States Senator in 1855, after the election of 1854. They were pledged to
certain things here at home, and were determined to have pledges from me;
and if he will find any of these persons who will tell him anything
inconsistent with what I say now, I will resign, or rather retire from
the race, and give him no more trouble. The plain truth is this: At the
introduction of the Nebraska policy, we believed there was a new era
being introduced in the history of the Republic, which tended to the
spread and perpetuation of slavery. But in our opposition to that measure
we did not agree with one another in everything. The people in the north
end of the State were for stronger measures of opposition than we of the
central and southern portions of the State, but we were all opposed to
the Nebraska doctrine. We had that one feeling and that one sentiment in
common. You at the north end met in your conventions and passed your
resolutions. We in the middle of the State and farther south did not hold
such conventions and pass the same resolutions, although we had in
general a common view and a common sentiment. So that these meetings
which the Judge has alluded to, and the resolutions he has read from,
were local, and did not spread over the whole State. We at last met
together in 1886, from all parts of the State, and we agreed upon a
common platform. You, who held more extreme notions, either yielded those
notions, or, if not wholly yielding them, agreed to yield them
practically, for the sake of embodying the opposition to the measures
which the opposite party were pushing forward at that time. We met you
then, and if there was anything yielded, it was for practical purposes.
We agreed then upon a platform for the party throughout the entire State
of Illinois, and now we are all bound, as a party, to that platform.

And I say here to you, if any one expects of me--in case of my
election--that I will do anything not signified by our Republican
platform and my answers here to-day, I tell you very frankly that person