Senatorial Canvass in Illinois, August 27, 1858

LINCOLN AND DOUGLAS AT OTTAWA.

[FROM OUR SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT.]

CHICAGO, August 27, 1858.

After Mr. Douglas spoke at Peoria on the 8th, he proceeded to Lacon, where, on the next day, he made the discovery that all the Presidents, naming them in order from Washington to Buchanan, had endorsed the principles of the Dred Scott Decision by refusing to grant passports to negroes to travel in foreign countries. After which, he reposed his wearied virtue for one day, to prepare for the extreme of mendacity, which he reached on Saturday at Ottawa. There, most aptly, he illustrated the Latin proverb— “Andas omnia perpeti, ruat per retitum nefas”¹ — and there he strode so deeply into the mire of falsification that extrication is impossible. But more of this further on.

At Lewiston, in Fulton county, on the 17th, Mr. Lincoln held one of his largest meetings and spoke for two hours and a half. At this place he tore from Douglas the mantle of Henry Clay, under which the senator had been strutting and hoping to hide the wickedness of his pretenses. Mr. Lincoln read largely from Clay’s writings and speeches, wherein he contends for the ultimate emancipation of the slave, and said that he would claim no support from the old line Whigs unless he could show that he stood upon the ground occupied by that great statesman. He further said that he believed Mr. Douglas was the only man of prominence before the country who had never declared, to friend or enemy, whether he believed slavery to be right or wrong. His speeches, to be sure, leave the hearer to infer that he did not desire slavery to be introduced into Illinois, but he indicates that no moral consideration would prevail with him against the exercise of slave-ownership, provided there was more money in working a negro that in working a horse. It was in this speech that Mr. Lincoln uttered an eloquent and impressive apostrophe into the Declaration of Independence, which ranks him at once among the foremost orators of the land. I give you a brief extract from the correspondent of the Press and Tribune:

“These communities, the thirteen colonies, by their representatives in old Independence Hall, said to the whole world of men; ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.’” This was their majestic interpretation of the economy of the Universe. This was their lofty, and wise, and noble understanding of the justice of the Creator to His creatures.  Applause.  Yes, gentlemen, to all His creatures, to the whole great family of man. In their enlightened belief, nothing stamped with the Devine image and likeness was sent into the world to be trodden on, and degraded, and imbruted by its fellows. They grasped not only the whole race of man then living, but they reached forward and seized upon the farthest posterity. They erected a beacon to guide their children and their children's children, and the countless myriads who should inhabit the earth in other ages. Wise statesmen as they were, they knew the tendency of prosperity to breed tyrants, and so they established these great self-evident truths, that when in the distant future some man, some faction, some interest, should set up the doctrine that none but rich men, or none but white men, were entitled to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, their posterity might look up again to the Declaration of Independence and take courage to renew the battle which their fathers began—so that truth, and justice, and mercy, and all the humane and Christian virtues might not be extinguished from the land; so that no man would hereafter dare to limit and circumscribe the great principles on which the temple of liberty was being built. Loud cheers.

“Now, my countrymen (Mr. Lincoln continued with great earnestness,) if you have been taught doctrines conflicting with the great landmarks of the Declaration of Independence; if you have listened to suggestions which would take away from its grandeur, and mutilate the fair symmetry of its proportions; if you have been inclined to believe that all men are not created equal in those inalienable rights enumerated by our charter of liberty, let me entreat you to come back. Return to the fountain whose waters spring close by the blood of the Revolution. Think nothing of me—take no thought for the political fate of any man whomsoever—but come back to the truths that are in the Declaration of Independence. You may do anything with me you choose, if you will but heed these sacred principles. You may not only defeat me for the Senate, but you may take me and put me to death. While pretending no indifference to earthly honors, I do claim to be actuated in this contest by something higher than an anxiety for office. I charge you to drop every paltry and insignificant thought for any man's success. It is nothing; I am nothing; Judge Douglas is nothing. But do not destroy that immortal emblem of Humanity—the Declaration of American Independence.”

