Lincoln on Race and Slavery

Henry Louis Gates, Donald Yacovone, Henry Gates, Donald Yacovone

• Publisher: Princeton University Press
• Year: 2009
• ISBN:
  9781400832088
• Topic: Histoire
• Subtopic: Histoire de la guerre de Sécession

From acclaimed scholar Henry Louis Gates, Jr., the most comprehensive collection of Lincoln's writings on race and slavery Generations of Americans have debated the meaning of Abraham Lincoln's views on race and slavery. He issued the Emancipation Proclamation and supported a constitutional amendment to outlaw slavery, yet he also harbored grave doubts about the intellectual capacity of African Americans, publicly used the n-word until at least 1862, and favored permanent racial segregation. In this book—the first complete collection of Lincoln's important writings on both race and slavery—readers can explore these contradictions through Lincoln's own words. Acclaimed Harvard scholar and documentary filmmaker Henry Louis Gates, Jr., presents the full range of Lincoln's views, gathered from his private letters, speeches, official documents, and even race jokes, arranged chronologically from the late 1830s to the 1860s.Complete with definitive texts, rich historical notes, and an original introduction by Henry Louis Gates, Jr., this book charts the progress of a war within Lincoln himself. We witness his struggles with conflicting aims and ideas—a hatred of slavery and a belief in the political equality of all men, but also anti-black prejudices and a determination to preserve the Union even at the cost of preserving slavery. We also watch the evolution of his racial views, especially in reaction to the heroic fighting of black Union troops.At turns inspiring and disturbing, Lincoln on Race and Slavery is indispensable for understanding what Lincoln's views meant for his generation—and what they mean for our own.

1

Protest in Illinois Legislature on Slavery

CW, 1:74–75

Although Illinois abolished slavery in its 1818 constitution, the state remained hostile to African Americans throughout the nineteenth century. Its 1848 constitution, for instance, barred black immigration and remained the law until 1865, although officials did not rigorously enforce it. The state’s white citizens demanded exclusion of new black settlers and threatened to “take the matter into their own hands, and commence a war of extermination.” In January 1837, the Illinois legislature passed a resolution stating that “we highly disapprove of the formation of abolition” societies, “and of the doctrines promulgated by them,” while admitting that slavery was indeed an “unfortunate condition of our fellow men, whose lots are cast in thralldom in a land of liberty and peace.” The legislature, however, asserted that “the General government has no power to strike their fetters from them.” The phrasing indicated the complexity of the slavery question for whites who generally disdained slavery and the slave. Throughout his career, Lincoln freely confessed to opposing the institution of slavery but remained equally opposed to the agitation of antislavery societies. Since the explosive debates surrounding the 1820 Missouri Compromise, the future of slavery remained the single greatest threat to the Union. Lincoln followed the example of his political hero Henry Clay and dedicated his career to preserving the Union and diminishing the strength of slavery. Lincoln, with state legislator Daniel Stone, a Whig lawyer originally from Vermont, went on record with this protest of the legislature’s resolution. Although Lincoln clearly agreed with its principles, he criticized the phrasing of the original legislation, perhaps reflecting his desire to distinguish himself among his peers and to appeal to residents from New England, rather than those from the South who dominated Illinois. Lincoln and Stone characterized slavery as an “injustice” and “bad policy,” but underscored their belief in the constitutionality of slavery where it already existed. Lincoln backed legislation where he believed the Constitution permitted action, in this case in the District of Columbia and, later, in the territories. More important, in one of his first public documents, Lincoln established his stand on the institution of slavery. For racial conditions in Illinois, see: Leon F. Litwack, North of Slavery: The Negro in the Free States, 1790–1860 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1961), 69.

March 3, 1837

The following protest was presented to the House, which was read and ordered to be spread on the journals, to wit:

“Resolutions upon the subject of domestic slavery having passed both branches of the General Assembly at its present session, the undersigned hereby protest against the passage of the same.

They believe that the institution of slavery is founded on both injustice and bad policy; but that the promulgation of abolition doctrines tends rather to increase than to abate its evils.

They believe that the Congress of the United States has no power, under the constitution, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the different States.

They believe that the Congress of the United States has the power, under the constitution, to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia; but that that power ought not to be exercised unless at the request of the people of said District.

The difference between these opinions and those contained in the said resolutions, is their reason for entering this protest.”

Dan Stone,
A. Lincoln,

Representatives from the county of Sangamon.

