The Writings of Abraham Lincoln, Complete

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On the other hand, I have said there is a sentiment which treats it as
not being wrong. That is the Democratic sentiment of this day. I do not
mean to say that every man who stands within 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. Although 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 anything 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 nothing 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 of the slave States should adopt a system of
gradual 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 succeed. 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 system you have proposed, and
it carefully excludes the idea that there is anything wrong in the
institution 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 sometime 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 denounced by those pretending to
respect Henry Clay for uttering a wish that it might sometime, in some
peaceful way, come to an end. The Democratic policy in regard to that
institution 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
arguments. 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
expression, whether it is intended to be expressive of his individual
sentiments on the subject, or only of the national policy he desires to
have established. It is alike valuable for my purpose. Any man can say
that who does not see anything 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 in a new Territory, like other property.
This is strictly logical if there is no difference between it and other
property. If it and other property are equal, this argument is entirely
logical. But if you insist that one is wrong and the other right, there
is no use to institute a comparison between right and wrong. You may turn
over everything in the Democratic policy from beginning 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 conversation, or the shape
it takes in short maxim-like arguments,--it everywhere carefully excludes
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 work and toil 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 enslaving another race, it is the same tyrannical
principle. I was glad to express my gratitude at Quincy, and I re-express
it here, to Judge Douglas,--that he looks to no end of the institution of
slavery. That will help the people to see where the struggle really is.
It will hereafter 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 perpetuation,--we can get out from among 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
difference 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 better 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-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
Brooks'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 argument Judge Douglas uses, while he sustains the Dred Scott
decision, that the people of the Territories 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 had 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 adopt unfriendly
legislation, they can practically exclude him. Now, without meeting this
proposition 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 Constitution 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 legislation
which his neighbor needs for the enjoyment of a right which is fixed in
his favor in the Constitution of the United States which he has sworn to
support? Can he withhold it without 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 doctrine 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 improperly made and I go for reversing it.
Judge Douglas is furious against those who go for reversing a decision.
But he is for legislating it 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
is a right fixed in the Constitution. But it cannot be made available to
them without Congressional legislation. In the Judge's language, it is a
"barren right," which needs legislation 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, and
that not that we like the institution of slavery. We profess to have no
taste for running and catching niggers, 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 Constitution, which guarantees that
right, can be supported 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 reclaim 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 necessary legislation to support slavery in a
Territory, who believes it is a constitutional right to have it there. No
man can, who does not give the Abolitionists an argument to deny the
obligation enjoined by the Constitution to enact a Fugitive State law.
Try it now. It is the strongest Abolition 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 distinction
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 decision
to be correct believes in the right. And the man who argues that by
unfriendly legislation, 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 arguement 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 reasoning, 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 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 argument
for nullifying the Fugitive Slave law. Why, there is not such an
Abolitionist in the nation as Douglas, after all! such an Abolitionist in
the nation as Douglas, after all!






THE WRITINGS OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN, Volume Five

1858-1862


CONSTITUTIONAL EDITION




TO SYDNEY SPRING, GRAYVILLE, ILL.

SPRINGFIELD, June 19, 1858.

SYDNEY SPRING, Esq.

MY DEAR SIR:--Your letter introducing Mr. Faree was duly received. There
was no opening to nominate him for Superintendent of Public Instruction,
but through him Egypt made a most valuable contribution to the
convention. I think it may be fairly said that he came off the lion of
the day--or rather of the night. Can you not elect him to the
Legislature? It seems to me he would be hard to beat. What objection
could be made to him? What is your Senator Martin saying and doing? What
is Webb about?

Please write me. Yours truly,

A. LINCOLN.




TO H. C. WHITNEY.

SPRINGFIELD, June 24, 1858

H. C. WHITNEY, ESQ.

DEAR SIR:--Your letter enclosing the attack of the Times upon me was
received this morning. Give yourself no concern about my voting against
the supplies. Unless you are without faith that a lie can be successfully
contradicted, there is not a word of truth in the charge, and I am just
considering a little as to the best shape to put a contradiction in. Show
this to whomever you please, but do not publish it in the paper.

Your friend as ever,

A. LINCOLN.




TO J. W. SOMERS.

SPRINGFIELD, June 25, 1858.

JAMES W. SOMERS, Esq.

MY DEAR SIR:--Yours of the 22nd, inclosing a draft of two hundred
dollars, was duly received. I have paid it on the judgment, and herewith
you have the receipt. I do not wish to say anything as to who shall be
the Republican candidate for the Legislature in your district, further
than that I have full confidence in Dr. Hull. Have you ever got in the
way of consulting with McKinley in political matters? He is true as
steel, and his judgment is very good. The last I heard from him, he
rather thought Weldon, of De Witt, was our best timber for
representative, all things considered. But you there must settle it among
yourselves. It may well puzzle older heads than yours to understand how,
as the Dred Scott decision holds, Congress can authorize a Territorial
Legislature to do everything else, and cannot authorize them to prohibit
slavery. That is one of the things the court can decide, but can never
give an intelligible reason for.