Reports from various localities indicate that the Fillmore Americans and Old Lane Whigs are coming to the support of Mr. Lincoln, to put down the agitator and demagogue, who, on the other hand, is appealing to them for their votes. It is not to be disguised that Mr. Douglas has the [illegible] faith of the masses of the democratic party; whether it be abiding is another question. Once he had the ear of the federal administration; now he has lost it, and it is the object of unceasing opposition from that quarter. Then he could rally his lieges and hold them because he had rewards to bestow; now his promises are beggarly and unproductive. Thrift no longer follows fawning upon him. The Buchanan men do not warm towards him yet, and they are not likely to although it is said a joint and special commission has gone to Washington to plead with the unrelenting Executive.

Saturday, the 21st, was the day of the first discussion between Lincoln and Douglas. It was held at Ottawa, a city of about 9,000 inhabitants, on the line of the Chicago and Rock Island Railroad and the Illinois canal, and the junction of the Fox and Illinois rivers. I arrived late the night before at Ottawa, and was accommodated with a sofa at the hotel. The city was already even full. Saturday was a pleasant, but warm day, and Ottawa was deluged in dust. By wagon, by rail, by canal, the people poured in, till Ottawa was one mass of active life. Men, women and children, old and young, the dwellers on the broad prairies, had turned their backs upon the plough, and had come to listen to these champions of the two parties. Military companies were out; martial music sounded, and salutes of artillery thundered in the air. [Eager] marshals in partisan sashes rode furiously about the streets. Peddlers were crying their wares at the corners, and excited groups of politicians were canvassing and quarrelling everywhere. And still they came, the crowd swelling constantly in its proportions and growing more eager and more hungry, perhaps more thirsty. Though every precaution was taken against this latter evil. About noon the rival processions were formed, and paraded the streets amid the cheers of the people. Mr. Lincoln was met at the depot by an immense crowd, who escorted him to the residence of the mayor, with banners flying and mottoes waving their unfaltering attachment to him and to his cause. The Douglas turnout, though plentifully interspersed with the Hibernian element, was less noisy, and thus matters were arranged for the after-dinner demonstration in the Court House square, where the stand was erected, and where, under the blazing sun unprotected by shade trees, and unprovided with seats, the audience was expected to congregate and listen to the champions.

Two men presenting wider contrasts could hardly be found as the representatives of the two great parties. Everybody knows Douglas, a short, thickset, burly man, with large round head, heavy hair, dark complexion, and fierce bull-dog bark. Strong in his own real power, and skilled by a thousand conflicts in all the strategy of a hand-to-hand or a general fight. Of towering ambition, restless in his determined desire for notoriety, proud, defiant, arrogant, audacious, unscrupulous, “Little Dug” ascended the platform and looked out imprudently and carelessly on the immense throng which surged and struggled before him. A native of Vermont, reared on a soil where no slave ever stood, trained to hard manual labor and schooled in early hardships, he came to Illinois a teacher, and from one post to another had risen to his present eminence. Forgetful of the ancestral hatred of slavery to which he was the heir, he had come to be a holder of slaves and to owe much of his fame to his continued subservience to southern influence.

