because it is not religion. Then where is the place to oppose it?
There is no suitable place to oppose it. There is no plan in the
country to oppose this evd overspreading the continent, which you
say yourself is coming. Frank Blair and Grata lb-own tried to get
up a system of gradual emancipation in Missouri, had an election in
August, and got beat ; and yon, Mr. Democrat, threw up your hat
and hallooed, "Hurrah for Democracy!"

So I say again, that in regard to the arguments that are made,
when Judge Douglas says he " don't care whether slavery is voted
up or voted down," whether he means that as an individual ex-
pression of sentiment, or only as a sort of statement of his views
on national policy, it is alike true to say that he can thus argue
logically if he don't see anything wrong in it; but he cannot say SO
logically if he admits that slavery is wrong. He cannot say that he
would as soon see a wrong voted up as voted down. When Judge
Douglas says that whoever or whatever community wants slaves.
they have a right to have them, he is perfectly logical if there is
nothing wrong in the institution; but if you admit that it is wrong,
he cannot logically say that anybody has a right to do wrong'. When
he says that slave property and horse and hog property are alike to
be allowed to go into the Territories, upon the principles of equality, he
is reasoning truly if there is no difference between them as property j
but if the one is property, held rightfully, and the other is wrong,
then there is no equality between the right and wrong; SO that, turn



ADDRESSES AND LETTERS OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN 465

it in any way you can, in all the arguments sustaining the Dem-
ocratic policy, and in that policy itself, there is a careful, studied
exclusion of the idea that there is anything wrong in slavery. Let
us understand this. I am not, just here, trying to prove that we are
right and they are wrong. I have been stating where we and they
stand, and trying to show what is the real difference between us ;
and I now say that whenever we can get the question distinctly
stated, — can get all these men who believe that slavery is in some of
these respects wrong, to stand and act with us in treating it as a
wrong, — then, and not till then, I think, will we in some way come
to an end of this slavery agitation.

Mr. Douglas's Reply in the Quincy Joint Debate.

Ladies and Gentlemen: Permit me to say that unless silence is
observed it will be impossible for me to be heard by this immense
crowd, and my friends can confer no higher favor upon me than by
omitting all expressions of applause or approbation. I desire to be
heard rather than to be applauded. I wish to address myself to
your reason, your judgment, your sense of justice, and not to your
passions.

I regret that Mr. Lincoln should have deemed it proper for him to
again indulge in gross personalities and base insinuations in regard
to the Springfield resolutions. It has imposed upon me the necessity
of using some portion of my time for the purpose of calling your at-
tention to the facts of the case, and it will then be for you to say
what you think of a man who can predicate such a charge upon the
circumstances he has in this. I had seen the platform adopted by
a Republican congressional convention held in Aurora, the second
congressional district, in September, 1854, published as purporting to
be the platform of the Republican party. That platform declared that
the Republican party was pledged never to admit another slave State
into the Union, and also that it was pledged to prohibit slavery in all
the Territories of the United States, — not only all that we then had,
but all that we should thereafter acquire, — and to repeal uncondition-
ally the fugitive-slave law, abolish slavery in the District of Columbia,
and prohibit the slave-trade between the different States. These and
other articles against slavery were contained in this platform, and
unanimously adopted by the Republican congressional convention
in that district. I had also seen that the Republican congressional
conventions at Rockford, in the first district, and at Bloomington, in
the third, had adopted the same platform that year, nearly word for
word, and had declared it to be the platform of the Republican party.
I had noticed that Major Thomas L. Harris, a member of Congress
from the Springfield district, had ref erred to that platform in a speech
in Congress, as having been adopted by the first Republican State
convention which assembled in Illinois. "When I had occasion to use
the fact in this canvass, I wrote to Major Harris to know on what
day that convention was held, and to ask him to send me its proceed-
ings. He being sick, Charles H. Lanphier answered my letter by
sending me the published proceedings of the convention held at
Vol. L— 30.



466 ADDRESSES AND LETTERS OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN

Springfield on the 5th of October, 1854, as they appeared in the re-
port of the "State Register." I read those resolutions from that
newspaper the same as any of you would refer hack and quote any
fact from the files of a newspaper which had published it. Mr. Lin-
coln pretends that after I had so quoted those resolutions he discov-
ered that they had never been adopted at Springfield. He does not
deny their adoption by the Republican party at Aurora, at Bloom-
ington, and at Rockford, and by nearly all the Republican county
conventions in northern Illinois where his party is in a majority; but
merely because they were not adopted on the "spot" on which I said
they were, he chooses to quibble about the place rather than meet and
discuss the merits of the resolutions themselves. I stated when I quoted
them that I did so from the " State Register." I gave my authority.
Lincoln bebeved at the time, as he has since admitted, that they had
been adopted at Springfield, as published. Does he believe now that
I did not tell the truth when I quoted those resolutions? He knows
in his heart that I quoted them in good faith, believing at the time
that they had been adopted at Springfield. I would consider myself
an infamous wretch if, under such circumstances, I could charge any
man with being a party to a trick or a fraud. And I will tell him,
too, that it will not do to charge a forgery on Charles H. Lanphier or
Thomas L. Harris. No man on earth, who knows them, and knows
Lincoln, would take his oath against their word. There are not two
men in the State of Illinois who have higher characters for truth, for
integrity, for moral character, and for elevation of tone, as gentle-
men, than Mr. Lanphier and Mr. Harris. Any man who attempts to
make such charges as Mr. Lincoln has indulged in against them, only
proclaims himself a slanderer.

