Lincoln-Douglas Debates

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Abraham Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas

The Lincoln-Douglas Debates are a series of public speeches between Abraham Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas in the campaign for the US Senate elections in Illinois in 1858 .

Lincoln was the candidate of the Republican Party , which had only been founded four years earlier , Douglas ran again for the Democratic Party . He had already won his Senate seat in the 1846 elections. The election campaign lasted from July to November 1858, both candidates covered several thousand kilometers within Illinois. Each made about sixty speeches and dozen of shorter, ad hoc speeches. The election campaign is seen as evidence of the extraordinary level of participatory democracy that the American Midwest exhibited in the decade before the civil war .

The starting point of the election campaign was Lincoln's House Divided speech , which he delivered on June 16, 1858 at the Old State Capitol in Springfield, Illinois . In it he asserted, based on Mk 3,25  Luth , that a divided house could not exist: there could only be either a restriction of slavery to the states and territories in which it was already permitted, or an expansion to the entire USA. He suspected his opponent, Douglas, of conspiring with former President Franklin Pierce , Supreme Court Justice Roger Taney, and President James Buchanan to introduce them across the United States. Douglas now quoted this speech in his campaign appearances in order to bring Lincoln closer to the radical abolitionists . He first traveled after Douglas to correct that in front of the same audience.

The climax were the seven public debates in which the two candidates met. The speech duels of the men, also outwardly radically different (Lincoln measured more than 1.90 m, Douglas was called the "little giant" because of his 163 cm height) were very popular with the citizens of the USA and were accompanied nationally by well-known newspapers. The speech duels did not deal with issues from the state of Illinois itself, but rather slavery in the United States . Douglas accused Lincoln of wanting to create full equality between whites and blacks, while Lincoln protested in part with racist remarks:

“There is a physical difference between the white and black races that, in my opinion, will make it impossible for the two races to live together in social and political equality. And insofar as they cannot live like that while they stay together, there must be a higher and a lower position, and I, like every man who belongs to it, advocate assigning the superior position to the white race . "

He also repeated his conspiracy theory that Douglas was secretly planning to expand slavery to the entire United States. Although Lincoln received widespread popularity and reputation, the Democrats won the Illinois mid-term election and Douglas was confirmed as Senator. Still, Lincoln benefited from the Lincoln-Douglas debates. National coverage of the duels made him known throughout the nation and made him appear as an honest, eloquent politician ( Honest Abe ).

The Lincoln-Douglas debates are widely recognized as the start of public speaking debates in the United States .

The election campaign ended in Lincoln's defeat. On December 5, 1859, Douglas was re-elected to the Senate in a joint session of the Illinois Senate and House of Representatives, as the Senators were not directly elected before the 17th Amendment was passed. The Democrats had a majority in both houses, although the Republicans received more votes overall in the November 2, 1858 election. In the long term, however, the debates were a success for Lincoln, because the national prominence they brought to the then little-known Illinois attorney gave him the opportunity to be elected President of the United States two years later .

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Richard Carwardine: Lincoln. A Life of Purpose and Power. Vintage Books, New York 2006, p. 75.
  2. ↑ “There is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any of her man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race. " Quoted from Richard Carwardine: Lincoln. A Life of Purpose and Power. Vintage Books, New York 2006, p. 79.
  3. ↑ Michael Butter : Plots, Designs, and Schemes. American Conspiracy Theories from the Puritans to the Present. Walter de Gruyter, Berlin / Boston 2014, ISBN 978-3-11-034693-0 , p. 197 (accessed via De Gruyter Online).
  4. ↑ Our Campaigns, IL US Senate , February 8, 2006, accessed November 18, 2019
  5. ↑ David Zarefsky: Lincoln and the House Divided: Launching a National Political Career . In: Rhetoric and Public Affairs 13, Issue 3: Special Issue on Lincoln's Rhetorical Worlds (2010), p. 446 ff.

literature

  • Paul M. Angle, Abraham Lincoln, Stephen A. Douglas: The Complete Lincoln-Douglas Debates of 1858 ISBN 0-226-02084-3 (Engl.)
  • Allen C. Guelzo: Lincoln and Douglas: The Debates that Defined America . Publisher: Simon & Schuster; New edition: Reprint (January 13, 2009) ISBN 978-0-7432-7321-3

Web links

Commons : Lincoln-Douglas Debates  - Collection of Images, Videos and Audio Files