In 1850 Douglas moved to Chicago, which had become the chief city
of the State.
The people were greatly exasperated by the passage of the Fugitive
Slave Law. The City Council, on October 21st, passed resolutions
harshly condemning the Senators and Representatives from the free
States who had supported it and "those who basely sneaked away from
their seats and thereby evaded the question," classing them with
Benedict Arnold and Judas Iscariot. This was a personal challenge
to Douglas. It happened that he was absent from the Senate on private
business when the bill was passed. But the charge of evading the
question was grossly unjust.
On the evening of the 22nd a mass meeting was held at the city
hall, attended by a great concourse of angry citizens, who, amid
tumultuous applause, resolved to defy "death, the dungeon and the
grave" in resisting the hated law. Douglas appeared on the platform
and announced that on the following evening he would address the
people in defense of the Fugitive Slave Law and the entire Compromise.
The announcement was received with a storm of hisses and groans.
The next night an enormous multitude gathered to hear him. The
audience was not only sullen but bitterly hostile. After a
contemptuous reference to the resolutions and a brief vindication
of himself against their insinuations, he plunged into the defense
of the law. He insisted that the provision for the return of
fugitive slaves contained in the recent act was analogous to the
general provision of law for the return of fugitives from justice,
and, while abuses of the process might occur and wrong occasionally
inflicted, that was one of the inherent infirmities of human law,
and the same objection could be urged with equal force to all
extradition statutes. While free blacks might be seized in the
North and carried South on the false charge of being fugitives
from service, innocent white men might also be seized in Chicago
and carried to California on the false charge of being fugitives
from justice.
He reminded them that the law of 1850 was substantially a reenactment
of that of 1793, passed by the Revolutionary Fathers, the founders
of the Constitution, and approved by President Washington. He
did not argue, but assumed the justice of the old law; nor did he
allude to the increased ardor of pursuit of fleeing slaves since
their increase in value. He rested his case on the close resemblance
of the letter of the new law to that of the old. He told them that
the duty of returning fugitive slaves was created not by THIS law,
but by the Constitution, and that the real question was not as to
the existence of the duty, but which law performed it most justly
and efficiently.
A listener asked him whether the Constitution was not in violation
of the will of God. He warned them of the danger of that objection,
arising from the difficulty of authentically ascertaining the will
of God. It was not practicable to allow each citizen to determine
it for himself. Hence, certain fundamental principles had been
established as a Constitution, which must be assumed to be in harmony
with it and from which no appeal lay. The Constitution provided
for the return of fugitive slaves. The sacred duty of citizenship
bound them to support it. Appeals to a higher law were impracticable
and a mere evasion of duty.
Read in a the calmer light of after years the effectiveness of this
speech is hard to understand. The literal difference between the
recent act and the law of 1793, was not great. But the difference
between the ethical views of slavery held by the people in 1850
and those held in 1793 was not to be measured. The changes in the
law were vicious and in the opposite direction from the radical
changes in popular sentiment. The specially odious provision of
the new law, distinguishing it from general extradition statutes,
was that forbidding resort to the writ of habeas corpus by the
alleged fugitive at the place where seized. The fugitive from
justice in California seized in Chicago could, on writ of habeas
corpus issued by an Illinois court, have it judicially determined
before his deportation whether the facts charged against him
constituted a crime and whether thee was probable cause to believe
that he had committed it.
Under the new law the Federal Commissioner of the State where the
arrest was made had no power to inquire into the truth or sufficiency
of the charge. He could only determine whether the person arrested
was probably the one who had committed the escape, and must decline
to hear the testimony of the fugitive himself. The fact of escape
was judicially determined in advance, ex parte, in the State from
which it had been made, and the alleged fugitive was remanded to
that State for such further proceedings as its laws might provide
and "no process issued by any Court, Judge, Magistrate or other
person whomsoever" could molest the captor in bearing away his
prize.
