Henry C. Whitney to Abraham Lincoln, 23 June 18581
Chicago Ill. June 23d 1858.=Honl[Honorable] A LincolnDear SirThe attack upon you in todays “Chicago Times” is far more dangerous than many persons might suppose:= the charge of your refusal
to vote for the appropriation Bill is the most potent & dangerous weapon that can
be used against you in the rural districts:= of course (even if true) it would have
no effect with men of sense but it is true and Douglass and his yelpers know it in all its breadth & depth that it is the very thing to take
in the byeways & hedges:=2 When I was stumping with Somers & Coler 2 years since they took especial pains to try it in every speech they made until
I spoke to you about it and you pronounced it false & I made them eat the statement:=
I saw Messrs[Messieurs] Scripps & Arnold about it this morning & they neither one knew anything about its falsity:= C L Wilson is not here ^nor is Judd^:= Scripps agrees with me in the importance of an early refutation and is quite anxious
to present the facts & figures in the morning but Bross is away & he can't leave the office:= I consumed the morning in finding the “Globe” & finally succeded in finding one at the Historical Society from which if it is possible I propose to obtain some statistics this P.M.:= I suppose of course
the papers will refute it unless indeed they are as Scripps & myself were impressed
with the belief that it is true; but then
In Haste Your FriendHenry C Whitney.=6<Page 2>
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it behooves all of us to see our Editorial friends & see to it that such refutation
is full clear & distinct and that the charge of lying is retorted on them with a vengeance:=
the little gentleman Johnson (I believe)3 would be an excellent hand to take the “Globe” & collate all the statistics relative
to the appropriations bills & shew how you voted & how others (now democrats) voted on the same questions:= they think they have made a terrible onslaught we
ought to return the charge equally as effective:= the devil ought to be fought with
fire:=4 Scripps says that neither Sheahan nor Douglas wrote it:=5 I did not go to Wentworth for his Globe as I was advised that John is willing to see the attack & would not lend his Globe to refute it:= don't let
us lose ground by inattention to these apparently trifling but really formidable matters:=
the fight is as effectually between you & Douglas as if you were in the field for
a popular vote:=
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“Happy Comparison[s”]
A Republican editor writing from the Springfield Republican Convention to his own paper, described the speech of the Hon. A. Lincoln as abounding in strong
arguments, great research, and “happy comparisons.” We know Mr. Lincoln personally,
and have no disposition to say one word having the slightest approach to disrespect,
but as he has set himself before the people of Illinois as the competitor of Senator Douglas, and has not only invited, but actually made
comparisons between himself and his opponent, we feel warranted in taking notice of
what he has said in this particular.7
There are a number of Republicans (as well as several Republican newspapers) who think
that in a struggle for the defence of the State, and of the Constitution, and of the North, good sense would dictate that a Senator
who can command support and power with the entire people of the Union, would be of
more service than a mere individual whose influence would be confined to his own
person, and whose power would be exhausted by the casting of his own vote. Mr. Lincoln,
in his speech, after pointing out to the Republicans of Illinois the reasons why he,
Lincoln, should be elected, turns to the question of whether he or Mr. Douglas would
prove the most serviceable representative in the councils of the nation, and he says
(we give the extract, italics and all, just as we find it published in the Springfield Journal:)
“There are those who denounce us openly to their own friends, and yet whisper us softly, that Senator Douglas is the aptest instrument there is, with which to effect that object. They do not tell us, nor has he told us, that he wishes any such object to be effected. They wish us to infer all, from the facts, that he now has a little quarrel with the present head of the
dynasty; and that he has regularly voted with us, on a single point, upon which, he
and we, have never differed.
They remind us that he is a very great man, and that the largest of us are very small ones. Let this be granted. But ‘a living dog is better than a dead lion.8’ Judge Douglas, if not a dead lion, for this work, is at least a caged and toothless one. How can he oppose the advances of slavery? He don’t care anything about it. His avowed mission is impressing the “public heart” to care nothing about it.”
Mr. Lincoln thinks proper to speak of his competitor as a “dead lion,” and to hold himself up to the people of Illinois as a “living dog.” We have no right to question Mr. Lincoln’s estimation of himself, he has applied
it to himself, and has, to give it stronger significance, italicised the expression in his printed speech.
