that portion of time popular
sovereignty is given up. The seal is absolutely put down upon it by the
court decision, and Judge Douglas puts his own upon the top of that; yet
he is appealing to the people to give him vast credit for his devotion
to popular sovereignty.

Again, when we get to the question of the right of the people to form a
State constitution as they please, to form it with slavery or without
slavery,--if that is anything new I confess I don't know it. Has there
ever been a time when anybody said that any other than the people of a
Territory itself should form a constitution? What is now in it that
Judge Douglas should have fought several years of his life, and pledge
himself to fight all the remaining years of his life for? Can Judge
Douglas find anybody on earth that said that anybody else should form a
constitution for a people?... It is enough for my purpose to ask,
whenever a Republican said anything against it? They never said anything
against it, but they have constantly spoken for it; and whosoever will
undertake to examine the platform and the speeches of responsible men of
the party, and of irresponsible men, too, if you please, will be unable
to find one word from anybody in the Republican ranks opposed to that
popular sovereignty which Judge Douglas thinks he has invented. I
suppose that Judge Douglas will claim in a little while that he is the
inventor of the idea that the people should govern themselves; that
nobody ever thought of such a thing until he brought it forward. We do
not remember that in that old Declaration of Independence it is said
that "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created
equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable
rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of
happiness; that to secure these rights, governments are instituted among
men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed." There
is the origin of popular sovereignty. Who, then, shall come in at this
day and claim that he invented it? The Lecompton constitution connects
itself with this question, for it is in this matter of the Lecompton
constitution that our friend Judge Douglas claims such vast credit. I
agree that in opposing the Lecompton constitution, so far as I can
perceive, he was right. I do not deny that at all; and, gentlemen, you
will readily see why I could not deny it, even if I wanted to. But I do
not wish to, for