On March 4th, 1857, Buchanan, the last Slave-President, was inaugurated, and, a few days after, Judge Taney, of the Supreme Court, rendered the famous “Dred Scott” decision relative to a fugitive negro slave of that name, to the effect that a man of African slave descent could not be a citizen of the United States—that the prohibition of slavery was unconstitutional, and that it existed by the Constitution in all the territories. Judge Taney, in fact, declared that the negro had no rights which the white man was bound to respect. “Against the Constitution—against the memory of the nation—against a previous decision—against a series of enactments—he decided that the slave is property, and that the Constitution upholds it against every other property.”[25] This decision was regarded as an outrage even by many old Democrats. In the same year the slavery-party in Kansas passed, by fraud and violence, the celebrated Lecompton Constitution, upholding slavery. By this time, Judge Douglas, the author of all this mischief, wishing to be re-elected to the Senate, and finding that there was no chance for him as a pro-slavery candidate, was suddenly seized with indignation at the Lecompton affair, which he pronounced an outrage. The result was the division of the Democratic party. He then made a powerful speech at Springfield, defending his course with great shrewdness, but it was, as usual, blown to the winds by a reply from Lincoln. Douglas suddenly became a zealous “Free Soiler,” after the manner admirably burlesqued by “Petroleum Nasby,”[26] when that worthy found it was necessary to become an anti-slavery man to keep his post-office. At this time Douglas made his famous assertion that he did not care whether slavery was voted up or down; and in the following year, April 30th, 1858, Congress passed the English Bill, by which the people of Kansas were offered heavy bribes in land if they would accept the Lecompton Constitution, but which the people rejected by an immense majority.
On the 16th June, 1858, a Republican State Convention at Springfield nominated Lincoln for the Senate, and on the 17th he delivered a bold speech, soon to be known far and wide as the celebrated “House divided against itself” speech. It began with these words—
“If we could first know where we are, and whither we are tending, we could then better judge what to do, and how to do it. We are now far on 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 had 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 master-workers from the beginning.”
These were awful words to the world, and with awe were they received. Lincoln was the first man among the “moderates” who had dared to speak so plainly. His friends were angry, but in due time this tremendous speech had the right effect, for it announced the truth. Meanwhile, Lincoln and Douglas were again paired together as rivals, and at one place the latter put to his adversary a series of questions, which were promptly answered. In return, Lincoln gave Douglas four others, by one of which he was asked if the people of a United States territory could in any lawful way, against the wish of any citizen of the United States, exclude slavery from its limits? To which Douglas replied that the people of a territory had the lawful means to exclude slavery by legislative action. This reply brought Douglas into direct antagonism with the pro-slavery men. He hoped, by establishing a “platform” of his own, to head so many Democrats that the Republicans would welcome his accession, and make him President. But Lincoln, by these questions, and by his unyielding attacks, weakened him to his ruin. It is true that Judge Douglas gained his seat in the Senate, but it was by an old and unjust law in the Legislature, as Lincoln really had four thousand majority.
The speeches which Lincoln delivered during this campaign, and which were afterwards published with those of Douglas, were so refined and masterly that many believed they had been revised for him by able friends. But from this time all his oratory indicated an advance in all respects. He was now bent on great things.
CHAPTER V.
Causes of Lincoln’s Nomination to the Presidency—His Lectures in New York, &c.—The first Nomination and the Fence Rails—The Nomination at Chicago—Elected President—Office-seekers and Appointments—Lincoln’s Impartiality—The South determined to Secede—Fears for Lincoln’s Life.
It is an almost invariable law of stern equity in the United States, as it must be in all true republics, that the citizen who has distinguished himself by great services must not expect really great rewards. The celebrity which he has gained seems, in a commonwealth, where all are ambitious of distinction, to be sufficient recompense. It is true that at times some overwhelming favourite, generally a military hero, is made an exception; but there are few very ambitious civilians who do not realise that a prophet is without great honour in his own country. Other instances may occur where aspiring men have carefully concealed their hopes, and of such was Abraham Lincoln. Perhaps his case is best stated by Lamon, who declares that he had all the requisites of an available candidate for the Presidency, chiefly because he had not been sufficiently prominent in national politics to excite the jealousies of powerful rivals. In order to defeat one another, these rivals will put forward some comparatively unknown man, and thus Lincoln was greatly indebted to the jealousy with which Horace Greeley, a New York politician, regarded his rival, W. H. Seward. Lincoln’s abilities were very great, “but he knew that becoming modesty in a great man was about as needful as anything else.” Therefore, when his friend Pickett suggested that he might aspire to the Chief Magistracy, he replied, “I do not think I am fit for the Presidency.”
But he had friends who thought differently, and in the winter of 1859, Jackson Grimshaw, Mr. Hatch, the Secretary of State, and Messrs. Bushnell, Judd, and Peck, held a meeting, and, after a little persuasion, induced Lincoln to allow them to put him forward as a candidate for the great office. In October, 1859, Lincoln received an invitation from a committee of citizens to give a lecture in New York.[27] He was much pleased with this intimation that he was well known in “the East,” and wrote out with great care a political address, which, when delivered, was warmly praised by the newspapers, one of which, the “Tribune,” edited by Horace Greeley, declared that no man ever before made such an impression on his first appeal to a New York audience. The subject of the discourse was most logical, vigorous, and masterly comment upon an assertion which Judge Douglas had made, to the effect that the framers of the Constitution had understood and approved of slavery. No better vindication of the rights of the Republican party to be considered as expressing and carrying out in all respects the opinions of Washington and of the framers of the Constitution, was ever set forth. From New York he went to New England, lecturing in many cities, and everywhere verifying what was said of him in the “Manchester Mirror,” that he spoke with great fairness, candour, and with wonderful interest. “He did not abuse the South, the Administration, or the Democrats. He is far from prepossessing in personal appearance, and his voice is disagreeable, yet he wins your attention and good-will from the start. His sense of the ludicrous is very keen, and an exhibition of that is the clincher of all his arguments—not the ludicrous acts of persons, but ludicrous ideas. Hence he is never offensive, and steals away willingly into his train of belief persons who were opposed to him. For the first half-hour his opponents would agree with every word he uttered, and from that point he began to lead them off, little by little, until it seemed as if he had got them all into his fold.”