The other—Lincoln—is a native of Kentucky, and of poor white parentage; and from his cradle has felt the blighting influence of the dark and cruel shadow which rendered labor dishonorable, and kept the poor in poverty, while it advanced the rich in their possessions. Reared in poverty and the humblest aspirations, he left his native state, crossed the line into Illinois, and began his career of honorable toil. At first a laborer, splitting rails for a living—deficient in education, and applying himself even to the rudiments of knowledge—he, too, felt the expanding power of his American manhood, and began to  achieve the greatness to which he has succeeded, With great difficulty struggling through the tedious formularies of legal lore, he was admitted to the bar and rapidly made his way to the front ranks of his profession. Honored by the people with office, he is still the same honest and reliable man. He volunteers in the Black Hawk war, and does the state good service in its sorest need. In every relation of his life, socially and to the state, Mr. Lincoln has been always the pure and honest man. In physique he is the opposite to Douglas. Built on the Kentucky type, he is very tall, slender and angular, awkward even, in gate and attitude. His face is sharp, large-featured and unprepossessing. His eyes are deep set, under heavy brows; his forehead is high and retreating, and his hair is dark and heavy. In repose, I must confess that “Long Abe’s” appearance is not comely. But stir him up, and the fire of his genius plays on every feature. His eye glows and sparkles, every lineament, now so ill-formed, grows brilliant and expressive, and you have before you a man of rare power and of strong magnetic influence. He takes the people every time, and there is no getting away from his sturdy good sense, his unaffected sincerity, and the unceasing play of his good humor, which accompanies his close logic and smoothes the way to conviction. Listening to him on Saturday, calmly and unprejudiced, I was convinced that he has no superior as a stump speaker. He is clear, concise and logical; his language is eloquent and at perfect command. He is altogether a more fluent speaker than Douglas, and in all the arts of debate fully his equal. The Republicans of Illinois have chosen a champion worthy of their heartiest support and fully equipped for the conflict with the great “squatter Sovereign.”

By previous arrangement, Mr. Douglas was to open in a speech of one hour, Mr. Lincoln was to respond in a speech of an hour and a half, and Mr. Douglas was to conclude in another half hour. The square was filled with people, and when the cannon and the music had been quieted, Mr. Douglas commenced. He began by referring to the attitude of the Whig and Democratic parties prior to the spring of 1854, claiming that up to that time they stood on the same platform with regard to the Slavery question. He said that in the session of 1853-4 he introduced the Kansas bill, in accordance with the principles of the compromise of 1850, and endorsed by the Wig and Democratic National Conventions of 1852. In 1854, after the passage of this bill, he said that Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Trumbull entered into a league to deliver up, bound hand and foot to the Abolitionists, the old Whigs and the old Democrats—in consideration whereof, Mr. Lincoln was to have Shield’s place, and Mr. Trumbull was to have his own. (A screw subsequently became loose, and the programme of substitution was changed.) In pursuance of this plan, the parties met at Springfield in 1854, to perfect arrangements. There they, Mr. Lincoln included, passed a certain series of abominable resolutions, one of which he would read, and to which Mr. Lincoln, and his party were [committed]. He then proceeded to discuss Mr. Lincoln’s position in regard to negro equality, to the evident satisfaction of the Hibernian body guard, who were made to believe that Mr. Lincoln was aching to place the African in high places of the land, and to fold him to his arms in a fraternal embrace. Recurring them to his doctrine of popular sovereignty, he lauded it as the great element of our growth and prosperity, and closed with a spread-eagle eulogium upon the democratic party. Mr. Douglas was often interrupted with light applause, but, on the hole, it was not a very enthusiastic demonstration.

Then the tall form of “Long Abe” loomed above the heads on the stage, the signal for a fanatic expression of applause. Mr. Lincoln replied seriatim to Mr. Douglas’s charges, denying the conspiracy with Trumbull entirely, stating that at that time he was opposed to the formation of a new party, and that he had no hand in the preparation of the Springfield resolutions. On the subject of negro equality, he read from a speech of his in 1854, and which he said Mr. Douglas heard, and on that record he was prepared to stand.

Mr. Lincoln closed, and Douglas came forward, evidently under much excitement. He took advantage of his last half hour, and rose to such a pitch of arrogance and audacity as is seldom witnessed. With brazen front and lungs of iron, with a recklessness peculiarly his own, he launched forth a bold and defiant speech, which his retainers applauded to the echo. The charges of his first speech he re-affirmed with an unblushing effrontery, denounced Trumbull and Lincoln in unstinted terms, passed the lie around the circle, shook his long locks, grew red in the face, stentorian in voice, declared that Buchanan was a most excellent man, and scouted at the idea of Mr. Lincoln’s having any reputation for veracity. When he concluded, he was followed to his quarters by part of the crowd. The rest gathered about the stand, cheering Lincoln, and when he descended, he was seized by his enthusiastic friends, and in spite of his struggles, borne in triumph to the hotel, on the shoulders of half a dozen men, at once a novel exhibition of the freedom of western politics and the exuberance of western feeling.

