The Writings of Abraham Lincoln, Complete

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And when this new principle--this new proposition that no human being
ever thought of three years ago--is brought forward, I combat 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 the right of ever
striving to be a man. I combat it as being one of the thousand things
constantly done in these days to prepare the public mind to make
property, and nothing but property, of the negro in all the States of
this Union.

But there is a point that I wish, before leaving 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 parental government and from our ancestors. 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
incorporate the institution of slavery amongst its elements."

The principle upon which I have insisted in this canvass is in relation
to laying the foundations 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 Missouri, or any other slave State,
shall emancipate her slaves; I have proposed no such thing. But when Mr.
Clay says that in laying the foundations of society in our Territories
where it does not exist, he would be opposed to the introduction of
slavery as an element, I insist that we have his warrant--his
license--for insisting upon the exclusion of that element which he
declared in such strong and emphatic language was most hurtful to him.

Judge Douglas has again referred to a Springfield 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 government 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 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 Douglas. 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 object 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 object"
of putting an end to the slavery agitation? We were to have no more
agitation in Congress; 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 business, 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 allaying plaster of Judge Douglas's
stirred it up again. But was it not understood or intimated with the
"confident promise" of putting an end 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 Lecompton
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 not ceased, but has constantly 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 introduction of that Nebraska
policy, which was to clothe the people of the Territories with a superior
degree of self-government, beyond what they had ever had before. The
first object and the main one of conferring upon the people a higher
degree of "self-government" is a question of fact to be determined by you
in answer to a single question. Have you ever heard or known of a people
anywhere on earth who had as little to do as, in the first instance of
its use, the people of Kansas 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.

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
ultimate 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 repeat, my wish is
that the further spread of it may be arrested, and that it may be where
the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is in the course of
ultimate extinction--I have expressed that as my wish I entertain the
opinion, upon evidence sufficient to my mind, that the fathers of this
government placed that institution where the public mind did rest in the
belief that it was in the course of ultimate extinction. 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 in another, if they did not look to its
being placed in the course of its ultimate extinction?

Again: the institution of slavery is only mentioned 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 one thousand eight hundred and eight."

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 direct taxes shall be apportioned among the several
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 excluding 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.

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 consequence of any law or regulation
therein be discharged 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, being the only allusions to slavery in the
instrument, covert language is used. Language is used not suggesting that
slavery existed or that the black race were among us. And I understand
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
course of ultimate extinction. And when I say that I desire to see the
further spread of it arrested, I only say I desire to see that done which
the fathers have first done. When I say I desire to see it placed where
the public mind will rest in the belief that it is in the course of
ultimate 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. Understand the sense in
which he puts it. He assumes that slavery is a rightful thing within
itself,--was introduced by the framers of the Constitution. The exact
truth is, that they found the institution existing among us, and they
left it as they found it. But in making the government 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 impossibility--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 falsehood; 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 element 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 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, wherein 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 intend anything evil in the result, but it is
incumbent 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 conflict 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 offensive to the judge, was part and parcel of
the same thing. He tries to show that variety in the democratic
institutions of the different States is necessary and indispensable. I do
not dispute 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 we have no
cranberries, because they have a cranberry law in Indiana, where they
have cranberries. I should insist that it would be exceedingly 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 Douglas or anybody else, that the variety in the soil
and climate and face of the country, and consequent variety in the
industrial pursuits and productions of a country, require systems of law
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 produces
commerce, brings us together, and makes us better friends. We like one
another the more for it. And I understand as well as Judge Douglas, or
anybody else, that these mutual accommodations are the cements which bind
together the different parts of this Union; that instead of being a thing
to "divide the house,"--figuratively expressing the Union,--they tend to
sustain 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. Consider it. When have we had any
difficulty or quarrel amongst ourselves about the cranberry laws of
Indiana, or the oyster laws of Virginia, 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 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 whenever 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 Douglas has intimated the same thing,
that all this difficulty in regard to the institution of slavery is the
mere agitation of office-seekers and ambitious Northern politicians. He
thinks we want to get "his place," I suppose. I agree that there are
office-seekers amongst us. The Bible says somewhere that we are
desperately selfish. I think we would have discovered that fact without
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 agitation we have in regard to
this institution of slavery spring 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 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 sprung 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 country.
Parties themselves may be divided and quarrel on minor questions, yet it
extends not beyond 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
disturbance 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, deep-seated power that somehow operates 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 politicians? Is that irresistible power, which
for fifty years has shaken the government and agitated the people, to be
stifled 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 statesmanship which assumes that you can
quiet that disturbing element in our society which has disturbed us for
more than half a century, which has been the only serious danger that has
threatened our institutions,--I say, where is the philosophy or the
statesmanship based on the assumption 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
system 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
themselves. I agree with him very readily that the different States have
that right. He is but fighting a man of straw when he assumes that I am
contending against the right 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 Government, 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 constantly to
defend ourselves from the assumption that we are warring upon the rights
of the Sates. 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 whatever
to interfere. I think we have some interest. I think that as white men we
have. Do we not 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 institutions 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 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 suggest it in a different
way. How many Democrats 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
advocating 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, not merely (I must say it here as I have elsewhere) for
our own people who are born amongst us, but as an outlet for free white
people 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 conditions in life.

I have stated upon former occasions, and I may as well state again, what
I understand to be the real issue in this controversy between Judge
Douglas and myself. On the point of my wanting 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 producing 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 foundation 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 contemplates the
institution of slavery in this country as a wrong is the sentiment of the
Republican party. It is the sentiment around which all their actions, all
their arguments, circle, from 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 getting 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 creating any more danger. They insist
that it should, 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 at some time. 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 impatient 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 platform. We
disclaim sympathy with him in practical action. He is not placed properly
with us.

On this subject 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 prosperity, 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 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 example.