Unlucky as Lincoln's attempt at storekeeping had been, it served one
good purpose. Indeed, in a way it may be said to have determined his
whole future career. He had had a hard struggle to decide between
becoming a blacksmith or a lawyer; and when chance seemed to offer a
middle course, and he tried to be a merchant, the wish to study law had
certainly not faded from his mind.
There is a story that while cleaning up the store, he came upon a barrel
which contained, among a lot of forgotten rubbish, some stray volumes
of Blackstone's "Commentaries," and that this lucky find still further
quickened his interest in the law. Whether this tale be true or not it
seems certain that during the time the store was running its downward
course from bad to worse, he devoted a large part of his too abundant
leisure to reading and study of various kinds. People who knew him then
have told how he would lie for hours under a great oak-tree that grew
just outside the store door, poring over his book, and "grinding around
with the shade" as it shifted from north to east.
Lincoln's habit of reading was still further encouraged by his being
appointed postmaster of New Salem on May 7, 1833, an office he held for
about three years--until New Salem grew too small to have a post-office
of its own, and the mail was sent to a neighboring town. The office
was so insignificant that according to popular fable it had no fixed
abiding-place, Lincoln being supposed to carry it about with him in
his hat! It was, however, large enough to bring him a certain amount of
consideration, and, what pleased him still better, plenty of newspapers
to read--newspapers that just then were full of the exciting debates of
Clay and Webster, and other great men in Congress.
The rate of postage on letters was still twenty-five cents, and small as
the earnings of the office undoubtedly were, a little change found
its way now and then into his hands. In the scarcity of money on the
frontier, this had an importance hard for us to realize. A portion of
this money, of course, belonged to the government. That he used only
what was rightfully his own we could be very sure, even if a sequel to
this post office experience were not known which shows his scrupulous
honesty where government funds were concerned. Years later, after he had
become a practising lawyer in Springfield, an agent of the Post-office
Department called upon him in his office one day to collect a balance
due from the New Salem post-office, amounting to about seventeen
dollars. A shade of perplexity passed over his face, and a friend,
sitting by, offered to lend him the money if he did not at the moment
have it with him. Without answering, Lincoln rose, and going to a little
trunk that stood by the wall, opened it and took out the exact sum,
carefully done up in a small package. "I never use any man's money but
my own," he quietly remarked, after the agent had gone.
Soon after he was raised to the dignity of postmaster another piece of
good fortune came in his way. Sangamon County covered a territory some
forty miles long by fifty wide, and almost every citizen in it seemed
intent on buying or selling land, laying out new roads, or locating some
future city. John Calhoun, the county surveyor, therefore, found himself
with far more work than he could personally attend to, and had to
appoint deputies to assist him. Learning the high esteem in which
Lincoln was held by the people of New Salem, he wisely concluded to make
him a deputy, although they differed in politics. It was a flattering
offer, and Lincoln accepted gladly. Of course he knew almost nothing
about surveying, but he got a compass and chain, and, as he tells us,
"studied Flint and Gibson a little, and went at it." The surveyor,
who was a man of talent and education, not only gave Lincoln the
appointment, but, it is said, lent him the book in which to study the
art. Lincoln carried the book to his friend Mentor Graham, and "went at
it" to such purpose that in six weeks he was ready to begin the practice
of his new profession. Like Washington, who, it will be remembered,
followed the same calling in his youth, he became an excellent surveyor.
Lincoln's store had by this time "winked out," to use his own quaint
phrase; and although the surveying and his post-office supplied his
daily needs, they left absolutely nothing toward paying his "National
Debt." Some of his creditors began to get uneasy, and in the latter part
of 1834 a man named Van Bergen, who held one of the Lincoln-Berry notes,
refusing to trust him any longer, had his horse, saddle, and surveying
instruments seized by the sheriff and sold at public auction, thus
sweeping away the means by which, as he said, he "procured bread and
kept soul and body together." Even in this strait his known honesty
proved his salvation. Out of pure friendliness, James Short bought in
the property and gave it back to the young surveyor, allowing him time
to repay.
