Lincoln Part 17

Lincoln next attacked Douglas's arguments in favor of that measure. Claiming that repeal of the Missouri Compromise was not necessary in order to set up a territorial government in Nebraska, he showed that in recent years both Iowa and Minnesota had been organized with the Missouri restriction; indeed, Douglas's 1853 bill, which "was within an ace of pa.s.sing," proved that Nebraska could be similarly organized. Vehemently Lincoln denied that pressure of public opinion had forced Douglas to introduce the Kansas-Nebraska bill. He dismissed as "a palliation-a lullaby" Douglas's argument that slavery would not go into the new territories. The climate of Kansas would not exclude slavery; it was just like that in northwestern Missouri, where slavery was flouris.h.i.+ng. Nor would the disposition of the early settlers, because Kansas was nearer slaveholding Missouri than it was to the free states of the North and West.

Up to this point Lincoln's appeal had been chiefly to reason and everyday experience, but his address took on a new tone when he turned to the next argument, that "the sacred right of self government" required restrictions on slavery be removed so the residents of the territories could decide for themselves whether to admit or exclude it. Of course the inhabitants of the territories should make their own laws, Lincoln conceded, and these should not be interfered with any more than "the oyster laws of Virginia, or the cranberry laws of Indiana." But whether they could permit or exclude slavery depended upon "whether a negro is not or is a man."

Here Lincoln reached the crux of his disagreement with Douglas. He and the senator might both regret that slavery had ever been introduced to the American continent and they might both believe that African-Americans could never be the moral or intellectual equals of whites. But their views of African-Americans were fundamentally different. Douglas, Lincoln said, "has no very vivid impression that the negro is a human; and consequently has no idea that there can be any moral question in legislating about him." But to Lincoln the African-American was very much a man. The Declaration of Independence taught him that all men-even men of limited abilities and prospects-are created equal. Because the Negro was a man, there could be no moral right to slavery, which was "founded in the selfishness of man's nature." "No man," Lincoln announced, "is good enough to govern another man, without that other's consent. I say this is the leading principle-the sheet anchor of American republicanism."

Though Lincoln's argument was terse and powerful, his audience found little in its substance that was new. After all, the Kansas-Nebraska issue had been before the American people for nine months, and the act had been repeatedly attacked from almost every conceivable direction. Indeed, a little later in the 1854 campaign Lincoln himself admitted that the flaws of Douglas's "iniquity" had been so often exposed, that "he could not help feeling foolish in answering arguments which were no arguments at all."

What listeners did find different and significant in Lincoln's speech was his tone of moral outrage when he discussed "the monstrous injustice of slavery." "There can be no moral right in connection with one man's making a slave of another," he thundered. It followed, then, that the extension of slavery into the territories and, prospectively, "to every other part of the wide world, where men can be found inclined to take it," was equally wrong. So was Douglas's "declared indifference, but as I must think, covert real zeal for the spread of slavery."

With this Lincoln reached the bedrock of his political faith, with its a.s.surance that all men are created equal. (Frequently in his 1854 addresses he made a significant misquotation of the Declaration, to the effect that all men are created "free and equal.") "Our revolutionary fathers" understood that slavery was wrong. For practical reasons they could not eradicate it at the time they set up the new national government, but they "hedged and hemmed it in to the narrowest limits of necessity." They did not allow the word "slavery" in the Const.i.tution but permitted only indirect references to it, "just as an afflicted man hides away a wen or a cancer, which he dares not cut out at once, lest he bleed to death; with the promise, nevertheless, that the cutting may begin at the end of a given time."

Sharply in contrast was the Kansas-Nebraska Act, with its open tolerance of this monstrous evil, and Lincoln reached a new oratorical height in denouncing Douglas's claim that he was merely acting in the spirit of the Founding Fathers in permitting self-government in the territories. In denouncing this heresy, Lincoln, as Herndon wrote a few days later in the Illinois State Journal, "quivered with feeling and emotion" and "his feelings once or twice swelled within and came near stifling utterance."

