John M. Bush to Abraham Lincoln, 5 August 18581
Pekin Ills Augt 5/58Hon. A. Lincoln,Dr[Dear] Sir:I am this morning in recpt[receipt] of you'rs dated 2nd inst.2 and would say in reply, that we are "considering the conflicting interests" in this
County with much anxiety.
It is our earnest desire to send a Republican Representative, and to this end every effort will be made independent of the Sheriffalty
and other matters of a local character, each of which however will have an influence
in the coming election.3
You are aware that in /56 the course of the "Old line Whigs" (know-nothings) gave the Democracy the Representative.4
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In addition to managing that interest, which I think we will succeed in doing there
are strong local prejudices and feelings in various sections of the County on Rail
Road questions which we have to watch after.5
Mr Douglass friends will doubtless nominate Nathaniel Green of Delavan who was an ardent Know Nothing at the last Presidential Election.
We hope however with Maj[Major]. Cullom or some such man to spoil their calculations if possible.
We are to have a mass meeting at Tremont on Saturday 14th to elect delegates to the Congressional Convention in Peoria 19th and would like very
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much to have some speaking on the occasion. If you could be with us we would take
measures to have a large gathering.6There is no County that needs your presence more than this.
The wavering faction which defeated us last time could be brought into the lines better in that way, I
think, than any other.
There is talk of Douglass spending a day or two with us but I don't know the day.
Your personal strength is greater than his in Tazewell, but his friends are exceedingly busy, and will leave no stone unmoved.
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I assure you I shall leave nothing undone in my power— whether by visiting the County,
or otherwise that will help the Cause.
Please let us know when you can be with us. Wishing you success, I remain7
Yours TrulyJno M BushIn haste<Page 5>
[Envelope]
PEKIN Ills[ILLINOIS].
AUG[AUGUST] 5Hon. A. Lincoln,SpringfieldIlls
AUG[AUGUST] 5Hon. A. Lincoln,SpringfieldIlls
1John M. Bush wrote and signed this letter. He also wrote Abraham Lincoln’s name and
address on the envelope shown in the fifth image.
3Based upon several other letters that Lincoln and his correspondents exchanged around
this time, it appears that Lincoln wrote multiple letters on August 2 inquiring about
the race for the Illinois House of Representatives in Tazewell County, Illinois. At this time, Lincoln was running against Democratic incumbent Stephen A. Douglas as the Illinois Republican Party’s candidate for the U.S. Senate in the 1858 Federal Election. See the 1858 Illinois Republican Convention. Members of the Illinois General Assembly voted for and elected the state’s representatives in the U.S. Senate; therefore,
the races for the Illinois House of Representatives and Illinois Senate were highly relevant to the outcome of the state’s race for the U.S. Senate seat.
It is more likely, therefore, that in his August 2 letter to Bush, Lincoln asked about
Tazewell County Republicans’ efforts to send a Republican to the Illinois House of
Representatives rather than to the U.S. House of Representatives.
Several of Lincoln’s political allies had also written him in late-July and early-August
about the possibility of Tazewell County’s Republicans supporting a member of the
Know Nothing or American Party for sheriff in 1858 in the hopes that it would boost
support for a Republican candidate for the Illinois House of Representatives.
Abraham Lincoln to Lyman Porter; Thomas J. Pickett to Abraham Lincoln; John A. Jones to Abraham Lincoln; 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; David Davis to Abraham Lincoln; Albert Parker to Abraham Lincoln.
4Since the formation of the Know Nothing Party in Illinois in 1855, the Illinois Republican
Party had to contend with its influence in local politics. Some former Whigs drifted
into the Know Nothing Party—including in central Illinois. Centrally-located Tazewell
County was in the Thirty-Ninth Illinois House District. In the state elections of
1856, Tazewell County’s voters elected Democrat Daniel Trail to the Illinois House as the representative for the Thirty-Ninth Illinois House District.
Tazewell County was also part of the state’s Fourth Congressional District. During
the 1856 Federal Election, although the district’s voters sent Republican William Kellogg to the U.S. House of Representatives with 51.1 percent of the vote to Democrat James W. Davidson’s 45.7 percent, voters in Tazewell County awarded Davidson a healthy majority of
52.5 percent of the county’s vote to Kellogg’s 42 percent. Third party candidate A.
H. Griffith won 5.5 percent of the county’s vote—162 votes in total. If all of the
votes cast in Tazewell County for Griffith had been cast for Kellogg instead, Kellogg
would have won 1,407 votes total to Davidson’s 1,555 votes total. Thus, despite Bush’s
comments above, the votes that Tazewell County’s voters cast for Griffith would not
have granted Kellogg a victory over Davidson in the county.
Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life, 1:407-8; Daily Illinois State Journal (Springfield), 5 January 1857, 2:2; Howard W. Allen and Vincent A. Lacey, eds., Illinois Elections, 1818-1990 (Carbondale and Edwardsville: Southern Illinois University Press, 1992), 10, 140.
