Chapter XXXI: Appendix (2)

“One of the gentlemen from South Carolina (Mr. Rhett) very much
deprecates these statistics. He particularly objects, as I
understand him, to counting all the pigs and chickens in the land.
I do not perceive much force in the objection. It is true, that if
every thing be enumerated, a portion of such statistics may not be
very useful to this object. Such products of the country as are to
be _consumed_ where they are _produced_, need no roads and rivers,
no means of transportation, and have no very proper connection with
this subject. The _surplus_, that which is produced in _one_ place
to be consumed in _another_; the capacity of each locality for
producing a _greater_ surplus; the natural means of transportation,
and their susceptibility of improvement; the hindrances, delays,
and losses of life and property during transportation, and the
causes of each, would be among the most valuable statistics in
this connection. From these it would readily appear where a given
amount of expenditure would do the most good. These statistics
might be equally accessible, as they would be equally useful, to
both the Nation and the States. In this way, and by these means,
let the nation take hold of the larger works, and the States the
smaller ones; and thus, working in a meeting direction, discreetly,
but steadily and firmly, what is made unequal in one place may be
equalized in another, extravagance avoided, and the whole country
put on that career of prosperity, which shall correspond with its
extent of territory, its natural resources, and the intelligence
and enterprise of its people.”

* * * * *

SPEECH ON THE PRESIDENCY AND GENERAL POLITICS.

(_Delivered in the House, July 27, 1848._)

GENERAL TAYLOR AND THE VETO POWER.

“Mr. SPEAKER:--Our Democratic friends seem to be in great distress
because they think our candidate for the Presidency don’t suit
_us_. Most of them can not find out that General Taylor has any
principles at all; some, however, have discovered that he has
_one_, but that that one is entirely wrong. This one principle
is his position on the veto power. The gentleman from Tennessee
(Mr. Stanton) who has just taken his seat, indeed, has said
there is very little if any difference on this question between
General Taylor and all the Presidents; and he seems to think it
sufficient detraction from General Taylor’s position on it, that
it has nothing new in it. But all others whom I have heard speak
assail it furiously. A new member from Kentucky (Mr. Clarke) of
very considerable ability, was in particular concern about it.
He thought it altogether novel and unprecedented for a President,
or a Presidential candidate, to think of approving bills whose
Constitutionality may not be entirely clear to his own mind. He
thinks the ark of our safety is gone, unless Presidents shall
always veto such bills as, in their judgment, may be of _doubtful_
Constitutionality. However clear Congress may be of their authority
to pass any particular act, the gentleman from Kentucky thinks the
President must veto it if _he_ has _doubts_ about it. Now I have
neither time nor inclination to argue with the gentleman on the
veto power as an original question; but I wish to show that General
Taylor, and not he, agrees with the earliest statesmen on this
question. When the bill chartering the first Bank of the United
States passed Congress, its Constitutionality was questioned;
Mr. Madison, then in the House of Representatives, as well as
others, had opposed it on that ground. General Washington, as
President, was called on to approve or reject it. He sought and
obtained, on the Constitutional question, the separate written
opinions of Jefferson, Hamilton, and Edmund Randolph, they then
being respectively Secretary of State, Secretary of the Treasury,
and Attorney General. Hamilton’s opinion was for the power; while
Randolph’s and Jefferson’s were both against it. Mr. Jefferson,
in his letter dated February 15th, 1791, after giving his opinion
decidedly against the Constitutionality of that bill, closed with
the paragraph which I now read:

“‘It must be admitted, however, that unless the President’s mind,
on a view of every thing which is urged for and against this bill,
is tolerably clear that it is unauthorized by the Constitution; if
the pro and the con hang so even as to balance his judgment, a just
respect for the wisdom of the Legislature would naturally decide
the balance in favor of their opinion; it is chiefly for cases
where they are clearly misled by error, ambition, or interest,
that the Constitution has placed a check in the negative of the
President.’

“General Taylor’s opinion, as expressed in his Allison letter, is
as I now read:

“‘The power given by the veto is a high conservative power; but,
in my opinion, should never be exercised, except in cases of clear
violation of the Constitution, or manifest haste and want of
consideration by Congress.

“It is here seen that, in Mr. Jefferson’s opinion, if, on the
Constitutionality of any given bill, the President _doubts_, he
is not to veto it, as the gentleman from Kentucky would have him
to do, but is to defer to Congress and approve it. And if we
compare the opinions of Jefferson and Taylor, as expressed in these
paragraphs, we shall find them more exactly alike than we can often
find any two expressions having any literal difference. None but
interested fault-finders, can discover any substantial variation.

“But gentlemen on the other side are unanimously agreed that Gen.
Taylor has no other principle. They are in utter darkness as to
his opinions on any of the questions of policy which occupy the
public attention. But is there any doubt as to what he will _do_
on the prominent question, if elected? Not the least. It is not
possible to know what he will or would do in every imaginable case;
because many questions have passed away, and others doubtless will
arise which none of us have yet thought of; but on the prominent
questions of currency, tariff, internal improvements, and Wilmot
proviso, General Taylor’s course is at least as well defined as is
General Cass’s. Why, in their eagerness to get at General Taylor,
several Democratic members here have desired to know whether, in
case of his election, a bankrupt law is to be established. Can
they tell us General Cass’s opinion on this question? (Some member
answered, ‘He is against it.’) Aye, how do you know he is? There is
nothing about it in the platform, nor elsewhere, that I have seen.
If the gentleman knows any thing which I do not, he can show it.
But to return: General Taylor, in his Allison letter says:

“‘Upon the subject of the tariff, the currency, the improvement of
our great highways, rivers, lakes, and harbors, the will of the
people, as expressed through their Representatives in Congress,
ought to be respected and carried out by the Executive.’

