Part 18 (1/2)
A VOICE FROM THE DEAD.
”Fellow citizens, my friend, Mr. Douglas, made the startling announcement to-day that the Whigs are dead. If that be so, you will now experience the novelty of hearing a speech from a dead man.” With his arms waving like windmill-sails, and his frame vibrating in every one of the seventy-five inches perpendicular, he shrilled: ”And I suppose you might properly say, or sing, in the language of the old hymn: 'Hark, from the tombs a doleful sound!'”--(Lincoln-Douglas Debate, 1858.)
”IF I MUST GO DOWN, LET IT BE LINKED TO TRUTH.”
In 1856, a red-letter day in American politics, the Republican party was organized at Bloomington, Illinois, and, after his speech at the inauguration, Abraham Lincoln was hailed as the foremost of the league throughout the West. A civil war raged, as he had foretold, in Kansas, through repeal of the Missouri Compromise, and Douglas was forced to about face and actually vote, as senator in Congress against the very measures he advocated, with the Republicans. He sought reelection, and so believed he would allure them over to his side. At the Republican State Convention in June, however, Lincoln was the unanimous representative for Cook County, and he made the celebrated speech known as ”The House Divided Against Itself.” This discourse had been rehea.r.s.ed before his clique of friends--the men who afterward boasted that they made the President out of the ”little one-horse lawyer of a little one-horse town!” They agreed that it was sound and energetic, but that it would not be politic to speak it then. The Republicans were cautious, and shrank from uniting with the advanced theorists known as the Abolitionists.
Lincoln slowly repeated the debated pa.s.sage:
”'A house divided against itself cannot stand.' I will deliver it as written. I would rather be defeated with this expression in the speech than be victorious without it.”
Before the persistence the advisers again implored him to moderate the lines. ”It would defeat his election--it will kill the embryo party!”
and so on.
But after silent reflection, he suddenly and warmly said:
”Friends, if it must be that I must go down because of this speech, then let me go down linked to truth--_die_ in the advocacy of what is right and just.”
That famous utterance of what was fermenting in the great heart of the people, and which perfect oneness with it and his own, enabled him to be the touchstone of the Satan yet disguised, cleared the sky, and all saw the battle, if not the doom, of the black stain on the United States.
COME ONE, COME ALL!
On his road to inauguration, Lincoln held a reception at Chicago.
The autograph fiend was not prominent in the thick crowd, but still several little girls were pushed forward by their besieging mamas and, under pretense of one gift deserving a return, gave flowers, and the spokesgirl said as she waved a sheet of paper:
”Your name, Mr. President, please!”
”But here are several other little girls----”
”They come with me,” replied the little miss, with the intention of gaining her end alone.
”Oh, then, as my signature will be little among eight--more paper!”
And he wrote a sentiment on each of eight sheets and affixed his sign manual.
a.s.sISTING THE INEVITABLE.