5In 1858, railroads in Illinois were suffering lingering financial effects from the
Panic of 1857, and the Illinois Central Railroad Company made an unpopular request to be released from a state tax requirement to pay seven
percent of its earnings as compensation for lands it had received from the state. Both Democrats and Republicans attempted to link the opposing party to the Illinois
Central Railroad during the election of 1858. In Tazewell County, discontent with
railroads was also related to a struggling effort to sell county bonds to fund two
railroads. Republicans did their best to win the votes of both former Whigs and members
of the Know Nothing Party by emphasizing national issues over local displeasure with
railroads.
Bruce Collins, “The Lincoln-Douglas Contest of 1858 and Illinois’ Electorate,” Journal of American Studies 20 (December 1986), 410-14.
6On July 20, Daniel A. Cheever had also written Lincoln asking him to speak in Tremont, Illinois, on August 14. Lincoln replied to Cheever on August 9, informing him that his schedule would not permit him to speak
in Tremont on that date. The Republicans of Tazewell County ultimately held their
convention in Tremont on August 30 instead. Lincoln attended and delivered an address.
Attendees nominated Richard N. Cullom as the party’s candidate for the Illinois House
of Representatives and Thomas C. Reeves for sheriff of Tazewell County.
Lincoln also attended the Republican Congressional Convention in Peoria, Illinois,
on August 19 and delivered a speech. During the convention, delegates unanimously
nominated Kellogg for reelection to the U.S. House of Representatives for Illinois’
Fourth Congressional District.
The Lincoln Log: A Daily Chronology of the Life of Abraham Lincoln, 30 August 1858, https://thelincolnlog.org/Results.aspx?type=CalendarDay&day=1858-08-30; Summary of Speech at Tremont, Illinois; Summary of Speech at Tremont, Illinois; Summary of Speech at the Congressional Convention of the Fourth District, Peoria,
Illinois; Summary of Speech at Peoria, Illinois; Daily Illinois State Journal (Springfield), 21 August 1858, 2:3; 4 November 1858, 3:2.
7If Lincoln replied to this letter, his response has not been located.
Central Illinois constituted the primary competition ground for both Lincoln and Douglas
given that the Republican Party dominated the state’s northern counties and the Democratic
Party dominated the southern counties. During the campaign of 1858, Douglas spoke
in Tazewell County twice: in Washington on September 30 and in Pekin on October 2. Lincoln spoke in Pekin on August 29, in
Tremont on August 30, and in Pekin again on October 5. Bush introduced Lincoln when
he spoke in Pekin on October 5.
In the local elections of 1858, Cullom received 1,783 votes, losing the Thirty-Ninth
Illinois House District’s seat in the Illinois House of Representatives to Democrat
Robert B. M. Wilson, who garnered 1,955 votes. Voters in Tazewell County elected Reeves sheriff.
In the federal election of 1858, Kellogg won reelection to the U.S. House of Representatives,
garnering 52.8 percent of the Fourth Congressional District’s votes compared to Democrat
Davidson’s 45.7 percent and anti-Lecompton Democrat Jacob Gale’s 1.5 percent. In Tazewell County, however, the patterns of the
federal election of 1856 repeated: Davidson received 52.2 percent of the county’s
votes, Kellogg received 47.5 percent, and Gale just 0.2 percent.
Although Republicans won a majority of all votes cast in Illinois in the local elections
of 1858, pro-Douglas Democrats retained control of the Illinois General Assembly,
and Douglas 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 as well as standing within the national Republican Party.
John Clayton, comp., The Illinois Fact Book and Historical Almanac 1673-1968
(Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1970), 222; Daily Illinois State Journal (Springfield), 4 November 1858, 3:2; The Weekly Chicago Times (IL), 11 November 1858, 2:5; History of Tazewell County Illinois (Chicago: Chas. C. Chapman, 1879), 713; Howard W. Allen and Vincent A. Lacey, eds.,
Illinois Elections, 1818-1990, 11, 142; Allen C. Guelzo, “Houses Divided: Lincoln, Douglas, and the Political
Landscape of 1858,” 404-8; The Lincoln Log: A Daily Chronology of the Life of Abraham Lincoln, 30 August 1858, https://thelincolnlog.org/Results.aspx?type=CalendarDay&day=1858-08-30, 5 October 1858, https://thelincolnlog.org/Results.aspx?type=CalendarDay&day=1858-10-05; Daily Illinois State Register (Springfield, IL), 4 September 1858, 2:3; Harry E. Pratt, The Great Debates (Springfield, IL: Illinois State Historical Library, 1955), 6-7; Summary of Speech at Tremont, Illinois; Summary of Speech at Tremont, Illinois; Summary of Speech at Pekin, Illinois; Summary of Speech at Pekin, Illinois; Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life, 1:556-57.
Autograph Letter Signed, 5 page(s), Abraham Lincoln Papers, Library of Congress (Washington, DC).