“Now, this is the whole matter--in substance, it is this: The
people say to General Taylor, ‘If you are elected shall we have a
National bank?’ He answers, ‘_Your_ will, gentlemen, not _mine_.’
‘What about the tariff?’ ‘Say yourselves.’ ‘Shall our rivers and
harbors be improved?’ ‘Just as you please.’ ‘If you desire a bank,
an alteration of the tariff, internal improvements, any or all, I
will not hinder you; if you do not desire them, I will not attempt
to force them on you. Send up your members of Congress from the
various districts, with opinions according to your own, and if they
are for these measures, or any of them, I shall have nothing to
oppose; if they are not for them, I shall not, by any appliances
whatever, attempt to dragoon them into their adoption.’ Now, can
there be any difficulty in understanding this? To you, Democrats,
it may not seem like principle; but surely you can not fail to
perceive the position plain enough. The distinction between it and
the position of your candidate is broad and obvious, and I admit
you have a clear right to show it is wrong, if you can; but you
have no right to pretend you can not see it at all. We see it, and
to us it appears like principle, and the best sort of principle at
that--the principle of allowing the people to do as they please
with their own business. My friend from Indiana (Mr. C. B. Smith)
has aptly asked, ‘Are you willing to trust the people?’ Some of
you answered, substantially, ‘We are willing to trust the people;
but the President is as much the representative of the people as
Congress.’ In a certain sense, and to a certain intent, he is the
representative of the people. He is elected by them, as well as
Congress is. But can he, in the nature of things, know the wants
of the people as well as three hundred other men coming from all
the various localities of the Nation? If so, where is the propriety
of having a Congress? That the Constitution gives the President a
negative on legislation, all know; but that this negative should be
so combined with platforms and other appliances as to enable him,
and, in fact, almost compel him, to take the whole of legislation
into his own hands, is what we object to--is what General Taylor
objects to--and is what constitutes the broad distinction between
you and us. To thus transfer legislation is clearly to take it from
those who understand with minuteness the interests of the people,
and give it to one who does not and can not so well understand it.
I understand your idea, that if a Presidential candidate avow his
opinion upon a given question, or rather upon all questions, and
the people, with full knowledge of this, elect him, they thereby
distinctly approve all those opinions. This, though plausible, is
a most pernicious deception. By means of it measures are adopted
or rejected, contrary to the wishes of the whole of one party,
and often nearly half of the other. The process is this: Three,
four, or half a dozen questions are prominent at a given time; the
party selects its candidate, and he takes his position on each of
these questions. On all but one his positions have already been
indorsed at former elections, and his party fully committed to
them; but that one is new, and a large portion of them are against
it. But what are they to do? The whole are strung together, and
they must take all or reject all. They can not take what they like
and leave the rest. What they are already committed to, being the
majority, they shut their eyes and gulp the whole. Next election,
still another is introduced in the same way. If we run our eyes
along the line of the past, we shall see that almost, if not quite,
all the articles of the present Democratic creed have been at
first forced upon the party in this very way. And just now, and
just so, opposition to internal improvements is to be established
if Gen. Cass shall be elected. Almost half the Democrats here
are for improvements, but they will vote for Cass, and if he
succeeds, their votes will have aided in closing the doors against
improvements. Now, this is a process which we think is wrong. We
prefer a candidate who, like Gen. Taylor, will allow the people to
have their own way regardless of his private opinion; and I should
think the internal-improvement Democrats at least, ought to prefer
such a candidate. He would force nothing on them which they don’t
want, and he would allow them to have improvements, which their own
candidate, if elected, will not.

“Mr. Speaker, I have said Gen. Taylor’s position is as well defined
as is that of Gen. Cass. In saying this, I admit I do not certainly
know what he would do on the Wilmot proviso. I am a Northern
man, or, rather, a Western free State man, with a constituency I
believe to be, and with personal feelings I know to be, against the
extension of slavery. As such, and with what information I have,
I hope, and _believe_, Gen. Taylor, if elected, would not veto
the proviso; but I do not _know_ it. Yet, if I knew he would, I
still would vote for him. I should do so, because, in my judgment,
his election alone can defeat Gen. Cass; and because, _should_
slavery thereby go into the territory we now have, just so much
will certainly happen by the election of Cass; and, in addition,
a course of policy leading to new wars, new acquisitions of
territory, and still further extensions of slavery. One of the two
is to be President; which is preferable?

