Abolitionism as a gospel showed rather paltry results for thirty years of unceasing labor. Still its essential dogma, hatred to human bondage, slowly but steadily held a larger place in the public thought. Mistakes of the South and its Northern friends hurried on a crisis. The Kansas controversy made the issue of a remorseless conflict clearer by a concrete example of the incompatibility of freedom and slavery. The nation was thus educated for aggressive action on the long mooted question. The time was becoming ripe for the translation of public sentiment into party platform, statute and decision. The Abolitionist with relentless gospel even of war on the Constitution was altogether too radical for the general mind. The slowly dying Whig party had not kept pace with the advanced public thought, it was too conservative. The democratic party kept on its path either of indifference to the slavery issue or ardent support of the southern view and was the refuge of those who were dead to the sweep of events. Hence the necessity of a new party, with a platform that should sturdily proclaim resistance to the spread of slavery in the territories; that should register a rising spirit in the North, growing restless and sensitive as it contemplated the increasing demands of the Southern institutions, as it grasped the significance of the issue involving the continued existence in their primal integrity of cherished principles of the Republic,a grappling for political supremacy of the free labor of the North and the slave power of the South. Mingled with the essential spirit of justice pervading Abolitionism was the growth of the opinion that slavery was a social and political evil. The public wrath at the repeal of a venerated Compromise, the increasing discontent at the violent manifestations of the friends of slavery in Kansas, prepared the public for the formation of a radical party.
Lincoln being a man of power, was beset by three parties. He was urged to remain a Whig by the conservatives, to become a Know-nothing by those drifting on the political waters. Others sought to baptise him in the spirit of Abolitionism. Lincoln had long since made his resolution to array himself on the side of freedom. He was awaiting the right moment. He saw the time for leadership was coming, that events were rapidly sweeping forward to a climax. In the perturbed political condition he was anxious not to go ahead of events and still not play the laggard. Among all politicians in American history he was the wisest student of the public mind.
With true vision, Lincoln foreshadowed the solemn consequences of the Kansas struggle. He asked if there could be a more apt invention to bring about collision and violence on the slavery question than the "Nebraska project," and whether "the first drop of blood so shed would not be the real knell of the Union."[305]Behind the fair form of the Douglas doctrine of popular sovereignty, he saw the lurking serpent. He was not deceived by fine, smooth words. In the beginning, he beheld the gaping wounds of Kansas, the hypocrisy of the policy professing the name of peace and bringing in its train the devildom of discord, the curse of a broken, plighted compact. A letter to his friend Speed in 1855illumines the whole subject, and is a contribution to the political history of the time—unsurpassed in statement, in clearness of understanding, in subdued calmness of judgment:
"You know I dislike slavery, and you fully admit the abstract wrong of it. So far there is no cause of difference. But you say that sooner than yield your legal right to the slave, especially at the bidding of those who are not themselves interested, you would see the Union dissolved. I am not awarethatany one is bidding you yield that right; very certainly I am not. I leave that matter entirely to yourself. I also acknowledge your rights and my obligations under the Constitution in regard to your slaves. I confess I hate to see the poor creatures hunted down and caught and carried back to their stripes and unrequited toil; but I bite my lips and keep quiet.... It is not fair for you to assume that I have no interest in a thing which has, and continually exercises, the power of making me miserable. You ought rather to appreciate how much the great body of the Northern people do crucify their feelings, in order to maintain their loyalty to the Constitution and the Union."[306]
He then bared with remorseless logic the common southern attitude: "You say, if you were President, you would send an army and hang the leaders of the Missouri outrages among the Kansas elections; still, if Kansas fairly votes herself a slave State she must be admitted or the Union must be dissolved. But how if she votes herself a slave State unfairly, that is, by the very means for which you say you would hang men? Must she still be admitted, or the Union dissolved? That will be the phase of the question when it first becomes a practicable one."[307]
The same letter shows he was aware of the potency of thepartisan lash, was an observer of the methods of securing results, of the cowardice and timidity of leaders where political policy appeared on the horizon. He confessed that in their opposition to the admission of Kansas, they would probably be beaten; that the Democrats standing as a unit among themselves, could, directly or indirectly, bribe enough men to carry the day as they could on the open proposition to establish a monarchy; that by getting hold of some man in the North whose position and ability was such that he could make the support of the measure, whatever it might be, a party necessity, the thing would be done.[308]
Then came a biting comment on the pretenses and practices of those who were spreading the national disease, of those who had one doctrine in public and another in private, who worshipped the God of Liberty with speech and Mammon with their deeds. In the same letter Lincoln said that although in a private letter or conversation the slaveholders would express their preference that Kansas should be free, they would not vote for a man for Congress who would say the same thing publicly and no such man could be elected from any district in a slave State; that slave-breeders and slave-traders were a small, detested class among them; and yet in politics they dictated the course of the Southerners, and were as completely their masters as they were the master of their own negroes.[309]
A vivid picture of party uncertainty is seen in his answer to the inquiry of Speed as to where he then stood. "I think I am a Whig; but others say there are no Whigs, and say that I am an Abolitionist. When I was at Washington, I voted for the Wilmot proviso as good as forty times; and I never heard of any one attempting to unwhig me for that. I now do no more than oppose the extension of slavery. Iam not a Know-nothing; that is certain. How could I be? How could any one who abhors the oppression of negroes be in favor of degrading classes of white people? Our progress in degeneracy appears to me to be pretty rapid. As a nation we began by declaring 'that all men are created equal.' We now practically read it, 'all men are created equal except negroes.' When the Know-nothings get control, it will read 'all men are created equal, except negroes and foreigners and Catholics.' When it comes to this, I shall prefer emigrating to some country where they make no pretense of loving liberty,—to Russia, for instance, where despotism can be taken pure, and without the base alloy of hypocrisy."[310]
To him "Know-nothingism" transcended all questions of policy, denied the very mission of Democracy, turned back the hour hand of political progress and was traitor and recreant to its teachings. He was not sure of his standing in the transitional period of party dissolution and showed something in his mental attitude of the spirit of unrest abroad in the nation and hardly knew whither the trend of events would carry the American people. Cautious in moving forward on matters involving method, he was unwedgeable when the principles of the Republic were at stake. His note of scorn rings clear and loud to these who, in selfishness and bigotry, sought exceptions to and a narrow interpretation of the Declaration of Independence.