The speech was adroit, clever and marvelously effective. It
strikingly illustrates the mental habits of the times. It sought
to stem an irresistible moral current with ingenious plausibilities
and appeals to precedent. It treated the question as one of
political expediency. It sounded no moral depths, discussed no
ethical problem, though the country was aflame with moral indignation
and rising passionately against the ethics of the past. It mastered
the audience by its fidelity to literal truth and sent them home
dazed, troubled, doubtful and ashamed. At the close of the speech
resolutions affirming the duty of Congress to pass the Fugitive
Slave Law and that of citizens to obey and support it, and repudiating
those of the Common Council, were presented and unanimously
adopted by the subdued and humbled crowd. On the following night
the Council repealed their offensive resolutions.
Meanwhile the country was enjoying the fruits of the Compromise
and striving to persuade itself that it would endure. The people
earnestly desired to believe that the slavery question was settled
forever. So strong was the wish to be done with it that, but for
the restless ambition of the politicians, the truce might have been
protracted for many years. Permanent peace on the preposterous
condition of maintaining on equipoise between active, aggressive and
hostile forces was, of course, impossible. but it was confidently
expected. Clay, Stephens and fifty-two other Members of the Senate
and House issued a manifesto in January, 1851, in which they
announced that the Compromise was final and, to give their manifesto
the highest solemnity, gravely declared that they would not support
anyone for office who was not in favor of faithfully upholding it.
In the North approval for the Compromise was general and enthusiastic.
It was hoped that money-making would no longer be disturbed by
fanatical agitation of moral questions.
And yet there were murmurs of anger against the detested law. It
was hard to compel the descendents of the Puritans to hunt down the
fleeing slaves when they believed that the curse of God rested on
the institution and that the rights of the fugitive were as sacred as
those of his pursuers. There were outbreaks of defiance, violent
rescues, occasional riots. But resistance was sporadic. The people
were disposed to wash their hands of all responsibility for the
law, to deprecate its existence, but, since it had been pronounced
a final Compromise, to pray that it might prove so. In the South
the general opinion was that the danger was past and that years of
peace were in prospect. Enthusiastic meetings approving the compromise
were held everywhere outside of South Carolina and Mississippi.
While the entire moral victory of the Compromise rested with
the people of the South, they had won nothing substantial but the
Fugitive Slave Law, which was of questionable value. The great
object for which they had conspired, sinned and fought had slipped
from their grasp. California was a free State. New Mexico with
indecent haste had called a Convention, adopted a Constitution
prohibiting slavery, and now demanded admission.
The Compromise, however, bade fair to endure. Fillmore in his
annual message in December said, with perfect truth, that a great
majority of the people sympathized in its spirit and purpose and were
prepared in all respects to sustain it. In Congress an optimistic
feeling prevailed. Clay complacently congratulated the country on
the general acquiescence in the law and said that it had encountered
but little resistance outside of Boston. Douglas assured the
Senate that Illinois in good faith discharged its duty under the
late Act. It was flanked on the east and west by the slave States
of Kentucky and Missouri. It did not intend to become a free negro
colony by offering refuge to the fleeing slaves of neighboring
States and, not relying on the action of the Federal Government
alone for protection, had enacted severe laws of its own to prevent
it. When a Judge in that State he had imposed heavy penalties
on citizens convicted of the offense of harboring fugitives from
service. It was the duty of all citizens to sustain and execute the
law, a duty imposed by patriotism and loyalty to the Constitution.
But there was an organization in the North to evade and resist
the law, with men of talent, genius, energy, daring and desperate
purpose at its head. It was a conspiracy against the Government,
and men occupying seats in the Senate were responsible for the
outrages the Boston mob perpetrated in resistance of the law. The
Abolitionists were arming negroes in the free States and inciting
them to murder anyone who attempted to seize them under the provisions
of the law.