Equally powerful was Lincoln's insistence that the American struggle over slavery must be viewed in world perspective. He had always shown sympathy for liberal movements abroad, for instance, expressing sympathy with the efforts of the Hungarian revolutionary Louis Kossuth in his struggles against the Hapsburg monarchy, but only in recent years had he come to see the importance of America as an example to lovers of freedom everywhere. In his eulogy on Clay he echoed that statesman's feeling "that the world's best hope depended on the continued Union of these States." Now he saw that by permitting the expansion of slavery the United States was undermining its influence on "the liberal party throughout the world." "We were proclaiming ourselves political hypocrites before the world," he warned, "by thus fostering Human Slavery and proclaiming ourselves, at the same time, the sole friends of Human Freedom."

It was a remarkable address, more elevated in sentiment and rhetoric than any speech Lincoln had previously made, and when he finished, the women in the audience waved their white handkerchiefs in support and the men gave loud and continuous hurrahs. Douglas took the floor immediately and offered a reb.u.t.tal that lasted nearly two hours. According to Democratic partisans, the senator demolished Lincoln, but in Herndon's report, Douglas "was completely cut down by Lincoln, and... Douglas felt himself overthrown."

That was the way that party newspapers always reported such encounters, but in the next few days there was considerable evidence that Lincoln had made an immense impression. Immediately after Lincoln spoke, Ichabod Codding and Lovejoy, two of the most radical antislavery men, gave notice of a meeting that evening to organize a Republican party in the state, in order to oppose the further extension of the slave power. That the turnout was small-twenty-six men and a boy, according to the hostile Register-was hardly surprising; after three hours of oratory by Lincoln and two more by Douglas, n.o.body wanted to attend another political rally. But the next day there was a meeting of respectable size, and the delegates, mostly from the northern counties, adopted a party platform. The real excitement at the convention, however, was over Lincoln's speech. "Ichabod [Codding] raved, and Lovejoy swelled," the Register reported, and all p.r.o.nounced it "a glorious abolition speech, worthy of Ichabod himself,... [which] ought to be reiterated all over the country." Although disappointed that Lincoln failed to attend, the Republicans, without asking his consent, named him to their state central committee.

The reaction of the Register suggested the impact of Lincoln's speech. Ordinarily the editors of this Democratic newspaper refrained from abusing Lincoln, a fellow townsman whom they liked and admired. But as it became clear that his arguments had weakened Douglas's position, the Register tried to counter with a mock eulogy on "the late Hon. Abe Lincoln." "Left to himself," it mourned with crocodile tears, "he might have been an honor to his kind," with his "talent to hoodwink the blind, and with a facility of speech well calculated to deceive the ignorant," but, "flattered and cajoled by his pretended friends," he had allowed himself to believe that he was a great man, capable of challenging Douglas. "Annihilation-utter annihilation"-had inevitably been his fate, and there was no hope "to resuscitate his lifeless remains."

Whig reactions also attested to the effectiveness of Lincoln's a.s.sault on Douglas. The day after the speech, B. F. Irwin and several other Springfield Whigs requested Lincoln to pursue Douglas for the remainder of the campaign, constantly challenging him and attacking his arguments "untill he runs him into his hole or makes him holler Enough."

Lincoln did just that. He asked to debate Douglas at Peoria on October 16, but the senator, exhausted from constant campaigning and so hoa.r.s.e that he could hardly be heard, was reluctant. Privately he told a friend that he did not want to share the platform with "the most difficult and dangerous opponent that I have ever met"; but he recognized the political risk of refusing to meet his challenger. He resolved his dilemma by speaking for more than three hours in the afternoon, until well after five o'clock, so that Lincoln would have to face a tired and restive crowd, eager to go home. Recognizing the problem, Lincoln urged listeners to have their supper and rea.s.semble at seven in the evening. Then, to keep the audience from scattering, he offered Douglas a final hour for reb.u.t.tal, saying candidly to the Democrats: "I felt confident you would stay for the fun of hearing him skin me."

