An old colored woman came to them for legal aid. Her case was a sad one. Brought from Kentucky, Lincoln's natal State, by a planter, Hinkle, he had set her and children free in Indiana, not fostering the waning oppression. Her son, growing up, had the rashness to venture on the steamboat down to New Orleans. His position was as bad as that of an Americanized foreigner returning into a despotic land. He was arrested and held for sale, having crossed a Louisiana law framed for such intrusions: a free negro could be sold here as if never out of bond. There was little time to redeem him, and Lincoln--whose view of the institution had not been enchanting--seized the opportunity to hit "and hit hard!" as he said in the same city on beholding a slave sale.
The office was in Springfield, the capital, and the state-house was over the way. While Lincoln continued to question and console the poor sufferer, his partner went over to learn of the governor what he could do in the matter. But there was no constitutional or even legal right to interfere with the doings of a sovereign State. This omission as regards humanity stung Lincoln, always tender on that score, and he excitedly vowed:
"By virtue of freedom for all, I will have that negro back--or a twenty years' agitation in Illinois, which will afford its governor a legal and constitutional right to interfere in such premises."
The only way to rescue the unfortunate young man was to make up a purse and recompense a correspondent at the city below, to obtain the captive and return him to his mother.
Such cases, of more often fugitive-slave matters, were not uncommon in the State. Lincoln was already linked with the ultras on the question, so that it was said by lawyers applied to, afraid as political aspirants:
"Go to that Lincoln, the liberator; he will defend a fugitive-slave case!"
LINCOLN'S VOW.
On the 17th of September, 1862, the Confederate inroad into Maryland was stopped by the decisive defeat of Antietam, and the raiders were sent to the retreat. Lincoln called the Cabinet to a special meeting, and stated that the time had come at last for the proclamation of freedom to the slaves everywhere in the United States. Public sentiment would now sustain--after great vacillation, and all his friends were bent upon it.
"Besides, I promised my God I would do it. Yea, I made a solemn vow before God that, if General Lee was driven back from Pennsylvania, I would crown the result by the declaration of freedom to the slave!"
It was remarked that the signature appeared tremulous and uneven, but the writer affirmed that that was not "because of any uncertainty or hesitation on my part."