John Torrey Morse

Abraham Lincoln


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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.

      … "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.

      … "We cannot absolutely know that all these exact adaptations are the result of preconcert. But when we see a lot of framed timbers, different portions of which we know have been gotten out at different times and places and by different workmen—Stephen, Franklin, Roger, and James, for instance—and when we see these timbers joined together, and see they exactly make the frame of a house or a mill, all the tenons and mortices exactly fitting, and all the lengths and proportions of the different pieces exactly adapted to their respective places, and not a piece too many or too few—not omitting even scaffolding; or, if a single piece be lacking, we see the place in the frame exactly fitted and prepared yet to bring such piece in—in such a case, we find it impossible not to believe that Stephen and Franklin and Roger and James all understood one another from the beginning, and all worked upon a common plan or draft drawn up before the first blow was struck.

      "It should not be overlooked that by the Nebraska bill the people of a State as well as a Territory were to be left 'perfectly free,' 'subject only to the Constitution.' Why mention a State? … Why is mention of this lugged into this merely territorial law?

      … "Put this and that together, and we have another nice little niche, which we may erelong see filled with another Supreme Court decision, declaring that the Constitution of the United States does not permit a State to exclude slavery from its limits. And this may especially be expected if the doctrine of 'care not whether slavery be voted down or voted up' shall gain upon the public mind sufficiently to give promise that such a decision can be maintained when made. Such a decision is all that slavery now lacks of being alike lawful in all the States." Following out this idea, Lincoln repeatedly put to Douglas a question to which he could never get a direct answer from his nimble antagonist: "If a decision is made, holding that the people of the States cannot exclude slavery, will he support it, or not?"

       Concerning sectionalism, Lincoln countered fairly enough on his opponent by asking: Was it, then, the case that it was slavery which was national, and freedom which was sectional? Or, "Is it the true test of the soundness of a doctrine that in some places people won't let you proclaim it?" But the remainder of Douglas's assault was by no means to be disposed of by quick retort. When Lincoln was pushed to formulate accurately his views concerning the proper status of the negro in the community, he had need of all his extraordinary care in statement. Herein lay problems that were vexing many honest citizens and clever men besides himself, and were breeding much disagreement among persons who all were anti-slavery in a general way, but could by no means reach a comfortable unison concerning troublesome particulars. The "all men free and equal" of the Constitution, and the talk about human brotherhood, gave the Democrats wide scope for harassing anti-slavery men with vexatious taunts and embarrassing cross-interrogatories on practical points. "I do not question," said Douglas, "Mr. Lincoln's conscientious belief that the negro was made his equal, and hence is his brother. But for my own part, I do not regard the negro as my equal, and positively deny that he is my brother, or any kin to me whatever." He said that "the signers of the Declaration had no reference to the negro, … or any other inferior and degraded race, when they spoke of the equality of men," but meant only "white men, of European birth and descent." This topic opens the whole subject of Lincoln's political affiliations and of his opinions concerning slavery and the negro, opinions which seem to have undergone no substantial change during the interval betwixt this campaign and his election to the presidency. Some selections from what he said may sufficiently explain his position.

      At Freeport, August 27, replying to a series of questions from Douglas, he declared that he had supposed himself, "since the organization of the Republican party at Bloomington, in May, 1856, bound as a party man by the platforms of the party, then and since." He said: "I do not now, nor ever did, stand in favor of the unconditional repeal of the Fugitive Slave Law." He believed that under the Constitution the Southerners were entitled to such a law; but thought that the existing law "should have been framed so as to be free from some of the objections that pertain to it, without lessening its efficiency." He would not "introduce it as a new subject of agitation upon the general question of slavery."

      He should be "exceedingly sorry" ever to have to pass upon the question of admitting more slave States into the Union, and exceedingly glad to know that another never would be admitted. But "if slavery shall be kept out of the Territories during the territorial existence of any one given Territory, and then the people shall, having a fair chance and a clear field, when they come to adopt their constitution, do such an extraordinary thing as to adopt a slave constitution, uninfluenced by the actual presence of the institution among them, I see no alternative, if we own the country, but to admit them into the Union." He should also, he said, be "exceedingly glad to see slavery abolished in the District of Columbia," and he believed that Congress