We think that for a “dead lion,” or even a “aged and toothless” one, Senator Douglas possesses and displays considerable vitality. To kill a dead lion, all the ‘living dogs’ of Illinois have been let loose with sharpened fangs.
To fight a ‘toothless’ lion all the living dogs from Cairo to Chicago have been lashed and whipped into the hunt. And yet there is not a ‘living dog’
in the entire pack that does not tremble and quake, lest that dead and toothless animal,
even in death, may rise and put him in jeopardy. Was the lion who stood in the pathway
of Lecomptonism dead when he bid the entire power and patronage of the Government defiance, and forbid
the consumation of that iniquity? Was that the voice of a dead lion, which has been heard in the
mountains and valleys of Pennsylvania, upon the streams of Ohio, all over the prairies of the Northwest, even now finds a responsive echo throughout
the State of Virginia? Was that the struggle of a dead lion which forced a proud and overbearing majority
in both houses of Congress, backed by all the power and appliances of the Federal Government, to abandon after
a four months’ struggle, their infamous measure, and send the Lecompton Constitution back to Kansas to be buried beyond all hope of resurrection by the people of that Territory? If that was the power of a dead lion, we would like to know whether there is a
‘living dog’ in Illinois who could have done the same deed! Suppose that Douglas
had not been in the Senate, and his place had been occupied by a ‘living dog’ in the
person of Abraham Lincoln, would Lecompton have been delayed one hour in its triumphant passage?
Who else than Douglas could have arrested that measure when he did, and as he did?
A new and popular Administration majority in both branches of Congress, the entire
patronage of the Government undisposed of, and yet a man arose up there and bid that
majority and that Administration to stop in the prosecution of an unjust measure.
Call you, Mr. Lincoln, the man who did that successfully a dead lion—a toothless animal?
And pray, when do you ever expect to be able, in the Senate or out of it, any where,
at home or abroad, to approach in power and influence the achievement of a dead lion?
In that hour, of what avail would have been the barking of a ‘living dog?’9
We remember that on one occasion, some years ago, a bill was pending in the House of Representatives at Washington for the purchase of medicines and the employment of nurses to attend the sick and
dying American soldiers in the hospitals and camps of hot and burning Mexico; when our suffering soldiers—the volunteers of Illinois and Indiana—the men who at Buena Vista had followed Hardin and Bissell, and who through the desert had accompanies Shields and Foreman—were crying out in their fever for cooling drinks and kind hands to minister to their
dying wants; we know that when the bill to purchase these medicines, and furnish necessaries
for the American soldiers who were sick and dying was pending, a ‘living dog’ reared
his ungainly person in the national councils, an din a yelping, barking tone, refused
them succor! Let them die—let them die, the men of Illinois, who fought over and
rescued the dead body of Hardin, who echoed back the cheering call of Bissell, of
Richardson, of Moore, of Harris, let them die. I, a ‘living dog,’ from the state of Illinois, refuse to send these
men food, clothing or medicine. I, Abram Lincoln. of Sangamon county, refuse to vote one dollar to feed, cloth, or minister to the wants of the sick and
dying volunteers from my own State, who are suffering in Mexico. Let them die like
dogs! Let them die for want of medicine! Let the fever-parched lips of my Illinois
neighbors crack in painful agony—not one drop of cooling liquid shall soothe them
if I can help it. What if they have served their country; what if they have encountered
and beaten back an enemy thrice their own number; what if they do lie on damp grounds
by night, and march in blistering sunlight by day; what if they have proved, every
man of them, to be a Lion in his country’s cause, I, Abram Lincoln, am a living dog, and ‘a living dog is
better than a dead lion.’
Oh, Mr. Lincoln, the living dog at that day tried his powers with the man who is now
styled a ‘dead lion;’ you then refused succours to your countrymen in Mexico, but the ‘living dog’ was powerless even for evil.
The money was voted, and the living dog skulked back into obscurity. Was not that
a deed worthy of "a living dog;" would not even a dead lion be ashamed that his memory
should be stained by the record of such an act?
