licanism from that quarter
were generally very tender on "the nigger question," and the most they
were prepared to admit was that they were opposed to slavery's
extension. These men largely dominated the new party. They generally
dictated its platforms, which, compared with earlier Abolition
utterances, were extremely timid, and they had much to do with making
party nominations. Their favorite candidates were not those whose
opinions on the slavery question were positive and well understood,
but those whose views were unsettled if not altogether unknown. When
General Fremont was nominated for the Presidency, not one in ten of
those supporting him knew what his opinions on that subject were, and
a good many of them did not care. Mr. Lincoln was accepted in much the
same way.

It is true that, from certain expressions about the danger to our
national house from being "half free" and "half slave," and other
generalizations of a more or less academic sort, it was known that
Mr. Lincoln was antagonistic to slavery; but as to whether he favored
that institution's immediate or speedy extinguishment, and, if so, by
what measures, was altogether unknown. We now know, from what has been
set forth in another chapter, that at the time of his first nomination
and election, he had very few things in common with the Abolitionists.
He then evidently had no thought of being hailed as the "liberator of
a race." He preferred, for the time at least, that the race in
question should remain where it was, and as it was, unless it could be
bodily transported to some other country and be put under the
protection of some other flag.

He did not break with the Abolitionists, although he kept on the edge
of a quarrel with them, and especially with what he called the
"Greeley faction," a good part of the time. He never liked them, but
he was a shrewd man--a born politician--and was too sagacious to
discard the principal round in the ladder by which he had climbed to
eminence. He managed to keep in touch with the Anti-Slavery movement
through all its steady advancement, but, as elsewhere stated, it was
as a follower rather than as a leader.

While a resident of the slave State of Missouri, I twice voted for Mr.
Lincoln, which was some evidence of my personal feeling toward him.
Both times I did it somewhat reluctantly. On the first occasion there
were four candidates. Breckenridge and Bell were Southern men--both by
residence and principle--and