I will now show you that I stated with entire fairness, as soon as
it was made known to me, that there was a mistake about the spot
where the resolutions had been adopted, although their truthfulness,
as a declaration of the principles of the Republican party, had not
and could not be questioned. I did not wait for Lincoln to point out
the mistake ; but the moment I discovered it, I made a speech, and
published it to the world, correcting the error. I corrected it my-
self, as a gentleman and an honest man, and as I always feel proud
to do when I have made a mistake. I wish Mr. Lincoln could show
that he has acted with equal fairness and truthfulness when I have
convinced him that he has been mistaken. I will give you an illus-
tration to show you how he acts in a similar rase : In a speech at
Springfield he charged Chief Justice Taney and his associates. Presi-
dent Pierce, President Buchanan, and myself, with having entered
into a conspiracy at the time the Nebraska bill was introduced, by
which the Dred Scott decision was to be made by the Supreme Court,
in order to carry slavery everywhere under the Constitution. Lcalled
his attention to the fact that at the time alluded to — to wit, the intro-
duction of the Nebraska bill — it was not possible that such a conspir-
acy could have been entered into, for the reason that the Dred Scott
case had never been taken before the Supreme Court, and was not
taken before it for a year after; and I asked him to take back that
charge. Did he do it? I showed him that it was impossible that



ADDEESSES AND LETTEKS OF ABEAHAM LINCOLN 467

the charge could be true ; I proved it by the record, and I then called
upon him to retract his false charge. What was his answer? Instead
of coming out like an honest man and doing so, he reiterated the
charge, and said that if the case had not gone up to the Supreme
Court from the courts of Missouri at the time he charged that the
judges of the Supreme Court entered into the conspiracy, yet that
there was an understanding with the Democratic owners of Dred
Scott that they would take it up. I have since asked him who the
Democratic owners of Dred Scott were, but he cordd not tell. And
why? Because there were no such Democratic owners in existence.
Dred Scott at the time was owned by the Rev. Dr. Chaffee, an Aboli-
tion member of Congress, of Springfield, Massachusetts, in right of
his wife. He was owned by one of Lincoln's friends, and not by
Democrats at all ; his case was conducted in court by Abolition
lawyers, so that both the prosecution and the defense were in the
hands of the Abolition political friends of Mr. Lincoln.

Notwithstanding I thus proved by the record that his charge
against the Supreme Court was false, instead of taking it back, he
resorted to another false charge to sustain the infamy of it. He also
charged President Buchanan with having been a party to the con-
spiracy. I directed his attention to the fact that the charge could
not possibly be true, for the reason that at the time specified Mr.
Buchanan was not in America, but was three thousand miles off,
representing the United States at the Court of St. James, and had
been there for a year previous, and did not return till three years
afterward. Yet I never could get Mr. Lincoln to take back his false
charge, although I have called upon him over and over again. He
refuses to do it, and either remains silent or resorts to other tricks
to try and palm his slander off on the country. Therein you will
find the difference between Mr. Lincoln and myself. When I make
a mistake, as an honest man I correct it without being asked to do so ;
but when he makes a false charge, he sticks to it and never corrects it.
One word more in regard to these resolutions : I quoted them at Ottawa
merely to ask Mr. Lincoln whether he stood on that platform. That
was the purpose for which I quoted them. I did not think that I had a
right to put idle questions to him, and I first laid a foundation for my
questions by showing that the principles which I wished him either
to affirm or deny had been adopted by some portion of his friends,
at least, as their creed. Hence I read the resolutions, and put the
questions to him, and he then refused to answer them. Subse-
quently — one week afterward — he did answer a part of them, but
the others he has not answered up to this day.