At Peoria, Lincoln gave essentially the same speech that he had delivered in Springfield; this time he wrote it out for publication in full over a week's issues of the Illinois State Journal, so that it would be widely read throughout the state. He went on from Peoria to Urbana, where he delivered his speech so effectively that years later Henry C. Whitney declared it had never been equaled before or since. After Lincoln spoke in Chicago, a journalist reported that he created the impression "on all men, of all parties,... first, that he was an honest man, and second, that he was a powerful speaker."

VII

In the fall elections voters across the North repudiated Douglas and the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Twenty-nine of the thirty-one New York congressmen elected were anti-Nebraska men, and so were twenty-one out of the twenty-five Pennsylvania representatives. Every congressman in Ohio was an opponent of Kansas-Nebraska, as were all but two in Indiana. Illinois joined the movement. Though the anti-Nebraska coalition failed to reelect Yates to Congress, choosing instead Douglas's loyal lieutenant, Thomas L. Harris, the Democrats could boast of few other victories. Anti-Nebraska candidates won five of the state's nine seats in the House of Representatives, and anti-Nebraska forces, by a small majority, would control the next General a.s.sembly, whose princ.i.p.al duty would be to elect the next United States senator from Illinois.

Even before the makeup of the new legislature was clear, Lincoln began to campaign for that office. He had been thinking about the prospect for some time. His address at Chicago, for instance, was probably intended to consolidate his following in the northern part of the state. Once the election turned out so favorably for the anti-Nebraska coalition, he sprang into action. Three days after the election he wrote candidly to Charles Hoyt, a client whom he had represented in an important patent suit: "You used to express a good deal of partiality for me; and if you are still so, now is the time. Some friends here are really for me, for the U.S. Senate." He asked Hoyt and his other correspondents to "make a mark for me" with members of the new legislature and solicited "the names, post-offices, and political position" of the incoming senators and representatives. His appeal went mainly to members of the Whig party. "It has come round that a whig may, by possibility, be elected to the U. S. Senate," he wrote one new legislator; "and I want the chance of being the man. You are a member of the Legislature, and have a vote to give. Think it over, and see whether you can do better than to go for me." So a.s.siduous was he in soliciting votes that, as Herndon wrote, during the weeks after the November election "he slept, like Napoleon, with one eye open."

Lincoln recognized that his candidacy was problematical. The new legislature was certain to be fragmented and disorganized; only four of the seventy-five representatives in the previous legislature retained their seats. The anti-Nebraska majority was slim and far from united on any one man. There were, he discovered, "ten or a dozen, on our side, who are willing to be known as candidates," plus "fifty secretly watching for a chance." The Democrats could be counted on to offer "a terrible struggle," and many vowed that, rather than elect an anti-Nebraska senator, they would prevent the state senate, where they were in the majority, from joining the house of representatives in a joint session and thus stave off any choice.

Lincoln understood, too, that there were particular problems blocking his own candidacy. For one thing, in November, Sangamon County voters had elected him again to the state legislature, with the largest number of votes given to any candidate. This was, at best, bittersweet news, because the Illinois const.i.tutional provision prohibiting the legislature from electing one of its own members to higher office might give unenthusiastic legislators an excuse not to vote for him. Apart from that, the new legislature was going to be so closely divided that, if Lincoln accepted the office, he might have the deciding vote in the election of senator. Propriety dictated that a man should not vote for himself but must abstain or cast his ballot for his opponent. There was, then, a real possibility that if Lincoln served in the legislature he might be obliged to a.s.sist in the reelection of the Democratic candidate, James s.h.i.+elds, his old political foe and Douglas's right-hand man. He thought about the problem for two weeks and then declined to accept election to the House of Representatives. "I only allowed myself to be elected," he explained, "because it was supposed my doing so would help Yates."

According to Charles H. Ray, of the Chicago Tribune, Lincoln's declination "did more than any thing else to damage him with the Abolitionists" throughout the state, for they thought he was putting his personal fortunes above those of the anti-Nebraska movement. The Know Nothings, who had supported Lincoln, were also resentful at what they considered betrayal; Dr. William Jayne reported that they were "down on Lincoln-hated him." Taken by surprise by Lincoln's refusal to serve, the anti-Nebraska forces in Sangamon County were unable to field a strong candidate in the special election held just before Christmas, and a Democrat won the Sangamon seat in the legislature. Opponents chuckled that the voters had slapped Lincoln's face, and s.h.i.+elds called the outcome "the best Christmas joke of the season."

