him that few facts are reported.25 Douglas also spoke in Cincinnati on the 13th of September. At the first announcement of Douglas' appointments to speak in Columbus and Cincinnati, the Republicans instinctively turned to Lincoln. The State Central Committee and also that of Hamilton County, invited him to Ohio to reply to Douglas, and to the chairman of the latter he wrote: PETER ZINN, Esq., SPRINGFIELD, ILL., Sept. 6, 1859. DEAR SIR: Yours of the 2nd in relation to my appearing at Cincinnati in behalf of the Opposition is received. I already had a similar letter from Mr. W. T. Bascom, Secretary of the Republican State Central Committee at Columbus, which I answer today. You are in correspondence with him and will learn all from him. I shall try to speak at Columbus and Cincinnati; but cannot do more. Yours truly, A. LINCOLN. On Friday, September 16, he spoke twice in Columbus, in the afternoon at two o'clock on the east terrace of the State House, and in the evening before the Young Men's Republican Club at the City Hall. During the day he also visited the county fair. The principal speech was that of the afternoon; Lincoln was introduced by George M. Parsons, chairman of the Republican County Committee, and his speech as written and revised by him is as follows:26 Fellow Citizens of the State of Ohio: I cannot fail to remember that I appear for the first time before an audience in this now great State, an audience that is accustomed to hear such speakers as Corwin, and Chase, and Wade, and many other renowned men; and, remembering this, I feel that it will be well The speech of Douglas at Columbus was telegraphed in full to the New York Times; this was regarded at the time as a remarkable piece of newspaper enterprise. 28 Lincoln-Douglas Debates. Columbus, O., 1860. Pp. 240-154, Yours of the draw in pilation to my at Reincernate in behalf of afpering is ресельной I had Offosition already day - You سو того LETTER TO PETER ZINN. Original in possession of Ohio State Archæological and Historical Society. It was The Neil House, represented in the above cut, was erected in 1837. burned down November 6, 1850. the day Lincoln was elected President, and soon thereafter rebuilt as it stands today. The present buildin, is shown on page 253 as it appeared on the occasion of the Lincoln obsequies. This famous hostelry has entertained distinguished men and womer in every walk of life. Fifteen Presidents have written their names in the Neil register: Andrew Jackson, William Henry Harrison. Lincoln, Johnson, Grant, Hayes, Garfield, Arthur, Cleveland. Benjamin Harrison, McKinley, Taft, Roosevelt, Wilson.. Hardin Ohio congressmen and senators have registered at the Neil. It has numbered in its list of distinguished guests Charles Dickens Henry Clay, William Dean Howells, Jenny Lind, Louis Kossuth, Admiral Farragut, Tom Corwin, Phil Sheridan, Horace Greeley, Stephen A. Donglas, Adelina Patti, W. J. Bryan, James G. Blaine, Orville Wright and more than a score of others equally eminent. for you, as for me, that you should not raise your expectations to that standard to which you would have been justified in raising them had one of these distinguished men appeared before you. You would perhaps be only preparing a disappointment for yourselves, and, as a consequence of your disappointment, mortification to me. I hope, therefore, that you will commence with very moderate expectations; and perhaps, if you will give me your attention, I shall be able to interest you to a moderate degree. Appearing here for the first time in my life, I have been somewhat embarrassed for a topic by way of introduction to my speech; but I have been relieved from that embarrassment by an introduction which the Ohio Statesman newspaper gave me this morning. In this paper I have read an article, in which, among other statements, I find the following: In debating with Senator Douglas during the memorable contest of last fall, Mr. Lincoln declared in favor of negro suffrage, and attempted to defend that vile conception against the Little Giant. I mention this now, at the opening of my remarks, for the purpose of making three comments upon it. The first I have already announced, it furnishes me an introductory topic; the second is to show that the gentleman is mistaken; thirdly, to give him an opportunity to correct it. -- In the first place, in regard to this matter being a mistake. I have found that it is not entirely safe, when one is misrepresented under his very nose, to allow the misrepresentation to go uncontradicted. I therefore propose, here at the outset, not only to say this is a misrepresentation, but to show conclusively that it is so; and you will bear with me while I read a couple of extracts from that very "memorable" debate with Judge Douglas last year, to which this newspaper refers. In the first pitched battle which Senator Douglas and myself had, at the town of Ottawa, I used the language which I will now read. Having been previously reading an extract, I continued as follows: Now, gentlemen, I don't want to read at any greater length, but this is the true complexion of all I have ever said in regard to the institution of slavery and the black race. This is the whole of it, and anything that argues me into his idea of perfect social and political equality with the negro, is but a specious and fantastic arrangement of words, by which a man can prove a horse-chestnut to be a chestnut horse. I will say here, while upon this subject, that I have no purpose directly or indirectly to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so. I have no purpose to introduce political and social equality between the white and black races. There is a physical difference between the two which, in my judgment, will probably forbid their ever living together upon the footing of perfectly equality; and inasmuch as it becomes a necessity that there must be a difference, I, as well as Judge Douglas, am in favor of the race to which I belong having the superior position. I have never said anything to the contrary, but I hold that, notwithstanding all this, there is no reason in the world why the negro is not entitled to all the natural rights enumerated in the Declaration of Independence, -the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. I hold that he is as much entitled to these as the white man. I agree with Judge Douglas, he is not my equal in many respects certainly not in color, perhaps not in moral or intellectual endowments. But in the right to eat the bread, without leave of anybody else, which his own hand earns, he is my equal, and the equal of Judge Douglas, and the equal of every living man.” Upon a subsequent occasion, when the reason for making a statement like this recurred, I said: While I was at the hotel today an elderly gentleman called upon me to know whether I was really in favor of producing perfect equality between the negroes and white people. While I had not proposed to myself on this occasion to say much on that subject, yet, as the question was asked me I thought I would occupy perhaps five minutes in saying something in regard to it. I will say, then, that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in anyway the social and political equality of the white and black races that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, or intermarry with the white people; and I will say in addition to this that 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 other man, am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race. I say upon this occasion I do not perceive that because the white man is to have the superior position, the negro should be denied everything. I do not understand that because I do not want a negro woman for a slave, I must necessarily want her for my wife. My understanding is that I can just let her alone. I am now in my fiftieth year, and I certainly never had a black woman for either a slave or a wife. So it seems to me quite possible for us to get along without making either slaves or wives of negroes. I will add to this that I have never seen, to my knowledge, a man, woman or child, who was in favor of producing perfect equality, social and political, between negroes and white men. I recollect of but one distinguished instance that I ever heard of so frequently as to be satisfied of its correctness and that is the case of Judge Douglas's old friend, Col. Richard M. Johnson. I will also add to the remarks I have made (for I am not going to enter at large upon this subject), that I have never had the least apprehension that I or my friends would marry negroes, if there was no law to keep them from it; but as Judge Douglas and his friends seem to be in great apprehension that they might, if there was no law to keep them from it, I give him the most solemn pledge that I will to the very last stand by the law of the State, which forbids the marrying of white people with negroes. There, my friends, you have briefly what I have, upon former occasions, said upon the subject to which this newspaper, to the extent of its ability, has drawn the public attention. In it you not only perceive as a probability, that in that contest I |