Already he aspired to the Presidency and began to jealously guard
his reputation against the sinister suspicions which in those days
haunted the ambitious statesman. The great problem which then taxed
the ingenuity of the aspiring politician was, how to win the South
without alienating the North, or how to hold the North without losing
the South. Irreconcilable differences of opinion on fundamental
questions, deepening ominously into passionate hostility of sentiment,
were already manifesting themselves. The task of the politician
was to steer his dangerous course between this Scylla and Charybdis.
If he gave color to the suspicion that he even tolerated the growing
anti-slavery sentiment of the North, the South would reject him
with horror. If he espoused too warmly the cause that had become
so dear to the heart of the South, the North, goaded by its
over-sensitive conscience, would spurn him with disgust. In the
existing state of party organization the highest success was not
possible without at least partial reconciliation of these irreconcilable
forces. Northern statesmen could not hope to succeed by brave
appeals to the passions and prejudices of the South, for they would
lose their home constituencies, the worst fatality that can befall
an American politician. They could not hope to succeed by brave
appeals to the earnest convictions of the North, for they had not
yet authority as affirmative rules of political conduct.
The charge of dodging a vote on the Fugitive Slave bill had annoyed
Douglas deeply. Any doubt cast upon his fidelity to the South
in its contest with the rising anti-slavery sentiment would be
disastrous. It was extremely distrustful of Northern politicians
and ready to take alarm on the slightest occasion. When the
session was but three weeks old he spoke, defending himself against
a series of political charges and boasting his partisan virtues in
a way that plainly proclaimed the candidate and savored strongly
of the stump. He explained that he had been called to New York
on urgent private business on the day of the passage of the law
and that on his return he was taken seriously ill and confined to
his bed during the latter part of the session and for weeks after
adjournment. He claimed credit for having written the original
Compromise bills which Clay's Committee joined together with a wafer
and reported as its own. He denied vehemently having favored the
Wilmot Proviso, excluding slavery from all territory acquired from
Mexico, and declared that he had sought to extend the Missouri
Compromise line to the Pacific. He said that the legislature of
Illinois had instructed him to vote for the exclusion of slavery
from the Territories, and that, while he had cast the vote of his
State according to instructions, he had protested against it, and
the vote cast was that of the legislature. He regarded the slavery
question as settled forever and had resolved to make no more
speeches on it. He assured them that the Democratic party was as
good a Union party as he wanted, and protested against new tests
of party fidelity and all interpolations of new matter into the
old creed. He conjured them to avoid the slavery question, with
the intimation that, if they did so, it would disappear from Federal
politics forever.
Already the approaching presidential nominations were casting their
shadows over the political arena. Though not yet thirty-nine,
Douglas was as eager for the Democratic nomination as Webster at
seventy was for that of the Whigs.
His picturesque youthfulness, energy and aggressiveness, so
strikingly in contrast with the old age, conservatism and timidity
of the generation of statesmen with whom he now came in competition,
aroused to the highest pitch the enthusiasm of the younger Democrats.
It is not impossible that he could have been nominated but for his
own imprudence and that of his counselors, who seem to have been
more richly endowed with enthusiasm than wisdom. To make sure
of getting him before the people in the most dramatic way, and
at an early stage, they brought out in the January number of the
"Democratic Review" a sensational article which immediately gave
him great prominence as a presidential candidate and solidified
against him an opposition which assured his defeat.
This famous article said that a new time was at hand, calling for
new men, sturdy, clear-headed and honest men. The Republic must
have them even if it must seek them in the forests of Virginia or
in the illimitable West. It was necessary to have a more progressive
Democratic Administration than theretofore. The statesmen of a
previous generation, with their antipathies, claims, greatness or
inefficiency, must get out of the way. Age was to be honored, but
senility was pitiable. Statesmen of the old generation were out
of harmony with either the Northern or Southern wing of the party.
Those who were not so were men incapable of grasping the difficulties
of the times, of fathoming its ideas or controlling its policy.