I said, near the commencement of this letter, that Mr. Douglas waded very deeply into the mire of mendacity at Ottawa. The full vindication of this charge, and the proof of his singular madness, is furnished in the Chicago Press and Tribune of this morning, to whose excellent phonographic report of the Ottawa meeting. I have been indebted for the completion of the brief notes which I took at the time. I can do no better than give you the proof, in the words of the journal to which I refer. “At the meeting in Ottawa, on Saturday, the senator read a series of radical resolutions, which he assured his hearers were passed by a Republican State Convention in 1854, at Springfield; that the constituted the platform of the party at that day, and that they represented the views of his distinguished competitor, who, he said, took part in the proceedings of which the resolutions were a share. The resolutions were frauds and forgeries from first to last. No such series was ever presented to, hence never adopted by, any State Republican Convention in Illinois! And in making the assertion Mr. Douglas knee that he basely, maliciously and willfully LIED. He not only lied circumstantially and wickedly; but be spent the first part of his speech in elaborating the lie with which he set out, and the entire latter part, in giving the lie application and effect. The resolutions which he read were adopted by one house meeting at Aurora, in Kane county, with which Mr. Lincoln had nothing to do, which he was not near, which he possibly never heard of except though the public prints.”

There the senator stands, branded and convicted of a deliberate fraud, gibbeted before the public. I confess I was prepared for this exhibition. I knew that Douglas’s life as a politician was one great [illegible] vocation, that he had experienced incessant “changes of heart,” and that his position in [illegible] campaign was only a trap and a lure to another and falser position in the next. But I could hardly expect that he would coolly stand up and read a printed resolution as genuine, where he must have known that he was deliberately submitting a false and fraudulent record. Yet, he it is that goes over the states saying “you lie,” and infamous liar,” to Trumbull and Lincoln. This exposure of the Press and Tribune takes the very heart and core out of Douglas’s Ottawa speech. It to the very bone, and leaves only a hollow and baseless frame behind, “were words, “mouthfuls of spoken wind,” a figure with swollen features, and windmill arms beating the air, with violent but [imbecile] gesticulation. The very audacity of this charge gave Douglas this seeming advantage; that it put Lincoln on the explanatory and defensive, in regard to a series of resolutions which, whether passed at a one horse meeting in Kane county” or at Springfield, he could know nothing about it, as he had no hand in making them, and it is asking too much, to require a politician to have at his tongue’s end all the resolutions of four year old conventions. Lincoln will overhaul Douglas for this cheat, at Freeport, on Friday, when they meet again. The senator’s friends came home in jubilant spirits on Saturday, but they are crest fallen to-day, and doubtful of the implicit faith they have heretofore reposed in him. Douglas is unchanged. Perhaps the wise men of the East, that counseled the Republicans of Illinois to sustain him, are still regretful that their arrangements were not carried out.

After the Ottawa meeting was concluded on Saturday, Hon. Owen Lovejoy addressed the Republicans in the evening. Thrusting aside the assaults in his own party, he dashed headlong at the enemy and carried the war into the democratic party. “from grave to gay, from lively to severe,” he proceeded boldly and eloquently to arraign that party at the popular bar, and to convict it of its errors, crimes and inconsistencies. It was a great speech, and finished up admirably the performances of the day. There was then a torchlight procession. By the moonlight thousands wended their way home, and quiet began to reign in Ottawa.

