The Writings of Abraham Lincoln, Complete

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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
burden 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 probably 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 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 practice would
wrong your section; and so meet it 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 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 our condemnation
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 warning, he had, as President of the United States,
approved and signed an act of Congress enforcing the prohibition of
slavery in the Northwestern 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
La Fayette that he considered that prohibition a wise measure,
expressing in the same connection his hope that we should sometime
have a confederacy of free States.

Bearing this in mind, and seeing that sectionalism has since arisen upon
this same subject, is that warning a weapon in your hands against us, or
in our hands against you? Could Washington 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 you, together with his example pointing to the right
application of it.

But you say you are conservative--eminently conservative--while we are
revolutionary, destructive, 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 substitute shall be.
You have considerable variety of new propositions and plans, but you are
unanimous 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 "gur-reat
pur-rinciple" 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 prohibition of slavery in Federal Territories, according
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 consider 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 unconditionally surrendered
to them? We know they will not. In all their present complaints against
us, the Territories are scarcely mentioned. Invasions and insurrections
are the rage now. Will it satisfy them, in the future, if we have nothing
to do with invasions and insurrections? 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 convince them, from the very beginning of our organization, but
with no success. In all our platforms and speeches, we have constantly
protested our purpose to let them alone; but this 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, 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 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 away because he was oppressed, and declare he was stolen off.
Whenever a master cuts his slaves with a 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 demanded. 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 consummation. Holding as they do that slavery
is morally right, and socially elevating, they cannot 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 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 on 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 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 forbids 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--contrivances such as groping for some middle ground between
the right and the wrong, vain as the search for a man who would be
neither a living man nor a dead man--such as a policy of "don't care" on
a question about which all free men do care--such as Union appeals
beseeching true Union men to yield to Disunionists, reversing the divine
rule, and caning, not the sinners, but the righteous to repentance--such
as invocations of Washington, 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.

[As Mr. Lincoln concluded his address, there was witnessed the wildest
scene of enthusiasm and excitement that has been in New Haven for years.
The Palladium editorially says: "We give up most of our space to-day to a
very full report of the eloquent speech of the HON. Abraham Lincoln, of
Illinois, delivered last night at Union Hall."]




RESPONSE TO AN ELECTOR'S REQUEST FOR MONEY

TO ________________ March 16, 1860

As to your kind wishes for myself, allow me to say I cannot enter the
ring on the money basis--first, because in the main it is wrong; and
secondly, I have not and cannot get the money.

I say, in the main, the use of money is wrong; but for certain objects in
a political contest, the use of some is both right and indispensable.
With me, as with yourself, the long struggle has been one of great
pecuniary loss.

I now distinctly say this--if you shall be appointed a delegate to
Chicago, I will furnish one hundred dollars to bear the expenses of the
trip.

Your friend as ever,

A. LINCOLN.

[Extract from a letter to a Kansas delegate.]




TO J. W. SOMERS.

SPRINGFIELD, March 17, 1860

JAMES W. SOMERS, Esq.

DEAR SIR:--Reaching home three days ago, I found your letter of February
26th. Considering your difficulty of hearing, I think you had better
settle in Chicago, if, as you say, a good man already in fair practice
there will take you into partnership. If you had not that difficulty, I
still should think it an even balance whether you would not better remain
in Chicago, with such a chance for copartnership.

If I went west, I think I would go to Kansas, to Leavenworth or Atchison.
Both of them are and will continue to be fine growing places.

I believe I have said all I can, and I have said it with the deepest
interest for your welfare.

Yours truly,

A. LINCOLN.




ACCUSATION OF HAVING BEEN PAID FOR A
POLITICAL SPEECH

TO C. F. McNEIL.

SPRINGFIELD, April 6, 1860

C. F. MCNEIL, Esq.

DEAR SIR:--Reaching home yesterday, I found yours of the 23d March,
inclosing a slip from The Middleport Press. It is not true that I ever
charged anything for a political speech in my life; but this much is
true: Last October I was requested by letter to deliver some sort of
speech in Mr. Beecher's church, in Brooklyn--two hundred dollars being
offered in the first letter. I wrote that I could do it in February,
provided they would take a political speech if I could find time to get
up no other. They agreed; and subsequently I informed them the speech
would have to be a political one. When I reached New York, I for the
first time learned that the place was changed to "Cooper Institute." I
made the speech, and left for New Hampshire, where I have a son at
school, neither asking for pay nor having any offered me. Three days
after a check for two hundred dollars was sent to me at New Hampshire;
and I took it, and did not know it was wrong. My understanding now
is--though I knew nothing of it at the time--that they did charge for
admittance to the Cooper Institute, and that they took in more than twice
two hundred dollars.

I have made this explanation to you as a friend; but I wish no
explanation made to our enemies. What they want is a squabble and a fuss,
and that they can have if we explain; and they cannot have it if we
don't.

When I returned through New York from New England, I was told by the
gentlemen who sent me the Check that a drunken vagabond in the club,
having learned something about the two hundred dollars, made the
exhibition out of which The Herald manufactured the article quoted by The
Press of your town.

