The record-union., 1896-10-11

His defiance of Buchanan and fight
against the LecOmpton Constitution had
made him the Northern Democratic
leader and won for him the admiration
and support of multitudes of anti
slavery people. He had brought the
comparatively new State of Illinois to
the front rank in the National Legisla-
ture, and the State was very proud
of him. The persecution of the Admin
istration secured him a hundred friends
for every Postmaster dismissed. He
controlled the machinery of a success
full party, and had the prestige and
power OF an aggressive and triumphant
organization behind him. Lincoln
keenly felt the limitation of local repu-
tation, the responsibility of his position
in national crisis, and the lack of
party confidence in the East in his
ability for the task. Douglas could
both defend positions then generally
conceded to be right, and attack prin-
ciples which were new and alarming in
practical politics. When hard pressed
he could retreat behind time-honored
prejudices and revered and moscow
cred traditions. Lincoln must always
be in the open. He had to attack pull
down and build up. He had that most
difficult task for an orator to separate
wrong from right when they have been
so entwined for generations that to at
tempt to destroy the one and save the
other seems to the timid a surgical op-
GRAFTON which may be a splendid exhibit
ton of skill, but death to the patient
The cotton growing South was the
home market for the food products and
manufactures of the North. The mon
ey power and business and social infiu-
enceS of the North We're fearful of Of
Tending the slave owners. Portions OF
the press and pulpit of the North were
in harmony with that unanimous ad-
vocacy of the right and justice of sla-
very by the press and pulpit OF the
South which educated a generation of
Southern State men to stake their lives
and fortunes for, TO them, a sacred
cause. There was superstitiOus rever-
| ence for the Constitution and dread of
| the dissolution of the Union as IN
| finitely worse than surrender to slavery.
Four thousand millions of dollars in
vested in human beings in the South,
and a large portion of the capital of the
| North engaged in business connected
with the slave-holding States, so blinded
| honest intelligent and well-meaning
people that to them God and Mammon
| were one. No more important council
| ever gathered than the conclave OF
friends summoned to Springfield by Lin
| coin that he might read to them his
| opening speech. The keynote of it was
| the famous declaration, "A house divid-
| ed against itself cannot stand. L be-
| lieve this Government cannot endure
permanently half slave and half free.
Il do not expect the Union to be dis
solved-I do not expect the house to fall
but I do expect it will cease to be dl-
vided. 1t will become all one thing or
all the other. Either the opponents OF
| slavery will arrest the farther spread
of it and place it where the public mind
shall rest in the belief that it is in due
| course of ultimate extinction, or its ad-
vccates will push it forward until ii
| shall become alike lawful in all the
| StateS-old as we'll as new, North as
we'll as South The shrewd politicians
about him unanimously opposed his
making this statement. They said that
| Douglas would seize upon and use 1t to
arouse the Union sentiment in his ia
vor and frighten the timid from Lincoln
| by claiming it to threaten a diSsolu-
| tiOn of the Union. Lincoln's answer was
the first revelation to his advisers and
the country Of that basic moral element
| in his nature which ultimately found
its full expression in the proclama-
ton of emancipation. He said: 81
would rather be defeated with these ex-
pressions in my speech held up and dis
cussed before the people than be victori-
Gus without them" Regardless of per-
scEal consequences or the danger sig
nails of the hour, he lost the Senatorshir
| Cd {J,r Dr0c y Jl,,cf cf,-r
ting in both speech and action his abid-
ing faith that God reigns. He intensely
| believed that false teachings, inherited
! pIejudices, party loyalty, and materia
interests might incrust the nationa
conscience, but that this could be bro
ken by the sledge hammer of truth He
| knew that to temporize with error is
to strengthen its hold. His prophetic
wisdom, far-sighted craftsmanship and
| unquestioning trust in the final judg-
rlent of those whom he delighted tc
call the plain people were conspicuously
confirmed when 100000 of citizens an
swered his call anl left homes and fam
| liz and business to give their lives fol
| the Union and the flag.
| 1t is always the device of party man
| ayers who are corruptly using theil
power to charge that the reformers who
| would purify the organization will de-
stroy it. This simply means that they
| will either rule or ruin; but the threat
deceives multitudes, who cannot see
that attacking false leaders is not as
sailing the party. Tens Of thousands
of well-meaning men believed that to
assail slavery was to endanger the
Union. They could not understand
that, while the shareholders were shout
ing patriOtically to the anti-Slavery
forces, IF you do not stop this agita-
ticn you will dissolve the Union," they
| meant ''if you do not leave slavery
where it is and permit it's extension
where it is not, we will break up the
Republic" 1t was Lincoln's task to
make this clear, and place the response
bility for secession upon those who Sc
ceded and for the rebellion upon those
who rebelled. and he did it with un-
equaled eloquence and power
Douglas knew the taste and temper
of the prevailing opinion, and played up
on it with consummate skill. He de-
clared the doctrine of "house divided
against itself was a declaration of re-
lentleSS sectional war" He presented
with tremendous force the Union dis
solved by this crusade, the people and
their institutions buried in common
ruin. and peace, prosperity and per
petuity with the Union saved by his
principle of popular sovereignty, enab-
ling the people of the territories to set
tie the slavery question for themselves.
He infiamed popular prejudice by de-
claring that the phrase "all men are
created equal in the Declaration of
Independence did not refer to negroes
and if Lincoln's contention that it did