I dislike slavery, and you fully admit the abstract wrong of it. So far
there is no cause of difference. But you say that sooner than yield your
legal right to the slave, especially at the bidding of those who are not
themselves interested, you would see the Union dissolved. I am not aware
that any one is bidding you yield that right; very certainly I am not. I
leave that matter entirely to yourself. I also acknowledge your rights
and my obligations under the Constitution in regard to your slaves. I
confess I hate to see the poor creatures hunted down and caught and
carried back to their stripes and unrequited toil; but I bite my lips
and keep quiet. In 1841, you and I had together a tedious low-water trip
on a steamboat, from Louisville to St. Louis. You may remember, as I
well do, that from Louisville to the mouth of the Ohio, there were on
board ten or a dozen slaves shackled together with irons. That sight was
a continued torment to me, and I see something like it every time I
touch the Ohio or any other slave border. It is not fair for you to
assume that I have no interest in a thing which has, and continually
exercises, the power of making me miserable. You ought rather to
appreciate how much the great body of the Northern people do crucify
their feelings in order to maintain their loyalty to the Constitution
and the Union. I do oppose the extension of slavery, because my judgment
and feeling so prompt me, and I am under no obligations to the contrary.
If for this you and I must differ, differ we must. You say if you were
President, you would send an army and hang the leaders of the Missouri
outrages upon the Kansas elections; still, if Kansas fairly votes
herself a slave State she must be admitted, or the Union must be
dissolved. But how if she votes herself a slave State unfairly; that
is, by the very means for which you say you would hang men? Must she
still be admitted, or the Union dissolved? That will be the phase of the
question when it first becomes a practical one. In your assumption that
there may be a fair decision of the slavery question in Kansas, I