Abraham Smith to Abraham Lincoln, 4 June 18581
Ridge Farm Illinois 6th Mo.[Month] 4th 1858Friend A. LincolnThy favor of 4th inst was receivd this morning.2 In relation to the two gentlemen spoken of for senator and representative I have
heard them spoken of and know of no objections3 Our folks of Vermilion would perhaps name the senator from this county— but but I and some others think it would be policy to wa^i^ve our preferences for one of ^our^ own men and run one from the south end of the district— and think that the senator & representative should be from the Whig K. N. wing of our party4
I know of no necessity for jealousy among republicans— while the honors of office are divided– We have none of us any sacrifice of principle
to make to cordialy oppose— democracy— the only difference between us I think is in the degree of our hatred to democracy–You
of of the whig party are opposed to democracy be cause you deem it unprofitable— bad policy— and dangerous temporaly; while we the abolitionists are opposed to it on for ^all^ your reasons and in addition we deem democrat doctrines & practices sin and blasphemy against God And where policy & right run to gether as they do in the issue now between republicanism & democracy and no probability of a different issue overshadowing soon, I— I can see no cause of jealousy
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I had not suffered myself to become jealous— of thee in the Lovejoy matter tho[though] it is comonly represented that all the Lawyers of the circuit with Judge d^D^avis and of all parties are in a conspiracy to defeat Lovejoy–5
I suppose that every thing that passd between you has since been handed rount^d^ to the abolitionists of this district— and an effort was making to implicate Lincoln—
and as I said in my last I am anxious that Lincoln should be elected to the senate— simply because I deem thee able and trust worthy— dont know of any better timber— nor of any one more likely to be tru deemed trust worth by all sections of our party— but by all classes of republicans in this country part of the state it appeart^d^ that Lincl^o^ln was understood to be our ol^n^ly candidate for the senate till this Lovejoy affair began to cause a little jealousy—
a little flutter about court time and a little more lately— till I thought it would
be best for thee to know how the the thing was working—tho I profess no personal partiality
Thy friendAbraham Smith6<Page 3>
[Envelope]
Hon. Abram LincolnSpringfieldIllinois
2No letter from Abraham Lincoln to which this is a response has been located. Lincoln’s
missing letter presumably responded to Smith’s letter of May 31, 1858 on the subject of the election of 1858. Smith gives the same date of June 4 to Lincoln’s missing letter and to this reply;
either one or both letters are presumably misdated, as it is unlikely that a letter
written June 4 could travel by mail from Springfield to Ridge Farm and arrive the
same morning it was written.
3Smith is presumably continuing the discussion from his previous letter on candidates for the Eighteenth Illinois Senate District, which included Coles, Cumberland, Edgar and Vermilion counties, and the Twenty-Fourth Illinois House District, which was
contiguous with Edgar County. In correspondence in late May and early June, Lincoln
was informed that Thomas A. Marshall and James Steele were the likely Republican candidates in these respective races and he may have communicated
these names to Smith. Marshall was indeed selected as the Republican candidate for
the Eighteenth Illinois Senate District, and he defeated Democrat Usher F. Linder in the election of 1858. Steele, however, declined to be a candidate for the Illinois House of Representatives and Robert Moseley was instead nominated at an Edgar County Republican convention held in September
1858. Moseley also won his office, defeating Democrat Charles Summers by a vote of 1,453 to 1,400.
Lincoln was interested in the outcome of races for the Illinois House of Representatives
and the Illinois Senate as he intended to challenge incumbent Stephen A. Douglas to represent Illinois in the U.S. Senate, and at this time the Illinois General Assembly elected the state’s U.S. senators. Not long after the date of this letter, Lincoln
was nominated to be the Republican Party’s U.S. Senate candidate at the 1858 Illinois Republican Convention on June 16. When the election for U.S. senator was held in the General Assembly in
January 1859, both Marshall and Moseley voted for Lincoln. While Lincoln received
forty-six votes in the General Assembly, Douglas received fifty-one votes and retained
the seat.
