Henry C. Whitney to Abraham Lincoln, 8 December, 18581
Chicago 8th. Decr 1858.Hon A LincolnDear SirI arrived from Champaign only on last evening & found your letter of 30th. Nov[November]. I called on Dr Ray today= he did not receive your letter so he says= they have no papers except their file & can't spare that:=Bissell sent for some the other day & could not be accommodated:= I had preserved the debate
for myself but gladly present it to you & if it is possible I will get you another
sett:= one of the papers I had lost but White had an extra one which he gave me:= please find the full sett herewith & accept the same with my best regards:= the Express charges are paid:=2 I recd[received] a letter from Mr Crittenden concerning the "Dickey" letter:= it is very illogical & unsatisfactory to me=3 I will shew it to you when I see you which will be from 25 Dec.[December] to Jany[January] 2d4 ^Will you be at home then?=^5
Yr[Your] Friend as everH. C. Whitney<Page 2>
Honl[Honorable] A LincolnSpringfieldIllinois1 Henry C. Whitney wrote and signed this letter. He also wrote Abraham Lincoln’s name
and address on the envelope.
2The enclosed papers were not located with this letter.
Abraham Lincoln had been the Republican candidate from Illinois for U.S. Senate in 1858. In the summer and fall of that year, Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas, his Democratic opponent and the incumbent , canvassed the state delivering speeches in support of candidates for the Illinois General Assembly in their respective parties. Members of the General Assembly voted for and elected
the state’s representatives in the U.S. Senate at this time , so the races for the
Illinois House of Representatives and Illinois Senate held on November 2, 1858 were highly relevant to the outcome of the U.S. Senate race.
Lincoln and Douglas also debated one another in seven locations throughout the state.
Republicans won a majority of all votes cast in the state elections, but pro-Douglas
Democrats retained control of the Illinois General Assembly and Douglas ultimately
won reelection to the U.S. Senate. Douglas's victory was confirmed in the election
held on January 5, 1859. 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.
See 1858 Federal Election; 1858 Illinois Republican Convention.
Following the campaign, Lincoln wrote Whitney, Charles H. Ray, William H. Carlin, and Sidney Breese asking for copies of the debates and other political speeches to put into a scrapbook of the campaign. The scrapbook Lincoln compiled of the Lincoln-Douglas Debates later
served as the source for the first publication of the debates in 1860.
Daily Illinois State Journal (Springfield), 3 November 1858, 2:1; Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008), 1:458-60, 492-540, 556-57;
Allen C. Guelzo, “Houses Divided: Lincoln, Douglas, and the Political Landscape of
1858,” The Journal of American History 94 (September 2007), 392-94, 414-16; George Fort Milton, "Lincoln-Douglas Debates,"
Dictionary of American History, rev. ed. (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1976), 4:155-56; Illinois Senate Journal. 1859. 21st G. A., 30; Illinois House Journal. 1859. 21st G. A., 32; Lincoln-Douglas Debates Scrapbook; Abraham Lincoln to Charles H. Ray; William H. Carlin to Abraham Lincoln; Sidney Breese to Abraham Lincoln; Political Debates Between Hon. Abraham Lincoln and Hon. Stephen A. Douglas (Columbus: Follett, Foster, 1860), iii-iv.
3On July 19, 1858, T. Lyle Dickey, a former Whig and Lincoln supporter who had defected to the Democrats and Douglas, wrote John J.
Crittenden, an eminent former Whig widely regarded as the natural successor to Henry Clay, requesting that he confirm a conversation with Dickey in April 1858 where Crittenden
praised Douglas. On August 1, Crittenden wrote Dickey confirming the conversation
and his praise for Douglas's service to Illinois and his principled opposition to
the Lecompton Constitution. Not wishing to be appear "to be an officious intermeddler" in the election, Crittenden
requested that Dickey, should he speak of the conversation or letter, "acquit me of
any intermeddling, or of the presumption of seeking to obtrude myself or my sentiments
upon the attention of the people of Illinois." Dickey kept the letter private until
October 19, when he read it aloud in a speech denouncing Lincoln for abandoning Clay
and Whiggery. Crittenden's letter to Dickey hurt Lincoln in the old Whig stronghold
of Central Illinois, contributing to Lincoln's loss to Douglas. Lincoln himself blamed
Crittenden in a letter dated November 4, 1858.
Whitney became aware of Crittenden’s letter to Dickey on October 24. Alarmed at the
damage it could do to Lincoln’s campaign, Whitney left court in Champaign and took the night train to Chicago, where he conferred with Ray and Norman B. Judd on a course of action. They sent an envoy to Kentucky to confer with Crittenden, but the envoy could not find Crittenden in time to counteract
the damage done. Before leaving Champaign, Whitney wrote Crittenden; Crittenden responded
on November 9--the letter referenced by Whitney here as “very illogical and unsatisfactory.”
Allen C. Guelzo, Lincoln and Douglass: The Debates that Defined America (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2008), 273-76; Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life, 1:456-57, 542-43, 547-48; Henry C. Whitney, Life on the Circuit with Lincoln (Boston: Estes and Lauriat, 1892), 383-85.
4Abraham Lincoln responded to Whitney on December 25, 1858, confirming that he had received the copies he had
requested.
5Abraham Lincoln was in Springfield in December of 1858 before leaving for Bloomington on December 30. However it is unknown if he met with Whitney during this time.
The Lincoln Log: A Daily Chronology of the Life of Abraham Lincoln, December 1858, https://thelincolnlog.org/Results.aspx?type=CalendarMonth&year=1858&month=12.
Autograph Letter Signed, 2 page(s), Abraham Lincoln Papers, Library of Congress (Washington, DC).