“But there is as much doubt of Cass on improvements as there is
of Taylor on the proviso. I have no doubt myself of Gen. Cass on
this question, but I know the Democrats differ among themselves as
to his position. My internal improvement colleague (Mr. Wentworth)
stated on this floor the other day, that he was satisfied Cass was
for improvements, because he had voted for all the bills that he
(Mr. W.) had. So far so good. But Mr. Polk vetoed some of these
very bills; the Baltimore Convention passed a set of resolutions,
among other things, approving these vetoes, and Cass declares, in
his letter accepting the nomination, that he has carefully read
these resolutions, and that he adheres to them as firmly as he
approves them cordially. In other words, Gen. Cass voted for the
bills, and thinks the President did right to veto them; and his
friends here are amiable enough to consider him as being on one
side or the other, just as one or the other may correspond with
their own respective inclinations. My colleague admits that the
platform declares against the Constitutionality of a general system
of improvement, and that Gen. Cass indorses the platform; but he
still thinks Gen. Cass is in favor of some sort of improvements.
Well, what are they? As he is against _general_ objects, those he
is _for_, must be _particular_ and _local_. Now, this is taking the
subject precisely by the wrong end. _Particularity_--expending the
money of the _whole_ people for an object which will benefit only a
_portion_ of them, is the greatest real objection to improvements,
and has been so held by Gen. Jackson, Mr. Polk, and all others,
I believe, till now. But now, behold, the objects most general,
nearest free from this objection, are to be rejected, while those
most liable to it are to be embraced. To return: I can not help
believing that Gen. Cass, when he wrote his letter of acceptance,
well understood he was to be claimed by the advocates of both sides
of this question, and that he then closed the door against all
further expressions of opinion, purposely to retain the benefits of
that double position. His subsequent equivocation at Cleveland, to
my mind, proves such to have been the case.

“One word more, and I shall have done with this branch of the
subject. You Democrats, and your candidate, in the main are in
favor of laying down, in advance, a platform--a set of party
positions, as a unit; and then of enforcing the people, by every
sort of appliance, to ratify them, however unpalatable some of them
may be. We, and our candidate, are in favor of making Presidential
elections and the legislation of the country distinct matters; so
that the people can elect whom they please, and afterward legislate
just _as_ they please, without any hindrance, save only so much as
may guard against infractions of the Constitution, undue haste,
and want of consideration. The difference between us is clear as
noonday. That we are right we can not doubt. We hold the true
Republican position. In leaving the people’s business in their
hands we can not be wrong. We are willing, and even anxious, to go
to the people on this issue.

“But I suppose I can not reasonably hope to convince you that we
have any principles. The most I can expect is, to assure you that
we think we have, and are quite contented with them. The other day,
one of the gentlemen from Georgia (Mr. Iverson), an eloquent man,
and a man of learning, so far as I can judge, not being learned
myself, came down upon us astonishingly. He spoke in what the
Baltimore _American_ calls the ‘scathing and withering style.’ At
the end of his second severe flash I was struck blind, and found
myself feeling with my fingers for an assurance of my continued
physical existence. A little of the bone was left, and I gradually
revived. He eulogized Mr. Clay in high and beautiful terms, and
then declared that we had deserted all our principles, and had
turned Henry Clay out, like an old horse, to root. This is terribly
severe. It can not be answered by argument; at least, I can not
so answer it. I merely wish to ask the gentleman if the Whigs are
the only party he can think of, who sometimes turn old horses out
to root? Is not a certain Martin Van Buren an old horse which your
own party have turned out to root? and is he not rooting a little
to your discomfort about now? But in not nominating Mr. Clay, we
deserted our principles, you say. Ah! in what? Tell us, ye men
of principles what principle we violated? We say you did violate
principle in discarding Van Buren, and we can tell you how. You
violated the primary, the cardinal, the one great living principle
of all Democratic representative government--the principle that
the representative is bound to carry out the known will of his
constituents. A large majority of the Baltimore Convention of 1844
were, by their constituents, instructed to procure Van Buren’s
nomination if they could. In violation, in utter, glaring contempt
of this, you rejected him--rejected him, as the gentlemen from
New York (Mr. Birdsall), the other day expressly admitted, for
_availability_--that same ‘general availability’ which you charge
upon us, and daily chew over here, as something exceedingly odious
and unprincipled. But the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Iverson),
gave us a second speech yesterday, all well considered and put down
in writing, in which Van Buren was scathed and withered a ‘few’
for his present position and movements. I can not remember the
gentlemen’s precise language, but I do remember he put Van Buren
down, down, till he got him where he was finally to ‘stink’ and
‘rot.’

“Mr. Speaker, it is no business or inclination of mine to defend
Martin Van Buren. In the war of extermination now waging between
him and his old admirers, I say, devil take the hindmost--and the
foremost. But there is no mistaking the origin of the breach;
and if the curse of ‘stinking’ and ‘rotting’ is to fall on the
first and greatest violaters of principle in the matter, I
disinterestedly suggest, that the gentleman from Georgia and his
present co-workers are bound to take it upon themselves.”

Mr. Lincoln then proceeded to speak of the objections against Gen. Taylor as a mere military hero; retorting with effect, by citing the attempt to make out a military record for Gen. Cass; and referring, in a bantering way, to his own services in the Black Hawk war, as already quoted. He then said:

“While I have Gen. Cass in hand, I wish to say a word about his
political principles. As a specimen, I take the record of his
progress on the Wilmot Proviso. In the Washington Union, of March
2, 1847, there is a report of the speech of Gen. Cass, made the day
before in the Senate, on the Wilmot Proviso, during the delivery of
which, Mr. Miller, of New Jersey, is reported to have interrupted
him as follows, to wit:

“‘Mr. Miller expressed his great surprise at the change in the
sentiments of the Senator from Michigan, who had been regarded as
the great champion of freedom in the North-west of which he was a
distinguished ornament. Last year the Senator from Michigan was
understood to be decidedly in favor of the Wilmot Proviso; and, as
no reason had been stated for the change, he (Mr. Miller) could not
refrain from the expression of his extreme surprise.’