It had been in the power of these superannuated leaders to do
much good; but their unfortunate lack of discreet and progressive
statesmanship had ruined the party. The next nominee for the
Presidency must not be trammeled with ideas belonging to an anterior
age, but a statesman who could bring young blood, young ideas and
young hearts to the councils of the Republic.
"Your mere general," it continued, "whether he can write on
his card the battle-fields of Mexico, or more heroically boast of
his prowess in a militia review; your mere lawyer, trained in the
quiddities of the court, without a political idea beyond a local
election; your mere wire-puller and judicious bottle-holder,
who claims preeminence now on the sole ground that he once played
second fiddle to better men; * * * and above all, your beaten horse,
whether he ran for a previous presidential cup as first or second
or nowhere at all on the ticket, none of these will do. The
Democratic party expects a new man * * * * of sound Democratic
pluck and world-wide ideas to use it on. * * * Let the Baltimore
Convention give to this young generation of America a candidate
and we are content."
The candidate thus presumptuously demanded by "Young America" was,
of course, Douglas. the superannuated statesmen, incapable of
grasping difficulties, trammeled by the ideas of an anterior age
and sinking into pitiable senility, were clearly, Cass, Buchanan
and Marcy. The description of them as the hero of a militia-review,
the mere lawyer with his quiddities, the political wire-puller
playing second fiddle to better men, was so clear that greater
offense could not have resulted from the use of their names.
On June first, 1852, while Congress was still sweltering in the
tropical heat of the Capital, the Democratic Convention met at
Baltimore, and began its five days of debating and balloting. There
was a general belief that the nominee was certain to be elected.
The Whigs in their Compromise measures had given the Democrats
substantially what they wanted. The chief desire of the latter
was to hold fast what they had and secure the administration of
the offices. They proposed no reforms, made no complaint against
the Administration. Their platform endorsed its chief measure. It
pledged the party to the Compromise, including the Fugitive Slave
Act, and to "resist all attempts to renew the agitation of the
slavery question in congress or out of it, under whatever shape or
color the attempt might be made." Like most political platforms,
it was made to win votes, not to announce moral truths; and the
four statesmen who were competing for the nomination believed that
platform best which would offend the fewest prejudices.
The speeches were delivered. the first ballot gave Cass 116, Buchanan
93, Marcy 37 and Douglas 20 votes. Day after day the managers of
the three veteran politicians plotted and counter-plotted and "Young
America" shouted for Douglas. On the fourth day he had risen to
second rank among the candidates, having 91 votes, while Cass had
93. On the fifth day the four distinguished statesmen were dropped
and Franklin Pierce, an inoffensive New Hampshire politician, was
nominated.
The Whig convention met at Baltimore on June 16th. Already the
Whigs, though in power, were demoralized. Their mission, never
very glorious, was ended. In the North, tinctured with the old
Puritanism and sincere reverence for the primary rights of man,
there was a widely diffused feeling that a party responsible for the
Fugitive Slave Law could be spared without great loss to civilization.
In the South slavery had definitely placed itself under the
protection of the Democratic party as the more reliable, if not the
more subservient, of the two. There was an appropriate funereal
air about the Convention as it struggled with the question of who
should stand on its platform of pitiful negations. The platform
solemnly declared that the Compromise Acts, including the Fugitive
Slave Law, were acquiesced in by the Whig party as a settlement
of the dangerous and exciting questions which they embraced. It
insisted upon the strict enforcement of the Compromise and deprecated
all further agitation of the question thus settled. If further
evidence of the collapse of the party were required, it was furnished
by the attitude and character of the candidates. Fillmore was a
passive candidate. Webster, his Secretary of State, was an eager
competitor. General Scott, though without experience in civil
affairs, was the third candidate and received the nomination.
This was the last serious appearance of the Whig party on the stage
of national politics. The election resulted in the overwhelming
defeat of Scott and the gradual dissolution of the party.