The Writings of Abraham Lincoln, vol 3 | Page 4

Convention Mr. LINCOLN had been named as their candidate
for United States Senator. Mr. DOUGLAS was not present.]
Mr. PRESIDENT AND GENTLEMEN OF THE CONVENTION:--If
we could first know where we are, and whither we are tending, we
could better judge what to do, and how to do it. 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 slavery agitation. Under the
operation of that 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 Union to be dissolved; 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.
Have we no tendency to the latter condition?
Let any one who doubts, carefully contemplate that now almost
complete legal combination-piece of machinery, so to speak
compounded of the Nebraska doctrine and the Dred Scott decision. Let
him consider, not only what work the machinery is adapted to do, and
how well adapted, but also let him study the history of its construction,
and trace, if he can, or rather fail, if he can, to trace the evidences of
design, and concert of action, among its chief architects, from the
beginning.
The new year of 1854 found slavery excluded from more than half the
States by State Constitutions, and from most of the National territory
by Congressional prohibition. Four days later, commenced the struggle
which ended in repealing that Congressional prohibition. This opened
all the National territory to slavery, and was the first point gained.
But, so far, Congress only had acted, and an indorsement by the people,
real or apparent, was indispensable to save the point already gained,
and give chance for more.
This necessity had not been overlooked, but had been provided for, as

well as might be, in the notable argument of "squatter sovereignty,"
otherwise called "sacred right of self-government," which latter phrase,
though expressive of the only rightful basis of any government, was so
perverted in this attempted use of it as to amount to just this: That if
any one man choose to enslave another, no third man shall be allowed
to object. That argument was incorporated into the Nebraska Bill itself,
in the language which follows:
"It being the true intent and meaning of this Act not to legislate slavery
into any Territory or State, nor to exclude it therefrom, but to leave the
people thereof perfectly free to form and regulate their domestic
institutions in their own way, subject only to the Constitution of the
United States."
Then opened the roar of loose declamation in favor of "squatter
sovereignty," and "sacred right of self-government." "But," said
opposition members, "let us amend the bill so as to expressly declare
that the people of the Territory may exclude slavery." "Not we," said
the friends of the measure, and down they voted the amendment.
While the Nebraska Bill was passing through Congress, a law case,
involving the question of a negro's freedom, by reason of his owner
having voluntarily taken him first into a free State, and then into a
territory covered by the Congressional Prohibition, and held him as a
slave for a long time in each, was passing through the United States
Circuit Court for the District of Missouri; and both Nebraska Bill and
lawsuit were brought to a decision in the same month of May, 1854.
The negro's name was "Dred Scott," which name now designates the
decision finally made in the case. Before the then next Presidential
election, the law case came to, and was argued in, the Supreme Court
of the United States; but the decision of it was deferred until after the
election. Still, before the election, Senator Trumbull, on the floor of the
Senate, requested the leading advocate of the Nebraska Bill to state his
opinion whether the people of a territory can constitutionally exclude
slavery from their limits; and the latter answers: "That is a question for
the Supreme Court."
The election came. Mr. Buchanan was elected, and the indorsement,
such as it was, secured. That was the second point gained. The
indorsement, however,