“To this Gen. Cass is reported to have replied as follows, to wit:

“Mr. Cass said, that the course of the Senator from New Jersey was
most extraordinary. Last year he (Mr. Cass) should have voted for
the proposition had it come up. But circumstances had altogether
changed. The honorable Senator then read several passages from the
remarks as given above, which he had committed to writing, in order
to refute such a charge as that of the Senator from New Jersey.’

“In the ‘remarks above committed to writing,’ is one numbered 4, as
follows, to wit:

“‘4th. Legislation would now be wholly imperative, because no
territory hereafter to be acquired can be governed without an act
of Congress providing for its government. And such an act, on its
passage, would open the whole subject, and leave the Congress,
called on to pass it, free to exercise its own discretion,
entirely uncontrolled by any declaration found in the statute book.’

“In Niles’ Register, vol. 73, page 293, there is a letter of
General Cass to A. O. P. Nicholson, of Nashville, Tennessee dated
December 24, 1847, from which the following are correct extracts:

“‘The Wilmot Proviso has been before the country some time. It has
been repeatedly discussed in Congress, and by the public press. I
am strongly impressed with the opinion that a great change has been
going on in the public mind upon this subject--in my own as well as
others; and that doubts are resolving themselves into convictions,
that the principle it involves should be kept out of the National
Legislature, and left to the people of the Confederacy in their
respective local Governments.

“‘Briefly, then, I am opposed to the exercise of any jurisdiction
by Congress over this matter; and I am in favor of leaving the
people of any territory which may be hereafter acquired, the right
to regulate it themselves, under the general principles of the
Constitution. Because,

“‘1. I do not see in the Constitution any grant of the requisite
power to Congress; and I am not disposed to extend a doubtful
precedent beyond its necessity--the establishment of territorial
governments when needed--leaving to the inhabitants all the rights
compatible with the relations they bear to the Confederation.’

“These extracts show that, in 1846, General Cass was for the
Proviso _at once_; that, in March, 1847, he was still for it,
_but not just then_; and that in December, 1847, he was _against_
it altogether. This is a true index to the whole man. When the
question was raised in 1846, he was in a blustering hurry to
take ground for it. He sought to be in advance, and to avoid the
uninteresting position of a mere follower, but soon he began to see
glimpses of the great Democratic ox-gad waving in his face, and to
hear indistinctly, a voice saying, ‘back,’ ‘back, sir,’ ‘back a
little.’ He shakes his head and bats his eyes, and blunders back to
his position of March, 1847; but still the gad waves, and the voice
grows more distinct, and sharper still--‘back, sir!’ ‘back, I say!’
‘further back!’ and back he goes to the position of December, 1847;
at which the gad is still, and the voice soothingly says--‘So!’
‘Stand still at that.’

“Have no fears, gentlemen, of your candidate; he exactly suits you,
and we congratulate you upon it. However much you may be distressed
about _our_ candidate, you have all cause to be contented and happy
with your own. If elected, he may not maintain all, or even any of
his positions previously taken; but he will be sure to do whatever
the party exigency, for the time being, may require; and that is
precisely what you want. He and Van Buren are the same ‘manner of
men;’ and like Van Buren, he will never desert _you_ till you first
desert _him_.”

After referring at some length to extra “charges” of General Cass upon the Treasury, Mr. Lincoln continued:--

“But I have introduced General Cass’s accounts here, chiefly to
show the wonderful physical capacities of the man. They show that
he not only did the labor of several men at the same _time_, but
that he often did it, at several _places_ many hundred miles apart,
_at the same time_. And at eating, too, his capacities are shown to
be quite as wonderful. From October, 1821, to May, 1822, he ate ten
rations a day in Michigan, ten rations a day here, in Washington,
and nearly five dollar’s worth a day besides, partly on the road
between the two places. And then there is an important discovery in
his example--the art of being paid for what one eats, instead of
having to pay for it. Hereafter, if any nice young man shall owe
a bill which he can not pay in any other way, he can just board
it out. Mr. Speaker, we have all heard of the animal standing in
doubt between two stacks of hay, and starving to death; the like
of that would never happen to General Cass. Place the stacks a
thousand miles apart, he would stand stock-still, midway between
them, and eat them both at once; and the green grass along the line
would be apt to suffer some too, at the same time. By all means
make him President, gentlemen. He will feed you bounteously--if
if--there is any left after he shall have helped himself.