Yours very truly,

A. LINCOLN.




TO A. CAMPBELL.

SPRINGFIELD, June 28, 1858.

A. CAMPBELL, Esq.

MY DEAR SIR:--In 1856 you gave me authority to draw on you for any sum
not exceeding five hundred dollars. I see clearly that such a privilege
would be more available now than it was then. I am aware that times are
tighter now than they were then. Please write me at all events, and
whether you can now do anything or not I shall continue grateful for the
past.

Yours very truly,

A. LINCOLN.




TO J. GILLESPIE.

SPRINGFIELD, July 16, 1858.

HON. JOSEPH GILLESPIE.

MY DEAR SIR:--I write this to say that from the specimens of Douglas
Democracy we occasionally see here from Madison, we learn that they are
making very confident calculation of beating you and your friends for the
lower house, in that county. They offer to bet upon it. Billings and Job,
respectively, have been up here, and were each as I learn, talking
largely about it. If they do so, it can only be done by carrying the
Fillmore men of 1856 very differently from what they seem to [be] going
in the other party. Below is the vote of 1856, in your district:

Counties.

Counties. Buchanan. Fremont. Fillmore.
Bond ............ 607 153 659
Madison ......... 1451 1111 1658
Montgomery ...... 992 162 686
---- ---- ----
3050 1426 3003

By this you will see, if you go through the calculation, that if they get
one quarter of the Fillmore votes, and you three quarters, they will beat
you 125 votes. If they get one fifth, and you four fifths, you beat them
179. In Madison, alone, if our friends get 1000 of the Fillmore votes,
and their opponents the remainder, 658, we win by just two votes.

This shows the whole field, on the basis of the election of 1856.

Whether, since then, any Buchanan, or Fremonters, have shifted ground,
and how the majority of new votes will go, you can judge better than I.

Of course you, on the ground, can better determine your line of tactics
than any one off the ground; but it behooves you to be wide awake and
actively working.

Don't neglect it; and write me at your first leisure. Yours as ever,

A. LINCOLN.




TO JOHN MATHERS, JACKSONVILLE, ILL.

SPRINGFIELD, JULY 20, 1858.

JNO. MATHERS, Esq.

MY DEAR SIR:--Your kind and interesting letter of the 19th was duly
received. Your suggestions as to placing one's self on the offensive
rather than the defensive are certainly correct. That is a point which I
shall not disregard. I spoke here on Saturday night. The speech, not very
well reported, appears in the State journal of this morning. You
doubtless will see it; and I hope that you will perceive in it that I am
already improving. I would mail you a copy now, but have not one [at]
hand. I thank you for your letter and shall be pleased to hear from you
again.

Yours very truly,

A. LINCOLN.




TO JOSEPH GILLESPIE.

SPRINGFIELD, JULY 25, 1858.

HON. J. GILLESPIE.

MY DEAR SIR:--Your doleful letter of the 8th was received on my return
from Chicago last night. I do hope you are worse scared than hurt, though
you ought to know best. We must not lose the district. We must make a job
of it, and save it. Lay hold of the proper agencies, and secure all the
Americans you can, at once. I do hope, on closer inspection, you will
find they are not half gone. Make a little test. Run down one of the
poll-books of the Edwardsville precinct, and take the first hundred known
American names. Then quietly ascertain how many of them are actually
going for Douglas. I think you will find less than fifty. But even if you
find fifty, make sure of the other fifty, that is, make sure of all you
can, at all events. We will set other agencies to work which shall
compensate for the loss of a good many Americans. Don't fail to check the
stampede at once. Trumbull, I think, will be with you before long.

There is much he cannot do, and some he can. I have reason to hope there
will be other help of an appropriate kind. Write me again.

Yours as ever,

A. LINCOLN.




TO B. C. COOK.

SPRINGFIELD, Aug. 2, 1858.

Hon. B. C. COOK.

MY DEAR SIR:--I have a letter from a very true and intelligent man
insisting that there is a plan on foot in La Salle and Bureau to run
Douglas Republicans for Congress and for the Legislature in those
counties, if they can only get the encouragement of our folks nominating
pretty extreme abolitionists.

It is thought they will do nothing if our folks nominate men who are not
very obnoxious to the charge of abolitionism. Please have your eye upon
this. Signs are looking pretty fair.

Yours very truly,

A. LINCOLN.




TO HON. J. M. PALMER.

SPRINGFIELD, Aug. 5, 1858.

HON. J. M. PALMER.

DEAR SIR:--Since we parted last evening no new thought has occurred to
[me] on the subject of which we talked most yesterday.

I have concluded, however, to speak at your town on Tuesday, August 31st,
and have promised to have it so appear in the papers of to-morrow. Judge
Trumbull has not yet reached here.

Yours as ever,

A. LINCOLN.




TO ALEXANDER SYMPSON.

SPRINGFIELD, Aug. 11, 1858.

ALEXANDER SYMPSON, Esq.