Democrats of Illinois, Republicans of Illinois! the man who styles himself a ‘living
dog asks you to support him for the United States Senate. The man who aspires to
be your representative in the Senate, who offers himself to fill the place heretofore
filled with such world-wide distinction by Douglas, tells you that he will go there
as a living dog. He has been in Congress before, but who is there outside of the
old settlers of Illinois has any recollection of his service there? What did he do?
What did he say? What act is there which has rendered his service or his presence
there memorable? Who is there in Illinois or in the Union that can remember any act
or speech (other than the one we have mentioned) by Lincoln in the Congress of the
United States. He asks you to send him there because he is better than a dead lion.
But is the lion dead? Why the hostile array then that has been prepared to kill the
lion who is already dead?
People of Illinois Mr. Lincoln has stated the issue—‘a living dog’ or a ‘lion’ not
dead, nor wounded, nor toothless, nor caged, but free, bold, firm, strong, and more
powerful than ever. Choose you, as your representative, the man who claims no higher
rank than that of a ‘living dog,’ or the man who has exercised, and forever will exercise
a controlling power over the legislation of his country.
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[Envelope]
CHICAGO Ill[Illinois]
JUN 24 1858Honl A. LincolnSpringfieldIllinois
JUN 24 1858Honl A. LincolnSpringfieldIllinois
1Henry C. Whitney wrote and signed this letter, including Abraham Lincoln’s name and
address on the envelope.
2The Daily Chicago Times attacked Lincoln’s congressional record on the Mexican War in an article appearing in the June 23 edition. Whitney enclosed a clipping of the
article with this letter.
Daily Chicago Times (IL), 23 June 1858, 2:1-2; The Weekly Chicago Times (IL), 24 June 1858, 2:3.
4Joseph Medill and John L. Scripps also wrote Lincoln informing him of the Daily Chicago Times’s attacks on his congressional record related to the Mexican War and asked him to supply a response. Lincoln replied to Whitney on June 24 and replied to Medill on June 25, but no reply to the letter from Scripps has been located. Lincoln
urged Whitney in his reply to “give yourself no concern” about Lincoln’s voting record on the Mexican War, unless
Whitney lacked faith that the lies could not be refuted successfully. In his reply to Medill, Lincoln supplied detailed information to counter the Daily Chicago Times’s attack.
Although Lincoln opposed the Mexican War and questioned its constitutionality during
his time in the U.S. House of Representatives, he nevertheless voted in favor of supplies for U.S. troops on at least two occasions:
February 17 and March 8, 1848. In both instances, the bills Lincoln voted for passed
the U.S. Senate and became law, funneling aid in the form of money, food, clothing, medical supplies,
and the like to U.S. military personnel serving in Mexico.
The Chicago Daily Tribune published a general defense of Lincoln in its June 24 edition, while also admitting
that the editors did not then know whether Lincoln “did or not vote against that war.”
The Daily Illinois State Journal published a refutation of the Daily Chicago Times’s attack on Lincoln in its June 25 edition, and the Chicago Daily Tribune printed a more thorough refutation of the attack in its June 26 issue.
Joseph Medill to Abraham Lincoln; John L. Scripps to Abraham Lincoln; Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008), 1:264-68, 526-28, 554-56;
‘‘Spot'' Resolutions in the United States House of Representatives; ‘‘Spot'' Resolutions in the United States House of Representatives; Speech in United States House of Representatives: The War with Mexico; Speech in United States House of Representatives: The War with Mexico; Mark E. Neely, Jr., Lincoln and the Triumph of the Nation: Constitutional Conflict in the American Civil
War (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2011), 33; U.S. House Journal. 1848. 30th Cong., 1st sess., 426-27; 520-21; An Act Further to Supply Deficiencies in the Appropriations for the Service of the
Fiscal Year Ending the Thirtieth of June, 1848; An Act to Authorize a Loan not to Exceed the Sum of Sixteen Millions of Dollars; Chicago Daily Tribune (IL), 24 June 1858, 2:1; 26 June 1868, 2:3; Daily Illinois State Journal (Springfield), 25 June 1858, 2:1.
5James W. Sheahan was a strong ally of Stephen A. Douglas and was known to employ less
than scrupulous tactics to support Douglas’s bid for reelection to the U.S. Senate
during the election campaign of 1858 Delegates to the Illinois State Republican Convention had recently nominated Lincoln as the Republican challenger against Douglas for U.S.