“But as General Taylor, is, par excellence, the hero of the Mexican
war; and, as you Democrats say we Whigs have always opposed the
war, you think it must be very awkward and embarrassing for us to
go for General Taylor. The declaration that we have always opposed
the war, is true or false accordingly as one may understand the
term ‘opposing the war.’ If to say ‘the war was unnecessarily and
unconstitutionally commenced by the President,’ be opposing the
war, then the Whigs have very generally opposed it. Whenever they
have spoken at all, they have said this; and they have said it
on what has appeared good reason to them: The marching an army
into the midst of a peaceful Mexican settlement, frightening the
inhabitants away, leaving their growing crops and other property
to destruction, to _you_ may appear a perfectly amiable, peaceful,
unprovoking procedure; but it does not appear so to _us_. So to
call such an act, to us appears no other than a naked, impudent
absurdity, and we speak of it accordingly. But if, when the war had
begun, and had become the cause of the country, the giving of our
money and our blood, in common with yours, was support of the war,
then it is not true that we have always opposed the war. With few
individual exceptions, you have constantly had our votes here for
all the necessary supplies. And, more than this, you have had the
services, the blood, and the lives of our political brethren in
every trial, and on every field. The beardless boy and the mature
man--the humble and the distinguished, you have had them. Through
suffering and death, by disease and in battle, they have endured,
and fought, and fallen with you. Clay and Webster each gave a son,
never to be returned. From the State of my own residence, besides
other worthy but less known Whig names, we sent Marshall, Morrison,
Baker, and Hardin; they all fought, and one fell, and in the fall
of that one, we lost our best Whig man. Nor were the Whigs few in
number, or laggard in the day of danger. In that fearful, bloody,
breathless struggle at Buena Vista, where each man’s hard task was
to beat back five foes, or die himself, of the five high officers
who perished, four were Whigs.

“In speaking of this, I mean no odious comparison between the
lion-hearted Whigs and Democrats who fought there. On other
occasions, and among the lower officers and privates on _that_
occasion, I doubt not the proportion was different. I wish to do
justice to all. I think of all those brave men as Americans, in
whose proud fame, as an American, I too have a share. Many of them,
Whigs and Democrats, are my constituents and personal friends; and
I thank them--more than thank them--one and all, for the high,
imperishable honor they have conferred on our common State.

“But the distinction between the cause of the _President_ in
beginning the war, and the cause of the _country_ after it was
begun, is a distinction which you can not perceive. To _you_, the
President and the country seem to be all one. You are interested
to see no distinction between them; and I venture to suggest
that _possibly_ your interest blinds you a little. We see the
distinction, as we think, clearly enough; and our friends, who have
fought in the war, have no difficulty in seeing it also. What those
who have fallen would say, were they alive and here, of course
we can never know; but with those who have returned there is no
difficulty. Colonel Haskell and Major Gaines, members here, both
fought in the war; and one of them underwent extraordinary perils
and hardships; still they, like all other Whigs here, vote on
the record that the war was unnecessarily and unconstitutionally
commenced by the President. And even General Taylor himself, the
noblest Roman of them all, has declared that, as a citizen, and
particularly as a soldier, it is sufficient for him to know that
his country is at war with a foreign nation, to do all in his power
to bring it to a speedy and honorable termination, by the most
vigorous and energetic operations, without inquiring about its
justice, or any thing else connected with it.

“Mr. Speaker, let our Democratic friends be comforted with the
assurance that we are content with our position, content with our
company, and content with our candidate; and that although they, in
their generous sympathy, think we ought to be miserable, we really
are not, and that they may dismiss the great anxiety they have on
_our_ account.”

* * * * *

SPEECH IN REPLY TO MR. DOUGLAS, ON KANSAS, THE DRED SCOTT DECISION, AND THE UTAH QUESTION.

(_Delivered at Springfield, Ill., June 26, 1857._)

“FELLOW-CITIZENS:--I am here, to-night, partly by the invitation
of some of you, and partly by my own inclination. Two weeks ago
Judge Douglas spoke here, on the several subjects of Kansas, the
Dred Scott decision, and Utah. I listened to the speech at the
time, and have read the report of it since. It was intended to
controvert opinions which I think just, and to assail (politically,
not personally) those men who, in common with me, entertain those
opinions. For this reason I wished then, and still wish to make
some answer to it which I now take the opportunity of doing.

“I begin with Utah. If it prove to be true, as is probable, that
the people of Utah are in open rebellion against the United States,
then Judge Douglas is in favor of repealing their territorial
organization, and attaching them to the adjoining States for
judicial purposes. I say, too, if they are in rebellion, they ought
to be somehow coerced to obedience; and I am not now prepared to
admit or deny, that the Judge’s mode of coercing them is not as
good as any. The Republicans can fall in with it, without taking
back any thing they have ever said. To be sure, it would be a
considerable backing down by Judge Douglas, from his much vaunted
doctrine of self-government for the territories; but this is only
additional proof of what was very plain from the beginning, that
that doctrine was a mere deceitful pretence for the benefit of
slavery. Those who could not see that much in the Nebraska act
itself, which forced Governors, and Secretaries, and Judges on the
people of the territories, without their choice or consent, could
not be made to see, though one should rise from the dead.

“But in all this, it is very plain the Judge evades the only
question the Republicans have ever pressed upon the Democracy in
regard to Utah. That question the Judge well knew to be this: ‘If
the people of Utah shall peacefully form a State Constitution
tolerating polygamy, will the Democracy admit them into the Union?’
There is nothing in the United States Constitution or law against
polygamy; and why is it not a part of the Judge’s ‘sacred right of
self-government’ for the people to have it, or rather to keep it,
if they choose? These questions, so far as I know, the Judge never
answers. It might involve the Democracy to answer them either way
and they go unanswered.