It took Lincoln seventeen years to get rid of his troublesome "National
Debt," the last instalment not being paid until after his return
from his term of service in Congress at Washington; but it was these
seventeen years of industry, rigid economy, and unflinching fidelity to
his promises that earned for him the title of "Honest Old Abe," which
proved of such inestimable value to himself and his country.
During all this time of trial and disappointment he never lost his
courage, his steady, persevering industry, or his determination to
succeed. He was not too proud to accept any honest employment that
offered itself. He would go into the harvest-field and work there when
other tasks were not pressing, or use his clerkly hand to straighten up
a neglected ledger; and his lively humor, as well as his industry, made
him a welcome guest at any farm-house in the county. Whatever he might
be doing, he was never too busy to help a neighbor. His strong arm was
always at the service of the poor and needy.
Two years after his defeat for the legislature there was another
election. His friends and acquaintances in the county had increased,
and, since he had received such a flattering vote the first time, it was
but natural that he should wish to try again. He began his campaign
in April, giving himself full three months for electioneering. It
was customary in those days for candidates to attend all manner
of neighborhood gatherings--"raisings" of new cabins, horseraces,
shooting-matches, auctions--anything that served to call the settlers
together; and it was social popularity, quite as much as ability to
discuss political questions, that carried weight with such assemblies.
Lincoln, it is needless to say, was in his element. He might be called
upon to act as judge in a horse-race, or to make a speech upon the
Constitution! He could do both. As a laughing peacemaker between two
quarrelsome patriots he had no equal; and as contestant in an impromptu
match at quoit-throwing, or lifting heavy weights, his native tact and
strong arm served him equally well. Candidates also visited farms and
outlying settlements, where they were sometimes unexpectedly called upon
to show their mettle and muscle in more useful labor. One farmer has
recorded how Lincoln "came to my house near Island Grove during harvest.
There were some thirty men in the field. He got his dinner, and went out
in the field where the men were at work. I gave him an introduction, and
the boys said that they could not vote for a man unless he could make a
hand. 'Well, boys,' said he, 'if that is all, I am sure of your votes.'
He took hold of the cradle and led the way all the round with perfect
ease. The boys were satisfied, and I don't think he lost a vote in the
crowd."
Sometimes two or more candidates would meet at such places, and short
speeches would be called for and given, the harvesters throwing down
their scythes meanwhile to listen, and enlivening the occasion with keen
criticisms of the method and logic of the rival orators. Altogether the
campaign was more spirited than that of two years before. Again there
were thirteen candidates for the four places; but this time, when the
election was over, it was found that only one man in the long list had
received more votes than Abraham Lincoln.
Lincoln's election to the legislature of Illinois in August, 1834, marks
the end of the pioneer period of his life. He was done now with the wild
carelessness of the woods, with the rough jollity of Clary's Grove, with
odd jobs for his daily bread--with all the details of frontier poverty.
He continued for years to be a very poor man, harassed by debts he was
constantly laboring to pay, and sometimes absolutely without money:
but from this time on he met and worked with men of wider knowledge
and better-trained minds than those he had known in Gentryville and New
Salem, while the simple social life of Vandalia, where he went to attend
the sessions of the legislature, was more elegant than anything he had
yet seen.
It must be frankly admitted that his success at this election was a most
important event in his life. Another failure might have discouraged
even his hopeful spirit, and sent him to the blacksmith-shop to make
wagon-tires and shoe horses for the balance of his days. With this
flattering vote to his credit, however, he could be very sure that he
had made a wise choice between the forge and the lawyer's desk. At
first he did not come into special notice in the legislature. He wore,
according to the custom of the time, a decent suit of blue jeans, and
was known simply as a rather quiet young man, good-natured and sensible.