Senator Trumbull is on the stump in the central and southern part of the state. He speaks at Alton on Wednesday, and at Springfield on Saturday. Douglas speaks at Galena on Wednesday and meets Lincoln at Freeport of Friday.

Douglas is in a quandary in regard to popular sovereignty and Dred Scott. At some places he tells his audiences that the decision is not binding where it conflicts with his specific. His reporter for he carries one about with him—omits this part of the performance from the bills.

Yours, &c.,

BAYOU.

_______________

¹ This was in italicized and hard to make out, but I believe I got it right as when I put in into Google Translate I got the translation as: “You go through everything, rush through the net of evil”

SOURCE,  The New York Eveing Post, New York, New York, Friday August 27, 1858, p. 1

A Threat Coming Home, August 26 1858

When at Ottawa, Mr. DOUGLAS flourished that resolution out of the Platform of the State of Aurora, over Mr. LINCOLN’s head, declared that it was out of the Republican Platform of the State of Illinois, pretended that he was in Springfield when it was adopted and stated day, date and circumstance to corroborate his words; when he threatened to “trot Abraham out,” to “bring him to his milk,” and otherwise put him through various and sundry equestrian and lacteal exercises, he did not dream that his threats would come home so soon.  He thought perhaps that he, of all men in Illinois, was the only one who remembered the events of 1854; hence, he howled, he ranted, he bellowed, he pawed dirt, he shook his head, he turned livid in the face, he struck his right hand into his left, he foamed at the mouth, he anathematized, he cursed he exulted, he domineered—he played DOUGLAS! But now behold him at Galena, yesterday! He maintained none of the characteristics of the leader of a bovine herd. In fact, though he displayed hoofs and horns, he never once roared. But he was brought to the point where he had threatened to bring LINCOLN. He was “brought to his milk!” He confessed—that he was mistaken! He packed the lie off on the shoulders of some one down about Springfield—the editor of the Register, or some other sheet that would not be injured by the imputation! Well done, DOUGLAS! Now that the milk has begun to flow, confess your share in the mutilation of LINCOLN’s speech, and the canvass will go on as before. But next time be chary with your threats.

SOURCE: Chicago Daily Press and Tribune, Chicago, Illinois, Thursday Morning, August 26, 1858, p. 1

Gerrit Smith to Elizabeth Cady Stanton, June 6, 1864

PETERBORO, June 6, 1864.

MRs. E. CADY STANTON, New-York:

MY DEAR Cousin: I have your letter. It would be too great labor to answer all, who seek to know my choice amongst the presidential candidates. But I must answer you.

I have no choice. The first of September will be time enough for me and for every other person to have one. Intermediate events and changes will be indispensable lessons in our learning who should be the preferred candidate. To commit ourselves in time of war to a candidate one month before it is necessary, is worse than would be a whole year of such prematureness in time of peace. Then there is the absorbing, not to say frenzying, interest, which attends our important elections. That it is frenzying is manifest from the scornful reproach and wild invective, which the press is already heaping up on Lincoln and Fremont — both of them honest and able men, and both of them intent on saving the country. How unwise, nay how insane, to let this absorbing and frenzying interest come needlessly early into rivalry with our interest in the one great work of crushing the rebellion! For more than half a year have I frequently and faithfully, both with lips and pen, deprecated the premature agitation of the question who should be the chosen candidate. If, therefore, the Cleveland and Baltimore Conventions shall have the effect to divide the loyal voters so far as to let a pro-slavery and sham Democrat slip into the Presidency through their divisions, I, at least, shall not be responsible for the ruin that may come of it.

My concern whether it shall be Lincoln or Fremont or Chase or Butler or Grant who shall reach the presidential chair is comparatively very slight. But my concern to keep out of it a man, who would make any other terms with the rebels than their absolute submission is overwhelming. For any other terms would not only destroy our nation, but lessen the sacredness of nationality everywhere, and sadly damage the most precious interests of all mankind.

