Papers Of Abraham Lincoln

Report of Speech at Carthage, Illinois, 22 October 18581

A Douglas Roorback Exposed.2

At Carthage, Hancock County, Oct.[October] 22, Mr. Lincoln discussed the following topics, not included in any of the joint debates with Judge Douglas:

On the 4th of October, at Woodford County, I learned that Judge Douglas had been imputing to me and my friends a purpose to release the Central Railroad Company from paying into the State Treasury the seven per cent. upon their gross earnings, which, by law, they are now bound to do.3 I learn he repeated the same imputation at Pekin, Oquawka, Monmouth and this place, though he has never mentioned it at any of our joint meetings, or elsewhere in my presence.4 I mention it now to correct any false impression that may have been made. I understand the Judge states, among other things, that I once received a fee of $5,000 from that Company. My partner and I did receive such fee under the following circumstances: By their charter, the Company are bound to make periodical payments into the State Treasury, in exemption of all other taxes. This exempts them from county and city taxes. The Legislature intended, as I understand, in consideration of the large land grant,5 to make the Company pay about as much as they could bear; and to make them pay it into the State Treasury, so that the whole people could share the benefit, instead of paying any to the counties through which the road passes, to the exclusion of those through which it does not pass. This was a fair way of dealing with the whole people, as was thought. The county of McLean, one of the counties through which the road passes, claimed that the exemption was unconstitutional, and that the Company was bound to pay county taxes on their property with the limits of the county; and the parties went to Court to try the question. The Railroad Company employed me as one of their lawyers in the case, the county having declined to employ me. I was not upon a salary, and no agreement was made as to the amount of fee. The Railroad Company finally gained the case. The decision, I thought, and still think, was worth half a million dollars to them. I wanted them to pay me $5,000, and they wanted to pay me about $500. I sued them and got the $5,000. This is the whole truth about the fee; and, what tendency it has to prove that I received any of the peoples money, or that I am on very cozy terms with the Railroad Company, I do not comprehend.6

It is a matter of interest to you that the Company shall not be released from their obligations to pay money into the State Treasury. Every dollar they so pay relieves the whole people of just so much in the way of taxation. I am a candidate for no office wherein I could release them, if elected. The State Legislature alone can release them. Therefore, all you need to do is to know of your candidates for the Legislature how they will vote on the question of release, if elected. I doubt not every candidate who is a friend of mine is ready to show his hand, and perhaps it would be well to have Judge Douglas’ friends show their hands also. See to your members of the Legislature, and you are beyond the power of all others as to releasing the Central Railroad from its obligations. This is your perfect security.7

1Abraham Lincoln delivered a speech in Carthage, Illinois, on October 22, 1858. The Chicago Tribune published this report of his speech in its October 27 edition.
At the time, Lincoln was the Illinois Republican Party’s candidate for election to the U.S. Senate in the 1858 Federal Election. He was running against Democratic incumbent Stephen A. Douglas. Both men traveled the state throughout the fall and summer of 1858, delivering public speeches in support of candidates for the Illinois General Assembly in their respective parties, as well as for the Lincoln-Douglas Debates. They devoted such significant time and effort to the local elections for members of the Illinois House of Representatives and the Illinois Senate because members of the General Assembly voted for and elected the state’s representatives in the U.S. Senate. See 1858 Illinois Republican Convention.
Chicago Daily Press and Tribune (IL), 27 October 1858, 2:2; Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008), 1:458; Allen C. Guelzo, “Houses Divided: Lincoln, Douglas, and the Political Landscape of 1858,” The Journal of American History 94 (September 2007), 392, 394.

2“Roorback” is a defamatory falsehood or fiction which is made, and often published, for political impact.
“Roorback.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/roorback, accessed April 27, 2026; John S. Farmer, Americanisms—Old and New (London: Thomas Poulter, 1889), 463.