Soon people began to realize that he was a man to be reckoned with in
the politics of the county and State. He was reelected in 1836, 1838,
and 1840, and thus for eight years had a full share in shaping the
public laws of Illinois. The Illinois legislature may indeed be called
the school wherein he learned that extraordinary skill and wisdom in
statesmanship which he exhibited in later years. In 1838 and 1840 all
the Whig members of the Illinois House of Representatives gave him their
vote for Speaker, but, the Democrats being in a majority, could not
elect him.
His campaign expenses were small enough to suit the most exacting. It is
recorded that at one time some of the leading Whigs made up a purse of
two hundred dollars to pay his personal expenses. After the election he
returned the sum of $199.25, with the request that it be given back to
the subscribers. "I did not need the money," he explained. "I made
the canvass on my own horse; my entertainment, being at the houses of
friends, cost me nothing; and my only outlay was seventy-five cents for
a barrel of cider, which some farm-hands insisted I should treat them
to."
One act of his while a member of the legislature requires special
mention because of the great events of his after-life. Even at that
early date, nearly a quarter of a century before the beginning of the
Civil War, slavery was proving a cause of much trouble and ill-will. The
"abolitionists," as the people were called who wished the slaves to
be free, and the "pro-slavery" men, who approved of keeping them in
bondage, had already come to wordy war. Illinois was a free State, but
many of its people preferred slavery, and took every opportunity of
making their wishes known. In 1837 the legislature passed a set of
resolutions "highly disapproving abolition societies." Lincoln and five
others voted against it; but, not content with this, Lincoln also drew
up a paper protesting against the passage of such a resolution and
stating his views on slavery. They were not extreme views. Though
declaring slavery to be an evil, he did not insist that the black people
ought to be set free. But so strong was the popular feeling against
anything approaching "abolitionism" that only one man out of the five
who voted against the resolution had the courage to sign this protest
with him. Lincoln was young, poor, and in need of all the good-will at
his command. Nobody could have blamed him for leaving it unwritten; yet
he felt the wrong of slavery so keenly that he could not keep silent
merely because the views he held happened to be unpopular; and this
protest, signed by him and Dan Stone, has come down to us, the first
notable public act in the great career that made his name immortal.
During the eight years that he was in the legislature he had been
working away at the law. Even before his first election his friend John
T. Stuart, who had been major of volunteers in the Black Hawk War
while Lincoln was captain, and who, like Lincoln, had reenlisted in the
Independent Spy Battalion, had given him hearty encouragement. Stuart
was now practising law in. Springfield. After the campaign was over,
Lincoln borrowed the necessary books of Stuart, and entered upon the
study in good earnest. According to his own statement, "he studied with
nobody. ... In the autumn of 1836 he obtained a law license, and on
April 15, 1837, removed to Springfield and commenced the practice, his
old friend Stuart taking him into partnership."
Lincoln had already endeared himself to the people of Springfield by
championing a project they had much at heart--the removal of the State
capital from Vandalia to their own town. This was accomplished, largely
through his efforts, about the time he went to Springfield to live.
This change from New Salem, a village of fifteen or twenty houses, to a
"city" of two thousand inhabitants, placed him once more in striking new
relations as to dress, manners, and society. Yet, as in the case of
his removal from his father's cabin to New Salem six years earlier, the
change was not so startling as would at first appear. In spite of its
larger population and its ambition as the new State capital, Springfield
was at that time in many ways no great improvement upon New Salem. It
had no public buildings, its streets and sidewalks were still unpaved,
and business of all kinds was laboring under the burden of hard times.