Since the Rebellion broke out, I have been nothing but an anti-rebellion man. So unconditionally have I gone for putting it down unconditionally, as to make no stipulations in behalf of m most cherished objects and dearest interests. And so shall I continue to go. I love the anti-slavery cause. Nevertheless, I would have the rebellion put down at whatever necessary expense to that cause. I love the Constitution; and deprecate the making of any even the slightest change in it. Nevertheless, I make infinitely less account of saving it than of destroying the rebellion. I love my country. But sooner than see her compromise with the rebels, I would see her exhaust herself and perish in her endeavors to defeat their crime — that greatest crime of all the ages and all the world. I do not forget that many of my old fellow abolitionists accuse me of having been unfaithful to the anti-slavery cause during the rebellion. My first answer to them is — that to help suppress the rebellion is the duty which stands nearest to me: and my second answer — that in no way so well as in suppressing it can the anti-slavery cause or any other good cause be promoted. There is not a good cause on the earth that has not an enemy in the unmixed and mighty wickedness of this rebellion.

You will rightly infer from what I have said, that my vote will be cast just where I shall judge it will be like to go farthest in keeping a disloyal man out of the Presidency. My definition of a disloyal man includes every one who would consent to obtain peace by concessions to the rebels – concessions however slight. Should the rebellion be disposed of before the election, I might possibly refuse to vote for any of the present candidates. When voting in time of war, and especially such a fearful war as the present, for a Governor or President, I vote for a leader in the war rather than for a civil ruler. Where circumstances leave me free to vote for a man with reference mainly to his qualifications as a civil ruler, I am, as my voting for thirty years proves, very particular how I vote. In 1856, Fremont was in nomination for the Chief Magistracy. I honored him — but I did not vote for him. In 1860, Lincoln was nominated for it. I had read his Debate with Senator Douglas, and I thought well of him. But neither for him did I vote. To-day, however, I could cheerfully vote for either to be the constitutional head of the army and navy. I go further, and say, that to save the Presidential office from going into the hands of one who would compromise with the rebels I, would vote for a candidate far more unsound on slavery than the severest abolition critic might judge either Lincoln or Fremont to be. But were there no such danger, I would sternly refuse to vote for any man who recognizes, either in or out of the Constitution, a law for slavery, or who would graduate any human rights, natural or political, by the color of the skin.

