Life of Abraham Lincoln | Page 9

the United States Senate. The Democrats, though not in perfect harmony, had a majority, and he could not be elected, but helped to turn the tide for the revolting faction of the Democrats. Though disappointed he knew that the struggle was only begun.
The nation was aroused over the question of slavery. While many good people desired peace rather than agitation concerning such an irritating problem, the question of slavery in the territories had to be decided and the whole question of slavery would not down. In 1856 the Republican party was organized for the state of Illinois in a big convention at Bloomington at which Lincoln made a strong speech; and in the Republican National Convention held in Philadelphia a few weeks later he was given 110 votes for Vice-President. He was committed to the new Republican party and campaigned vigorously for Fremont, their candidate for President.
Lincoln's enthusiastic friends said he was already on the track for the Presidency. As the contest of 1858 for the Senate approached, it again appeared that the Democrats would be divided and Lincoln had some confidence of success. Out in Kansas the proslavery men, by an unfair vote, had adopted the Lecompton Constitution favoring slavery; President Buchanan urged Congress to admit Kansas with that fraudulent constitution; Douglas opposed that constitution and voted against the admission of Kansas as a slave state; thus angering the President and the South and delighting the Republicans of the North.
Now the time was approaching when, in the 1859 session of the Illinois legislature, Douglas would have to stand for re-election to the United States Senate. The legislators would be chosen in the campaign of 1858 largely on that issue. Douglas had become the foremost man in the Democratic party, and any man who could beat him would have national recognition. The Republicans of Illinois nominated Lincoln, who challenged Douglas to a series of joint debates.
The famous Lincoln-Douglas Debates are full of interest and repay a full and careful study, but they will be treated very briefly in this volume.
Lincoln entered upon these debates in a lofty spirit and to the end pursued a high course, fraught with kindness, fairness, magnanimity and most commendable dignity. He said, "While pretending no indifference to earthly honors, I do claim, in this contest, to be actuated by something higher than anxiety for office," and apparently he was.
Lincoln looked into the future and foresaw the coming campaign of 1860 for the Presidency. He foresaw that Douglas would be the leader of the Democrats in that campaign and conducted the debate accordingly.
Lincoln thought not alone of momentary issues, but also of eternal verities. Some things which his friends wished him not to say, for fear it would lose him votes, he said, because they were things that were true and ought to be said: for example, "This nation cannot endure half slave and half free.... A house divided against itself cannot stand.... I do not expect the house to fall.... I do not expect the Union to be dissolved. I do expect it to 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 in the public mind it is in the course of ultimate extinction; or its advocates will push it until it will become alike lawful in all the states, old as well as new, North as well as South." While such utterances probably did cost him votes at the time, later his people could see that his prophetic vision had been right and their confidence in him, always strong, was accordingly increased.
Lincoln, with the training of the lawyer, the wily cross-examiner, the profound jurist, the farsighted statesman, forced Douglas into a dilemma between the northern Democrats of Illinois and the southern Democrats of the slave states. Lincoln was warned by his friends that Douglas would probably choose to please the Democrats of Illinois and be elected United States Senator; but Lincoln replied to his friends: "I am after larger game: the battle of 1860 is worth a hundred of this." Time proved that Lincoln was right. While Lincoln's friends guessed wisely as to the prediction that Douglas would choose to secure the Senatorship by pleasing the Democrats of Illinois, many of whom were opposed to slavery, Lincoln was wise in his prediction concerning the effect on the campaign of 1860 for President.
For example, one of the questions Lincoln asked was: "Can the people of a United States Territory, in any lawful way, against the wishes of any citizen of the United States, exclude slavery from its limits prior to the formation of a state constitution?" If Douglas should answer, "No," he would alienate Illinois; and if he should answer "Yes," he would