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Abraham Lincoln to Alexander Sympson, 24 October 18581
Blandonville, Oct 24. 1858A. Sympson, Esq[Esquire]Dear Sir
Since parting with you this morning2 I heard some things which make me believe that Edmunds and Morrill, will spend this week among the National democrats trying to induce them to content themselves by voting for Jake Davis, and then to vote for the Douglas candidates for Senator and Representative–3 Have this headed off, if you can– Call Wagley’s attention to it, & have him and the National democrat for Rep.[Representative] to counteract it as far as they can–4
Yours as everA. Lincoln5
1Abraham Lincoln wrote and signed this letter.
2Lincoln had been Alexander Sympson’s guest in Carthage, Illinois, where he had given a speech on October 22, 1858. Lincoln was at this time running against incumbent senator Stephen A. Douglas to represent Illinois in the U.S. Senate, having been nominated at the 1858 Illinois Republican Convention in June. With the Republican Party dominating the northern part of Illinois, and the Democratic Party stronger in the southern part of the state, Lincoln and Douglas both focused their campaign efforts on the former Whig stronghold of central Illinois where the electoral outcome was less certain. From Carthage, Lincoln had visited Fountain Green, Dallas City, and La Harpe on October 23, 1858, making speeches in the latter two locations, then was in Blandinsville on or before October 24, when he wrote this letter. Sympson apparently accompanied Lincoln for a time after Lincoln departed from Carthage. See 1858 Federal Election.
Report of Speech at Carthage, Illinois; The Lincoln Log: A Daily Chronology of the Life of Abraham Lincoln, 22 October 1858, https://www.thelincolnlog.org/Results.aspx?type=CalendarDay&day=1858-10-22; 23 October 1858, https://www.thelincolnlog.org/Results.aspx?type=CalendarDay&day=1858-10-23; 24 October 1858, https://www.thelincolnlog.org/Results.aspx?type=CalendarDay&day=1858-10-24; The Chicago Sunday Tribune (IL), 5 March 1893, 42:2-3; Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008), 1:457-58, 476-77; Allen C. Guelzo, “Houses Divided: Lincoln, Douglas, and the Political Landscape of 1858,” The Journal of American History 94 (September 2007), 392-94, 400-401.
3A rift had formed in the Democratic Party after Douglas criticized the Lecompton Constitution and President James Buchanan’s support of it in December 1857. In the Fifth Congressional District of Illinois Jacob C. Davis was running for election in 1858 as an independent Democrat, challenging incumbent Democrat Isaac N. Morris. In this race Buchanan supporters, also known as National Democrats, were backing Davis, and Douglas supporters were backing Morris. Davis ultimately placed a distant third in the race, garnering just under 2 percent of the vote. Morris won reelection with 52.7 percent of the vote, and Republican candidate Jackson Grimshaw earned 45.4 percent.
Lincoln is reporting a rumor that Hancock County Douglas Democrats George Edmunds, Jr. and Milton M. Morrill intended to propose the concession that Buchanan Democrats could support their candidate, Davis, in the U.S. House of Representatives race in exchange for supporting Douglas Democrats in the Illinois General Assembly races. Such a deal among the Democrats of the Fifth Congressional District would be significant to Lincoln’s U.S. Senate campaign against Douglas, as the Illinois General Assembly elected the state’s representatives to the U.S. Senate at this time. Douglas Democrat candidates were ultimately successful in the Hancock County General Assembly races of 1858. In the Thirty-First District of the Illinois House of Representatives, which consisted solely of Hancock County, William H. Roosevelt won election with 2,389 votes, defeating Republican George Rockwell who earned 2,032 votes, and Buchanan Democrat William F. Frazee who garnered 44 votes. Hancock, Henderson, and Schuyler counties constituted the Eleventh Illinois Senate District, where John P. Richmond earned 4,578 votes and defeated Republican John C. Bagby who received 4,112 votes, and Buchanan Democrat William C. Wagley who earned 207 votes. Roosevelt and Richmond both voted for Douglas for U.S. Senate in the election of 1858.
Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life, 1:445-48; Howard W. Allen and Vincent A. Lacey, eds., Illinois Elections, 1818-1990 (Carbondale and Edwardsville: Southern Illinois University Press, 1992), 10, 11, 142; Abraham Jonas to Abraham Lincoln; John Clayton, comp., The Illinois Fact Book and Historical Almanac 1673-1968 (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1970), 219, 220, 222; Chicago Daily Press and Tribune (IL), 1 November 1858, 2:4; The Weekly Chicago Times (IL), 11 November 1858, 2:6; 18 November 1858, 3:3; Illinois House Journal. 1859. 21st G. A., 32.
4Among Illinois Republicans there was hope that the division in the Democratic Party in 1858, which resulted in competing Democratic candidates in some races, would improve the chances of Republican candidates. Although during the summer of 1858 Lincoln had denied knowledge of collusion between Republicans and Buchanan Democrats in Illinois, he is here calling for the Buchanan Democratic candidates for Illinois General Assembly in Hancock County, Wagley and Frazee, to be notified of this rumored courting of their supporters by Douglas Democrats so that they could push back and thus maintain a divided Democratic vote to the benefit of Lincoln’s U.S. Senate campaign.
On being informed of this letter later in life, Edmunds recollected that fearing for the election prospects of the Hancock County Douglas Democrat candidates for Illinois General Assembly in 1858 in light of the split in the party, he and Morrill had called a meeting at the county courthouse, which resulted in a Democratic Party convention “which was held and resulted so satisfactorily to the Democratic voters that we were able to elect Douglas Democrats to both Senate and House.”
Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life, 1:455-56; Allen C. Guelzo, “Houses Divided: Lincoln, Douglas, and the Political Landscape of 1858,” 392-403; Abraham Lincoln to Samuel Wilkinson; Abraham Lincoln to Lyman Trumbull; Ozias M. Hatch to Abraham Lincoln; Chicago Daily Press and Tribune (IL), 29 September 1858, 1:1; The Chicago Sunday Tribune (IL), 5 March 1893, 42:3.
5No response to this letter has been located. Lincoln wrote to Sympson following the election of 1858 to acknowledge their mutual disappointment in the outcome.

Copy of Autograph Letter Signed, 1 page(s), Abraham Lincoln Association Files, Lincoln Collection, Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum (Springfield, IL).