Senate.
Despite publication of the facts surrounding Lincoln's voting record in the U.S. House
in the Illinois press as early as June 25, 1858—including by Democratic newspapers—Douglas
repeated the Daily Chicago Times’ s claims throughout the election campaign. In speeches he delivered during the campaign,
including during the Lincoln-Douglas Debates, Lincoln repeatedly refuted the charges and cited congressional records to back up
his voting record in the U.S. House.
Ultimately, in the local elections of 1858, Republicans won a majority of all votes
cast in Illinois, but pro-Douglas Democrats retained control of the Illinois General Assembly. At the time, members of the General Assembly voted for and elected the state’s
representatives in the U.S. Senate, and Douglas won reelection. Through the campaign,
however, and in particular through his participation in the Lincoln-Douglas Debates,
Lincoln gained recognition as well as standing within the national Republican Party.
Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life, 1:458, 467, 554-56; Report of Speech at Clinton, Illinois; Daily Illinois State Journal (Springfield, IL), 25 June 1858, 2:1; Daily Illinois State Register (Springfield, IL), 26 June 1858, 2:2; Allen C. Guelzo, “House Divided: Lincoln, Douglas,
and the Political Landscape of 1858,” The Journal of American History 94 (September 2007), 394, 414-16.
6Although no additional correspondence between Lincoln and Whitney regarding this matter
has been located after Lincoln’s June 24 letter to Whitney, they exchanged at least eight additional letters related to the election of 1858.
Henry C. Whitney to Abraham LincolnHenry C. Whitney to Abraham Lincoln; Henry C. Whitney to Abraham Lincoln and William H. Herndon; Henry C. Whitney to Abraham Lincoln; Abraham Lincoln to Henry C. Whitney; Henry C. Whitney to Abraham Lincoln; Henry C. Whitney to Abraham Lincoln; Henry C. Whitney to Abraham Lincoln.
7Reference to Lincoln’s “House Divided Speech,” which he delivered to at the Illinois
State Republican Convention when accepting the nomination for U.S. Senate.
Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life, 1:457-65; Daily Illinois State Journal (Springfield), 17 June 1858, 2:5, 6; Report of Speech at Springfield, Illinois; Report of Speech at Springfield, Illinois; Fragment of A House Divided: Speech at Springfield, Illinois; Report of Speech at Springfield, Illinois.
9The writer in the previous three paragraphs references the conflict within the Democratic
Party over the Lecompton Constitution. During the agitation over whether to admit the Kansas Territory as a free or slave state, pro-slavery Kansans held a constitutional convention in
Lecompton from September 7 to November 8, 1857, drafting a constitution guaranteeing slaveholders
already in the territory their property rights and leaving the decision whether to
allow new slaves into the territory to voters in a referendum. Voters could vote for
the “constitution with slavery” or the “constitution without slavery,” but were not
offered the opportunity to accept or reject the constitution as a whole. On December
21, 1857, Kansans voting in the referendum on the Lecompton Constitution—free state
Kansans abstained from participating—cast 6,226 votes for Lecompton with slavery and
569 for it without slavery amid charges of voter fraud. Despite opposition in Kansas
and considerable backlash from Republicans and the anti-slavery faction in the Democratic
Party, President James Buchanan supported the Lecompton Constitution, urging that Kansas be admitted into the Union
under its terms. Douglas, however, opposed it, bringing him into conflict with Buchanan.
Buchanan warned Douglas that he faced political reprisals if he opposed the administration,
but Douglas defied the president. The U.S. Senate approved the Lecompton Constitution,
but Republicans, Democratic allies of Douglas, and others, with Douglas as floor leader
of the opposition, defeated it in the U.S. House of Representatives. See Bleeding Kansas.
David M. Potter, The Impending Crisis: America Before the Civil War 1848-1861 (New York: Harper & Row, 1976), 307, 315-16, 318, 320, 325; Wendall H. Stephenson,
“Lecompton Constitution,” Dictionary of American History, rev. ed. (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1976), 4:130-31; Cong. Globe, 35th Cong., 1st Sess., Appendix, 195 (1858).
Autograph Letter Signed, 4 page(s), Abraham Lincoln Papers, Library of Congress (Washington, DC).