By nature Lincoln was a friend of peace. He would have rejoiced at any plan that produced a peaceful solution of the vexed problem. No matter how slow the march of freedom, he would have bridled his wrath. But the aggressiveness of the South in the Kansas struggle opened his vision to the fatuity of gradual emancipation. He grew bitter as Garrison in statement as he contemplated the hypocriticlimits on freedom, the spread of an institution hostile to democracy with an ever widening promise of future abatement: "On the question of liberty as a principle," he wrote a friend, "we are not what we have been. When we were the political slaves of King George, and wanted to be free, we called the maxim that 'all men are created equal,' a self evident truth, but now when we have grown fat, and have lost all dread of being slaves ourselves, we have become so greedy to be masters that we call the same maxim 'a self evident lie.' The Fourth of July has not quite dwindled away; it is still a great day—for burning fire-crackers!!!"[311]
The groping of a giant mind concerning itself with a mammoth problem, the germ of the great speech of Springfield that was soon to startle the nation with its boldness likewise shows itself in this same letter. "Our political problem now is, 'Can we as a nation continue together permanently—forever—half slave and half free?' The problem is too mighty for me—may God, in his mercy, superintend the solution."[312]
Finally the nation changed. The people, once dead to the cry of the slave, were alive to the evil of slavery. Doctrines once deemed the outburst of the fanatic were now on the lips of conservative men, and Lovejoy had become the consort of the political leader. All these years, Lincoln had waited in patience for the day when white men should be ready to fight for the freedom of others. Civilization comes from a sure, steady and progressive enlightenment of public sentiment. Genius alone is helpless in the presence of a palsied national opinion. Consider Lincoln in South Carolina in 1856, and the hopelessness of the ideal without the company of circumstances is manifest. Living history comesfrom the union of the great man and the happy moment for the crystallization of advancing public sentiment. In this sense alone the individual makes history, and it becomes the record of the few. The great man is the symbol of the marching life of the multitude and through him humanity moves resistlessly to its higher attitude.
A gathering of editors opposed to the Nebraska bill on February 22, 1856, marked the first visible step in the formation of the Republican party in Illinois. Lincoln was, of course, not entitled to participate in the public deliberations of that convention. That he promptly heard the tramp of coming events is seen in his readiness to play a commanding part in the early manifestation of the protesting movement.
Declaring that the black cloud of the American party was threatening to drive the Germans from the ranks of the party about to be formed, Hon. George Schieder said that he entered the Decatur convention with a resolution in opposition to that movement, and helped to form a platform containing a paragraph against the prescriptive doctrine of the so-called American party. That portion of the platform condemning Know-nothingism raised a storm of opposition, and, in despair, he proposed submitting it to Mr. Lincoln and abiding by his decision. After carefully reading the paragraph, Lincoln made the remark that the resolution introduced by Mr. Schieder was nothing new, that it was already contained in the Declaration of Independence, and that they could not form a new party on prescriptive principles. Mr. Schieder states that this declaration of Lincoln saved the resolution and helped to establish the new party on the most liberal basis, and that it was adopted at the Bloomington Convention, and next at the First National-Republican Convention at Philadelphia. He further states that Lincoln crystallized public sentiment, gave it a focalpoint, so that the great majority of the Germans entered the new party that later made Lincoln President.
Lincoln was in the van of the leaders who rallied to the support of the infant party that has written such luminous pages in American history. He showed his wonted sagacity, when an editor suggested his name as a candidate for Governor, in immediately advising the nomination of an anti-Nebraskan Democratic candidate, on the ground that such a nomination would be more available.[313]
To Herndon the caution of Lincoln seemed to partake of brotherhood with inaction. He hardly realized the sureness of the unremitting character of his progress. As Lincoln's partner felt the thrilling approach of a political crisis, he resolved to unloose Lincoln from his conservative connections without realizing that the latter was ready to dare the future on the bark of the coming party. Delegates were to be elected for the State Convention at Bloomington that was to breathe life into the Republican party in Illinois. Herndon signed Mr. Lincoln's name to the call for the Sangamon County Convention without authority and published it in a local paper. A dramatic incident ensued:
"John T. Stuart was keeping his eye on Lincoln, with a view of keeping him on his side—the totally dead conservative side. Mr. Stuart saw the published call and grew mad; rushed into my office, seemed mad, horrified, and said to me, 'Sir, did Mr. Lincoln sign that Abolition call which is published this morning?' I answered, 'Mr. Lincoln did not sign that call.'—'Did Lincoln authorize you to sign it?' said Mr. Stuart. 'No, he never authorized me to sign it.'—'Then do you know that you have ruined Mr. Lincoln?'—'I did not know that I had ruined Mr. Lincoln; did not intend to do so; thought he was a made man by it; that the time had comewhen conservatism was a crime and a blunder.'—'You, then, take the responsibility of your acts; do you?'—'I do, most emphatically.'"
Herndon then wrote Lincoln. He instantly replied that he adopted what Herndon had done, and promised to meet Lovejoy and other radicals.[314]
Lincoln did not serve freedom in word only. A free young negro was in danger of being sold into slavery. The Governor of Illinois was seen. He responded that he had no right to interfere. Lincoln rose from his chair, hat in hand, and exclaimed: "By God, Governor, I'll make the ground in this country too hot for the foot of a slave, whether you have the legal power to secure a release of this boy or not."[315]
During all the trying time when the liberty of Kansas was in the balance, when violence was being met with violence, when even conservative men drifted into the movement to aid the free state men in opposing the Government, he remained master of himself, looked beyond the passion of the moment to the abiding realities. Herndon, who was a participant in this movement, unfolds a view of the calm, far sighted man, who knew that violence was the father of great evils and not a safe foundation for a free state. He says that Lincoln was informed of their intents, and took the first opportunity that he could to dissuade them from their partially formed purpose. They spoke of liberty, justice, and God's higher law. He answered that he believed "in the providence of the most men, the largest purse, and the longest cannon"; that if they were in the minority, they could not succeed, and that if they were in the majority they could succeed with the ballot, throwing away the bullet. He advised them that, "In a democracy where the majority rule by the ballot through the forms of law, physical rebellionsand bloody resistances" were radically wrong, unconstitutional, and were treason. He besought them to revolutionize through the ballot-box, and "restore the Government once more to the affections and hearts of men, by making it express, as it was intended to do, the highest spirit of justice and liberty." Their attempt, he continued, to resist the laws of Kansas by force, was criminal and all their feeble attempts would end in bringing sorrow on their heads, and ruin the cause they would freely die to preserve.[316]Well might Herndon say that this speech saved them from the greatest follies.[317]Instead of desperate measures, money was forwarded under legitimate conditions, Lincoln joining in the subscription.