Now let me call your attention for a moment to the answers
which Mr. Lincoln made at Freeport to the questions which I pro-
pounded to him at Ottawa, based upon the platform adopted by a ma-
jority of the Abolition counties of the State, which now, as then,
supported him. In answer to my question whether he indorsed the
Black Republican principle of " no more slave States," he answered
that he was not pledged against the admission of any more slave
States, but that he would be very sorry if he should ever be placed
in a position where he would have to vote on the question ; that he



468 ADDRESSES AND LETTERS OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN

would rejoice to know that no more slave States would be admitted
into the Union; "but," he added, "if slavery shall be kept out of the
Territories during the territorial existence of any one given Ter-
ritory, and then the people shall, having a fair chance and a clear
field when they come to adopt the constitution, do such an extraordi-
nary 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." The point I
wish him to answer is this : Suppose Congress should not prohibit
slavery in the Territory, and it applied for admission with a consti-
tution recognizing slavery, then how would he vote ? His answer at
Freeport does not applv to any Territory in America I ask you
[turning to Lincoln], will you vote to admit Kansas into the Union,
with just such a constitution as her people want, with slavery or
without, as they shall determine ? He will not answer. I have put
that question to him time and time again, and have not been able to
get an answer out of him. I ask you again, Lincoln, will yon vote
to admit New Mexico, when she has the requisite population, with
such a constitution as her people adopt, either recognizing slavery
or not, as they shall determine? He will not answer. I put the
same question to him in reference to Oregon and the new States to
be carved out of Texas in pursuance of the contract between Texas
and the United States, and he will not answer. He will not answer
these questions in reference to any Territory now in existence, but
says that if Congress should prohibit slavery in a Territory, and
when its people asked for admission as a State they should adopt
slavery as one of their institutions, that he supposes he would have
to let it come in. I submit to you whether that answer of his to my
question does not justify me in saving that he has a fertile genius in
devising language to conceal his thoughts. I ask you whether there
is an intelligent man in America who does not believe that that an-
swer was made for the purpose of concealing what he intended to do.
He wished to make the old-line Whigs believe that he would stand
by the compromise measures of 18.10, which declared that the States
might come into the Union with slavery, or without, as they pleased.
while Lovejoy and his Abolition allies up north explained to the
Abolitionists that in taking this ground he preached good Abolition
doctrine, because his proviso would not apply to any Territory in
America, and therefore there was no chance of his being governed
by it. It would have been quite easy for him to have said that he
would let the people of a State do just as they pleased, it' he desired
to convey such an idea. Why did he not do it ! lie would not an-
swer my question directly because, up north, the Abolition creed
declares that there shall be no more slave States, while down south,
in Adams County, in Coles, and in Sangamon, he and his friends are
afraid to advance that doctrine. Then-fore he gives an evasive and
equivocal answer, to be construed one way in the south and another
way in the north, which, when analyzed, it is apparent is not an
answer at all with reference to any Territory now in existence.

Mr. Lincoln complains that, in my speech* the other day at (Talcs-
burg, I read an extract from a speech delivered by him at Chicago,



ADDRESSES AND LETTERS OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN 469

and then another from his speech at Charleston, and compared
them, thus showing the people that he had one set of principles in
one part of the State and another in the other part. And how does
he answer that charge ? Why, he quotes from his Charleston speech
as I quoted from it, and then quotes another extract from a speech
which he made at another place, which he says is the same as the
extract from his speech at Charleston; but he does not quote the
extract from his Chicago speech, upon which I convicted him of
double-dealing. I quoted from his Chicago speech to prove that he
held one set of principles up north among the Abolitionists, and
from his Charleston speech to prove that he held another set down
at Charleston and in southern Illinois. In his answer to this charge,
he ignores entirely his Chicago speech, and merely argues that he
said the same thing which he said at Charleston at another place.
If he did, it follows that he has twice, instead of once, held one creed
in one part of the State, and a different creed in another part. Up
at Chicago, in the opening of the campaign, he reviewed my reception
speech, and undertook to answer my argument attacking his favorite
doctrine of negro equality. I had shown that it was a falsification
of the Declaration of Independence to pretend that that instrument
applied to and included negroes in the clause declaring that all men
are created equal. What was Lincoln's reply? I will read from
his Chicago speech, and the one which he did not quote, and dare not
quote, in this part of the State. He said :

I should like to know if, taking this old Declaration of Independence,
which declares that all men are equal upon principle, and making excep-
tions to it, where will it stop ? If one man says it does not mean a negro,
why may not another man say it does not mean another man? If that
declaration is not the truth, let us get this statute-book in which we find it
and tear it out.

There you find that Mr. Lincoln told the Abolitionists of Chicago
that if the Declaration of Independence did not declare that the
negro was created by the Almighty the equal of the white man, that
you ought to take that instrument and tear out the clause which says
that all men are created equal. But let me call your attention to
another part of the same speech. You know that in his Charleston
speech, an extract from which he has read, he declared that the negro
belongs to an inferior race, is physically inferior to the white man,
and should always be kept in an inferior position. I will now read
to you what he said at Chicago on that point. In concluding his
speech at that place, he remarked:

My friends, I have detained you about as long as I desire to do, and I
have only to say, let us discard all this quibbling about this man and the
other man — this race and that race and the other race being inferior, and
therefore they must be placed in an inferior position, discarding our stan-
dard that we have left us. Let us discard all these things, and unite as one
people throughout this land until we shall once more stand up declaring
that all men are created equal.