As for himself, although he now owned a license to practise law, it was
still a question how well he would succeed--whether his rugged mind and
firm purpose could win him the livelihood he desired, or whether, after
all, he would be forced to turn his strong muscles to account in earning
his daily bread. Usually so hopeful, there were times when he was
greatly depressed. His friend William Butler relates how, as they were
riding together on horseback from Vandalia to Springfield at the close
of a session of the legislature, Lincoln, in one of these gloomy moods,
told him of the almost hopeless prospect that lay immediately before
him. The session was over, his salary was all drawn, the money all
spent; he had no work, and did not know where to turn to earn even a
week's board. Butler bade him be of good cheer, and, kind practical
friend that he was, took him and his belongings to his own home, keeping
him there for a time as his guest. His most intimate friend of those
days, Joshua F. Speed, tells us that soon after riding into the new
capital on a borrowed horse, with all his earthly possessions packed
in a pair of saddle-bags, Lincoln entered the store owned by Speed,
the saddle-bags over his arm, to ask the price of a single bed with
its necessary coverings and pillows. His question being answered, he
remarked that very likely that was cheap enough, but, small as the price
was, he was unable to pay it; adding that if Speed was willing to credit
him until Christmas, and his experiment as a lawyer proved a success, he
would pay then. "If I fail in this," he said sadly, "I do not know that
I can ever pay you." Speed thought he had never seen such a sorrowful
face. He suggested that instead of going into debt, Lincoln might share
his own roomy quarters over the store, assuring him that if he chose
to accept the offer, he would be very welcome. "Where is your room?"
Lincoln asked quickly. "Upstairs," and the young merchant pointed to a
flight of winding steps leading from the store to the room overhead.
Lincoln picked up the saddle-bags, went upstairs, set them down on the
floor, and reappeared a moment later, beaming with pleasure. "Well,
Speed," he exclaimed, "I am moved!" It is seldom that heartier, truer
friendships come to a man than came to Lincoln in the course of his
life. On the other hand, no one ever deserved better of his fellow-men
than he did; and it is pleasant to know that such brotherly aid as
Butler and Speed were able to give him, offered in all sincerity and
accepted in a spirit that left no sense of galling obligation on either
side, helped the young lawyer over present difficulties and made it
possible for him to keep on in the career he had marked out for himself.
The lawyer who works his way up from a five-dollar fee in a suit before
a justice of the peace, to a five-thousand-dollar fee before the Supreme
Court of his State, has a long and hard path to climb. Lincoln
climbed this path for twenty-five years, with industry, perseverance,
patience--above all, with that self-control and keen sense of right and
wrong which always clearly traced the dividing line between his duty to
his client and his duty to society and truth. His perfect frankness
of statement assured him the confidence of judge and jury in every
argument. His habit of fully admitting the weak points in his case
gained him their close attention to his strong ones, and when clients
brought him questionable cases his advice was always not to bring suit.
"Yes," he once said to a man who offered him such a case; "there is
no reasonable doubt but that I can gain your case for you. I can set a
whole neighborhood at loggerheads; I can distress a widowed mother
and her six fatherless children, and thereby gain for you six hundred
dollars, which rightfully belongs, it appears to me, as much to them as
it does to you. I shall not take your case, but I will give you a little
advice for nothing. You seem a sprightly, energetic man. I would advise
you to try your hand at making six hundred dollars in some other way."
He would have nothing to do with the "tricks" of the profession, though
he met these readily enough when practised by others. He never knowingly
undertook a case in which justice was on the side of his opponent. That
same inconvenient honesty which prompted him, in his store-keeping
days, to close the shop and go in search of a woman he had innocently
defrauded of a few ounces of tea while weighing out her groceries, made
it impossible for him to do his best with a poor case. "Swett," he once
exclaimed, turning suddenly to his associate, "the man is guilty; you
defend him--I can't," and gave up his share of a large fee.
After his death some notes were found, written in his own hand, that had
evidently been intended for a little lecture or talk to law students.