The second step in the formation of the Republican party was the Convention at Bloomington. Tragic events had taken place in the State and Nation; signs of the sombre character of the approaching conflict. Sumner was struck down in the Senate by the dastard attacks of Brooks, an act which sent a shudder of anger and indignation through the North and a wave of approbation through the South. This incident alone showed the strain that the moorings of the Nation were undergoing. In Illinois, too, violence asserted its hideousness, and a delegate, Paul Selby, was treacherously assaulted by political opponents. The spread of the Civil War in Kansas heightened the magnitude of the occasion. The seriousness of the National and State situation had taken hold of the delegates. The gravity of public affairs aroused mad instincts. Many were ready for radical conduct, were ready to meet force with force, and violence with violence.
From the four corners of the State, dauntless anti-Nebraska Democrats, conservative Whig, distraught Know-nothing,bitter Abolitionist, and those drifting on the tide of events, gathered under a common impulse in opposition to the vaunting slave party. Beneath the surface there was memory of former antagonism. The problem of the hour was the uniting of these discordant elements into the homogeneity of common conviction; submerging old and cherished affiliations with a flood of fealty to a new gospel; the transmuting raw recruits; quickening the martial spirit commonly the product only of long service.
It was a time for a momentous speech. Several leaders of distinction had addressed the convention, when the audience, with instinctive wisdom, called for Lincoln to make the closing address. It was one of those rare moments in human affairs when words may turn the tide of events. He caught the wandering thoughts of troubled men and gave them continuity.[318]Those long without a political faith were rejoiced to find a home. Like an inspired giant, he was aglow with the greatness of his theme. He spoke as the spirit of the age might have spoken, if it had broken into eloquence sublime and resistless. Men were brought face to face with immortal justice, with eternal righteousness. The humblest hearer lived in the thrill of such communion. Reporters dropped their pencils and forgot their work; even Herndon, who was wont to take notes when Lincoln spoke, threw pen and paper aside, subdued and overcome by the majesty of his partner's speech.
It was not alone a triumph in immediate results, but also a triumph in moulding the abiding convictions of men. Above all the enthusiasm of the moment, there still remained his solid logic, a logic that made Republicans of life-long Democrats. John M. Palmer declared that he remembered only one expression of speech, "We will not dissolve the Union,and you shall not do it." Others dwelt on his declaration to meet the occasion with ballots and not bullets, and so the minds of men as well as the impulses were wisely educated. The address became famous as "the lost speech." Its renown grew with age. It became sacred to the memory of those who heard it and time hallowed its history.[319]
In the light of later events, the platform adopted at the Bloomington Convention seems conservative. It simply rebuked the administration for its attitude on the Kansas issue, the repeal of the Missouri Compromise, and the extension of slavery into Territories.[320]
When the first flood of enthusiasm, after the Bloomington Convention, subsided, a mysterious apathy, a stifling indifference, met the new movement, anotunusual phenomenon in politics or human affairs. Such a time had now come. It was at this period dark and trying that Lincoln towered in lonely grandeur. It was easy enough to be brave and vaunting at a convention when thousands hung on every word. But now it took a higher heroism to be true to the cause. Then Lincoln did not flinch. With superb step, with elated soul, with increasing intrepidity, he continued the championship of the same principles that took captive the delegates at Bloomington. He spoke like one in the wilderness.
Lamon tells the story of a ratification meeting five days after the Bloomington Convention:—"Mr. Herndon got out huge posters, announcing the event, and employed a band of musicians to parade the streets and 'drum up a crowd.' As the hour of meeting drew near, he 'lit up the Court House with many blazes,' rung the bells and blew a horn. At seven o'clock the meeting should have been called to order, but it turned out to be extremely slim. There was nobodypresent, with all those brilliant lights, but A. Lincoln, W. H. Herndon and W. H. Pain. 'When Lincoln came into the Court-room,' says the bill-poster and horn-blower of this great demonstration, 'he came with a sadness and a sense of the ludicrous on his face. He walked to the stand, mounted it in a kind of mockery,—mirth and sadness all combined,—and said: 'Gentlemen, this meeting is larger than I knew it would be. I knew that Herndon and myself would come, but I did not know that any one else would be here; and yet another has come,—you, John Pain. These are sad times, and seem out of joint. All seems dead, dead, dead: but the age is not yet dead; it liveth as sure as our Maker liveth. Under all this seeming want of life and motion, the world does move nevertheless. Be hopeful. Now let us adjourn and appeal to the people.'"[321]
In June the first National Republican Convention met at Philadelphia. Young, aggressive and flushed with enthusiasm, it put forth as the standard bearer, John C. Fremont, the daring, romantic pathfinder. Lincoln received one hundred and ten votes for the vice-presidency. So little was this distinction anticipated, that at first he refused to believe that he was the recipient of the flattering compliment, saying that it must have been the great Lincoln from Massachusetts.
