20. LINCOLN-DOUGLAS DEBATE-DOUGLAS'S

OPENING SPEECH

(Delivered at Ottawa, Ill., August 21, 1858.)

IT WAS Lincoln's debates with Douglas in 1858 that first brought him prominently before the whole country and (with his Cooper Union speech of February 27, 1860) procured for him the Republican nomination for the presidency.

In 1854 Lincoln failed by only four votes in the Illinois legislature of election to the United States Senate; and in 1858 he was again put forward as candidate by the Republican State convention at Springfield, in opposition to Douglas, who was seeking re-election. Lincoln accepted the nomination the same day (June 17th) in a speech clearly reviewing the national issues; Douglas replied at Chicago, July 9th; and the next evening Lincoln answered him. After further interchanges of speeches, a series of seven joint debates was arranged, which took place at Ottawa, Freeport, Jonesboro, Charleston, Galesburg, Quincy, and Alton, Ill., the first on August 21, the last on October 15, 1858. The first speaker in each debate was allowed one hour, his opponent was given one hour and a half for reply, and then the first speaker closed the debate in a rejoinder of one-half hour. In this and the following section are

STEPHEN ARNOLD DOUGLAS. Born in Vermont, 1813; removed to New York, in 1830, and to Illinois in 1833; studied law, and admitted to the bar, 1834; AttorneyGeneral, 1834-35; member of Illinois legislature, 1836; appointed Secretary of State (Illinois), 1840; elected Judge of Supreme Court, 1841; in U. S. Congress, 1843-47; Senator from Illinois, 1847-61; nominated for Presidency by Democratic National Convention, at Baltimore, 1860; died, 1861.

given Douglas's opening speech, and Lincoln's reply; Douglas's rejoinder closing the first debate is omitted as dealing with personalities of no great importance.

Douglas was a political leader of first-class ability, and was at this time at the height of his career. He had invented the doctrine of Popular Sovereignty, as a solution of the slavery question which should prove acceptable alike to Northern and Southern Democrats, and looked forward with some confidence to his election to the presidency in 1860. Compared with Lincoln, Douglas was better practiced in the arts of debate; but in the discussion of principles, the remorseless logic of Lincoln placed Douglas at his mercy. Douglas did not, however, make the mistake of underrating his awkward and ungainly opponent. "I shall have my hands full," he is reported to have said. "He is the strong man of his party-full of wit, facts, dates-and the best stump-speaker, with his droll ways and dry jokes, in the West. He is as honest as he is shrewd; and if I beat him, my victory will be hardly won." dotes of Public Men, II, p. 179.)

(Forney, Anec

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[STEPHEN A. DOUGLAS, at Ottawa, Ill., August 21, 1858.]

ADIES AND GENTLEMEN: I appear before you today for the purpose of discussing the leading political topics which now agitate the public mind. By an arrangement between Mr. Lincoln and myself, we are present here today for the purpose of having a joint discussion, as the representatives of the two great political parties of the State and Union, upon the principles in issue between those parties; and this vast concourse of people shows the deep feeling which pervades the public mind in regard to the questions dividing us.

Prior to 1854, this country was divided into two great political parties, known as the Whig and Democratic par

ties. Both were national and patriotie, advocating principles that were universal in their application. An old-line Whig could proclaim his principles in Louisiana and Massachusetts alike. Whig principles had no boundary sectional line: they were not limited by the Ohio river, nor by the Potomac, nor by the line of the free and slave States, but applied and were proclaimed wherever the Constitution ruled or the American flag waved over the American soil. So it was and so it is with the great Democratic party, which from the days of Jefferson until this period has proven itself to be the historic party of this nation. While the Whig and Democratic parties differed in regard to a bank, the tariff, distribution, the specie circular, and the sub-treasury, they agreed on the great slavery question which now agitates the Union. I say that the Whig party and the Democratic party agreed on the slavery question, while they differed on those matters of expediency to which I have referred. The Whig party and the Democratic party jointly adopted the compromise measures of 1850 as the basis of a proper and just solution of the slavery question in all its forms. Clay was the great leader, with Webster on his right and Cass on his left and sustained by the patriots in the Whig and Democratic ranks, who had devised and enacted the compromise measures of 1850.

