56.]

[Footnote 471: New York _Independent_, February 7, 1856.]

[Footnote 472: New York _Times_, February 1, 1856.]

In the midst of this excitement, Senator Douglas began the debate on
his Kansas bill which was destined to become more historic than the
outrages of the border ruffians themselves. Douglas upheld the acts of
the territorial Legislature as the work of law and order, denouncing
the Northern emigrants as daring and defiant revolutionists, and
charging that "the whole responsibility for all the disturbance rested
upon the Massachusetts Emigrant Aid Company and its affiliated
societies."[473] Horace Greeley admitted the force and power of
Douglas' argument, and Harriet Beecher Stowe, the gifted author of
_Uncle Tom's Cabin_, was so profoundly impressed with the matchless
orator that she thought it "a merciful providence that with all his
alertness and adroitness, all his quick-sighted keenness, Douglas is
not witty--that might have made him too irresistible a demagogue for
the liberties of our laughter-loving people, to whose weakness he is
altogether too well adapted now."[474] The friends of a free Kansas
appreciated the superiority in debate of the Illinois statesman, whose
arguments now called out half a dozen replies from as many Republican
senators. It afforded a fine opportunity to define and shape the
principles of the new party, and each senator attracted wide
attention. But the speech of Seward, who took the floor on the 9th of
April in favour of the immediate admission of Kansas as a State, seems
to have impressed the country as far the ablest. He sketched the
history of the Kansas territory; reviewed the sacrifices of its
people; analysed and refuted each argument in support of the
President's policy; and defended the settlers in maintaining their
struggle for freedom. "Greeley expressed the opinion of the country
and the judgment of the historian," says Rhodes, "when he wrote to his
journal that Seward's speech was 'the great argument' and stood
'unsurpassed in its political philosophy.'"[475] The _Times_
pronounced it "the ablest of all his speeches."[476] On the day of its
publication the _Weekly Tribune_ sent out 162,000 copies. Seward wrote
Weed that "the demand for it exceeds what I have ever known. I am
giving copies away by the thousand for distribution in Pennsylvania,
Ohio, and other States."[477]

[Footnote 473: Report of Committee on Territories, U.S. Senate, March
12, 1856.]

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