“As to Kansas. The substance of the Judge’s speech on Kansas, is
an effort to put the Free State men in the wrong for not voting
at the election of delegates to the Constitutional Convention. He
says: ‘There is every reason to hope and believe that the law will
be fairly interpreted and impartially executed, so as to insure
to every bona fide inhabitant the free and quiet exercise of the
elective franchise.’

“It appears extraordinary that Judge Douglas should make such a
statement. He knows that, by the law, no one can vote who has
not been registered; and he knows that the Free State men place
their refusal to vote on the ground that but few of them have been
registered. It is possible this is not true, but Judge Douglas
knows it is asserted to be true in letters, newspapers, and public
speeches, and borne by every mail, and blown by every breeze to the
eyes and ears of the world. He knows it is boldly declared, that
the people of many whole counties, and many whole neighborhoods
in others, are left unregistered; yet he does not venture to
contradict the declaration, or to point out how they can vote
without being registered; but he just slips along, not seeming to
know there is any such question of fact, and complacently declares,
‘There is every reason to hope and believe that the law will be
fairly and impartially executed, so as to insure to every bona fide
inhabitant the free and quiet exercise of the elective franchise.’

“I readily agree that if all had a chance to vote, they ought to
have voted. If, on the contrary, as they allege, and Judge Douglas
ventures not particularly to contradict, few only of the Free State
men had a chance to vote, they were perfectly right in staying from
the polls in a body.

“By the way, since the Judge spoke, the Kansas election has come
off. The Judge expressed his confidence that all the Democrats in
Kansas would do their duty--including ‘Free State Democrats’ of
course. The returns received here, as yet, are very incomplete;
but, so far as they go, they indicate that only about one-sixth
of the registered voters, have really voted; and this, too, when
not more, perhaps, than one-half of the rightful voters have been
registered, thus showing the thing to have been altogether the
most exquisite farce ever enacted. I am watching with considerable
interest, to ascertain what figure ‘the Free State Democrats’ cut
in the concern. Of course they voted--all Democrats do their
duty--and of course they did not vote for Slave State candidates.
We soon shall know how many delegates they elected, how many
candidates they have pledged to a free State, and how many votes
were cast for them.

“Allow me to barely whisper my suspicion, that there were no
such things in Kansas as ‘Free State Democrats’--that they were
altogether mythical, good only to figure in newspapers and speeches
in the free States. If there should prove to be one real, living
free State Democrat in Kansas, I suggest that it might be well
to catch him, and stuff and preserve his skin, as an interesting
specimen of that soon to be extinct variety of the genus Democrat.

“And now, as to the Dred Scott decision. That decision declares two
propositions--first, that a negro cannot sue in the United States
Courts; and secondly, that Congress can not prohibit slavery in the
Territories. It was made by a divided court--dividing differently
on the different points. Judge Douglas does not discuss the merits
of the decision, and in that respect, I shall follow his example,
believing I could no more improve upon McLean and Curtis, than he
could on Taney.

“He denounces all who question the correctness of that decision, as
offering violent resistance to it. But who resists it? Who has, in
spite of the decision, declared Dred Scott free, and resisted the
authority of his master over him?

“Judicial decisions have two uses--first, to absolutely determine
the case decided; and secondly to indicate to the public how other
similar cases will be decided when they arise. For the latter use,
they are called ‘precedents’ and ‘authorities.’

“We believe as much as Judge Douglas (perhaps more) in obedience
to, and respect for the judicial department of Government. We think
its decisions on Constitutional questions, when fully settled,
should control, not only the particular cases decided, but the
general policy of the country subject to be disturbed only by
amendments of the Constitution, as provided in that instrument
itself. More than this would be revolution. But we think the Dred
Scott decision is erroneous. We know the court that made it has
often overruled its own decisions, and we shall do what we can to
have it overrule this. We offer no resistance to it.

“Judicial decisions are of greater or less authority as precedents,
according to circumstances. That this should be so, accords both
with common sense, and the customary understanding of the legal
profession.

“If this important decision had been made by the unanimous
concurrence of the judges, and without any apparent partisan
bias, and in accordance with legal public expectation, and with
the steady practice of the departments, throughout our history,
and had been in no part based on assumed historical facts which
are not really true; or, if wanting in some of these, it had been
before the court more than once, and had there been affirmed and
re-affirmed through a course of years, it then might be, perhaps
would be, factious, nay, even revolutionary, not to acquiesce in it
as a precedent.

“But when, as is true, we find it wanting in all these claims to
the public confidence, it is not resistance, it is not factious,
it is not even disrespectful, to treat it as not having yet quite
established a settled doctrine for the country. But Judge Douglas
considers this view awful. Hear him:

“‘The courts are the tribunals prescribed by the Constitution and
created by the authority of the people to determine, expound, and
enforce the law. Hence, whoever resists the final decision of
the highest judicial tribunal, aims a deadly blow to our whole
Republican system of government--a blow which, if successful,
would place all our rights and liberties at the mercy of passion,
anarchy and violence. I repeat, therefore, that if resistance
to the decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States, in a
matter like the points decided in the Dred Scott case, clearly
within their jurisdiction as defined by the Constitution, shall
be forced upon the country as a political issue, it will become a
distinct and naked issue between the friends and enemies of the
Constitution--the friends and enemies of the supremacy of the laws.’