This disposition to meddle with things before their time is one that has manifested itself, and worked badly, all the way through the war. The wretched attempts at “Reconstruction” are an instance of it. “Reconstruction” should not so much as have been spoken of before the rebellion was subdued. I hope that by that time all loyal men, the various doctrines and crotchets to the contrary notwithstanding, will be able to see that the seceded States did, practically as well as theoretically, get themselves out of the Union and Nation — as effectually out as if they had never been in. Our war with Mexico ended in a treaty of peace with her. Doubtless our war with the South will end in like manner. If we are the conqueror, the treaty will, I assume, be based on the unconditional surrender of the South. And then the South, having again become a portion of our nation, Congress will be left as free to ordain the political divisions of her territory, as it was to ordain those of the territory we conquered from Mexico. Next in order, Congress will very soon, as I have little doubt, see it to be safe and wise to revive our old State lines. Nevertheless, I trust, that such revival would never be allowed until Congress should see it to be clearly safe and wise. We hear much of the remaining constitutional rights of the loyal men in the seceded States. But they, no more than their rebellious neighbors, have such rights. It is true that the rebellion is their misfortune instead of their crime. Nevertheless, it severed every political cord as well between the nation and themselves as between the nation and those rebellious neighbors. The seceded States embarked in a revolution, which swept away all the political relations of all their people, loyal as well as disloyal. Such is the hazard, which no man, however good, can escape from. If the major part or supreme power of his State carries it to destruction, he is carried along with it. A vigilant, informed, active, influential member of his body politic does it therefore behoove every good man to be. In his haste for “Reconstruction,” the President went forward in it — whereas he is entitled to not the least part in it, until Congress has first acted in it. In the setting up of military or provisional governments, as we proceed in our conquests, his is the controlling voice — for he is the military head of the nation. But in regard to the setting up of civil governments in the wake of those conquests, he is entitled to no voice at all until after Congress has spoken. Another instance of meddling with things before their time is this slapping of the face of France with the “Monroe Doctrine.” I was about to say that doing so serves but to provoke the enmity of France. There is, however, one thing more which it provokes and that is the ridicule of the world. For us, whilst the rebels are still at the throat of our nation, and may even be at her funeral, to be resolving that we will protect the whole Western Continent from the designs of the whole Eastern Continent, is as ludicrous a piece of impotent bravado as ever the world laughed at. And still another instance of our foolish prematureness is the big words in which we threaten to punish the leaders of the rebellion. It would be time enough for these big words when we had subdued the rebellion and captured the leaders. In the mean time there should be only big blows. Moreover, if we shall succeed in getting these leaders into our hands, it will be a question for the gravest consideration whether we should not beg their pardon instead of punishing them. What was it that stirred up the rebellion? The spirit of slavery. That alone is the spirit by means of which Southern treason can build up a fire in the Southern heart whose flames shall burst out in rebellion. Slavery gone from the South, and there will never more be rebellions there to disturb the peace and prosperity in which North and South will ever after dwell together. Who was the guiltier party in feeding and inflaming that spirit? The pro-slavery and preponderant North. The guiltier North it was, that had the more responsible part in moulding the leaders of the rebellion. Does it then become this guiltier North to be vengeful toward these her own creations—her own children ?—and, what is more, vengeful toward them for the bad spirit which she herself had so large a share in breathing into them? — for the Satanic character which she herself did so much to produce in them? But I shall be told that the North has repented of her in upholding slavery, and thereby furnishing the cause of the rebellion; and that the South should have followed her example. But if her repentance did not come until after the rebellion broke out, then surely it came too late to save her from responsibility for the rebellion. Has it, however, come even yet? I see no proof of it. I can see none so long as the American people continue to trample upon the black man. God can see none. Nor will he stay his desolating judgments so long as the American Congress, instead of wiping out penitently and indignantly all fugitive slave statutes, is infatuated enough to be still talking of “the rights of slaveholders,” and of this being “a nation for white men.” Assured let us be, that God will never cease from his controversy with this guilty nation until it shall have ceased from its base and blasphemous policy of proscribing, degrading, and outraging portions of his one family. The insult to him in the persons of his red and black children, of which Congress was guilty in its ordinance for the Territory of Montana, will yet be punished in blood, if it be not previously washed out in the tears of penitence. And this insult, too, whilst the nation is under God’s blows for like insults! What a silly as well as wicked Congress! And then that such a Congress should continue the policy of providing chaplains for the army! Perhaps, however, it might be regarded as particularly fit for such a Congress to do this. Chaplains to pray for our country's success whilst our country continues to perpetrate the most flagrant and diabolical forms of injustice! As if the doing of justice were not the indispensable way of praying to the God of justice! It is idle to imagine that God is on the side of this nation. He can not be with us. For whilst he is everywhere with justice, he is nowhere with injustice. I admit that he is not on the side of the rebellion. From nothing in all his universe can his soul be further removed than from this most abominable of all abominations. If we succeed in putting it down, our success, so far as God is concerned, will be only because he hates the rebellion even more than he hates our wickedness. To expect help from him in any other point of view than this, is absurd. Aside from this, our sole reliance must be, as was the elder Napoleon's, on having “the strongest battalions.” I believe we shall succeed — but that it will be only for the reasons I have mentioned — only because we are the stronger party and that God is even more against the rebels than he is against us. How needful, however, that we guard ourselves from confounding success against the rebellion with the salvation of the nation! Whether the nation shall be saved is another question than whether the rebellion shall be suppressed. In the providence of God, even a very wicked nation may be allowed to become a conqueror — may be used to punish another wicked nation before the coming of its own turn to be conquered and punished. But a nation, like an individual, can be saved only by penitence and justice.