Thus you see that when addressing the Chicago Abolitionists he
declared that all distinctions of race must be discarded and blotted



470 ADDRESSES AND LETTERS OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN

out, because the negro stood on an equal footing with the white man ;
that if one man said the Declaration of Independence did not mean
a negro when it declared all men created equal, that another man
would say that it did not mean another man ; and hence we ought to
discard all difference between the negro race and all other races, and
declare them all created equal. Did old Giddings, when he came
down among you four years ago, preach more radical Abolitionism
than this? Did Lovejoy, or Lloyd < tarrison, or Wendell Phillips, or
Fred Douglass, ever take higher Abolition grounds than that ? Lin-
coln told you that I had charged him with getting up these personal
attacks to conceal the enormity of his principles, and then com-
menced talking about something else, omitting to quote this part
of his Chicago speech which contained the enormity of his principles
to which I alluded. He knew that I alluded to his negro-equality
doctrines when I spoke of the enormity of his principles, vet he did
not find it convenient to answer on that point. Having sliown you
what he said in his Chicago speech in reference to negroes being
created equal to white men, and about discarding all distinctions
between the two races, I will again read to you what he said at
Charleston :

I will say, then, that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing
about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black
races; that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of making voters of the
free negroes, or jurors, or qualifying them to hold office, or having them to
marry with white people. I will say, in addition, that there is a physical
difference between the white and black races which, I suppose, will forever
forbid the two races living together upon terms of social and political
equality; and inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain to-
gether, there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I, as much
as any other man, am in favor of the superior position being assigned to the
white man.

A voice : " That 's the doctrine."

Mr. Douglas : Yes, sir, that is good doctrine ; but Mr. Lincoln is
afraid to advocate it in the latitude of Chicago, where he hopes to get
his votes. It is good doctrine in the anti- Abolition counties for him,
and his Chicago speech is good doctrine in the Abolition counties.
I assert, on the authority of these two speeches of Mr. Lincoln, that
he holds one set of principles in the Abolition counties, and a differ-
ent and contradictory set in the other counties. I do not question
that he said at Ottawa what he quoted, but that only convicts him
further, by proving that he has twice contradicted himself instead of
once. Let me ask him why he cannot avow his principles the same
in the north as in the south — the same iu every county, if he has a
conviction that they are just ? But I forgot — he would not be a Re-
publican if his principles would apply alike to every part of the
country. The party to which he belongs is bounded and limited by geo-
graphical lines. "With their principles they cannot even cross the Mis-
sissippi River on your ferry-boats. They cannot cross over the Ohio
into Kentucky. Lincoln himself cannot visit the land of his fathers,
the scenes of his childhood, the graves of his ancestors, and carry
his Abolition principles, as he declared them at Chicago, with him.



ADDRESSES AND LETTERS OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN 471

This Republican organization appeals to the North against the
South; it appeals to Northern passion, Northern prejudice, and
Northern ambition, against Southern people, Southern States, and
Southern institutions, and its only hope of success is by that appeal.
Mr. Lincoln goes on to justify himself in making a war upon slavery
upon the ground that Frank Blair and Gratz Brown did not succeed
in their warfare upon the institutions in Missouri. Frank Blair was
elected to Congress, in 1856, from the State of Missouri, as a Bu-
chanan Democrat, and he turned Fremonter after the people elected
him, thus belonging to one party before his election, and another
afterward. What right, then, had he to expect, after having thus
cheated his constituency, that they would support him at another
election? Mr. Lincoln thinks that it is his duty to preach a crusade
in the free States against slavery, because it is a crime, as he believes,
and ought to be extinguished, and because the people of the slave
States will never abolish it. How is he going to abolish it? Down
in the southern part of the State he takes the ground openly that
he will not interfere with slavery where it exists, and says that he
is not now and never was in favor of interfering with slavery where
it exists in the States. Well, if he is not in favor of that, how does
he expect to bring slavery into a course of ultimate extinction ? How
can he extinguish it in Kentucky, in Virginia, in all the slave States,
by his policy, if he will not pursue a policy which will interfere with
it in the States where it exists ? In his speech at Springfield before
the Abolition or Republican convention, he declared his hostility to
any more slave States in this language :

Under the operation of that policy the agitation has 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 sla-
very 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.

Mr. Lincoln there told his Abolition friends that this government
could not endure permanently divided into free and slave States as