The Topeka state journal., 1899-10-07
IF LINCOLN WE'RE PRESIDENT
Charles Emory Smith Tells What He
Would Do.

Charles Emory Smith Tells What he
Would Do.
Galesburg, Ill, Oct. POSTMASTER
General Charles Emory Smith, the ora
today:
I'VE are here to commemorate the
famous LincOln-DOuglas debate. On the
very spot where we now stand the
great cOmbatants met fOrty-One years
ago today in one of the brilliant en-
counters of that glittering intellectual
and political tournament. Some of you
saw and well remember the gleam and
blows of the flashing swords. With the
vivid traditions and the striking figures
ever living in the American memory
and imagination, you can all picture
the dramatic scene.
1T is fit that the president with his
cabinet should come to this memorable
ground. Here history was made and
moulded. Here the mightfest issues of
the age were tried in the forum of rea-
son before being appealed to the arbi-
trament of arms. Here the two con-
tending chieftainS stamped their deep
impress on the rushing current of
thought and events which speedily cul-
minated in the most gigantic moral and
physical conflict of the century. Here
may be found the inspiration of ex-
ample and the lesson of experience.
THE debate was worthy of this dis
tinctive commemoration. 1t was the
most significant and decisive dual con-
trOVerSy in our history. The only other
forensic tourney which can compare
with it was the celebrated discussion of
Webster and Hayne nearly forty years
before. Between the two there was in
deed a logical and historical connection.
| The one was the complement and the
! sequence of the other. The Webster
Hayne debate turned upon the abstract
issue of an indissoluble union as against
| the right of notification and secession.
| The LincOln-DOuglas debate turned on
| the concrete struggle of freedom and
| slavery which brought on the War of
| the Rebellion and put the issue of I'm
| ion against secession to the practical
| test. That debate preSaged and crys-
| talliZed the great coming conflict. 1t
| was the Ominous thunder before the
! outbreak of the storm. In declaring and
! defining the irresistible tendencies, in
faShiOning the attitude and action of
parties, in directly moulding the course
| of events, as it did, it was a potent
and mOmentOuS element in the swift
| advancing climax. Neither Lincoln nor
! Douglas sought the final and crucial
| clash. Both earnestly and anxiously
| labOred against it. Each believed that
his own policy was the true way to
| avert it. But their stupendous conten-
! tion signified and shaped the irrepressi-
! BILE conflict and determined the political
| alignments and divisions which pre-
| cipitated the ultimate and inevitable
| issue.
Lincoln lived to save the nation, and
| died to consecrate it with his blood. His
| unriValled place among the worlds
elect is immutably fixed. He remains
| the best loved of all Americans. 1t is
not merely that his gaunt and sombre
and picturesque personality, deep on
| his front engraven deliberation sad and
! public care has an enduring and ir-
resistible fascination. 1t is not merely
| that he stands out among the most ma
| jestic figures in the worlds mighty
| drama, and that of the builders and
! saviors of states who have moulded the
| decisive epOchs in the worlds progress
he is preeminent for moral heroism and
| grandeur. Beyond and beneath these
| imposing historic proportions there is q
I magic of kinship and fate that brings
| him above all others close to the heart
| of the people Around what other name,
| however great and honored, clusters so
much of tender, sympathetic and i'm
/ passiOned sentiment? Where else will
| YOU find at once so much of the human
quality that pulses to the common
| heartbeat so much of the heroic conse-
! Grafton that uplifts the nation and ex-
| alts liberty, and so much of the pathos
of tragedy that seemed to cOnSecrate in
| one appealing blow a Yicarious sacrifice
| for all the people?
Lincoln was the most typical of
| Americans. You can think of Wash
| ington as another Hampden, grand, Sc
| rene, benign, the rounded and perfected
! archetype of English liberty. You can
| think of Hamilton as another Pitt,
equally precocious, equally brilliant in
] elOquence and Statecraft, equally mas
ter of the men and measures of his
time. You can think of Webster as an
other Lord Mansfield in his massive 1e-
]
in his majestic oratOry and his impos-
! ing craftsmanship. You can think even
of Lincoln's fiery rival, Douglas, as an
other Charles James Fox, vehement,
impetuOus and fervid, the very Prince
Rupert of debaterS. But you cannot
think of Lincoln as any other than a
| characteristic and unmfStakable Amer
lean. He was copied from no model and
founded no example. He blended and
| accentuated the recognized American
traits and stands out before the world
as preeminently the American of Amer
leans.
He was equally skilled in leading
| the leaders and in getting into the
hearts of the plain people. No other
American ever so thoroughly understood
or came so close to the great thrObbing
masses. He sprang from their ranks
I and he continued to be their soul Con-
centrate the genius of the common peo-
/ pie in one grand incarnation, refining
| and sublimating their essence,to be then
idealized in their alteration, and you
! call it Abraham Lincoln. He had at
once the flavor of the soil and the flight
\ of the stars. When he rose to large en-
| deavor he had what seemed to be al
most divine inspiration. Some of his
| papers in their simplicity, d1rectneSS
of St. Paul than anything else in liter
| ature. His speech was as lucent as
| crystal because his thought was as
| clear as the sunbeam.
He was filed with sublime thoughts
| which transmitted themselves into
sublime acts. The imperishable speech
| at Gettysburg, which will ever remain
the noblest monument of that immortal
| field, sprang from the greatness of his
| soul and reflected his inmOst being. The
second inaugural rose to moral eleva-
j ton not reached outside OF sacred de-