Abraham Lincoln and the Union | Page 9

the South. Then, too, the Democratic party still
spoke the language of the theoretical Democracy inherited from
Jefferson. And Americans have always been the slaves of phrases!
Furthermore, the close alliance of the Northern party machine with the
South made it, generally, an object of care for all those Northern
interests that depended on the Southern market. As to the Southerners,
their relation with this party has two distinct chapters. The first
embraced the twenty years preceding the Compromise of 1850, and
may be thought of as merging into the second during three or four years
following the great equivocation. In that period, while the antislavery
crusade was taking form, the aim of Southern politicians was mainly
negative. "Let us alone," was their chief demand. Though aggressive in
their policy, they were too far-sighted to demand of the North any
positive course in favor of slavery. The rise of a new type of Southern
politician, however, created a different situation and began a second
chapter in the relation between the South and the Democratic party

machine in the North. But of that hereafter.
Until 1854, it was the obvious part of wisdom for Southerners to
cooperate as far as possible with that party whose cardinal idea was that
the government should come as near as conceivable to a system of
non-interference; that it should not interfere with business, and
therefore oppose a tariff; that it should not interfere with local
government, and therefore applaud states rights; that it should not
interfere with slavery, and therefore frown upon militant abolition. Its
policy was, to adopt a familiar phrase, one of masterly inactivity.
Indeed it may well be called the party of political evasion. It was a huge,
loose confederacy of differing political groups, embracing paupers and
millionaires, moderate anti-slavery men and slave barons, all of whom
were held together by the unreliable bond of an agreement not to tread
on each other's toes.
Of this party Douglas was the typical representative, both in strength
and weakness. He had all its pliability, its good humor, its broad and
easy way with things, its passion for playing politics. Nevertheless, in
calling upon the believers in political evasion to consent for this once to
reverse their principle and to endorse a positive action, he had taken a
great risk. Would their sporting sense of politics as a gigantic game
carry him through successfully? He knew that there was a hard fight
before him, but with the courage of a great political strategist, and
proudly confident in his hold upon the main body of his party, he
prepared for both the attacks and the defections that were inevitable.
Defections, indeed, began at once. Even before the bill had been passed,
the "Appeal of the Independent Democrats" was printed in a New York
paper, with the signatures of members of Congress representing both
the extreme anti-slavery wing of the Democrats and the organized
Free-Soil party. The most famous of these names were those of Chase
and Sumner, both of whom had been sent to the Senate by a coalition
of Free-Soilers and Democrats. With them was the veteran abolitionist,
Giddings of Ohio. The "Appeal" denounced Douglas as an
"unscrupulous politician" and sounded both the warcries of the
Northern masses by accusing him of being engaged in "an atrocious
plot to exclude from a vast unoccupied region immigrants from the Old
World and free laborers from our own States."
The events of the spring and summer of 1854 may all be grouped under

two heads--the formation of an antiNebraska party, and the quick rush
of sectional patriotism to seize the territory laid open by the
Kansas-Nebraska Act. The instantaneous refusal of the Northerners to
confine their settlement to Nebraska, and their prompt invasion of
Kansas; the similar invasion from the South; the support of both
movements by societies organized for that purpose; the war in Kansas
all the details of this thrilling story have been told elsewhere.* The
political story alone concerns us here.
*See Jesse Macy, "The Anti-Slavery Crusade". (In "The Chronicles of
America".)
When the fight began there were four parties in the field: the
Democrats, the Whigs, the Free-Soilers, and the Know-Nothings.
The Free-Soil party, hitherto a small organization, had sought to make
slavery the main issue in politics. Its watchword was "Free soil, free
speech, free labor, and free men." It is needless to add that it was
instantaneous in its opposition to the Kansas-Nebraska Act.
The Whigs at the moment enjoyed the greatest prestige, owing to the
association with them of such distinguished leaders as Webster and
Clay. In 1854, however, as a party they were dying, and the very
condition that had made success possible for the Democrats made it
impossible for the Whigs, because the latter stood for positive ideas,
and aimed