Lincoln had also to steer his way out of his entanglement with the radical antislavery wing of the anti-Nebraska movement, which const.i.tuted the new Republican party. Whether from prudence or pressure of business, he had been absent from Springfield in October 1854, when their convention adopted a platform urging an end to slavery in all national territories and a repeal of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, and made him a member of the state central committee. Lincoln neither accepted nor declined members.h.i.+p and, indeed, made no response until after the election, when Codding requested him to attend a meeting of the committee. As delicately as possible, he tried to disengage himself from a group whose votes he wanted but with whom he could not afford to be publicly affiliated. "I have been perplexed some to understand why my name was placed on that committee," he wrote Codding. "I was not consulted on the subject; nor was I apprized of the appointment, until I discovered it by accident two or three weeks afterwards." He could easily have resigned, but he was not willing to repudiate voters whose support he needed for the senate election. "I suppose my opposition to the principle of slavery is as strong as that of any member of the Republican party," he continued; "but I had also supposed that the extent to which I feel authorized to carry that opposition, practically; was not at all satisfactory to that party." Did the Republicans misunderstand his position, he asked diplomatically, or did he misunderstand theirs?

Once again, Lincoln was making it clear that he opposed the Kansas-Nebraska Act as a Whig, not as a Republican, much less as an abolitionist. Despite the soaring eloquence of his Springfield speech, his message was a moderate one, which appealed to the conservatism of Whigs in central Illinois. Unlike the antislavery radicals, he did not favor prohibiting the admission of additional slave states to the Union; indeed, he stated explicitly that, much as he hated slavery, he "would consent to the extension of it rather than see the Union dissolved." Unlike Republicans, he did not call for the elimination of slavery in all national territories; he stood pledged to the Compromise of 1850, which allowed New Mexico and Utah to tolerate or to forbid slavery. He accepted the Fugitive Slave Act, though he suggested it should be modified so that it would "not, in its stringency, be more likely to carry a free man into slavery, than our ordinary criminal laws are to hang an innocent one." Rather than condemning Southerners for the immorality of slaveholding, he expressed sympathy for the South, where he and so many other Whigs in central Illinois had been born.

In thus distancing himself from the Republican wing of the anti-Nebraska coalition, Lincoln knew that he risked alienating the earnest antislavery element. In the northern part of the state many felt that no man closely identified with either of the old parties ought to be elected senator. From repeated betrayals they distrusted the professions of all "mere politicians." Many were suspicious of Lincoln because of his background. "I must confess I am afraid of 'Abe,'" Ray wrote. "He is Southern by birth, Southern in his a.s.sociations and southern, if I mistake not, in his sympathies.... His wife, you know, is a Todd, of a pro-slavery family, and so are all his kin."

Through intermediaries Lincoln worked to a.s.suage these doubts. The previous summer Herndon had tried to reach Zebina Eastman, the fiercely abolitionist editor of the Chicago Free West. Known to be more radical on the slavery issue than his partner, Herndon had a long talk with the editor about Lincoln and offered him "a sight of his heart." "Although he does not say much," he pledged, "you may depend upon it; Mr. Lincoln is all right." Eastman was impressed, but not convinced, and the Free West continued to lament Lincoln's shortcomings. For more effective a.s.sistance, Lincoln turned to Elihu B. Washburne, who had just been elected to Congress from the Galena district as a Republican but who as a former Whig had great admiration for Lincoln. Washburne earnestly recommended Lincoln to Eastman and the northern Illinois Republicans as "a man of splendid talents, of great probity of character," who at Springfield had "made the greatest speech in reply to Douglas ever heard in the State." Most influential of all with Illinois abolitionists was the veteran Ohio antislavery leader Joshua R. Giddings, who announced unconditional support for his old congressional messmate and declared that he "would walk clear to Illinois" to help elect Lincoln.