Like the Bloomington gathering the National Convention instinctively linked itself in strength to the impressing principles of the Declaration of Independence. It took a bolder and more advanced stand than the Illinois Convention, denying the authority of Congress to give legal existence to slavery in any Territory and that it was its right and duty to prohibit therein those "twin relics of barbarism, polygamy and slavery."[322]
In the ensuing campaign, Lincoln, as a presidential electorand orator towered in the State as strong in his invigorating championship of the Republican policies. He made fifty speeches. Indiana, Wisconsin and Iowa sent for him. The impress of his personality was humbly, but pervasively winning the hearts and minds of men. One man wrote with sure faith, "Come to our place, because in you do our people place more confidence than in any other man. Men who do not read want the story told as you only can tell it. Others may make fine speeches but it would not be 'Lincoln said so in his speech.'"[323]A college president spoke of him with reverence, as, "one providentially raised up for a time like this, and even should defeat come in the contest, it would be some consolation to remember we had Hector for a leader."[324]
He was most skillful in seeing the danger of Fillmore as a candidate in withholding strength from Fremont. He studied the problem as keenly as a legal proposition. No man in all of the United States saw the issues more plainly or could state it as precisely. To a Fillmore man he wrote that every vote withheld from Fremont and given to Fillmore in Illinois actually lessened Fillmore's chance of being President, for if Buchanan got all the slave states and Pennsylvania, and one other State, he would be elected, but if Fillmore got the slave states of Maryland and Kentucky, then Buchanan would not be elected and Fillmore would go into the House of Representatives, and might be made President by a compromise. Likewise he argued that if Fillmore's friends threw away a few thousand votes on him in Indiana, it would inevitably give those states to Buchanan, which would more than compensate him for the loss of Maryland and Kentucky; that it was as plain as adding up the weight of three small hogs for Fillmore who had no possible chance to carry Illinois for himself, to let Fremont take it, and thus keepit out of the hands of Buchanan. Lamon remarks that this letter was discovered by the Buchanan men, printed in their newspapers, and pronounced, as its author anticipated, "a mean trick," and that it was a dangerous document to them, and was calculated to undermine the very citadel of their strength.[325]
Lincoln's fear of Fillmore was justified by events. While Fremont was defeated, Bissel the Republican was elected Governor by a fair margin. To Lincoln, the defeat of Fremont was prophetic of future triumph. With infinitely surer vision than President Pierce, he perceived the trend of events. Beyond seeming setback, he beheld the triumphing movement. He likened the President to a rejected lover making merry at the wedding of his rival, in felicitating himself hugely over the late presidential election, in considering the result a signal triumph of good men, and a very pointed rebuke of bad ones. To the statement of Pierce that the people did it, Lincoln called attention to the fact that those who voted for Buchanan, were in a minority of the whole people by about four hundred thousand votes, and thus the "rebuke" might not be quite as durable as he seemed to think and that the majority might not choose to remain permanently rebuked by that minority.[326]
Strong in the belief that slavery was at war with the essential spirit of the Republic, he declared that the government rested on public opinion; that public opinion, on any subject, always had a "central idea," and that "central idea" in American political public opinion was until recently "the equality of man," and although it submitted patiently to some inequality as a matter of actual necessity, its constant working was a steady progress toward the practical equality of all men and the late Presidential election was a struggleby one party to discard that central idea and to substitute as a central idea the perpetuity of human slavery and its extension to all countries and colors.[327]
This conviction vivified him with new hopes. The leader called to those in the valley of doubt and indifference to leave their low-vaulted chamber: "Then let bygones be bygones; let past differences as nothing be; and with steady eye on the real issue, let us reinaugurate the good old 'central idea' of the republic. We can do it. The human heart is with us; God is with us. We shall again be able not to declare that 'all States as States are equal,' nor yet that 'all citizens as citizens are equal,' but to renew the broader, better declaration, including both these and much more, that 'all men are created equal.'"[328]
With unfailing vision Lincoln was attracted to the larger issues under all professed and alleged reasons, both North and South, as to the cause of difference in attitude on the slavery question. He believed it was largely an industrial and economical problem, a moral conflict in the North mainly through the absence of a controlling material interest. With plain, blunt speech, he laid bare the national cancer in October, 1856, showing that there was no difference in the mental or moral structure of the people North and South, but that in the slavery question the people of the South had an immediate, immense, pecuniary interest, while with the people of the North it was merely an abstract question of moral right.
The slaves of the South, he continued, were worth a thousand millions of dollars, and that financial interest united the Southern people as one man; that moral principle was a looser bond than pecuniary interest. Hence if a Southern man aspired to be President, they choked him down, that the glittering prize of the presidency might be held up on southern terms to Northern ambition. And their conventions in 1848, 1852 and 1856 had been struggles exclusively among Northern men, each vying to outbid the other, the South standing calmly by finally to cry "Going, going, gone" to the highest bidder.[329]
The Dred Scott decision throws a shadow over the judicial history of the United States. That in an hour of crisis the supreme judicial tribunal should ally itself with the potent institution of injustice rather than with humanity, should interpret the principles of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence in a paltry and impoverished manner, should cringe before title and power and grovel in gloom in the dawn of a new era of American citizenship, an era that was to hurl its thunderbolts with ever increasing daring against the further advance of the slave sovereignty, is baffling and astounding.
Lincoln realized that the Supreme Court to be venerated, must be in the van, and not a laggard in the world spirit and progress; a guide and not a pupil in the best kind of citizenship and sensitive to the rising tide of public conscience. The Dred Scott decision did more than any malice of foe to weaken the general regard for the august tribunal—the one supreme discovery of American politics.
It is of interest to study Lincoln's attitude to this decision and to the tribunal responsible for it. Above most men, he had preached the gospel of sacred devotion to law and to the iniquity of mob rule. He was an enemy of all violence. Yet he rebelliously abided the adjudication that made the prospective emancipation of the black man more uncertain, that imprisoned the enlightened principles of the Fathers of the Republic, that manacled America in her Titan march on the highway of humanity.
Lincoln maintained in 1857 that judicial decisions had two uses, to absolutely determine the case decided, and to indicate to the public how other similar cases would be decided. Lincoln then argued that if the decision had been made by the unanimous concurrence of the judges, without partisan bias, in accordance with legal public expectation,and in no part based on assumed historical facts which were not really true; or if it had been before the court more than once, and had there been reaffirmed through a course of years, it then might be even revolutionary not to acquiesce in it as a precedent.[330]
Still, by the side of the impassioned outbreaks of the abolitionists and radicals this criticism seems cold and measured. But Lincoln with his usual apprehension justified his opposition by democratic example. He confounded Douglas by recalling the action of his ideal Jackson on a Whig measure, the National Bank, with the statement that the same Supreme Court once decided a national bank to be constitutional; but President Jackson disregarded the decision, and vetoed a bill for the recharter, partly on constitutional ground declaring that each public functionary must support the Constitution as he understood it. And then to the further discomfiture of Douglas he declared that again and again he had heard Judge Douglas denounce that bank decision and applaud General Jackson for disregarding it; that it would be interesting for him to look over his recent speech, and see how exactly his fierce philippics against resisting Supreme Court decisions fell upon his own head.[331]Still Douglas might have retorted that in those days the Whigs were violent in their denunciation of General Jackson for that very opposition.