John Clayton, comp., The Illinois Fact Book and Historical Almanac 1673-1968
(Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1970), 219, 222; George W. Rives to Abraham Lincoln; James Steele to Abraham Lincoln; Oliver L. Davis to Abraham Lincoln; George W. Rives to Abraham Lincoln; Chicago Daily Press and Tribune (IL), 1 November 1858, 2:4; Daily Illinois State Journal (Springfield), 29 September 1858, 2:4; The Weekly Chicago Times (IL), 11 November 1858, 4:2; Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008), 1:457-58; 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; Illinois Senate Journal. 1859. 21st G. A., 30; Illinois House Journal. 1859. 21st G. A., 32.
4Lincoln and Douglas focused their 1858 campaign efforts on the former Whig stronghold
of central Illinois, where the state legislative races were the closest. Among the
former Whigs whose votes were courted were those who had moved into the American Party following the dissolution of the Whig Party. In the Eighteenth Illinois Senate District,
Vermilion County was considered to be safely Republican, but in the southern portion
of the district, Coles and Edgar counties were located in the former “Whig belt” of
Illinois, and Cumberland County leaned Democratic. Smith’s preference for a state
senate candidate from the southern portion of the district, and for candidates who
had formerly been members of either the Whig or American parties was informed by an
understanding of the need to win over voters who might be reluctant to support Republican
candidates. The Republican candidates selected in these races aligned with this strategy;
Illinois Senate candidate Marshall was from Coles County, and Marshall and Moseley
were both Whigs before they became Republicans.
Allen C. Guelzo, “Houses Divided: Lincoln, Douglas, and the Political Landscape of
1858,” 392-94, 400-401; Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life, 1:476-77; The History of Coles County, Illinois
(Chicago: Wm. Le Baron, Jr., 1879), 526; The History of Edgar County, Illinois (Chicago: Wm. Le Baron, Jr., 1879), 346.
5Smith is referencing the 1858 electoral race in the Third Congressional District of
Illinois, of which his home county of Vermilion was a part. Owen Lovejoy was up for
reelection to the U.S. House of Representatives and some of the more conservative Republicans of the district sought to replace him
due to his reputation as an abolitionist. Among those who opposed Lovejoy’s reelection
were Lincoln’s friends and allies David Davis, Leonard Swett, T. Lyle Dickey, and Ward H. Lamon. Lincoln, however, recognized the importance of Lovejoy’s supporters to his own ambition
to be elected to the U.S. Senate, and had himself warned Lovejoy as early as March 1858 to be wary of the possibility of Democrats recruiting
a Republican to run against him. Attempts from conservative Republicans and Democrats
to either replace Lovejoy as the Republican candidate or challenge him with an independent
opponent continued to be a concern throughout the campaign of 1858. Despite these
efforts, Lovejoy was unanimously nominated for reelection at the district Republican
convention in Joliet on June 30, and was returned to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1858 with 57.7
percent of the vote, defeating Douglas Democrat George W. Armstrong who garnered 38.8 percent and Buchanan Democrat David Le Roy who received 3.4 percent.
Howard W. Allen and Vincent A. Lacey, eds., Illinois Elections, 1818-1990 (Carbondale and Edwardsville: Southern Illinois University Press, 1992), 10, 11,
142; Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life, 1:456-57; Edward Magdol, Owen Lovejoy: Abolitionist in Congress (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1967), 189-99; Stephen G. Paddock and John H. Bryant to Abraham Lincoln; Abraham Smith to Abraham Lincoln; Abraham Lincoln to Charles H. Ray; Abraham Lincoln to the Editors, Chicago Tribune; David Davis to Abraham Lincoln; James W. Somers to Abraham Lincoln; Henry C. Whitney to Abraham Lincoln and William H. Herndon; Abraham Lincoln to Burton C. Cook; Joseph O. Glover to Abraham Lincoln; Owen Lovejoy to Abraham Lincoln; The Daily Pantagraph (Bloomington, IL), 2 July 1858, 2:1-3; 9 October 1858, 2:2.
6No response to this letter by Lincoln has been located. Smith wrote Lincoln again on the subject of the election of 1858 on July 20, 1858.
Autograph Letter Signed, 3 page(s), Abraham Lincoln Papers, Library of Congress (Washington, DC).