It was harder to know how to deal with the Know Nothings in the incoming legislature-in part because n.o.body was sure just who belonged to the secret order. Leonard Swett, who was rounding up support for Lincoln in northern Illinois, pa.s.sed along the prediction of a local newspaper editor, himself a member of one of the lodges, that the Know Nothings would control the new General a.s.sembly. There was a general belief that they favored Lincoln. The Free West announced bluntly, "Mr. Lincoln is a Know Nothing and expects the full vote... of the Know Nothings." That was not true, but even the rumor of nativism lost him support. Publicly to repudiate the Know Nothings would be even more costly. Lincoln held his peace and did nothing to alienate voters who belonged to the secret organization.

Many of the responses to Lincoln's letter-writing campaign were all that he could have hoped for. "It will give me pleasure to do what I can for your appointment to the Sennet," Charles Hoyt wrote him. "So far as any effort of mine, can aid in securing such a result," replied editor Robert Boal of Lacon, "it will not be spared, and in any way in which I can a.s.sist you, my services are at your disposal." A correspondent in Lewistown wrote that the most prominent Whigs of his vicinity were earnestly for Lincoln on the somewhat equivocal ground that "we want some one that can stand right up to the little Giant (excuse me) it takes a great Blackguard (you know) to do that-and thou art (excuse again) the Man."

But other responses were less encouraging. After talking with a new member of the legislature, Abraham Jonas, Lincoln's firm friend in Quincy, had to report, "I can get nothing out of him, except that he will act altogether with the Whig party in regard to Senator and will make no pledges." A representative from Coles County was said to think well of Lincoln, "tho he seems to make it a matter of pride not to commit himself." And Thomas J. Turner of Freeport, who was to become the speaker of the new House of Representatives, loftily replied: "I am not committed to any one for the office of U. S. Senator, nor do I intend to be untill I know where I can exert my influence the most successfully against those who are seeking to extend the era of Slavery."

Even so, when the legislature a.s.sembled on January 1, 1855, Lincoln believed that he had 26 members committed to his election-more than twice as many as pledged to any other candidate. He needed 25 more votes. By his estimate, 43 of the 100 members of the General a.s.sembly were Douglas Democrats, none of whom would vote for Lincoln. Douglas had made the senatorial election a referendum on popular sovereignty, and he insisted that all true Democrats in the legislature must endorse the Kansas-Nebraska Act. They should also support s.h.i.+elds, who had been Douglas's loyal ally in the Senate. "Our friends in the Legislature should nominate s.h.i.+elds by acclamation, and nail his flag to the mast," the senator directed, "and never haul it down under any circ.u.mstances nor for any body." Even if that course resulted in a stalemate, with no candidate receiving a majority of the votes, that would be preferable to "the election of Lincoln or any other man spoken of." If s.h.i.+elds was defeated, the Democrats could "throw the responsibility on the Whigs of beating him because he was born in Ireland." "The Nebraska fight is over," Douglas counseled, "and Know Nothingism has taken its place as the chief issue in the future."

In order to win, therefore, Lincoln had to have the backing of nearly every anti-Nebraska legislator. Throughout January, as the rival elements in the anti-Nebraska coalition jockeyed for position, he constantly lobbied for election. He tried not to be too obvious in his efforts, but again and again, as he chatted with legislators, the senate election would come up and he would say, "That is a rather delicate subject for me to talk upon, but I must confess that I would be glad of your support for the office, if you shall conclude that I am the proper person for it." To a.s.sist his supporters in the legislature he prepared several small notebooks in which he carefully listed the members of the state senate and house of representatives, the counties they represented, and their political affiliations. David Davis temporarily threw aside his judicial robes to help plan Lincoln's legislative strategy. Logan, who had just been elected to the house of representatives, became his floor manager, entrusted with making necessary deals to secure the support of the northern antislavery members. Herndon did all he could to influence the abolitionist element, while Leonard Swett and Ward Hill Lamon b.u.t.tonholed uncommitted legislators.