3Lincoln delivered a public address in Metamora, Illinois, on October 4.
Per the Illinois Central Railroad Company’s charter, the Illinois General Assembly permitted the Company to pay a capped tax rate of seven percent of its gross receipts to the state treasury and exempted the company from all other taxation not specified in the charter.
Daily Illinois State Journal (Springfield), 1 October 1858, 2:1; The Lincoln Log: A Daily Chronology of the Life of Abraham Lincoln, 4 October 1858, https://www.thelincolnlog.org/Results.aspx?type=CalendarDay&day=1858-10-04; “An Act to Incorporate the Illinois Central Railroad Company,” 10 February 1851, Private Laws of Illinois (1851), 72-73.

4Douglas delivered a speech in Pekin, Illinois, on October 2, Oquawka, Illinois, on October 4, Monmouth, Illinois, on October 5, and Carthage, Illinois, on October 11. Copies of his speeches in Pekin, Monmouth, and Carthage do not appear to be extant. However, the Daily Illinois State Register provided coverage of Douglas’s remarks in Oquawka. During his speech, Douglas insinuated that Lincoln was “an attorney in the employ of the I. C. R. R. at the time the [company’s] charter was granted” and lobbied members of the Illinois General Assembly on the company’s behalf. Furthermore, Douglas asserted that Lincoln made “a good bargain for the co., against the state”, “induced the legislature” to reduce the percentage that the Company was obligated to pay the state from fifteen to seven percent, and that Lincoln remained the Company’s employee up to the time of the election campaign of 1858.
Douglas made similar remarks during a speech he delivered in Henry, Illinois, on September 29, and he repeated these accusations during a speech he gave in Springfield, Illinois, on October 20. Lincoln was not present at the Henry or Springfield speeches either, as he was speaking in Winchester, Illinois, on September 29 and Rushville, Illinois on October 20—confirming his assertion that Douglas made these accusations only when he was not in Lincoln’s presence.

Lincoln also delivered speeches in Pekin, Oquawka, and Monmouth, on October 5, 9, and 11, respectively.

The Illinois Central Railroad was a controversial topic during the election campaign of 1858. Railroads throughout the state were suffering lingering financial effects from the Panic of 1857. The Illinois Central Railroad went into receivership in 1857 and foreclosed on roughly 4,000 mortgages. The Company also asked to be released from a state taxation requirement to pay seven percent of its earnings as compensation for lands it had received from the state—a request that was immensely unpopular among voters.
Daily Illinois State Register (Springfield), 20 September 1858, 2:1; 4 October 1858, 2:1; 9 October 1858, 2:3-4; 29 October 1858, 2:4-5; The Lincoln Log: A Daily Chronology of the Life of Abraham Lincoln, 29 September 1858, https://www.thelincolnlog.org/Results.aspx?type=CalendarDay&day=1858-09-29; 5 October 1858, https://www.thelincolnlog.org/Results.aspx?type=CalendarDay&day=1858-10-05; 9 October 1858, https://www.thelincolnlog.org/Results.aspx?type=CalendarDay&day=1858-10-09; 11 October 1858, https://www.thelincolnlog.org/Results.aspx?type=CalendarDay&day=1858-10-11; 20 October 1858, https://www.thelincolnlog.org/Results.aspx?type=CalendarDay&day=1858-10-20; Summary of Speech at Pekin, Illinois; Summary of Speech at Pekin, Illinois; Summary of Speech at Monmouth, Illinois; Summary of Speech at Monmouth, Illinois; Daily Illinois State Journal (Springfield), 28 September 1858, 2:1; Chicago Daily Journal (IL), 5 October 1858, 2:3; Bruce Collins, “The Lincoln-Douglas Contest of 1858 and Illinois’ Electorate,” Journal of American Studies 20 (December 1986), 410-14; Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life, 1:528.

