LINCOLN DESCRIBES NATION AS A HOUSE DIVIDED
Springfield, Illinois (JFK+50) We may think the American political scene is divided today, but it pales in comparison to the climate of the 1850s. Abraham Lincoln* expressed the situation so well in his House Divided speech given at the close of the Illinois State Republican Convention on June 16, 1858 here in Springfield.
Mr. Lincoln said...
A house divided against itself cannot stand. This government cannot remain half-slave and half-free."
The future Republican President of the United States warned that the nation was just "one (Supreme Court) decision away" from slavery becoming the law of the land.
Springfield, Illinois (JFK+50) We may think the American political scene is divided today, but it pales in comparison to the climate of the 1850s. Abraham Lincoln* expressed the situation so well in his House Divided speech given at the close of the Illinois State Republican Convention on June 16, 1858 here in Springfield.
Mr. Lincoln said...
"I believe this government cannot endure permanently 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 it will cease to be divided. 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 public mind shall rest in the belief that it is in the course of ultimate extinction, or its advocates will push it forward til it shall become lawful in all the States.
A house divided against itself cannot stand. This government cannot remain half-slave and half-free."
The future Republican President of the United States warned that the nation was just "one (Supreme Court) decision away" from slavery becoming the law of the land.
Abraham Lincoln concluded his speech with this promise...
"We shall not fail--if we stand firm. Sooner or later the victory is sure to come."
*Abraham Lincoln lost his bid to unseat Senator Douglas in the general election. The final vote in the Illinois Legislature was 54 to 46 in favor of Douglas. In 1860, however, Lincoln would get another chance against Douglas, this time for the Presidency of the United States.
SOURCE
"Life and Works of Abraham Lincoln, Volume 4," ed. Marion Mills Miller, www.en.wikisource.org/wiki/A_house_divided
JFK+50 NOTE:
At this month's meeting of the Knoxville Civil War Roundtable, Dr. Daniel Feller of the University of Tennessee, made a compelling argument that slavery was "THE CAUSE" of the War Between the States.
Of particular interest was Dr. Feller's calling to our attention lines from Lincoln's 2nd Inaugural Address of March 4, 1865 which precede the well-known words... "With malice toward none..."
"If we shall suppose that American slavery is one of those offenses, which, in the providence of God, must needs come, but which, having continued through his appointed time, He now wills to remove, and that He gives to both North and South this terrible war as the woe due to those by whom the offense came, shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living God always ascribe to Him?
Fondly do we hope (and) pray that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondsman's 250 years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said 3000 years ago, so still it must be said 'the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.'"
Abraham Lincoln in 1860
Photo by Matthew Brady