As a result of these efforts, Lincoln steadily gained strength during the early weeks of the legislative session. By careful negotiation his aides were able to win over all of what he called "the extreme Anti-Slavery men," conceding to them the speakers.h.i.+p and all of the lesser offices in the house of representatives. But during the same time he lost the support of at least three Whig members, including an old friend, J. L. D. Morrison, of St. Clair County, who was married to a Catholic and distrusted Lincoln's reported connections with the Know Nothings. He could not afford to lose others. As January 31, the scheduled day for the election, approached, he still was about three votes short of a majority, and he did not see where they could come from.

A small group of Independent Democrats held the balance of power in the legislature-men like Norman B. Judd of Chicago, and John M. Palmer of Carlinville, who had been loyal Democrats all their lives but had broken with Douglas over the Kansas-Nebraska Act. They had little in common with the other elements in the anti-Douglas coalition: they detested the radical antislavery men who styled themselves Republicans; they rejected even the tacit support of the Know Nothings; and they strongly suspected the motives of the Whigs, against whom they had fought in election after election. These anti-Nebraska Democrats had no personal objection to Lincoln, but they announced that "having been elected as Democrats they could not vote for any one but a Democrat for US senator." Their candidate was Lyman Trumbull, the lifelong Democrat from Alton, in southern Illinois, whose hatred for slavery compelled him to give up his safe place on the Illinois Supreme Court to run a bitter, and successful, anti-Douglas campaign for a seat in the United States House of Representatives. As Lincoln summarized the situation, these four or five anti-Nebraska legislators were "men who never could vote for a whig; and without the votes of two of whom I never could reach the requisite number to make an election."

Voting was delayed by a fierce snowstorm, the worst since 1831, which isolated Springfield for twelve days and prevented the a.s.sembling of a quorum in the state legislature, but in the initial ballot on February 8 the results were pretty much what Lincoln had antic.i.p.ated. He led with 45 votes, to s.h.i.+elds's 41, and Trumbull had 5.

Most significant, however, was the one vote cast for Governor Joel A. Matteson, for it suggested the Democrats' strategy. Aware that they probably could not elect s.h.i.+elds, local Democrats rejected Douglas's advice and quietly began rallying around the governor, a wealthy contractor for public works. Matteson had said just enough in favor of the Kansas-Nebraska Act not to offend Douglas but in private had expressed enough opposition to convince many of Douglas's enemies. His strength in the legislature came from members in the districts along the Illinois and Michigan Ca.n.a.l, whom he had repeatedly a.s.sisted with favors, both legal and otherwise, in connection with his construction work.

The Democrats stuck with s.h.i.+elds for six ballots, and then, by prearrangement, they switched to Matteson on the seventh. Lincoln's vote was dwindling, while Trumbull's was gradually increasing. On the ninth ballot Lincoln was down to 15 hard-core loyalists, while Trumbull had 35 votes and Matteson, with 47, lacked only three of election. The danger at this point was that Matteson might use his wealth and his patronage to bribe a few of Trumbull's supporters, and, according to one story, Lincoln learned of a "contract" that the governor had arranged with one of these men-Frederick S. Day, of La Salle County.

Once Lincoln was aware of the danger, he promptly directed that his fifteen remaining supporters go for Trumbull on the tenth ballot. Bitterly disappointed, Logan urged him to hold on to his support and try one or two ballots more, but Lincoln was firm. "I am for Trumbull," he told his followers, and they loyally cast their votes as he directed. On the tenth ballot Lyman Trumbull was elected to the United States Senate.

Privately, according to friends, Lincoln was "disappointed and mortified" by the outcome and found it hard to accept that his 45 supporters had to yield to Trumbull's five. "A less good humored man than I, perhaps would not have consented to it," he grumbled. Immediately after his defeat he was so dejected that he told Joseph Gillespie, an old friend, that "he would never strive for office again," because "he could bear defeat inflicted by his enemies with a pretty good grace-but it was hard to be wounded in the house of his friends." Logan was furious over Lincoln's defeat, as was David Davis, who distrusted Trumbull as "a Democrat all his life-dyed in the wool-as ultra as he could be." Mary Lincoln was bitterly disappointed with the outcome; after Trumbull's victory, she refused to speak to Mrs. Trumbull, the former Julia Jayne, who had been one of her oldest and most intimate friends.