SOURCES: Gerrit Smith, Speeches and Letters of Gerrit Smith (from January 1863, to January 1864), on the Rebellion, Volume 2, p. 14-8

The Lincoln-Douglas Debates

Ottawa, Illinois	August 21, 1858
Freeport, Illinois	August 27, 1858
Jonesboro, Illinois	September 15, 1858
Charleston, Illinois	September 18, 1858
Galesburg, Illinois,	October 7, 1858
Quincy, Illinois	October 13, 1858
Alton, Illinois	October 15, 1858

John M. Forbes to Nassau William Senior, June 18, 1860

Boston, June 18,1860.

My Dear Mr. Senior, — Thinking you may be interested in the antecedents of our promised ruler Lincoln, I send through my bookseller a copy of his speeches (and Douglas's) during their great fight for the Illinois senatorship — which form his chief record.

From such of them as I have read I get the idea that he is an earnest, rough, quick-witted man, — persistent and determined, half educated, but self-reliant and self-taught. These speeches, made before Seward's, show that Lincoln originated in these latter days the utterance of the “irrepressible conflict,” — and what is more, stuck to it manfully. Those who know him assure me that he is honest and straightforward and owned by no clique of hackneyed politicians.

Seward was killed by his association with the politicians who joined in the plundering of the last New York legislature, and by his speech in the Senate ignoring the irrepressible conflict and smoothing over his supposed radicalism.

The first evil lost him the confidence of the right sort of men, not because they believed him corrupt, but from the bad company he had been in and would probably be in again! His latter-day conservatism conciliated his enemies, who would not, however, vote for him, happen what might; and cooled the zeal of his radical supporters, and especially of the country people. I think on the whole the actual nominee will run better and be quite as likely to administer well when in. We shall elect him, I think, triumphantly, by the people; and avoid that abominable expedient, an election by the House, — filled as it is with so large a proportion of mere politicians. There is some danger that we shall be disgusted with a repetition of the log-cabin and hard-cider style of campaigning which was so successful in the Harrison election, but this is a minor evil compared with either having Douglas, with his filibustering crew, or a set of Albany wire-pullers under a Republican administration. . . .

Although you say nothing about it, I still hope you will come out this summer and take care of your young prince and see our heir apparent!

Yours very truly,

J. M. Forbes.

SOURCE: Sarah Forbes Hughes, Letters and recollections of John Murray Forbes, Volume 1, p.183-4

How Baber Got His Commission

Armstrong of the Tiffin (Ohio) Advertiser, who has just returned from a visit to Washington, relates the following, which is sufficiently life-like to be true.

Almost everybody about Columbus, Ohio, knows Baber, while out of the capital.

Baber is the individual who published the Douglas and Lincoln debates, and but the ball in motion that finally landed Uncle Abraham into the White House.  Baber, hence claims to be Warwick, the Kingmaker, and for his services has been rewarded with the office of Paymaster in the United States Army.

When the President appointed the Major to his position he desired him to call upon the Secretary of War and receive his commission.  Now Cameron is besieged and hunted by hundreds, and is hard to reach.  Baber stood at the gate for a long while, the hours wore away, and no attention was paid to his appeals by the secretary at the door.

Finally, Baber – who had for long years warred Chase – concluded to call upon that functionary to assist him, on the principle that Chase is always willing to do more for his enemies than his friends.  The Governor went with Baber, and Sesame opened.  Chase with Baber at his side, strode into the War Department and up to Cameron.

“Cameron,” said Chase, “here is the man who beat you and me for the Presidency at Chicago.  Give him his commission, quick, or Abe will have him in his Cabinet in place of one of us.”

Baber got his papers and gleefully relates how courteously his old friend “came down.”

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, February 8, 1862, p. 2