ad you to suppose that the slavery agitation was
settled?

An election was held in Kansas in the month of August, and the
constitution which was submitted to the people was voted down by a large
majority. So Kansas is still out of the Union, and there is a probability
that she will remain out for some time. But Judge Douglas says the slavery
question is settled. He says the bill he introduced into the Senate of
the United States on the 4th day of January, 1854, settled the slavery
question forever! Perhaps he can tell us how that bill settled the slavery
question, for if he is able to settle a question of such great magnitude
he ought to be able to explain the manner in which he does it. He knows
and you know that the question is not settled, and that his ill-timed
experiment to settle it has made it worse than it ever was before.

And now let me say a few words in regard to Douglas's great hobby of negro
equality. He thinks--he says at least--that the Republican party is in
favor of allowing whites and blacks to intermarry, and that a man can't be
a good Republican unless he is willing to elevate black men to office
and to associate with them on terms of perfect equality. He knows that
we advocate no such doctrines as these, but he cares not how much he
misrepresents us if he can gain a few votes by so doing. To show you what
my opinion of negro equality was in times past, and to prove to you that
I stand on that question where I always stood, I will read you a few
extracts from a speech that was made by me in Peoria in 1854. It was made
in reply to one of Judge Douglas's speeches.

(Mr. Lincoln then read a number of extracts which had the ring of the true
metal. We have rarely heard anything with which we have been more pleased.
And the audience after hearing the extracts read, and comparing their
conservative sentiments with those now advocated by Mr. Lincoln, testified
their approval by loud applause. How any reasonable man can hear one
of Mr. Lincoln's speeches without being converted to Republicanism is
something that we can't account for. Ed.)

Slavery, continued Mr. Lincoln, is not a matter of little importance,
it overshadows every other question in which we are interested. It has
divided the Methodist and Presbyterian churches, and has sown discord in
the American Tract Society. The churches have split and the society will
follow their example before long. So it will be seen that slavery is
agitated in the