and insurrec- 
 tions? We know it will not. We so know be- 
 
368 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. 6 
 
 cause we know we never have had anything to 
 do with invasions and insurrections ; and yet this 
 total abstaining does not exempt us from the 
 charge and the denunciation. 
 
 The question recurs, What will satisfy them? 
 Simply this: we must not only let them alone, 
 but we must somehow convince them that we 
 do let them alone. This we know by experience 
 is no easy task. We have been so trying to con- 
 vince them from the very beginning of our or- 
 ganization, but with no success. In all our plat- 
 forms and speeches we have constantly pro- 
 tested our purpose to let them alone; but this 
 has had no tendency to convince them. Alike 
 unavailing to convince them is the fact that they 
 have never detected a man of us in any attempt 
 to disturb them. 
 
 These natural and apparently adequate means 
 all failing, what will convince them? This, and 
 this only: cease to call slavery wrong, and join 
 them in calling it right. And this must be done 
 thoroughly — done in acts as well as in words. 
 Silence will not be tolerated — we must place 
 ourselves avowedly with them. Douglas's new 
 sedition law must be enacted and enforced, sup- 
 pressing all declarations that slavery is wrong, 
 whether made in politics, in presses, in pulpits, 
 or in private. We must arrest and return their 
 fugitive slaves with greedy pleasure. We must 
 
i860] New Haven Speech 369 
 
 pull down our free-State constitutions. The 
 whole atmosphere must be disinfected of all 
 taint of opposition to slavery before they will 
 cease to believe that all their troubles proceed 
 from us. So long as we call slavery wrong, 
 whenever a slave runs away they will overlook 
 the obvious fact that he ran because he was op- 
 pressed, and declare that he was stolen off. 
 Whenever a master cuts his slaves with the lash, 
 and they cry out under it, he will overlook the 
 obvious fact that the negroes cry out because 
 they are hurt, and insist that they were put up 
 to it by some rascally Abolitionist. 
 
 I am quite aware that they do not state their 
 case precisely in this way. Most of them would 
 probably say to us: "Let us alone; do nothing 
 to us, and say what you please about slavery." 
 But we do let them alone, — have never disturbed 
 them, — so that, after all, it is what we say which 
 dissatisfies them. They will continue to accuse 
 us of doing, until we cease saying. 
 
 I am also aware that they have not as yet in 
 terms demanded the overthrow of our free-State 
 constitutions. Yet those constitutions declare the 
 wrong of slavery with more solemn emphasis 
 than do all other sayings against it; and when 
 all these other sayings shall have been silenced, 
 the overthrow of these constitutions will be de- 
 manded, ?.nd nothing be left to resist the demand. 
 
370 Abraham Lincoln [Mar. 6 
 
 It is nothing to the contrary that they do not 
 demand the whole of this just now. Demand- 
 ing what they do, and for the reason they do, they 
 can voluntarily stop nowhere short of this con- 
 summation. Holding as they do that slavery 
 is morally right and socially elevating, they can- 
 not cease to demand a full national recognition 
 of it, as a legal right and a social blessing. 
 
 Nor can we justifiably withhold this on any 
 ground save our conviction that slavery is wrong. 
 If slavery is right, all words, acts, laws, and con- 
 stitutions against it are themselves wrong, and 
 should be silenced and swept away. If it is right, 
 we cannot justly object to its nationality — its uni- 
 versality; if it is wrong, they cannot justly in- 
 sist upon its extension — its enlargement. All 
 they ask we could readily grant, if we thought 
 slavery right; all we ask they could as readily 
 grant, if they thought it wrong. Their thinking 
 it right, and our thinking it wrong, is the precise 
 fact upon which depends the whole controversy. 
 Thinking it right, as they do, they are not to 
 blame for desiring its full recognition as being 
 right; but thinking it wrong, as we do, can we 
 yield to them? Can we cast our votes with their 
 view, and against our own? In view of our 
 moral, social, and political responsibilities, can 
 we do this? 
 
 Wrong as we think slavery is, we can yet af- 
 
i860] New Haven Speech 371 
 
 ford to let it alone where it is, because that much 
 is due to the necessity arising from its actual 
 presence in the nation; but can we, while our 
 votes will prevent it, allow it to spread into the 
 national Territories and to overrun us here in 
 these free States? 
 
 If our sense of duty forbids this, then let us 
 stand by our duty fearlessly and effectively. Let 
 us be diverted by none of those sophistical con- 
 trivances wherewith we are so industriously 
 plied and belabored — contrivances such as grop- 
 ing for some middle ground between the right 
 and the wrong; vain as the search for a man 
 who should be neither a living man nor a dead 
 man; such as a policy of "don't care" on a ques- 
 tion about which all true men do care; such as 
 Union appeals beseeching true Union men to 
 yield to Disunionists, reversing the divine rule, 
 and calling, not the sinners, but the righteous 
 to repentance; such as invocations to Washing- 
 ton, imploring men to unsay what Washington 
 did. 
 
 Neither let us be slandered from our duty by 
 false accusations against us, nor frightened from 
 it by menaces of destruction to the government, 
 nor of dungeons to ourselves. Let us have faith 
 that right makes might; and in that faith let us 
 to the end dare to do our duty as we understand 
 it. 
 

 
 
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