“Why, this same Supreme Court once decided a national bank to
be Constitutional; but General Jackson, as President of the
United States, disregarded the decision, and vetoed a bill for
a re-charter, partly on Constitutional ground, declaring that
each public functionary must support the Constitution, ‘as he
understands it.’ But hear the General’s own words. Here they are,
taken from his veto message:

“‘It is maintained by the advocates of the bank, that its
Constitutionality, in all its features, ought to be considered as
settled by precedent, and by the decision of the Supreme Court. To
this conclusion I can not assent. Mere precedent is a dangerous
source of authority, and should not be regarded as deciding
questions of Constitutional power, except where the acquiescence
of the people and the States can be considered as well settled. So
far from this being the case on this subject, an argument against
the bank might be based on precedent. One Congress, in 1791,
decided in favor of a bank; another, in 1811, decided against it.
One Congress, in 1815, decided against a bank; another, in 1816,
decided in its favor. Prior to the present Congress, therefore,
the precedents drawn from that source were equal. If we resort to
the States, the expression of legislative, judicial, and executive
opinions against the bank have been probably to those in its favor
as four to one. There is nothing in precedent, therefore, which,
if its authority were admitted, ought to weigh in favor of the act
before me.’

“I drop the quotations merely to remark, that all there ever was,
in the way of precedent up to the Dred Scott decision, on the
points therein decided, had been against that decision. But hear
General Jackson further:

“‘If the opinion of the Supreme Court covered the whole ground of
this act, it ought not to control the co-ordinate authorities of
this Government. The Congress, the Executive and the Court, must
each for itself be guided by its own opinion of the Constitution.
Each public officer, who takes an oath to support the Constitution,
swears that he will support it as he understands it, and not as it
is understood by others.’

“Again and again have I heard Judge Douglas denounce that bank
decision, and applaud General Jackson for disregarding it. It
would be interesting for him to look over his recent speech, and
see how exactly his fierce philippics against us for resisting
Supreme Court decisions, fall upon his own head. It will call to
mind a long and fierce political war in this country, upon an issue
which, in his own language, and, of course, in his own changeless
estimation, was ‘a distinct issue between the friends and the
enemies of the Constitution,’ and in which war he fought in the
ranks of the enemies of the Constitution.

“I have said, in substance, that the Dred Scott decision was, in
part, based on assumed historical facts which were not really true,
and I ought not to leave the subject without giving some reasons
for saying this; I, therefore, give an instance or two, which I
think fully sustain me. Chief Justice Taney, in delivering the
opinion of the majority of the Court, insists at great length, that
negroes were no part of the people who made, or for whom was made,
the Declaration of Independence, or the Constitution of the United
States.

“On the contrary, Judge Curtis, in his dissenting opinion, shows
that in five of the then thirteen States, to wit: New Hampshire,
Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, and North Carolina, free
negroes were voters, and, in proportion to their numbers, had the
same part in making the Constitution that the white people had.
He shows this with so much particularity as to leave no doubt of
its truth; and as a sort of conclusion on that point, holds the
following language:

“‘The constitution was ordained and established by the people of
the United States, through the action, in each State, of those
persons who were qualified by its laws to act thereon in behalf
of themselves and all other citizens of the State. In some of the
States, as we have seen, colored persons were among those qualified
by law to act on the subject. These colored persons were not only
included in the body of ‘the people of the United States,’ by whom
the Constitution was ordained and established; but in at least five
of the States they had the power to act, and, doubtless, did act,
by their suffrages, upon the question of its adoption.’

“Again, Chief Justice Taney says: ‘It is difficult, at this day to
realize the state of public opinion in relation to that unfortunate
race, which prevailed in the civilized and enlightened portions of
the world at the time of the Declaration of Independence, and when
the Constitution of the United States was framed and adopted.’ And
again, after quoting from the Declaration, he says: ‘The general
words above quoted would seem to include the whole human family,
and if they were used in a similar instrument at this day, would be
so understood.’

“In these the Chief Justice does not directly assert, but plainly
assumes, as a fact, that the public estimate of the black man is
more favorable now than it was in the days of the Revolution.
This assumption is a mistake. In some trifling particulars, the
condition of that race has been ameliorated; but as a whole,
in this country, the change between then and now is decidedly
the other way; and their ultimate destiny has never appeared so
hopeless as in the last three or four years. In two of the five
States--New Jersey and North Carolina--that then gave the free
negro the right of voting, the right has since been taken away;
and in the third--New York--it has been greatly abridged; while it
has not been extended, so far as I know, to a single additional
State, though the number of the States has more than doubled. In
those days, as I understand, masters could, at their own pleasure,
emancipate their slaves; but since then such legal restraints have
been made upon emancipation as to amount almost to prohibition. In
those days ‘Legislatures held the unquestioned power to abolish
slavery in their respective States; but now it is becoming quite
fashionable for State Constitutions to withhold that power from the
Legislatures. In those days by common consent, the spread of the
black man’s bondage to the new countries was prohibited; but now,
Congress decides that it will not continue the prohibition--and
the Supreme Court decides that it could not if it would. In those
days our Declaration of Independence was held sacred by all, and
thought to include all; but now, to aid in making the bondage
of the negro universal and eternal, it is assailed, sneered at,
construed, hawked at, and torn, till, if its framers could rise
from their graves, they could not at all recognize it. All the
powers of earth seem rapidly combining against him. Mammon is after
him; ambition follows, philosophy follows, and the theology of the
day is fast joining the cry. They have him in his prison-house;
they have searched his person, and left no prying instrument with
him. One after another they have closed the heavy iron doors upon
him; and now they have him, as it were, bolted in with a lock of a
hundred keys, which can never be unlocked without the concurrence
of every key; the keys in the hands of a hundred different men, and
they scattered to a hundred different and distant places; and they
stand musing as to what invention, in all the dominions of mind and
matter, can be produced to make the impossibility of his escape
more complete than it is.

