olygamy and slavery." At Buchanan, recently
nominated by the Democratic National Convention in Cincinnati, it
aimed a barbed shaft: "Resolved, That the highwayman's plea that
'might makes right,' embodied in the Ostend circular, was in every
respect unworthy of American diplomacy, and would bring shame and
dishonor upon any government or people that gave it their sanction."
It demanded the maintenance of the principles of the Declaration of
Independence, of the Federal Constitution, of the rights of the
States, and the union of the States. It favored a Pacific railroad,
congressional appropriations for national rivers and harbors; it
affirmed liberty of conscience and equality of rights; it arraigned
the policy of the Administration; demanded the immediate admission of
Kansas as a State, and invited "the affiliation and cooeperation of men
of all parties, however differing from them in other respects, in
support of the principles declared."

The nominees and platform of the Philadelphia Convention were accepted
by the opposition voters of the free-States with an alacrity and an
enthusiasm beyond the calculation of even the most sanguine; and in
November a vote was recorded in their support which, though then
unsuccessful, laid the secure foundation of an early victory, and
permanently established a great party destined to carry the country
through trials and vicissitudes equal in magnitude and results to any
which the world had hitherto witnessed.

In that year none of the presidential honors were reserved for the
State of Illinois. While Lincoln thus narrowly missed a nomination for
the second place on the Republican ticket, his fellow-citizen and
competitor, Douglas, failed equally to obtain the nomination he so
much coveted as the candidate of the Democratic party. The Democratic
National Convention had met at Cincinnati on the 2d day of June, 1856.
If Douglas flattered himself that such eminent services as he had
rendered the South would find this reward, his disappointment must
have been severe. While the benefits he had conferred were lightly
estimated or totally forgotten, former injuries inflicted in his name
were keenly remembered and resented. But three prominent candidates,
Buchanan, Pierce, and Douglas, were urged upon the convention. The
indiscreet crusade of Douglas's friends against "old fogies" in 1852
had defeated Buchanan and nominated Pierce; now, by the turn of
political fortune, Buchanan's friends