My judgment is, and therefore my request is, that you give no denial and
no explanation.

Thanking you for your kind interest in the matter, I remain, Yours truly,

A. LINCOLN.




TO H. TAYLOR.

SPRINGFIELD, ILL., April 21, 1860.

HAWKINS TAYLOR, Esq.

DEAR SIR:--Yours of the 15th is just received. It surprises me that you
have written twice, without receiving an answer. I have answered all I
ever received from you; and certainly one since my return from the East.

Opinions here, as to the prospect of Douglas being nominated, are quite
conflicting--some very confident he will, and others that he will not be.
I think his nomination possible, but that the chances are against him.

I am glad there is a prospect of your party passing this way to Chicago.
Wishing to make your visit here as pleasant as we can, we wish you to
notify us as soon as possible whether you come this way, how many, and
when you will arrive.

Yours very truly,

A. LINCOLN




TELEGRAM TO A MEMBER OF THE ILLINOIS DELEGATION

AT THE CHICAGO CONVENTION. SPRINGFIELD, May 17? 1860.

I authorize no bargains and will be bound by none.

A. LINCOLN.




REPLY TO THE COMMITTEE SENT BY THE CHICAGO CONVENTION TO INFORM

LINCOLN OF HIS NOMINATION,

MAY 19, 1860.

Mr. CHAIRMAN AND GENTLEMEN OF THE COMMITTEE:--I tender to you, and
through you to the Republican National Convention, and all the people
represented in it, my profoundest thanks for the high honor done me,
which you now formally announce. Deeply and even painfully sensible of
the great responsibility which is inseparable from this high honor--a
responsibility which I could almost wish had fallen upon some one of the
far more eminent men and experienced statesmen whose distinguished names
were before the convention--I shall, by your leave, consider more fully
the resolutions of the convention, denominated their platform, and
without any unnecessary or unreasonable delay respond to you, Mr.
Chairman, in writing--not doubting that the platform will be found
satisfactory, and the nomination gratefully accepted.

And now I will not longer defer the pleasure of taking you, and each of
you, by the hand.




ACCEPTANCE OF NOMINATION AS REPUBLICAN CANDIDATE
FOR PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES

TO GEORGE ASHMUN AND OTHERS.

SPRINGFIELD ILLINOIS, May 23, 1860

HON. GEORGE ASHMUN, President of Republican National Convention.

SIR:--I accept the nomination tendered me by the convention over which
you presided, and of which I am formally apprised in the letter of
yourself and others, acting as a committee of the convention for that
purpose.

The declaration of principles and sentiments which accompanies your
letter meets my approval; and it shall be my care not to violate or
disregard it in any part.

Imploring the assistance of Divine Providence, and with due regard to the
views and feelings of all who were represented in the convention, to the
rights of all the States and Territories and people of the nation, to the
inviolability of the Constitution, and the perpetual union, harmony, and
prosperity of all--I am most happy to co-operate for the practical
success of the principles declared by the convention.

Your obliged friend and fellow-citizen,

A. LINCOLN.




To C. B. SMITH.

SPRINGFIELD, ILL., May 26, 1860.

HON. C. B. SMITH.

MY DEAR SIR:-Yours of the 21st was duly received, but have found no time
until now to say a word in the way of answer. I am indeed much indebted
to Indiana; and, as my home friends tell me, much to you personally. Your
saying, you no longer consider it a doubtful State is very gratifying.
The thing starts well everywhere--too well, I almost fear, to last. But
we are in, and stick or go through must be the word.

Let me hear from Indiana occasionally.

Your friend, as ever,

A. LINCOLN.




FORM OF REPLY PREPARED BY MR. LINCOLN, WITH WHICH HIS PRIVATE

SECRETARY WAS INSTRUCTED TO ANSWER A NUMEROUS CLASS OF LETTERS IN THE
CAMPAIGN OF 1860.

(Doctrine.)
SPRINGFIELD, ILLINOIS, ______, 1860

DEAR SIR:--Your letter to Mr. Lincoln of and by which you seek to obtain
his opinions on certain political points, has been received by him. He
has received others of a similar character, but he also has a greater
number of the exactly opposite character. The latter class beseech him to
write nothing whatever upon any point of political doctrine. They say his
positions were well known when he was nominated, and that he must not now
embarrass the canvass by undertaking to shift or modify them. He regrets
that he cannot oblige all, but you perceive it is impossible for him to
do so.

Yours, etc.,

JNO. J. NICOLAY.




TO E. B. WASHBURNE.

SPRINGFIELD, ILLINOIS, MAY 26, 1860
HON. E. B. WASHBURNE.

MY DEAR SIR:--I have several letters from you written since the
nomination, but till now have found no moment to say a word by way of
answer. Of course I am glad that the nomination is well received by our
friends, and I sincerely thank you for so informing me. So far as I can
learn, the nominations start well everywhere; and, if they get no
back-set, it would seem as if they are going through. I hope you will
write often; and as you write more rapidly than I do, don't make your
letters so short as mine.

Yours very truly,

A. LINCOLN.




TO S. HAYCRAFT.

SPRINGFIELD, ILL., June 4, 1860.