2

Address Before the Young Men’s
Lyceum of Springfield, Illinois

CW, 1:108, 109–112

Beginning in the 1820s, rioting became an all-too-common occurrence in America’s cities and towns. Sparked by the market economic revolution and cyclical depressions, immigration, rapid urbanization, and racism, the blight of increasing violence spared few of the nation’s growing population centers. This turmoil was compounded by the escalating debate over the morality of slavery, and by Nat Turner’s 1831 slave insurrection; a young man like Lincoln might well express apprehension for the future. As a state legislator, Lincoln helped orchestrate the relocation of the state capital to Springfield in 1837, where he moved in April. In January of the next year, in one of his first speeches in the new capital, Lincoln addressed the growing unrest he saw. He had only to allude to Elijah P. Lovejoy, murdered the previous year in Alton, Illinois, for publishing an antislavery newspaper, to illustrate his warning that a new level of chaos endangered the entire nation. He even condemned the lynching of a black murderer as a wanton violation of the legal order and pointed to the killing of a recently freed slave for the crime of “attending to his own business, and at peace with the world.” Lincoln feared for the future, presciently admonishing his audience that the greatest threat to national security would come from within. The only effective protection he could imagine lay in devotion to the principles of liberty established by the Founding Fathers with the “blood of the revolution.” In this remarkable speech, one can see the principles that would in the years ahead lead a rising lawyer and politician to challenge Stephen A. Douglas, whom Lincoln saw as the greatest threat to the liberty won in the American Revolution.

January 27, 1838

The Perpetuation of Our Political Institutions

. . . At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide.

I hope I am over wary; but if I am not, there is, even now, something of ill-omen amongst us. I mean the increasing disregard for law which pervades the country; the growing disposition to substitute the wild and furious passions, in lieu of the sober judgement [sic] of Courts; and the worse than savage mobs, for the executive ministers of justice. This disposition is awfully fearful in any community; and that it now exists in ours, though grating to our feelings to admit, it would be a violation of truth, and an insult to our intelligence, to deny. Accounts of outrages committed by mobs, form the every-day news of the times. They have pervaded the country, from New England to Louisiana;—they are neither peculiar to the eternal snows of the former, nor the burning suns of the latter;—they are not the creature of climate—neither are they confined to the slaveholding, or the non-slaveholding States. Alike, they spring up among the pleasure hunting masters of Southern slaves, and the order loving citizens of the land of steady habits. Whatever, then, their cause may be, it is common to the whole country.

It would be tedious, as well as useless, to recount the horrors of all of them. Those happening in the State of Mississippi, and at St. Louis, are, perhaps, the most dangerous in example, and revolting to humanity. In the Mississippi case, they first commenced by hanging the regular gamblers: a set of men, certainly not following for a livelihood, a very useful, or very honest occupation; but one which, so far from being forbidden by the laws, was actually licensed by an act of the Legislature, passed but a single year before. Next, negroes, suspected of conspiring to raise an insurrection, were caught up and hanged in all parts of the State: then, white men, supposed to be leagued with the negroes; and finally, strangers, from neighboring States, going thither on business, were, in many instances, subjected to the same fate. Thus went on this process of hanging, from gamblers to negroes, from negroes to white citizens, and from these to strangers; till, dead men were seen literally dangling from the boughs of trees upon every road side; and in numbers almost sufficient, to rival the native Spanish moss of the country, as a drapery of the forest.

Turn, then, to that horror-striking scene at St. Louis. A single victim was only sacrificed there. His story is very short; and is, perhaps, the most highly tragic, of any thing of its length, that has ever been witnessed in real life. A mulatto man, by the name of McIntosh, was seized in the street, dragged to the suburbs of the city, chained to a tree, and actually burned to death; and all within a single hour from the time he had been a freeman, attending to his own business, and at peace with the world.

Such are the effects of mob law; and such are the scenes, becoming more and more frequent in this land so lately famed for love of law and order; and the stories of which, have even now grown too familiar, to attract any thing more, than an idle remark.