DEAR SIR:--Yours of the 6th received. If life and health continue I shall
pretty likely be at Augusta on the 25th.

Things look reasonably well. Will tell you more fully when I see you.

Yours truly,

A. LINCOLN.




TO J. O. CUNNINGHAM.

OTTAWA, August 22, 1858.

J. O. CUNNINGHAM, Esq.

MY DEAR SIR:--Yours of the 18th, signed as secretary of the Republican
club, is received. In the matter of making speeches I am a good deal
pressed by invitations from almost all quarters, and while I hope to be
at Urbana some time during the canvass, I cannot yet say when. Can you
not see me at Monticello on the 6th of September?

Douglas and I, for the first time this canvass, crossed swords here
yesterday; the fire flew some, and I am glad to know I am yet alive.
There was a vast concourse of people--more than could get near enough to
hear.

Yours as ever,

A. LINCOLN.




ON SLAVERY IN A DEMOCRACY.

August ??, 1858

As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my
idea of democracy. Whatever differs from this, to the extent of the
difference, is no democracy.

A. LINCOLN.




TO B. C. COOK.

SPRINGFIELD, August 2, 1858

HON. B. C. COOK.

MY DEAR SIR:--I have a letter from a very true friend, and intelligent
man, writing that there is a plan on foot in La Salle and Bureau, to run
Douglas Republican for Congress and for the Legislature in those
counties, if they can only get the encouragement of our folks nominating
pretty extreme abolitionists. It is thought they will do nothing if our
folks nominate men who are not very [undecipherable word looks like
"obnoxious"] to the charge of abolitionism. Please have your eye upon
this. Signs are looking pretty fair.

Yours very truly,

A. LINCOLN.




TO DR. WILLIAM FITHIAN, DANVILLE, ILL.

BLOOMINGTON, Sept. 3, 1858

DEAR DOCTOR:--Yours of the 1st was received this morning, as also one
from Mr. Harmon, and one from Hiram Beckwith on the same subject. You
will see by the Journal that I have been appointed to speak at Danville
on the 22d of Sept.,--the day after Douglas speaks there. My recent
experience shows that speaking at the same place the next day after D. is
the very thing,--it is, in fact, a concluding speech on him. Please show
this to Messrs. Harmon and Beckwith; and tell them they must excuse me
from writing separate letters to them.

Yours as ever,

A. LINCOLN

P. S.--Give full notice to all surrounding country. A.L.




FRAGMENT OF SPEECH AT PARIS, ILL.,

SEPT. 8, 1858.

Let us inquire what Judge Douglas really invented when he introduced the
Nebraska Bill? He called it Popular Sovereignty. What does that mean? It
means the sovereignty of the people over their own affairs--in other
words, the right of the people to govern themselves. Did Judge Douglas
invent this? Not quite. The idea of popular sovereignty was floating
about several ages before the author of the Nebraska Bill was
born--indeed, before Columbus set foot on this continent. In the year
1776 it took form in the noble words which you are all familiar with: "We
hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,"
etc. Was not this the origin of popular sovereignty as applied to the
American people? Here we are told that governments are instituted among
men deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. If that
is not popular sovereignty, then I have no conception of the meaning of
words. If Judge Douglas did not invent this kind of popular sovereignty,
let us pursue the inquiry and find out what kind he did invent. Was it
the right of emigrants to Kansas and Nebraska to govern themselves, and a
lot of "niggers," too, if they wanted them? Clearly this was no invention
of his because General Cass put forth the same doctrine in 1848 in his so
called Nicholson letter, six years before Douglas thought of such a
thing. Then what was it that the "Little Giant" invented? It never
occurred to General Cass to call his discovery by the odd name of popular
sovereignty. He had not the face to say that the right of the people to
govern "niggers" was the right of the people to govern themselves. His
notions of the fitness of things were not moulded to the brazenness of
calling the right to put a hundred "niggers" through under the lash in
Nebraska a "sacred" right of self-government. And here I submit to you
was Judge Douglas's discovery, and the whole of it: He discovered that
the right to breed and flog negroes in Nebraska was popular sovereignty.




SPEECH AT CLINTON, ILLINOIS,

SEPTEMBER 8, 1858.

The questions are sometimes asked "What is all this fuss that is being
made about negroes? What does it amount to? And where will it end?" These
questions imply that those who ask them consider the slavery question a
very insignificant matter they think that it amounts to little or nothing
and that those who agitate it are extremely foolish. Now it must be
admitted that if the great question which has caused so much trouble is
insignificant, we are very foolish to have anything to do with it--if it
is of no importance we had better throw it aside and busy ourselves with
something else. But let us inquire a little into this insignificant
matter, as it is called by some, and see if it is not important enough to
demand the close attention of every well-wisher of the Union. In one of
Douglas's recent speeches, I find a reference to one which was made by me
in Springfield some time ago. The judge makes one quotation from that
speech that requires some little notice from me at this time. I regret
that I have not my Springfield speech before me, but the judge has quoted
one particular part of it so often that I think I can recollect it. It
runs I think as follows: