USA > Illinois > Illinois, the story of the prairie state > Part 9
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But the national government did not lose by this
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generous grant to Illinois. Its land had been on the market for twenty years, at a dollar and a quar- ter an acre, yet found no purchasers. With the rail- road a certainty, this same land sold for an average price of five dollars an acre; and the federal govern- ment, by casting its bread on the waters, made some- thing over nine millions.
And the results to the state were no less marked. The unsettled interior was opened to immigrants. The rich soil was brought into cultivation. Almost overnight ten million acres in private hands in- creased in value and added forty millions to the taxable wealth of Illinois. The rich agricultural and mineral products of the newly developed region found ready markets. Chicago had another "boost" in her marvelous growth.7
Best of all, in forty years the state treasury re- ceived more money from the Illinois Central than was appropriated for the whole internal improve- ment system. Lest the railroad might try to have this seven per cent. provision changed, and some legislature yield to the demand, in 1870 this was written into the state constitution. And this income for the state, constantly increasing, is now perpetual.
But more than the canal and more than the rail- roads the prairie-breaking plow is responsible for the prosperity of Illinois. It is the realest of her in- ternal improvements. For it made the prairie coun-
EFTETIME THAT
A train entering the Chicago railway station of the Illinois Central and Michigan Central roads. Date, 1857
Style of passenger car most frequently used during the decade from 1840 to 1850. The windows of this vehicle were not raised, but the entire panels were dropped bodily down into the sides of the car
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try, covering about two-thirds of the state, available for farms. It opened an avenue of wealth greater than all the mines of gold and silver in the nation. ยท
The earliest settlers cleared the timber land with axes and broke its soil with a wooden plow banded with iron. The prairies they used only for pas- turage. A beautiful wilderness it was-covered with waving grass, taller than a man on horseback; with rosin weed, gay with yellow blooms; with many bushes and flowering shrubs, with acres and acres of wild strawberries. But it was so infested with swarms of yellow-headed flies, mosquitoes and buffalo gnats that in the summer-time travelers journeyed only at night.8 The pioneers ridiculed the idea that the tough prairie sod would ever yield to the civilizing plow, and would produce greater crops than the timber land.
In 1826 Oramel Clark, a Connecticut blacksmith who had settled in Sangamon County, made a sod plow. It was drawn by oxen and held to the fur- rows by a man walking behind it, grasping its han- dles. But when the share struck a red-root, the toughest of the prairie grasses, the handles would strike the man, and usually knocked him flat. Clark, however, was patient and persisted; and in 1830 a prairie-breaking plow was achieved - rude and clumsy and awkward, but efficient.9
Fastened to a six-inch beam of oak was the iron
2
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share, with edge of steel. There were wooden trucks, one wheel at the side and one in the fur- row, and a very heavy frame, so that the whole weighed about a thousand pounds and was five times as large as the plows of to-day. But it had a tough work to accomplish and must needs be massive and heavy, to stay in the furrow. Improvements in Clark's plow followed, and soon the crack of the ox-whip announced a new day for Illinois. With five or six, or even eight yoke of oxen, the prairie soil was broken up; but so tough and thick was the grass that if corn was to be planted the same year holes had to be chopped with an ax or hatchet for the kernels to be dropped in. By twelve months later the grass had begun to rot.
One of the picturesque characters of the day was the old ox driver, carrying his great whip, with a handle six feet long and a twelve-foot lash. He could wield it so skilfully that, twenty feet distant, he could flick a prairie fly off the back of a certain ox. The oxen were trained to come under the yoke, to turn to right or left. They went slowly but stead- ily up and down the field, turning a two-foot fur- row, often half a mile long. The plowman usually owned his oxen and offered the service of himself, his heavy implement, and his patient animals, charg- ing from two to three dollars an acre. People complained at paying double the initial cost to have
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the land made ready for a crop. But timber land, cleared, was worth twenty dollars an acre, and though they were perhaps equally rich, the prairie land retained its fertility longer.
This conquest of Illinois, begun in the thirties, lasted for thirty years; a bloodless conquest, not less deserving of renown than victories in war. Its results were a revolution in western farming, a movement and shift of population seldom equaled in the history of the world. It changed millions of acres from trackless wilderness into prosperous farms. People from the eastern states and immi- grants from Europe flocked to Illinois, and in the fifties, the principal decade of the subjugation, the population more than doubled.
But after the prairies began to be cultivated and prolific crops produced, there was no market for corn and wheat, flax and tobacco. The farmers fed their corn to cattle and hogs and drove them to St. Louis and Cincinnati and Chicago, sometimes even over the mountains to New York and Phila- delphia.
Clark's prairie-breaking plow was a John the Bap- tist in the Illinois wilderness, heralding a new order of things. For just in the years when, perfected, it was being widely used, began the success of rail- roads and farm machinery in the west. The very decade which saw the prairies conquered saw the
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building of the Illinois Central, and miles and miles of other roads-for the prosperity of the farms and the success of railroads are interdependent. The same years saw, too, the invention of agricultural machinery as we know it to-day-planters and cul- tivators, reapers and threshers. Rapid transporta- tion, underground drainage, a wise rotation of crops, seed selection, good roads, have added to the agricultural resources of Illinois. To-day the scientist is among us. The soil chemist, trained at a state agricultural college, is teaching the farmers of Illinois how to preserve the fertility of their fields, how to use and not abuse the land. Who can foretell what future improvements will be?
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XXII
THE GROWTH OF A PARTY
U P to now the story of Illinois has been all her own, touching the history of the nation only incidentally. But for the next few years events in Illinois are not a part of the country's history, rather they are the story of the nation. Take away from United States history these incidents and you have nothing left.
During her early years as a state the politics of Illinois were personal and confused, with no clear- cut issues. The slavery campaign in 1824 is the one exception, but this was not related to any national event. Beginning in the early thirties, however, Illinois had definitely organized political parties. There were regular conventions held by Whigs and Democrats. And for twenty-four years one party carried the day, for Illinois was a Democratic stronghold, with only an occasional Whig to vary the monotony of her delegations in Congress. By 1850 one of her senators was a recognized national leader in his party, and was even talked of for the presidency.
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On the question of slavery, the people of Illinois were very conservative. They had, you remember, voted against establishing slavery in their own state. But they were not in favor of interfering with it elsewhere. You already know, from the Lovejoy story, how strong the feeling was against abolition. And this was true, not only in Alton, but among most of the responsible leaders in the state. Illinois congressmen voted as a unit against the Wilmot proviso.1
But the slavery question, like Banquo's ghost, would not down. And gradually a change was coming. The underground railroad became well organized in certain Illinois towns. The law made every citizen a slave-catcher, and against this the lovers of freedom rebelled and secretly helped fugi- tives on their way north. Canada was their Mecca, especially after the proclamation of Queen Victoria "that every fugitive from United States slavery should be recognized and protected as a British sub- ject the moment his foot touched the soil of her domain."2
Negroes were hidden in barns and garrets, even in the cupola of a church. Supplies of clothing were kept in readiness. And on dark and stormy nights this human freight was forwarded from one station to another. Being a conductor on this railroad meant great labor and expense, the risk of a heavy
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fine or six months in prison, and social ostracism. But resistance to the law increased, and when one house became too well known as a stopping place, the station was changed.
Chicago was the great railroad center in Illinois, for slaves could be sent by boat to Detroit and then slip over to Canada. Ottawa, Quincy and Jackson- ville were stations, while a runaway slave was as safe on the streets of Galesburg as if he were al- ready in a free land.
Politically, too, a change was at hand. The Free Soil vote in 1848 was a straw showing how the wind blew. And the turn of the tide was clearly indicated by the criticism poured on the head of Senator Douglas, denouncing him for his vote on the fugi- tive slave bill in 1850. Both Whigs and Democrats had worked for this measure and approved of the compromise. The presidential election two years later made the Democratic party seem well-nigh in- vincible.
But suddenly public opinion changed. The slav- ery question came up again, more violent and bitter than ever before. The cause was the Kansas-Ne- braska bill, which canceled the Missouri line by saying, "Instead of having an arbitrary division be- tween free and slave states, we will leave this to the people of each territory to decide for them- selves." Douglas called it "non-intervention"; the
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people named it "squatter sovereignty." Though it was suggested by a Whig senator from a southern state, the credit or blame for the measure centered wholly on Stephen A. Douglas, who was chairman of the committee on territories and fathered it through Congress.3
Like a clap of thunder in a clear sky the Kansas- Nebraska bill came on the country. Its passage was greeted by salvos of artillery in Washington, announcing a triumph. But the booming of these cannon wakened the echoes and aroused the north, filling the people with indignation. It caused a spontaneous combustion, kindling the fires of free- dom and forming a new group in politics. Every- where it made fatal changes in the old party lines. The Whigs became a name only. The Free Soilers and the American party, with many ardent ex- Democrats and zealous ex-Whigs, plus citizens of foreign birth, joined to create the Republican party. These odds and ends, incongruous, heterogeneous, largely through the shrewd advice of Abraham Lin- coln, were fused into harmony and union. The members disagreed on almost every question, but did agree in this one thing : opposition to the repeal of the Missouri Compromise.4 The Republicans were wise in selecting their time, Lincoln skilful in choosing this one issue.
In the local elections in 1854 Illinois went anti-
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Nebraska, and the new party had votes enough in the legislature to elect a senator. But they had two candidates, Lincoln, almost their unanimous choice, and Lyman Trumbull, an ex-Democrat. The ex- citement became intense as the balloting continued and the Democratic candidate crept up within three of a majority. Quick to see the impending danger, Lincoln, placing principle above self, besought his friends to support Trumbull. Judge Logan trans- ferred his vote with tears, the others followed, and Trumbull, strongly anti-Nebraska, became senator.5 Two years later the Republicans, like an infant Her- cules, were strong enough to secure the governor- ship, though the legislature was Democratic.
Meanwhile the Nebraska matter had assumed a new phase. Douglas's principle of squatter sov- ereignty, if honestly applied and fairly carried out in a new territory, offered the chance of a peaceful solution of this burning question. But to Kansas and Nebraska armed immigrants were promptly sent by the north, while armed slave holders pressed over the Missouri border. Naturally collision fol- lowed and border war. The Lecompton constitu- tion, forcing slavery on an unwilling people, voted through by fraud, was opposed by Douglas. Its submission to the people, he said, was a mockery and an insult, and he would resist it to the last, as illegal and unfair.6 He became the champion of
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the people of Kansas, standing with the "black Re- publicans" against his Democratic friends. He dis- regarded party ties, he opposed the wish of Presi- dent Buchanan, though he knew the slave power would not forgive him. And the Republican news- papers heartily praised his course.
Another event changed the temper of the peo- ple. This was the famous Dred Scott decision, making it legal for a slave owner to take his negroes into a free state and still own them as personal property. Look up this test case and see how Illi- nois touches the story of Dred Scott and his wife Harriet. Look up, too, the members of the supreme court, and see how many of them were southerners, and you can then understand their decision about the slaves of this army surgeon." Douglas upheld the court, Lincoln opposed it.
As regards the slavery question, Lincoln saw that men must now stand on one side or the other, with no middle ground and no third party. He was to make a speech in a Republican state convention, and submitted this paragraph to his friends :
""'A house divided against itself can not stand.' I believe this government can not endure perma- nently half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved-I do not expect the house to fall-but I do expect that it will cease to be di-
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vided. It will become all one thing or all the other. Either the opponents of slavery will arrest the further spread of it and place it where the pub- lic mind shall rest in the belief that it is in the course of ultimate extinction, or its advocates will push it forward, till it shall become alike lawful in all the states, old as well as new, north as well as south."
His friends were startled at this radical sugges- tion. Only one of them approved.
" 'It will never do for you to make that speech,' they urged. 'What you say is true, but the time has not come for you to say it. It will defeat your election. It will ruin the party.'