In the same speech Lincoln burst into indignant eloquence at the policy that was a departure from the old ideas of justice and liberty and the still more radiant hope of the future indulged in by Washington, Jefferson and Franklin, that in time slavery would no longer darken or endanger the national life, for Lincoln said that in those days the Declaration was held sacred by all, and thought to include all; butthat at this time it was construed, hawked at and torn, till, if its framers could rise from their graves, they could not at all recognize it. He observed that all the powers of earth seemed rapidly combining against the negro; that Mammon, ambition, philosophy and theology of the day were fast joining the cry; that they had him in his prison-house, bolted in with a lock of a hundred keys, which could never be unlocked without the concurrence of every key—the keys in the hands of a hundred different men, and they scattered to a hundred and distant places; and they still stood musing as to what invention, in all the dominions of mind and matter, could be produced to make the impossibility of his escape more complete than it was.[332]
Less than a decade of history proved Lincoln wiser than those who framed the momentous majority opinion in the Dred Scott case. Lincoln was learned not alone in legal knowledge, but was also familiar with the mighty national movements that laugh laws and decisions to scorn; that ultimately and finally determine progress. These judges were students of the past, slaves of precedent, defenders of antiquity, while Lincoln was a student of the present and the future and the ambassador of abiding justice. He had as deep and ultimate a knowledge of the national character and capacity as the statesman, and was a student of political and social progress in order to follow and wisely lead the deep public sentiment and conscience that alone measures true civilization.
Few pages in our history present a darker picture than the ruffianism of the friends of slavery in Kansas, and the retaliating spirit of its opponents. Still, the gloom is illumined by patriotic politicians, democratic slave holders and sympathizers, who sternly put duty before party. There are few more glorious incidents in our political annals than the unwavering fidelity of Robert J. Walker of Mississippi. As Governor of Kansas he lived up to his public pledges, though the offer of the Presidency of the United States was dangled before him.[333]Like Washington, himself, Walker towered above temptation. If the Mississippi statesman had held the place of Buchanan, slavery, instead of being nursed by the palsied policy of the Northern statesman, would have been startled by another Jackson, and the nation might have owed its salvation to a Southern leader instead of to the prairie politician.
In the fine language of Seward: "The ghosts on the banks of the Styx constitute a cloud scarcely more dense than the spirits of the departed Governors of Kansas, wandering in exile and sorrow for having certified the truth against falsehood in regard to the elections between Freedom and Slavery in Kansas."[334]The strange fact above all is that the admission of Kansas as a slave state against the wishes of its people was not asked for by the South. It was freely tenderedto the slave dynasty by a majority of northern democrats in the executive and legislative branches of the Government.[335]And so again the North shared with the South in the zeal for spreading slavery.
The final scene in the drama was the Lecompton Constitution. Douglas then saw the fatal result that Lincoln had foretold in his June speech of 1857, when he declared that Douglas, since the famous Nebraska Bill, saw himself superseded in a presidential nomination by one generally endorsing his measure, but standing clear of the odium of its untimely agitation and its violation of the national faith; that he saw his chief aids in his own State, politically speaking, successfully tried, convicted and executed for an offense not their own, but his, and that now he saw his own case standing next on the docket for trial.[336]
Northern Democrats refused to brook longer the crime in Kansas. To refuse submission of the Constitution to that people made a mockery of the popular sovereignty of Douglas. With desperate constancy he had impressed that great principle, as he called it, on his constituency. It was now so shorn of all dignity that even a child might see it. He either had to lose Illinois or fight the policy of the administration. Once having decided to differ he took a bold stand. No Abolitionist or Republican used plainer or more impelling language: "But if this Constitution is to be forced down our throats, in violation of the fundamental principles of free government, under a mode of submission that is a mockery and insult, I will resist it to the last. I have no fear of any party associations being severed. I should regret any social or political estrangement, even temporarily; but if it must be, if I cannot act with you and preserve my faith and my honor, I will stand on the great principle of popularsovereignty, which declares the right of all people to be left perfectly free to form and regulate their domestic institutions in their own way. I will follow that principle wherever its logical consequences may take me, and I will endeavor to defend it against assault from any and all quarters. No mortal man shall be responsible for my action but myself."[337]
The former distinction of Douglas as a slave advocate made his seeming accession to the ranks of its opponents all the more marked. Stirring stories were told of his peerless courage when Buchanan told him to remember that no Democrat ever yet differed from an administration of his own choice without being crushed, and to beware of the fate of Tallmadge and Rives.
"Mr. President," retorted Douglas, "I wish you to remember that General Jackson is dead."[338]Like an undaunted Abolitionist he flung aside all compromise, refused to accede to the English bill that many administration opponents welcomed as an exit from the dilemma of party recusancy. Many began to believe that Douglas was about to turn into a black Republican. He had stolen conferences with their leaders, inducing them to believe that it was policy for him to conceal his present real intention; that he would soon unmask himself and fight their battles. He often said that he had checked all his baggage and taken a through ticket.[339]
He convinced his foes that the Nebraska bill was a daring device in behalf of freedom. One Republican said that the plan of Douglas for destroying the Missouri line and thereby opening the way for the march of freedom beyond the limits forever prohibited and conceded to belong to the Slave States, and its march westward, from the British possessions to Mexico, struck him "as the most magnificent scheme everconceived by the human mind." This kind of conversation made the deepest impression upon his hearers, and often changed their opinion of the man.[340]
In this way, Douglas triumphantly vindicated his policy of popular sovereignty for which he protested he was willing to devote all his talent and the remainder of his life. The very prospect of such a convert dazzled the vision of even radicals like Greeley. So these visionaries wandered in the dreamland of politics, and were eager to enter into an unholy alliance. Even shrewd leaders in the party built bridges for the entering of Douglas. It was rumored that Seward and others were in the plot.[341]
A letter from Herndon in 1858 vividly shows the political condition of this time. Speaking of Greeley he said, "He evidently wants Douglas sustained and sent back to the Senate. He did not say so in so many words, yet hisfeelingsare with Douglas. Iknowit from the spirit and drift of his conversation. He talked bitterly—somewhat so—against the papers in Illinois, and said they were fools. I asked him this question, 'Greeley, do you want to see a third party organized, or do you want Douglas to ride to power through the North, which he has so much abused and betrayed?' and to which he replied, 'Let the future alone; it will all come right. Douglas is a brave man. Forget the past and sustain the righteous.' Good God,righteous, eh!... By-the-bye, Greeley remarked to me this, 'The Republican standard is too high; we want something practical.'... The Northern Men are cold to me—somewhat repellant."[342]
Douglas, after a heroic combat with the administration and after his triumphant championship of the rights of the people of Kansas, returned as a conqueror to Illinois. Hewas the ideal of the Democrats of his state, save of a few office holders under Buchanan. With Lincoln it was otherwise. Despite his brilliant and consecrated service to the Republican principles, even in Illinois, in the home of his friends, all was not yet serene; he was not yet to taste the sweetness of hero worship. Too proud to resort to dramatic effects, slow to express his resentment, he was almost jealous of the supremacy of his rival. A veteran in the service of freedom, he hardly welcomed the possible entrance of his old foe into the Republican arena. Mingled with personal feeling, was his knowledge of the crafty career of his opponent. Lincoln was not content that Douglas should gain the laurel of a triumphant movement in the hour of victory.