During the session of Congress of 1853-54, I introduced into the Senate of the United States a bill to organize the Territories of Kansas and Nebraska on that principle which had been adopted in the compromise measures of 1850, approved by the Whig party and the Democratic party in Illinois in 1851, and indorsed by the Whig party and the Democratic party in national'convention in 1852. In order that there might be no misunderstanding in relation to the principle involved in the Kansas and Nebraska bill, I put forth the true intent and meaning of the act in these words: "It is the true intent and meaning of this act not to legislate slavery into any State or Territory, or to exclude it

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therefrom, but to leave the people thereof perfectly free to form and regulate their domestic institutions in their own way, subject only to the Federal Constitution." Thus you see that to 1854, when the Kansas and Nebraska bill was brought into Congress for the purpose of carrying out the principles which both parties had up to that time indorsed and approved, there had been no division in this country in regard to that principle, except the opposition of the Abolitionists.

In 1854 Mr. Abraham Lincoln and Mr. Lyman Trumbull entered into an arrangement, one with the other, and each with his respective friends, to dissolve the old Whig party on the one hand, and to dissolve the old Democratic party on the other, and to connect the members of both into an Abolition party, under the name and disguise of a Republican party. The terms of that arrangement between Lincoln and Trumbull have been published by Lincoln's special friend, James H. Matheny, Esq.; and they were that Lincoln should have General Shield's place in the United States Senate, which was then about to become vacant, and that Trumbull should have my seat when my term expired. Lincoln went to work to Abolitionize the old Whig party all over the State, pretending that he was then as good a Whig as ever; and Trumbull went to work in his part of the State preaching Abolitionism in its milder and lighter form, and trying to Abolitionize the Democratic party and bring old Democrats handcuffed and bound hand and foot into the Abolition camp. In pursuance of the arrangement, the parties met at Springfield in October, 1854, and proclaimed their new platform. Lincoln was to bring into the Abolition camp the old-line Whigs and transfer them over to Giddings, Chase, Fred Douglass, and Parson Lovejoy, who were ready to receive them and christen them in their new faith. They laid down on that occasion a platform for their new Republican party, which was thus to be constructed. I have the resolutions of the State convention then held, which was the first mass State convention ever

held in Illinois by the Black Republican party, and I now hold them in my hands and will read a part of them, and cause the others to be printed. Here are the most important and material resolutions of this Abolition platform:

"Resolved, That the times imperatively demand the reorganization of parties, and, repudiating all previous party attachments, names, and predilections, we unite ourselves together in defense of the liberty and Constitution of the country, and will hereafter co-operate as the Republican party, pledged to the accomplishment of the following purposes: to bring the administration of the government back to the control of first principles; to restore Nebraska and Kansas to the position of free Territories; that, as the Constitution of the United States vests in the States and not in Congress the power to legislate for the extradition of fugitives from labor, to repeal and entirely abrogate the fugitive-slave law; to restrict slavery to those States in which it exists; to prohibit the admission of any more slave States into the Union; to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia; to exclude slavery from all the Territories over which the general government has exclusive jurisdiction; and to resist the acquirement of any more Territories unless the practice of slavery therein forever shall have been prohibited."

My object in reading these resolutions was to put the question to Abraham Lincoln this day, whether he now stands and will stand by each article in that creed, and carry it out. [1] I desire to know whether Mr. Lincoln to-day stands as he did in 1854, in favor of the (unconditional repeal of the fugitive-slave law. [2] I desire him to answer whether he stands pledged to-day, as he did in 1854, against the admission of any more slave States into the Union, even if the people want them. [3] I want to know whether he stands pledged against the admission of a new State into the Union with such a constitution as the