5The U.S. Congress granted the Illinois Central Railroad Company nearly 2.6 million acres of public land to aid the construction of the railroad. See Illinois Central Railroad Company.
“An Act to Incorporate the Illinois Central Railroad Company,” 10 February 1851, Private Laws of Illinois (1851), 61-74; “An Act Granting the Right of Way, and Making a Grant of Land to the States of Illinois, Mississippi, and Alabama, in Aid of the Construction of a Railroad from Chicago to Mobile,” 20 September 1850, Statutes at Large of the United States 9 (1862):466-67.

6Lincoln represented the Illinois Central Railroad Company at least as early as May 1853, in the case Illinois Central Railroad v. McGinnis. Before the railroad officially retained Lincoln, it had received its charter from the Illinois General Assembly and later sued McLean County for an injunction to stop the county from selling railroad land to pay taxes. This case was known as Illinois Central RR v. McLean County, Illinois & Parke. In late-September 1853, the parties reached an agreement, in which the McLean County Circuit Court would dismiss the bill, thus ruling for McLean County, and the railroad would appeal the case to the Illinois Supreme Court, where the only question would be whether the county had a lawful right to tax the Illinois Central Railroad’s property. Lincoln represented the railroad in this case, which began in December 1853.
In December 1855, the Illinois Supreme Court reversed the judgment of the McLean County Circuit Court, and Justice Walter B. Scates ruled that the Illinois General Assembly could exempt property from taxation. Therefore, the Illinois Central Railroad’s charter was constitutional. Lincoln received $5,000 for his legal services, although he had to sue the railroad in 1857 to collect the fee.
Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life, 1:528-29; Illinois Central RR v. McLean County, Illinois & Parke, Martha L. Benner and Cullom Davis et al., eds., The Law Practice of Abraham Lincoln: Complete Documentary Edition, 2d edition (Springfield: Illinois Historic Preservation Agency, 2009), http://www.lawpracticeofabrahamlincoln.org/Details.aspx?case=136867, http://www.lawpracticeofabrahamlincoln.org/Details.aspx?case=136868; Receipt of Abraham Lincoln to Illinois Central Railroad Company; Sandra K. Lueckenhoff, “A. Lincoln, a Corporate Attorney and the Illinois Central Railroad,” Missouri Law Review 61 (Spring 1996), 394; For full details on Lincoln’s involvement in the case Illinois Central Railroad v. McGinnis, see Illinois Central Railroad v. McGinnis, Martha L. Benner and Cullom Davis et al., eds., The Law Practice of Abraham Lincoln: Complete Documentary Edition, http://www.lawpracticeofabrahamlincoln.org/Details.aspx?case=136555; Abraham Lincoln to Mason Brayman; For details on Lincoln suing the railroad to collect the fee for his services, see: Lincoln v. Illinois Central RR, Martha L. Benner and Cullom Davis et al., eds., The Law Practice of Abraham Lincoln: Complete Documentary Edition, http://www.lawpracticeofabrahamlincoln.org/Details.aspx?case=136777.

7In Illinois’s local elections of 1858, Republicans won a majority of all votes cast in the state, but pro-Douglas Democrats retained control of the Illinois General Assembly and Douglas ultimately won reelection to the U.S. Senate. Through the campaign, however, and in particular through his participation in the Lincoln-Douglas Debates, Lincoln gained recognition and respect within the national Republican Party.
The elected members of the Illinois General Assembly held the Illinois Central Railroad Company to its obligation to remit seven percent of its gross earnings to the state of Illinois per its charter and land grant agreement with the state.
Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life, 1:556-57; Allen C. Guelzo, “Houses Divided: Lincoln, Douglas, and the Political Landscape of 1858,” 414; Sandra K. Lueckenhoff, “A. Lincoln, a Corporate Attorney and the Illinois Central Railroad,” 424, 426; “An Act to Incorporate the Illinois Central Railroad Company,” 10 February 1851, Private Laws of Illinois (1851), 61-74.