Not alone did Lincoln fear dissension in his own state, but he was also afraid that Douglas might be taken up by the Republican leaders of the party. He grew restless and gloomy at the unjust attitude of Greeley, an attitude that quite vanquished him. To Herndon he unburdened himself, "I think Greeley is not doing me right. His conduct, I believe, savors a little of injustice. I am a true Republican and have been tried already in the hottest part of the anti-slavery fight, and yet I find him taking up Douglas, a veritable dodger,—once a tool of the South, now its enemy,—and pushing him to the front. He forgets that when he does that he pulls me down at the same time. I fear Greeley's attitude will damage me with Sumner, Seward, Wilson, Phillips and other friends in the East."[343]
He had slowly gained the confidence, more than he realized, of the rank of his party. Though loyalty to him was less pretentious, it was not the less sincere. The Republicans in Illinois did not trust Douglas; they were not deceived by his marvelous strategy. Pursuant to a wide spread sentiment,the Republican state convention, with unanimity adopted the significant resolution: "That Hon. Abraham Lincoln is our first and only choice for United States Senator to fill the vacancy about to be created by the expiration of Mr. Douglas' term of office."[344]
One incident shows the enthusiasm of the hour. Cook County brought a banner into the convention inscribed, "Cook County for Abraham Lincoln." A delegate from another county proposed to amend the banner by substituting for "Cook County" the word "Illinois." "The Cook delegation promptly accepted the amendment, and during a hurricane of hurrahs, the banner was altered to express the sentiment of the whole Republican party of the State."[345]
In anticipation of his nomination as Senator, Lincoln had carefully prepared an address of acceptance. It was delivered on the 17th of June, 1858, in the presence of an immense audience at Springfield. At the time, it was perhaps the most radical speech that had yet burst forth from a Republican statesman. It is not strange that it astounded his friends. It baffled their comprehension to find him at a single stride in the front rank of the radicals. Herndon, the aggressive abolitionist, was alike bewildered, saying of the first paragraph that it was true; but asking if it was entirelypoliticto read or speak it as it was written. Lincoln said that it made no difference; that it was a truth of all human experience; that he wanted to use some universally known figure, expressed in simple language as universally known that might strike home to the minds of men, in order to rouse them to the peril of the times; that he would rather bedefeated with that expressionin the speech, and have it held up and discussed before the people, than to bevictorious without it.[346]
Lamon questioned whether Lincoln had a clear right to indulge in such a venture, as a representative party man in a close contest, having other interests than his own in charge, and bound to respect the opinions, and secure the success of his party. Lamon states that at the Bloomington Conventionhe uttered the same ideas in almost the same words; and their recognition of a state of incipient civil war in a country for the most part profoundly peaceful,—these, and the bloody work which might come of their acceptance by a great party, had filled the minds of some of his hearers with the most painful apprehensions; the theory was equally shocking to them, whether as partisans or as patriots. Begged to suppress such speech in the future, he vindicated his utterance, but after much persuasion, promised at length not to repeat it.[347]
The night before its delivery, at a gathering of his close friends, Lincoln slowly read the first paragraph. No uncertain, unsparing criticisms followed. It was called "a fool utterance," ahead of the time, a statement that would frighten many voters.[348]Only one auditor, his partner, approved the far-reaching statement, saying, "Lincoln, deliver it just as it reads. It is in advance of the times, let us—you and I, if no one else—lift the people to the level of this speech now, higher hereafter. The speech is true, wise and politic, and will succeed now or in the future. Nay, it will aid you, if it will not make you President of the United States."
Then Lincoln rose from his chair, walked backwards and forwards in the hall, stopped and said that he had thought about the matter a great deal, had weighed the question from all corners, and was thoroughly convinced the time had come when it should be uttered; and that if he must go down because of that speech, he would go down linked to truth, and would say again and again that the nation could not live on injustice.[349]
This speech stands alone among American orations. Captivating in its logic, marvellous in its directness, condensedin utterance, it is as true to Lincoln as the reply to Hayne was to Webster. It is one of the most momentous addresses in American history. It became the angry battle ground of local and general campaigns. It directed the issues of national parties. In a transitional period with the hand of genius it peerlessly traced party demarcation lines. For the moment in advance of the national progress it soon became the very gospel of multitudes, the war cry of the friends of the Union. Plainer to the average man than the fine phrase of Seward as to "the irrepressible conflict," it brought home to the daily worker the issues of the hour, put him face to face with the deep meaning of the whole struggle going on in his very presence. Its strength was in this—that it put in clear speech the question that was agitating the common mind and thus gave it form and being before other men. With prophetic solemnity he indulged in the philosophic utterance that the slavery agitation would not cease until a crisis should be reached and passed, saying: "'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 that 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 the course of ultimate distinction, 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."[350]
Lincoln in the loneliness of his soul passed upon the solemn issue that the hour for speech and action had come; that the time of compromise was over; that justice would no longer be trifled with; that the law of humanity spurnedfurther outrage. He gave voice to the hitherto silent sentiments of many. The period for the judicious utterance of radical truth had come. In a few years what then seemed the outburst of a perverted attitude became the common thought of the multitude.