" 'My friends,' Lincoln replied, 'the time has come when these sentiments should be uttered; and if it is decreed that I should go down because of this speech, then let me go down linked to the truth-let '"8 me die in the advocacy of what is just and right.
And after the speech was made and he had been nominated as candidate for senator, he wrote to a pessimistic friend, "If I had to draw my pen across my record and erase my whole life from sight, and if I had one poor choice left as to what I should save from the wreck, I should choose that speech and leave it to the world as it is."
Lincoln and Douglas were the standard bearers
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of their parties. They spoke at Chicago, on suc- cessive days, and again in Springfield, and then Lin- coln challenged Douglas to a series of joint debates. This method of presenting a political issue had come to Illinois from Kentucky, and the people had al- ways favored it. Candidates must be accustomed to public speaking and willing to meet their oppo- nents on the stump or they had no chance of success at the polls. There were no daily papers and few weeklies in the pioneer days. And a public debate was the best way to tell the people about political matters. A candidate could not mislead his hearers when both were heard at one meeting. By 1858, of course, the reason for debates, through the mul- tiplication of papers and magazines, had disap- peared. Yet people still felt that hearing the leaders argue was the best way to arrive at the merits of any political controversy.9
Douglas accepted the challenge, and it was ar- ranged that they should have seven debates-an hour's opening, followed by a ninety-minute speech, the first speaker to have a half hour to reply. Doug- las's friends called him the "little giant." Physically and intellectually Lincoln was the big giant. The Democrats, from the senator down, were confident. They boasted that "the little giant would use up Old Abe and utterly demolish him." So noisy. and demonstrative were they, so absolutely sure of suc-
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cess, that some of the Republicans became alarmed. One of Lincoln's friends spoke to him of their anxiety.
"Sit down," was his reply, "let me tell you a story. You and I, as we have traveled the circuit together attending court, have often seen two men about to fight. One of them, the big or the little giant, as the case may be, is noisy and boastful. He jumps high in the air, strikes his feet together, smites his fists, brags about what he is going to do, and tries hard to skeer the other man, who says not a word. His arms hang down, his fists are clenched, his teeth set, his head settled firmly on his shoulders, he saves his breath and strength for the struggle. This man will whip, just as sure as the fight comes off. Good-by, and remember what I say."10
The friends of Douglas managed his campaign well. A special train, decorated with flags and ban- ners, carried him from city to city like a conquering hero. Its arrival was announced with the booming of cannon, bands playing, ladies waving their hand- kerchiefs, and air-splitting cheers. At night there were fireworks. Lincoln traveled alone, with no trumpeter to herald his coming.
And now blazed forth in full splendor the most remarkable canvass ever made in Illinois. The very prairies seemed alive with political discussions. The people talked of little else. The railroads did an
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enormous business, for excursions were the order of the day. From five to twenty thousand people heard each of the debates, held out-of-doors because no halls were large enough to accommodate the au- diences. Men went in wagons, with supplies of food, and camped out in the groves at night. They were aglow with the fire of the two leaders, as up and down the state, through its length and breadth, raged the great political battle of these Illinois giants.
Far beyond the mere personal success of one can- didate or the other, the debates arrested public at- tention in every part of the Union. Many leading newspapers in St. Louis, Cincinnati and New York had their own correspondents on the ground. The speeches were taken down, printed, and scattered broadcast. They were so widely read that the whole nation heard the debates and paused to watch this contest for an Illinois senatorship.11
Douglas, was a popular speaker, able to manage a mixed audience, to bridge over a hard place in an argument, to make the most of a weak point in his opponent's armor. But Lincoln was a born logician and could demonstrate a public question with mathe- matical clearness and certainty. His chief advan- tage was the sincerity of his belief, the earnestness and fearlessness with which he spoke his conviction :
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free labor is preferable to slave labor, and slavery is inherently wrong.