HON. SAMUEL HAYCRAFT.

MY DEAR SIR:--Like yourself I belonged to the old Whig party from its
origin to its close. I never belonged to the American party organization,
nor ever to a party called a Union party; though I hope I neither am or
ever have been less devoted to the Union than yourself or any other
patriotic man.

Yours very truly,

A. LINCOLN.




ABRAHAM OR "ABRAM"

TO G. ASHMUN.

SPRINGFIELD, ILL. June 4, 1860
HON. GEORGE ASHMUN.

MY DEAR SIR:--It seems as if the question whether my first name is
"Abraham" or "Abram" will never be settled. It is "Abraham," and if the
letter of acceptance is not yet in print, you may, if you think fit, have
my signature thereto printed "Abraham Lincoln." Exercise your judgment
about this.

Yours as ever,

A. LINCOLN.




UNAUTHORIZED BIOGRAPHY

TO S. GALLOWAY.

SPRINGFIELD, ILL., June 19, 1860

HON. SAM'L GALLOWAY.

MY DEAR SIR:--Your very kind letter of the 15th is received. Messrs.
Follett, Foster, & Co.'s Life of me is not by my authority; and I have
scarcely been so much astounded by anything, as by their public
announcement that it is authorized by me. They have fallen into some
strange misunderstanding. I certainly knew they contemplated publishing a
biography, and I certainly did not object to their doing so, upon their
own responsibility. I even took pains to facilitate them. But, at the
same time, I made myself tiresome, if not hoarse, with repeating to Mr.
Howard, their only agent seen by me, my protest that I authorized
nothing--would be responsible for nothing. How they could so
misunderstand me, passes comprehension. As a matter wholly my own, I
would authorize no biography, without time and opportunity [sic] to
carefully examine and consider every word of it and, in this case, in the
nature of things, I can have no such time and Opportunity [sic]. But, in
my present position, when, by the lessons of the past, and the united
voice of all discreet friends, I can neither write nor speak a word for
the public, how dare I to send forth, by my authority, a volume of
hundreds of pages, for adversaries to make points upon without end? Were
I to do so, the convention would have a right to re-assemble and
substitute another name for mine.

For these reasons, I would not look at the proof sheets--I am determined
to maintain the position of [sic] truly saying I never saw the proof
sheets, or any part of their work, before its publication.

Now, do not mistake me--I feel great kindness for Messrs. F., F., &
Co.--do not think they have intentionally done wrong. There may be
nothing wrong in their proposed book--I sincerely hope there will not. I
barely suggest that you, or any of the friends there, on the party
account, look it over, and exclude what you may think would embarrass the
party bearing in mind, at all times, that I authorize nothing--will be
responsible for nothing.

Your friend, as ever,

A. LINCOLN.


[The custom then, and it may have been a good one, was for the
Presidential candidate to do no personal canvassing or speaking--or as we
have it now "running for election." He stayed at home and kept his mouth
shut. Ed.]




TO HANNIBAL HAMLIN.

SPRINGFIELD, ILLINOIS, July 18, 1860.

HON. HANNIBAL HAMLIN. MY DEAR SIR:--It appears to me that you and I ought
to be acquainted, and accordingly I write this as a sort of introduction
of myself to you. You first entered the Senate during the single term I
was a member of the House of Representatives, but I have no recollection
that we were introduced. I shall be pleased to receive a line from you.

The prospect of Republican success now appears very flattering, so far as
I can perceive. Do you see anything to the contrary?

Yours truly,

A. LINCOLN.




TO A. JONAS.

(Confidential.)
SPRINGFIELD, ILLINOIS, JULY 21, 1860.

HON. A. JONAS.

MY DEAR SIR:--Yours of the 20th is received. I suppose as good or even
better men than I may have been in American or Know-Nothing lodges; but
in point of fact, I never was in one at Quincy or elsewhere. I was never
in Quincy but one day and two nights while Know-Nothing lodges were in
existence, and you were with me that day and both those nights. I had
never been there before in my life, and never afterward, till the joint
debate with Douglas in 1858. It was in 1854 when I spoke in some hall
there, and after the speaking, you, with others, took me to an
oyster-saloon, passed an hour there, and you walked with me to, and
parted with me at, the Quincy House, quite late at night. I left by stage
for Naples before daylight in the morning, having come in by the same
route after dark the evening, previous to the speaking, when I found you
waiting at the Quincy House to meet me. A few days after I was there,
Richardson, as I understood, started this same story about my having been
in a Know-Nothing lodge. When I heard of the charge, as I did soon after;
I taxed my recollection for some incident which could have suggested it;
and I remembered that on parting with you the last night I went to the
office of the hotel to take my stage-passage for the morning, was told
that no stage-office for that line was kept there, and that I must see
the driver before retiring, to insure his calling for me in the morning;
and a servant was sent with me to find the driver, who, after taking me a
square or two, stopped me, and stepped perhaps a dozen steps farther, and
in my hearing called to some one, who answered him, apparently from the
upper part of a building, and promised to call with the stage for me at
the Quincy House. I returned, and went to bed, and before day the stage
called and took me. This is all.