And so again Lincoln showed his keen sense of the drift of events. In this he was wiser than the pure politicians. When events justified his foresight, some were found who cherished the notion that Lincoln was guided by self-seeking motives in his radical advocacy. Two biographers think that Lincoln was quietly dreaming of the Presidency, and edging himself to a place in advance, where the tide might take him up in 1860; that as sectional animosities, far from subsiding, were growing deeper and stronger with time, Lincoln knew that the next nominee of the exclusively Northern party must be a man of radical views, and so the speech was intended to take the wind out of Seward's sails.[351]
The biographer who sees a plotting, scheming Lincoln in all this is far from understanding the real man. For mingled with his political sagacity was a sublime communion with the mighty spirit of world justice. Elated at the approaching clash of freedom and slavery, believing that out of the conflict would come a better humanity, he rejoicingly dwelt in the pure realm of the unfettered utterance of a truth, far above the stifling valley of commonplace diplomacy. To him it was a rare moment of utter freedom without calculation, moving through regions of unclouded justice and righteous outlook.
Criticism bitter and biting of political friends did not shake his serenity or his belief in his diagnosis of the national disease. He lived so long with the solution, that he showed the calmness of a historian in judging passing events. Slowto value highly his own service, he was proudly aware of the intrinsic worth of this utterance. To a friend who said that the foolish speech would kill him, Lincoln replied that if he had to draw a pen across, and erase his whole life from existence, and he had one poor gift or choice left, as to what he would save from the wreck, he would choose that speech, and leave it to the world unerased.[352]
Withal, the speech was wisely framed. It aroused the fear of the Northerners with the statement that they would lie down pleasantly dreaming that the people of Missouri were on the verge of making their State free, and they would awake to the reality instead that the Supreme Court had made Illinois a slave state.[353]The dread that slavery might invade the free States of the North, as it ceased to be something more than a possibility, haunted and horrified the North. Some who bore with complacency the servitude of the black men in the distance fumed with anger as they contemplated even a prospect of a closer relation of the institution. Thus the self interest of the North was played upon. This practical danger more than all abstract arguments awakened free communities. Douglas saw the danger of this appeal. He could no longer hold North and South. It put him on the defensive. Lincoln forced the fighting. It became necessary for Douglas to make the speech of Lincoln the basis of his discussion.
Lincoln weighed his speech at its soul value, and measured its truth and worth in lonely struggle. No counsel could stay his purpose. He had come upon another crisis in his career. He could no longer compromise with himself in safety, the hour of decision could not be delayed. He faced defeat in all its darkness but afar he saw the star of simple duty. If he had faltered or cringed he might have becomeSenator, but that distinction only would have crowned him. He had the rare perception of knowing when to be firm as the earth beneath, of distinguishing between policy and principle, of ever keeping his integrity unsullied by barter or bargain. It is noteworthy that the very speech politicians deemed the graveyard of his career in reality became his apotheosis. The politician of Illinois became a national leader. From that time, he loomed large in the history of the Republican party and was regarded as wise in counsel and brave in speech. Before Seward, he put in concrete utterance the very philosophy of Republicanism. And that party had reason to regard him with favor as a possible guide in the gathering contest.
This speech gave Lincoln a prominence that led to the dramatic debates with Douglas and that fastened the attention of the nation on the combat. The Lincoln-Douglas controversy was the fruition of this Springfield speech. This address is the most fitting line of demarcation between Lincoln the Citizen of Illinois and Lincoln the Citizen of the United States.
The political condition of a nation is a symptom of its health or disease. Official corruption is an unfailing sign of national degeneration. Art, science and commerce may thrive, yet if dishonesty and selfishness rule in the administration of public affairs, there is no substantial progress. The real civilization of a nation can advance little beyond the state of public service. When citizens are indifferent to the general welfare, when the rights of the many are entrusted to the designing, when talent is dedicated to the acquisition of wealth or the mere promotion of art, then in spite of mountain high learning and world wide commercial prosperity, a nation is in the domain of danger.
A crisis reveals the potency of the politician and statesman. When war or internal conflict shows its "wrinkled front," then the merchant, the manufacturer, the artist, and the scientist forget their pride. The true politician is the incarnation of civil patriotism and guards the nation during the long days of peace, with an unfailing heroism like that of the soldier in the sudden test of war. The devotion of the civil hero is not spectacular and is often undervalued. The whole history of humanity has been a giant effort to beget a democracy where the genius of the few shall become the possession of many. When a nation cannot command the best heart and brain of its citizens for its service it is bankrupt.
The problem of Democratic government is the maintenance of a just balance between the radical and conservative elements of society, between anarchy and apathy. American history was for a long time largely a struggle between visionary abolitionist and slavery adherent. Northern reformers turned all Southerners into vigorous advocates of human bondage, while Southern radicals finally abolitionized the North. Slaveholders were the children of a long established selfish interest. Abolitionists were possessed of a vision. Neither understood the other. Rock and cloud were not more unlike. Each saw only the injustice in the opposing position, and had no charity for the environment and traditions of the other. There could be no compromise between a Wendell Phillips and a Preston Brooks. War was the only solution.
Statesmanship looks to the preservation of the primal principles of the Republic, favors the general welfare whenever circumstances permit, seeks its progressive evolution, encourages prudent reform, a reform that is not the parent of reaction. It avoids alike the radicalism of the demagogue and the stagnation of the materialist. While stupid conservatism is unwittingly the main friend of anarchy, statesmanship is its chief foe. The stability of the Republic depends on wise leadership, courageous enough to combat violence on the one hand and greed on the other.
Egoism and foolish fears are the chief obstacles of human progress. Self interest being the main source of human action, it is the problem of the politician to quicken the public conscience and convince the community that advancement and enlightened selfishness are companions. Altruism is a large factor in human evolution, yet not so basic that it may be made the foundation of abiding government. It is a high mission to lead the people to the conception of making selfinterest an every day servant of the general welfare.
Expediency is as essential to the triumph of right as to that of wrong. Cunning materialism may vanquish virtue that is a stranger to wisdom, but prudent integrity never knows final defeat. The following of visions without purpose is as vain as the worship of debasing worldliness. Politics is a larger phase of life than the idealist comprehends, while ideas are more dominant than politicians dream.