Politically and intellectually different, their phys- ical contrast was no less striking. Lincoln, tall, lank, lean ; Douglas, short, round, robust. The voice of Douglas, sonorous and full; Lincoln's sharp and thin, though of large compass. Lincoln with an inexhaustible store of wit and humor, and apt anec- dotes to illustrate his points ; Douglas with sparkling repartee which helped him to make happy turns of thought against his rival. Lincoln, with unpolished strength, closely reasoning, at times highly eloquent, using simple, homely, accurate words ; Douglas bold, decided, magnetic, plausible. Douglas carried away the more popular applause ; Lincoln made a deeper, more lasting impression.
"Somehow," said a man who heard the debates, "while Douglas was greeted with constant cheers, when Lincoln closed the people seemed serious and thoughtful, and could be heard all through the crowd gravely and anxiously discussing the subjects on which he had been speaking. "12
"Why don't you tell funny stories and make the people laugh and cheer you?" a friend asked Lin- coln.
"The occasion is too serious, and the issue too grave. I do not seek applause, or to amuse the people, but to convince them."
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Lincoln was frank and fair and courteous, an- swering every question, always good humored; Douglas was arrogant, at times evasive, when hard pressed irritable, once almost brutal. Douglas had the advantage of education and fifteen years' expe- rience in Congress. To offset this Lincoln had two things in his favor : he had a more familiar knowl- edge of the slavery question than any other states- man of the day; and he was on the right side, the side of liberty, toward which the tide of popular feeling was setting, with tremendous force. Con- scious of the greatness of his cause, he spoke with an energy, ability and power which rapidly gave him a national reputation.
There was but one real issue between them-the question of slavery : the repeal of the Missouri Com- promise, the theory of squatter sovereignty, the duty of Congress to prohibit slavery in future states. Said Douglas :
"Lincoln says that he looks forward to a time when slavery shall be abolished everywhere. I look forward to a time when each state shall be allowed to do as it pleases. If it chooses to keep slavery forever, it is not my business, but its own; if it chooses to abolish slavery, it is its own business- not mine. I care more for the great principle of self-government, the right of the people to rule, than I do for all the negroes in Christendom."
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Said Lincoln :
"Douglas contends that whatever community wants slaves has a right to have them. So they have if it is not a wrong. But if it is a wrong, he can not say that people have a right to do wrong. He says that, upon the score of equality, slaves should be allowed to go in a new territory like other property. This is strictly logical if there is no dif- ference between it and other property. But if you insist that one is wrong and the other right, there is no use to institute a comparison between right and wrong.
"That is the real issue. That is the issue that will continue in this country when these poor tongues of Judge Douglas and myself shall be silent. It is the eternal struggle between these two princi- ples-right and wrong-throughout the world."13
The wisdom of putting one question was dis- cussed by Lincoln with his friends. They advised against it. They insisted that an answer from Douglas would help his fortunes in Illinois, with- out hurting him in the south. They urged him not to ask the question, saying, "If you do, you can never be senator."-
But Lincoln, persisting in his determination to force an answer, replied : "Gentlemen, I am killing larger game; if Douglas answers, he can never be president, and the coming battle of 1860 is worth a hundred of this."
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So the question was put : How can you reconcile the Dred Scott decision with your popular sover- eignty theory? You are holding that a thing may lawfully be driven away from a place where it has a lawful right to go! At once the southern states charged that Douglas was two-faced on this point, contending for the extension of slavery under the decision, and for its exclusion under the Kansas- Nebraska bill.14
The debates ended, a drawn battle. The victory was claimed by Lincoln and by Douglas. The im- mediate result was the election of Republican state officers and a Democratic legislature, so that Doug- las became senator. But this campaign simply fore- shadowed the presidential election. That was fought out on the same principles. As Lincoln prophesied, Douglas had made it impossible for the south to support him; he did indeed win the nom- ination of the northern Democrats, but this split in the party assured the election of a Republican pres- ident.
For during these two years, tension of feel- ing had not relaxed, and the bitterness was in- creased. Both north and south, for or against slavery, were unyielding and determined. Lincoln, defeated for the senate, was now brought to the front as candidate for the much higher office of president. The notoriety of his contest with Doug-
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