interfere with the question of slavery at all. I have said that always;
Judge Douglas has heard me say it, if not quite a hundred times, at least
as good as a hundred times; and when it is said that I am in favor of
interfering with slavery where it exists, I know it is unwarranted by
anything I have ever intended, and, as I believe, by anything I have ever
said. If, by any means, I have ever used language which could fairly be
so construed (as, however, I believe I never have), I now correct it.

So much, then, for the inference that Judge Douglas draws, that I am in
favor of setting the sections at war with one another. I know that I
never meant any such thing, and I believe that no fair mind can infer any
such thing from anything I have ever said.

Now, in relation to his inference that I am in favor of a general
consolidation of all the local institutions of the various States. I will
attend to that for a little while, and try to inquire, if I can, how on
earth it could be that any man could draw such an inference from anything
I said. I have said, very many times, in Judge Douglas's hearing, that no
man believed more than I in the principle of self-government; that it
lies at the bottom of all my ideas of just government, from beginning to
end. I have denied that his use of that term applies properly. But for
the thing itself, I deny that any man has ever gone ahead of me in his
devotion to the principle, whatever he may have done in efficiency in
advocating it. I think that I have said it in your hearing, that I
believe each individual is naturally entitled to do as he pleases with
himself and the fruit of his labor, so far as it in no wise interferes
with any other man's rights; that each community as a State has a right
to do exactly as it pleases with all the concerns within that State that
interfere with the right of no other State; and that the General
Government, upon principle, has no right to interfere with anything other