In an ideal state diplomats would be no more essential than the physician, lawyer, jurist and minister. Compromise finds its basis in human weakness, conservatism and selfishness. The history of humanity is written in blood and tears largely because men have been prone to passion and prejudice rather than true to reason and judgment. Politics is the art of securing results in government. It is a study of success applied to legislation and administration.
There are few problems of larger moment than the general acceptance of the wisest policy in combating established and organized evil. Civilization itself depends on the manner in which the unresting battle between the constructive and destructive forces in society is conducted and decided. Mighty empires have flourished and fallen, democracies have sprung to life and decayed, dauntless protesters have sacrificed on the altar of conviction, even nations under the spirit of high impulses have for a short time followed the banner of the brotherhood of man. Yet in spite of ages of progress, of heroic martyrdom, the battle is still of the same character as the conflict was on the plains of Palestine, the banks of the Nile and the seven hills of Rome. Human nature has changed largely in outer manifestations, not in essential character. The selfishness of man, vested interests, fear of change, still stand in the way of righteous reforms, which are now as bitterly contested as they were by the patriciansof Latium and the barons of the middle ages. In the conflicts of centuries good men have sunk sometimes in a fearless, sometimes in an imprudent encounter with the host of cohesive and malignant interests. Selfish motives unite the supporters of evil, while the forces of righteousness are often discordant and rent with civil feuds. Economic interest is the influence that makes evil gregarious.
Lincoln conceived his plan of warfare on the organized evil of his time in wisdom. He attacked it at its weakest point, its injustice and its bad policy. He made it not only an ethical issue, but an economic one as well. He understood that reform must be founded on self interest as well as on justice. He fought the evil and not the wrong doer. He was aware of the influence of environment on the opinions of men whenever property rights were involved and so would not exact nor expect too much of the individual. He did not favor premature reform, knowing that it was not permanent. A foe to slavery, yet for a long time he was not a friend of abolitionism. He longed for the emancipation of the black man, yet would not buy it by attacks on the Constitution or on the compromises of the statesmen of the Republic.
He admitted the evil of slavery, yet recognized the institution as far as the law sanctioned its existence. So he would fight its transfer to new territory where it had no legal right of entrance. He would circumscribe and starve it, would favor compensated emancipation, and thus slowly and safely eradicate the evil from the nation. His political philosophy is worthy of the study of every citizen, patriot and reformer, of every man who believes in the dawn of better ages. His greatness consists in never having relinquished his lofty ideal in all of the materialism of daily compromise, and in never forgetting charity, justice and policy in his communion withworld-shaking ideas.
No man in history longed for the triumph of justice more earnestly than Abraham Lincoln. He hated evil. Still his main purpose was the preservation of the principles of the republic. Rather than endanger them, the larger good, he would hesitate to begin a campaign against organized selfishness. Such battles for humanity require good generalship as well as those of cannon, fife and drum. It is not enough to hate evil, to strike at it in the dark. To husband strength, to bide the time, to await the solemn moment for attack, is political generalship, a generalship that is as essential in the Senate as on the battlefield.
He was willing to engage in the hard mission of educating men to believe that brotherhood was a more substantial foundation for humanity than hatred and selfishness. There was nothing of Don Quixote in his warfare. Democracy was his religion, the source of his strength and the secret of his influence. All that he was, he largely owed to the privileges of the Republic, to the support of the plain people. He believed in them with a rare faith and they trusted him with remarkable fidelity, as the incarnation of the higher humanity. He was in harmony with the onward movement of sanity, justice and manhood. Charity to all was his platform, justice his program, democracy his guide. His spirit is the spirit of the new age. He almost marks as distinguished an advance in American history as Moses did in that of Israel.
The politician blindly follows, while the statesman wisely educates public sentiment. In his political philosophy Lincoln gave due weight to the potency of the general opinion of mankind. He said, "He who molds public sentiment goes deeper than he who enacts statutes or pronounces decisions. He makes statutes or decisions possible or impossible to beexecuted." He well knew the principle, so paltrily recognized, by even modern legislators, that it is far more vital to prepare the public mind for righteous legislation than prematurely to pass laws. It would be well to write his supreme statement relating to public sentiment in every legislative hall and judicial tribunal in the whole land. An educated public sentiment will soon enough secure the passage of appropriate legislation, and what is more essential, see to it that it is enforced. The curse of American politics is the passage of multitudinous enactments to please certain organized interests and the deliberate indifference, if not hostility, of public sentiment to their subsequent enforcement. The problem will be far from settled until fewer laws are passed, and such enactments are religiously enforced. Lincoln would not aid in the passage of a law not intended to be enforced or incapable in the common course of events of being substantially enforced, and he recognized that legislation should be a practical science based on the actual character, the ability of a people to move forward. Froward reform is almost as pernicious as selfish conservatism.
So complete was Lincoln's mastery over the masses that many have misunderstood the power of his genius as merely following public opinion. He did infinitely more. He studied the capacity of men for progress, slowly leading them to the higher altitude. Lincoln recognized the limitations of average human advance; that the mind and heart move slowly in the march of centuries. He worked with the materials at hand and builded on the solid foundation of the real national character. He did not stand in the direct way of events, still he deemed it a duty ever to guide them toward the goal of an advancing civilization.
The attitude of Lincoln to party organization is of commanding interest. There was no more valiant, earnest workerin the Whig ranks. None can question his devotion to the routine, burdensome labor of the campaign. In making speeches, in writing platforms, in arranging meetings, in issuing circulars, and in the tiring work at the polls, he was a persistent toiler, a loyal partisan. In the Legislature he usually voted with his associates. He often sought to strengthen the party in the selection of office holders.
He believed in organized political action. He remained a trusted leader in the party of his choice, seldom alienating himself from the party managers, or the rank and file. Still he was no slave of party or caucus. His party, town or state, could not buy or bribe his integrity, or get him to be false to his duty. He believed that parties were useful to democratic government as long as they were substantially in harmony with its deeper objects. Still he did not deem them sacred, and when circumstances demanded, favored their dissolution, and the organization of new parties. He was one of the few politicians in American history who acted on the conviction that the man who served his state best, best served his party. Having no sympathy with anarchy in politics, he gave full value to the importance of the organization, but did not exalt it into an object of adoration. Above it, he placed loyalty to the Constitution and the fathers of the country. He was neither mugwump nor partisan.