Part 3 (1/2)

He was too good a politician to yield, even if there had been no other reason to stand firm, but continued to defend the only doctrine on which there was the slightest chance of beating the Republicans in the approaching election One method he took to defend it was novel, but he has hadpublic uazine of the day The article is not nearly so good reading as his speeches, but it idely read Judge Jeremiah Black, the Attorney-General of Buchanan's cabinet, las rejoined; but little of value was added to the discussions in Congress and on the stu As they saw their long ascendency in the governher Soitate for a revival of the African slave trade; and this also Douglas had to oppose His following in the Senate was now reduced to two or three, and one of these, Broderick, of California, a brave and steadfast man, was first defeated by the Southern interest, and then slain in a duel John Brown's invasion of Virginia soht have gone for a warning The elections in the autuer disposed to forbearance with slavery Douglas went as far as anyJohn Brown and those ere thought to have set hi Cuba But Davis, on the very eve of the De upon the Senate a series of resolutions setting forth the extre the Territories He was as bitter toward Douglas as he was toward the Republicans At Charleston, Yancey took the same tone with the convention

Practically the whole las now, and the ainst him The party was divided, as the whole country was, by a line that ran fro but the success of that party would avert the danger of disunion, and the best judges were of opinion that it could not succeed with any other candidate than Douglas or any other platforers at Charleston offered the Cincinnati platform of 1856, with the addition of a demand for Cuba and an indorsement of the Dred Scott decision and of any future decisions of the Supreme Court on slavery in the Territories But the Southerners would not yield a hair's breadth Yancey, their orator, upbraided Douglas and his folloith cowardice because they did not dare to tell the North that slavery was right In that strange way the question of right and wrong was forced again upon the h, of Ohio, spokeslas, answered the fire-eaters ”Gentlemen of the South,” he cried, ”you las platform was adopted, and the men of the cotton States withdrew On ballot after ballot, a majority of those who remained, and a las, but it was decided that two thirds of the whole convention was required to nominate Men who had followed his fortunes until his ambition was beco deferment, broke down and wept Finally, it was voted to adjourn to Baltilas fell once more into their bitter controversy in the Senate

At Baltiates from the cotton States appeared in place of the seceders, but they were no sooner ad, the chairraphed his friends to sacrifice him if it were necessary to save his platform, but the rump convention adopted the platforroups of seceders united on the Yancey platfore, of Kentucky, for a candidate A new party of sincere but unpractical Union-savers took the field with John Bell, an old Whig, for a candidate, and a platforuided in ways they themselves did not understand, had put aside Seward and taken Lincoln to be their leader

The rivals were again confronted, but on cruelly unequal terms Frooing Republican, and that the cotton States were for Breckinridge or disunion Whatever chance Douglas had in the border States and in the Democratic States of the North was destroyed by the new party But he kneas at the head of the true party of Jefferson, he felt that the old Union would not stand if he was beaten He was the leader of a forlorn hope, but he led it superbly well He undertook a canvass of the country the like of which no candidate had ever made before At the very outset of it he was called upon to show his colors in the greater strife that was to follow

At Norfolk, in Virginia, it was demanded of him to say whether the election of a Black Republican President would justify the Southern States in seceding He answered, no Pennsylvania was again the pivotal State, and at an election in October the Republicans carried it over all their opponents colas was in Iohen he heard the news He said calmly to his companions: ”Lincoln is the next President I have no hope and no destiny before me but to do my best to save the Union from overthro let us turn our course to the South”--and he proceeded through the border States straight to the heart of the kingdom of slavery and cotton The day before the election, he spoke at Montgoht, he slept at Mobile If in 1858 he was like Napoleon the afternoon of Marengo, noas like Napoleon struggling backward in the darkness toward the lost field of Waterloo

There was a true dignity and a true patriotism in his appeal to his ainst the Union their fathers made:--

”Woodh”

An old soldier of the Confederacy, scarred with the wounds he took at Bull Run, looking back over a wasted life to the youth he sacrificed in that ill-starred cause, re else of the whole year of revolution the last plea of Douglas for the old party, the old Constitution, the old Union

He carried but one State outright, and got but twelve votes in the electoral college Lincoln swept the North, Breckinridge the South, and Bell the border States Nevertheless, in the popular vote, hopeless candidate that he was, he stood next to Lincoln, and none of his cohout the whole country

When all was over, he could not rest, for he was still the first ton and joined in the anxious conferences of such as were striving for a peaceable settleh that he did not believe in the right of secession or consider that there was any grievance sufficient to justify the act But he was for concessions if they would save the country fro forward after the manner of Clay with a series of amendments to the Constitution, and another Colas was ready to play the same part he had played in 1850 But the plan could not pass the Senate, and one after another the cotton States followed South Carolina Then he labored with the men of the border States, and broke his last lance with Breckinridge, hen he ceased to be Vice-President, came down for a little while upon the floor as a senator to defend the ainst their country Douglas engaged him with all the old fire and force, and worsted hienerous and ural address, looked aardly about hilasses to read those noble paragraphs, Douglas caraceful courtesy won him praise; and that was his attitude toward the new administration The day Sumter was fired on, he went to the President to offer his help and counsel There is reason to believe that during those fearful early days of power and trial Lincoln calas was of ht to speak for the Democrats of the North On his way hoht to speak Once, he was aroused fro to the front, and his great voice rolled down upon thened beneath hio he spoke firmly and finally, for hiered, he had gone to the extrenanimity, but the time for conciliation was past ”There can be no neutrals in this war,” he said: ”only patriots and traitors” They were the best words he could have spoken They were the last he ever spoke to his countrymen, for at once he was stricken doith a swift and mortal illness and hurried to his end A little while before the end, his wife bent over hie to his sons He roused himself, and said: ”Tell them to obey the laws and support the Constitution of the United States” He died on June 11, 1861, in the forty-ninth year of his age

It was a hard ti nature stirred at the call Plunged in his youth into affairs, and wonted all his life to action, he had played aHe had taken ht bring redress He was a leader, and for want of hi series of defeats He was a true Aer He was ahtly finished He was the second ht yet be the first

But first he never could have been while Lincoln lived, nor ever could have got a hold like Lincoln's on his kind His place is secure a, self-reliant es and countries have for a time hastened, or stayed, or diverted froreat streaiven hiy and his brilliant parts, for all the char in adversity, we cannot turn froed and softened eyes For Lincoln, indeed, is one of the few men eminent in politics e adht; and there, released from that coarse clay which prisoned hientle and heroic of older lands Douglas abides without

The Riverside Biographical Series

1 ANDREW JACKSON, by WG BROWN