But in public Lincoln gave no expression to his natural disappointment. "I regret my defeat moderately," he wrote Washburne, "but I am not nervous about it," adding, with an uncharacteristic lack of generosity, that Matteson's "defeat now gives me more pleasure than my own gives me pain." He expressed no animosity toward the four anti-Nebraska Democrats who had blocked his election, two of whom-Norman B. Judd and John M. Palmer-became wheel horses in his later political campaigns. He went to considerable pains to make it clear that Trumbull had engaged in no underhand dealings or maneuvers, and on the night after the election he made a point of appearing at a reception that the Ninian Edwardses gave for the victor-a reception that had originally been planned to honor Lincoln himself. There he was at his smiling best, and when his hostess said she knew how disappointed he must be, he moved forward to shake the hand of the newly elected senator, saying, "Not too disappointed to congratulate my friend Trumbull."

On reflection, Lincoln did not consider his defeat a disaster. After all, he had entered the contest dubious of success. He could take satisfaction in knowing that the outcome was a blistering rebuke to Douglas and his popular-sovereignty ideas, and he knew that Trumbull, who had endless persistence and a sharp tongue, would make life miserable for the senior senator from Illinois. In addition, this election cleared the way for Lincoln to run against Douglas himself in 1858. On the night after Trumbull's victory, the anti-Nebraska Democrats of the legislature, gratified by Lincoln's conduct, pledged to support him in the next Senate race. Later Trumbull confirmed that pledge when he wrote Lincoln: "I shall continue to labor for the success of the Republican cause and the advancement at the next election to the place now occupied by Douglas of that Friend, who was instrumental in promoting my own."

VIII

In March, Lincoln had to explain to a client why he had neglected some legal business directed to him back in December. "I was dabbling in politics; and, of course, neglecting business," he wrote, adding, "Having since been beaten out, I have gone to work again." For a full twelve months after his defeat, he made no speeches or public statements on political affairs but devoted himself to his law business trying, as he said, "to pick up my lost crumbs of last year."

Much of the summer and fall of 1855 he spent in preparing to partic.i.p.ate in the patent infringement suit that Cyrus Hall McCormick, the inventor of the reaper, had brought against John H. Manny, who was building closely similar machines. The suit was an important one, for it was already apparent that the mechanical reaper was transforming wheat cultivation, and there was a huge market for these machines, which could replace thousands of farm laborers. In the hope of breaking McCormick's patent, a number of other Eastern and Western manufacturers helped finance Manny's defense, and he employed a team of the leading patent lawyers in the country, headed by George Harding of Philadelphia. Because it seemed likely that Judge Thomas Drummond, of the United States Court for the Northern District of Illinois, would hear the case, Harding thought the team should include a local Illinois attorney who knew the judge and had his confidence-though, he said in his superior Eastern way, "we were not likely to find a lawyer there who would be of real a.s.sistance in arguing such a case."

After failing to secure the services of the Chicago lawyer Isaac N. Arnold, Harding in June sent his a.s.sociate, Peter Watson, a patent lawyer in Was.h.i.+ngton, to Springfield to see if Lincoln might do. Calling without notice at the house at Eighth and Jackson streets, Watson encountered "a very tall man having on neither coat nor vest, who said he was Lincoln and was just putting up a bed." Impressed neither by Lincoln's dress nor by his small, plainly furnished house, Watson concluded this was not the a.s.sociate Harding wanted but thought it would be impolitic to risk his anger by turning him down after consulting him. Consequently he paid Lincoln a $400 retainer, arranged for a fee-reputedly $1,000-and left him with the impression that he was to make an argument at the hearing.

Lincoln began studying the case and went out to Rockford, where Manny's factory was located, so that he could examine the machines closely. Puzzled that Watson failed to send him copies of the depositions and other legal papers, he went to the United States District Court in Chicago and had his own copies made. From the newspapers he learned that the case would be heard not in Chicago but in Cincinnati, where Supreme Court Justice John McLean would preside, but neither Watson nor anybody else on Harding's team told him when the hearing was to be held or invited him to be present.