They set forth forcibly, in a few words, his idea of what a lawyer ought
to be and to do. He earnestly commends diligence in study, and, after
diligence, promptness in keeping up the work. "As a general rule, never
take your whole fee in advance," he says, "nor any more than a small
retainer. When fully paid beforehand you are more than a common mortal
if you can feel the same interest in the case as if something were still
in prospect for you as well as for your client." Speech-making should
be practised and cultivated. "It is the lawyer's avenue to the public.
However able and faithful he may be in other respects, people are slow
to bring him business if he cannot make a speech. And yet, there is
not a more fatal error to young lawyers than relying too much on
speech-making. If any one, upon his rare powers of speaking, shall claim
an exemption from the drudgery of the law, his case is a failure
in advance." Discourage going to law. "Persuade your neighbors to
compromise whenever you can. Point out to them how the nominal winner
is often a real loser--in fees, expenses, and waste of time. As a
peacemaker the lawyer has a superior opportunity of being a good man.
There will still be business enough." "There is a vague popular belief
that lawyers are necessarily dishonest. Let no young man choosing the
law for a calling for a moment yield to the popular belief. Resolve to
be honest at all events; and if, in your own judgment, you cannot be an
honest lawyer, resolve to be honest without being a lawyer. Choose some
other occupation rather than one in the choosing of which you do, in
advance, consent to be a knave."
While becoming a lawyer, Lincoln still remained a politician. In those
early days in the West, the two occupations went hand in hand, almost
of necessity. Laws had to be newly made to fit the needs of the new
settlements, and therefore a large proportion of lawyers was sent to
the State legislature. In the summer these same lawyers went about the
State, practising before the circuit courts, Illinois being divided into
what were called judicial circuits, each taking in several counties,
and sometimes covering territory more than a hundred miles square.
Springfield and the neighboring towns were in the eighth judicial
circuit. Twice a year the circuit judge traveled from one county-seat to
another, the lawyers who had business before the court following also.
As newspapers were neither plentiful nor widely read, members of the
legislature were often called upon, while on these journeys, to explain
the laws they had helped to make during the previous winter, and
thus became the political teachers of the people. They had to be well
informed and watchful. When, like Mr. Lincoln, they were witty, and had
a fund of interesting stories besides, they were sure of a welcome and
a hearing in the courtroom, or in the social gatherings that roused the
various little towns during "court-week" into a liveliness quite put of
the common. The tavern would be crowded to its utmost--the judge having
the best room, and the lawyers being put in what was left, late comers
being lucky to find even a sleeping-place on the floor. When not
occupied in court, or preparing cases for the morrow, they would sit
in the public room, or carry their chairs out on the sidewalk in front,
exchanging stories and anecdotes, or pieces of political wisdom, while
men from the town and surrounding farms, dropping in on one pretext or
another, found excuse to linger and join in the talk. At meal-times the
judge presided at the head of the long hotel table, on which the food
was abundant if not always wholesome, and around which lawyers, jurors,
witnesses, prisoners out on bail, and the men who drove the teams,
gathered in friendly equality. Stories of what Mr. Lincoln did and said
on the eighth judicial circuit are still quoted almost with the force
of law; for in this close companionship men came to know each other
thoroughly, and were judged at their true value professionally, as well
as for their power to entertain.
It was only in worldly wealth that Lincoln was poor. He could hold his
own with the best on the eighth judicial circuit, or anywhere else
in the State. He made friends wherever he went. In politics, in
daily conversation, in his work as a lawyer, his life was gradually
broadening. Slowly but surely, too, his gifts as an attractive public
speaker were becoming known. In 1837 he wrote and delivered an able
address before the Young Men's Lyceum of Springfield. In December, 1839,
Stephen A. Douglas, the most brilliant of the young Democrats then in
Springfield, challenged the young Whigs of the town to a tournament of
political speech-making, in which Lincoln bore a full and successful
share.
The man who could not pay a week's board bill was again elected to the
legislature, was invited to public banquets and toasted by name, became
a popular speaker, moved in the best society of the new capital, and
made, as his friends and neighbors declared, a brilliant marriage.