“It is grossly incorrect to say or assume, that the public estimate
of the negro is more favorable now than it was at the origin of the
Government.

“Three years and a half ago, Judge Douglas brought forward his
famous Nebraska bill. The country was at once in a blaze. He
scorned all opposition, and carried it through Congress. Since then
he has seen himself superseded in a Presidential nomination, by
one indorsing the general doctrine of his measure, but at the same
time standing clear of the odium of its untimely agitation, and its
gross breach of national faith; and he has seen that successful
rival Constitutionally elected, not by the strength of friends, but
by the division of his adversaries, being in a popular minority
of nearly four hundred thousand votes. He has seen his chief aids
in his own State, Shields and Richardson, politely speaking,
successively tried, convicted, and executed, for an offence not
their own, but his. And now he sees his own case, standing next on
the docket for trial.

“There is a natural disgust, in the minds of nearly all white
people, to the idea of an indiscriminate amalgamation of the
white and black races; and Judge Douglas evidently is basing his
chief hope upon the chances of his being able to appropriate the
benefit of this disgust to himself. If he can, by much drumming
and repeating, fasten the odium of that idea upon his adversaries,
he thinks he can struggle through the storm. He, therefore, clings
to this hope, as a drowning man to the last plank. He makes an
occasion for lugging it in from the opposition to the Dred Scott
decision. He finds the Republicans insisting that the Declaration
of Independence includes ALL men, black as well as white, and
forthwith he boldly denies that it includes negroes at all, and
proceeds to argue gravely that all who contend it does do so only
because they want to vote, eat and sleep, and marry with negroes.
He will have it that they can not be consistent else. Now, I
protest against the counterfeit logic which concludes that because
I do not want a black woman for a slave I must necessarily want
her for a wife. I need not have her for either. I can just leave
her alone. In some respects she certainly is not my equal; but in
her natural right to eat the bread she earns with her own hands,
without asking leave of any one else, she is my equal, and the
equal of all others.

“Chief Justice Taney, in his opinion in the Dred Scott case, admits
that the language of the Declaration is broad enough to include the
whole human family; but he and Judge Douglas argue that the authors
of that instrument did not intend to include negroes, by the fact
that they did not at once actually place them on an equality with
the whites. Now, this grave argument comes to just nothing at all,
by the other fact, that they did not at once, or ever afterward,
actually place all white people on an equality with one another.
And this is the staple argument of both the Chief Justice and the
Senator for doing this obvious violence to the plain, unmistakable
language of the Declaration.

“I think the authors of that notable instrument intended to include
_all_ men, but they did not intend to declare all men equal _in all
respects_. They did not mean to say all were equal in color, size,
intellect, moral developments, or social capacity. They defined
with tolerable distinctness in what respects they did consider all
men created equal--equal with ‘certain inalienable rights, among
which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.’ This they
said, and this meant. They did not mean to assert the obvious
untruth, that all were then actually enjoying that equality, nor
yet that they were about to confer it immediately upon them. In
fact, they had no power to confer such a boon. They meant simply to
declare the _right_, so that the _enforcement_ of it might follow
as fast as circumstances should permit.”

* * * * *

SPEECH IN REPLY TO SENATOR DOUGLAS.

(_At Chicago, on the evening of July 10, 1858._)

“MY FELLOW-CITIZENS: On yesterday evening, upon the occasion of the
reception given to Senator Douglas, I was furnished with a seat
very convenient for hearing him, and was otherwise very courteously
treated by him and his friends, for which I thank him and them.
During the course of his remarks my name was mentioned in such a
way as, I suppose, renders it at least not improper that I should
make some sort of reply to him. I shall not attempt to follow him
in the precise order in which he addressed the assembled multitude
upon that occasion, though I shall perhaps do so in the main.

“There was one question to which he asked the attention of the
crowd, which I deem of somewhat less importance--at least of
propriety for me to dwell upon--than the others, which he brought
in near the close of his speech, and which I think it would not
be entirely proper for me to omit attending to, and yet if I were
not to give some attention to it now, I should probably forget it
altogether. While I am upon this subject, allow me to say that I do
not intend to indulge in that inconvenient mode sometimes adopted
in public speaking, of reading from documents; but I shall depart
from that rule so far as to read a little scrap from his speech,
which notices this first topic of which I shall speak--that is,
provided I can find it in the paper. [Examines the morning’s paper.]