The bill was not considered. Lincoln had not satisfied anyone as a Congressman. The local political machine did not admit that he deserved any special consideration and felt that others were entitled to their day in the sun at Washington. The younger Whigs wanted a more aggressive type of leader. Apparently he was out of it politically in Illinois. Lincoln's life is a succession of waves of energy rising and falling. There is good reason to be lieve that his spirit was in an ebb tide, a tide of disappointment and depression, when he returned from Congress in 1849. Such a mood was likely to make manifest in Lincoln the vein of inde cision that was in the background of his nature, that he did not conquer until after the tremendous experiences of 1862. At this critical moment he was offered the governorship of the new terri tory of Oregon. He seems to have thought, for a space, of follow ing his father's example and escaping from trouble by seeking a new horizon. His wife saved him. A long controversy has raged about her character and whether she and her husband were truly congenial. That Mrs. Lincoln was a matter-of-fact, perhaps a self willed, even tyrannical woman is not unlikely. That in some re spects her narrow vision and her dogmatic firmness may have been the saving of her husband is equally probable. She was emphatic on the refusal of the Oregon offer. Her husband acquiesced. They remained in Springfield and Lincoln escaped his last serious temptation to follow in the footsteps of wandering Thomas.
The next five years were devoted to the law. The firm of Logan and Lincoln had disappeared (1845) and the more famous firm of Lincoln and Herndon had taken its place. During this period Lin coln at last became prosperous. Though not a legal scholar he was a great jury lawyer. He had a genius for perceiving the essen tials of a case. It was a saying of his, "If I can strip this case of technicalities and swing it to the jury I'll win it." He was fanatically honest. Having been deceived by a client when on the circuit, he threw up the case in the midst of the trial, withdrew to his hotel and sent word to the presiding judge, "My hands are dirty and I came over to clean them." The Peoria Speech.—He was recalled to politics by the Kansas Nebraska Act of 1854 opening the north-western territories to slavery. The five years of hard work at the law had developed in him exceptional powers of lucid argument. When Stephen A. Douglas became the champion of the Kansas-Nebraska Act Lin coln was urged to reply to him. He did so at Peoria on Oct. 16, 1854. The great speech delivered that day gave him his place in history. The change from the inadequate politician who had failed in Congress five years before is so great as to seem all but incredible. For directness of vision, for scope of argument, for breadth of sympathy the speech is unrivalled by anything in the previous literature of the slavery controversy. Unlike the Abolitionists he admitted no abstractions into his thought on this subject and no vindictiveness; he was wholly the democrat and the humanitarian ; he wanted to check the extension of slavery because he thought it inhuman but even more because, as he put it, "new free states are places for poor people to go to and better their condition." This was the key-note of his thought ever after,
both in regard to the territories and in regard to the preserva tion of the Union. He admitted frankly that his overmastering concern was the welfare of the free poor people of the white races.
The Peoria speech made him famous. His political ambition immediately sprang to life again. He stood for the senatorship. But though the Whigs accepted him as their candidate they were not strong enough to elect him. At the last moment Lincoln scored a partial triumph by throwing his votes to Lyman Trumbull, a seceding Democrat opposed to the policies of Douglas. There followed a political duel between Lincoln and Douglas culminating in the famous debates of 1858 when both were candidates for the senate. Douglas obtained the prize. But Lincoln was now one of the conspicuous leaders of the day. After much hesitation he had joined the New Republican Party two years previous to his defeat by Douglas. At the State Republican Convention in 1856 he made his "Lost Speech" which was not reported at the time but which is supposed to have been a masterpiece of compelling oratory. His speech accepting the Republican nomination for the senate (1858) contained the most noted single passage in any of his speeches. It began, "A house divided against itself cannot stand. I believe this Government cannot endure permanently half slave and half free." This was the idea upon which he rang the changes in the debates with Douglas. In one of them, by skilful questioning he forced Douglas into a dilemma from which he could extricate himself only by formulating what at once became known as "the Freeport Doctrine." Douglas was defending the idea of complete local autonomy on the subject of slavery—"squatter sovereignty," as it was called—and yet trying to avoid challenging the validity of the recent decision of the supreme court in the Dred Scott case which denied that it was possible to close a territory to slavery. Lincoln's purpose was to trap Douglas into taking a position which, while it might save him with the Illinois Democrats who were for squatter sovereignty and indifferent to the supreme court, would split the party as a whole by alienating the Southerners who were strong for the Dred Scott decision. Driven to the wall, Douglas chose to make sure of Illinois and announced the doctrine that no matter what the court might do, slavery could exist only through friendly local legislation and therefore that squatter sovereignty was omnipotent. He was returned to the senate but the national Democratic Party was split in two. The man who had out generalled Douglas and split the Democrats was inevitably a possible candidate for the presidency two years later. During 1859 he hesitated whether he was strong enough to risk letting his name go before the Republican Convention. Long before he made up his mind his friends were hard at work. At length he consented.