The Writings of Abraham Lincoln, vol 3 | Page 5

fell short of a clear popular majority by nearly
four hundred thousand votes,(approximately 10% of the vote) and so,

perhaps, was not overwhelmingly reliable and satisfactory. The
outgoing President, in his last annual message, as impressively as
possible echoed back upon the people the weight and authority of the
indorsement. The Supreme Court met again, did not announce their
decision, but ordered a reargument. The Presidential inauguration came,
and still no decision of the court; but the incoming President, in his
inaugural address, fervently exhorted the people to abide by the
forth-coming decision, whatever it might be. Then, in a few days, came
the decision.
The reputed author of the Nebraska Bill finds an early occasion to
make a speech at this capital indorsing the Dred Scott decision, and
vehemently denouncing all opposition to it. The new President, too,
seizes the early occasion of the Silliman letter to indorse and strongly
construe that decision, and to express his astonishment that any
different view had ever been entertained!
At length a squabble springs up between the President and the author of
the Nebraska Bill, on the mere question of fact, whether the Lecompton
Constitution was or was not in any just sense made by the people of
Kansas; and in that quarrel the latter declares that all he wants is a fair
vote for the people, and that he cares not whether slavery be voted
down or voted up. I do not understand his declaration, that he cares not
whether slavery be voted down or voted up, to be intended by him
other than as an apt definition of the policy he would impress upon the
public mind,--the principle for which he declares he has suffered so
much, and is ready to suffer to the end. And well may he cling to that
principle! If he has any parental feeling, well may he cling to it. That
principle is the only shred left of his original Nebraska doctrine. Under
the Dred Scott decision "squatter sovereignty" squatted out of existence,
tumbled down like temporary scaffolding; like the mould at the foundry,
served through one blast, and fell back into loose sand; helped to carry
an election, and then was kicked to the winds. His late joint struggle
with the Republicans, against the Lecompton Constitution, involves
nothing of the original Nebraska doctrine. That struggle was made on a
point--the right of a people to make their own constitution--upon which
he and the Republicans have never differed.
The several points of the Dred Scott decision, in connection with
Senator Douglas's "care not" policy, constitute the piece of machinery,

in its present state of advancement. This was the third point gained. The
working points of that machinery are:
Firstly, That no negro slave, imported as such from Africa, and no
descendant of such slave, can ever be a citizen of any State, in the sense
of that term as used in the Constitution of the United States. This point
is made in order to deprive the negro, in every possible event, of the
benefit of that provision of the United States Constitution which
declares that "The citizens of each State shall be entitled to all
privileges and immunities of citizens in the several States."
Secondly, That, "subject to the Constitution of the United States,"
neither Congress nor a Territorial Legislature can exclude slavery from
any United States Territory. This point is made in order that individual
men may fill up the Territories with slaves, without danger of losing
them as property, and thus to enhance the chances of permanency to the
institution through all the future.
Thirdly, That whether the holding a negro in actual slavery in a free
State makes him free, as against the holder, the United States courts
will not decide, but will leave to be decided by the courts of any slave
State the negro may be forced into by the master. This point is made,
not to be pressed immediately; but, if acquiesced in for a while, and
apparently indorsed by the people at an election, then to sustain the
logical conclusion that what Dred Scott's master might lawfully do with
Dred Scott, in the free State of Illinois, every other master may lawfully
do with any other one, or one thousand slaves, in Illinois, or in any
other free State.
Auxiliary to all this, and working hand in hand with it, the Nebraska
doctrine, or what is left of it, is to educate and mould public opinion, at
least Northern public opinion, not to care whether slavery is voted
down or voted up. This shows exactly where we now are; and partially,
also, wither we are tending.
It will throw additional light on the latter, to go back and run the mind
over the string of historical facts already stated. Several