But you are, perhaps, ready to ask, “What has this to do with the perpetuation of our political institutions?” I answer, it has much to do with it. Its direct consequences are, comparatively speaking, but a small evil; and much of its danger consists, in the proneness of our minds, to regard its direct, as its only consequences. Abstractly considered, the hanging of the gamblers at Vicksburg, was of but little consequence. They constitute a portion of population, that is worse than useless in a[ny community; and their death, if no perni]cious example be set by it, is never matter of reasonable regret with any one. If they were annually swept, from the stage of existence, by the plague or small pox, honest men would, perhaps, be much profited, by the operation. Similar too, is the correct reasoning, in regard to the burning of the negro at St. Louis. He had forfeited his life, by the perpetration of an outrageous murder, upon one of the most worthy and respectable citizens of the city; and had he not died as he did, he must have died by the sentence of the law, in a very short time afterwards. As to him alone, it was as well the way it was, as it could otherwise have been. But the example in either case, was fearful. When men take it in their heads to day, to hang gamblers, or burn murderers, they should recollect, that, in the confusion usually attending such transactions, they will be as likely to hang or burn some one, who is neither a gambler nor a murderer [as] one who is; and that, acting upon the [exam]ple they set, the mob of to-morrow, may, an[d] probably will, hang or burn some of them, [by th]e very same mistake. And not only so; the innocent, those who have ever set their faces against violations of law in every shape, alike with the guilty, fall victims to the ravages of mob law; and thus it goes on, step by step, till all the walls erected for the defence of the persons and property of individuals, are trodden down, and disregarded. But all this even, is not the full extent of the evil. By such examples, by instances of the perpetrators of such acts going unpunished, the lawless in spirit, are encouraged to become lawless in practice; and having been used to no restraint, but dread of punishment, they thus become, absolutely unrestrained. Having ever regarded Government as their deadliest bane, they make a jubilee of the suspension of its operations; and pray for nothing so much, as its total annihilation. While, on the other hand, good men, men who love tranquility, who desire to abide by the laws, and enjoy their benefits, who would gladly spill their blood in the defence of their country; seeing their property destroyed; their families insulted, and their lives endangered; their persons injured; and seeing nothing in prospect that forebodes a change for the better; become tired of, and disgusted with, a Government that offers them no protection; and are not much averse to a change in which they imagine they have nothing to lose. Thus, then, by the operation of this mobocratic spirit, which all must admit, is now abroad in the land, the strongest bulwark of any Government, and particularly of those constituted like ours, may effectually be broken down and destroyed—I mean the attachment of the People. Whenever this effect shall be produced among us; whenever the vicious portion of population shall be permitted to gather in bands of hundreds and thousands, and burn churches, ravage and rob provision stores, throw printing presses into rivers, shoot editors, and hang and burn obnoxious persons at pleasure, and with impunity; depend on it, this Government cannot last. By such things, the feelings of the best citizens will become more or less alienated from it; and thus it will be left without friends, or with too few, and those few too weak, to make their friendship effectual. At such a time and under such circumstances, men of sufficient tal[ent and ambition will not be want]ing to seize [the opportunity, strike the blow, and over-turn that fair fabric], which for the last half century, has been the fondest hope, of the lovers of freedom, throughout the world.

I know the American People are much attached to their Government;—I know they would suffer much for its sake;—I know they would endure evils long and patiently, before they would ever think of exchanging it for another. Yet, notwithstanding all this, if the laws be continually despised and disregarded, if their rights to be secure in their persons and property, are held by no better tenure than the caprice of a mob, the alienation of their affections from the Government is the natural consequence; and to that, sooner or later, it must come.

Here then, is one point at which danger may be expected.

The question recurs “how shall we fortify against it?” The answer is simple. Let every American, every lover of liberty, every well wisher to his posterity, swear by the blood of the Revolution, never to violate in the least particular, the laws of the country; and never to tolerate their violation by others. As the patriots of seventy-six did to the support of the Declaration of Independence, so to the support of the Constitution and Laws, let every American pledge his life, his property, and his sacred honor;—let every man remember that to violate the law, is to trample on the blood of his father, and to tear the character [charter?] of his own, and his children’s liberty. Let reverence for the laws, be breathed by every American mother, to the lisping babe, that prattles on her lap—let it be taught in schools, in seminaries, and in colleges;—let it be written in Primmers, spelling books, and in Almanacs;—let it be preached from the pulpit, proclaimed in legislative halls, and enforced in courts of justice. And, in short, let it become the political religion of the nation; and let the old and the young, the rich and the poor, the grave and the gay, of all sexes and tongues, and colors and conditions, sacrifice unceasingly upon its altars.

3

AL to Mary Speed

CW, 1:260

Lincoln said that he grew up hating slavery, and his few recorded reactions to seeing actual slaves reinforced his professed revulsion. In this letter to Mary Speed, the half sister of his best friend, Joshua, Lincoln depicted his experience of seeing a coffle of slaves in St. Louis. The slaves recently had been purchased in his home state of Kentucky and were destined for the owner’s farm somewhere in the South. Lincoln imagined how it would feel to be “separated forever from the scenes of their childhood, their friends, their fathers and mothers, and brothers and sisters, and many of them, from their wives and children, and going into perpetual slavery where the lash of the master is proverbially more ruthless and unrelenting than any other where.” Yet he believed that the poor slaves endured their misfortune with laughter and song, God’s or nature’s way of permitting a person to endure hardship. As a teenager, Lincoln had sailed to New Orleans on a flatboat with a local storeowner’s son to transport supplies. Somewhere in Louisiana, “seven negroes” attacked the pair, intending, or so Lincoln believed, to rob and kill them both. The incidents strongly suggest how Lincoln could have developed such deep animosity for the institution of slavery side by side with such unbending belief in the necessity of racial segregation. For Lincoln’s early experience with African Americans, see: David Herbert Donald, Lincoln (London: Jonathan Cape, 1995), 34.

Miss Mary Speed	Bloomington, Illinois,
Louisville, Ky.	Sept. 27^th. 1841

. . . You remember there was some uneasiness about Joshua’s health when we left. That little indisposition of his turned out to be nothing serious; and it was pretty nearly forgotten when we reached Springfield. We got on board the Steam Boat Lebanon, in the locks of the Canal about 12. o’cloc...