ady a
settled question, and so settled by the very means you so pointedly
condemn. By every principle of law ever held by any court, North or
South, every negro taken to Kansas is free; yet in utter disregard
of this--in the spirit of violence merely--that beautiful
Legislature gravely passes a law to hang any man who shall venture
to inform a negro of his legal rights. This is the substance and
real object of the law. If, like Haman, they should hang upon the
gallows of their own building, I shall not be among the mourners
for their fate. In my humble sphere I shall advocate the
restoration of the Missouri Compromise so long as Kansas remains a
Territory; and, when, by all these foul means, it seeks to come
into the Union as a slave State, I shall oppose it.... You inquire
where I now stand. That is a disputed point. I think I am a Whig;
but others say there are no Whigs, and that I am an Abolitionist.
When I was in Washington I voted for the Wilmot Proviso as good as
forty times, and I never heard of any attempt to unwhig me for
that. I now do no more than oppose the extension of slavery. I am
not a Know-Nothing--that is certain. How could I be? How can anyone
who abhors the oppression of the negroes be in favor of degrading
classes of white people? Our progress in degeneracy appears to me
to be pretty rapid. As a nation we began by declaring that 'all men
are created equal.' We now practically read it 'all men are created
equal, except negroes.' When the Know-Nothings get control, it will
read, 'all men are created equals, except negroes and foreigners
and Catholics.' When it comes to that, I should prefer emigrating
to some other country where they make no pretense of loving
liberty--to Russia for instance, where despotism can be taken pure,
and without the base alloy of hypocrisy.

Your friend forever,
A. LINCOLN.

Lincoln was soon accorded an opportunity to cross swords again with his
former political antagonist, Douglas, who had lately come from his place
in the Senate Chamber at Washington, where he had carried the obnoxious
Nebraska Bill against the utmost efforts of Chase, Seward, Sumner, and
others, to defeat it. As Mr. Arnold narrates the incident,--"When, late
in September, 1854, Douglas returned to Illinois he was received with a
storm of indignation which