Lincoln On The Declaration Of Independence: 'Let Me Entreat You To Come Back'

Compliments of the University of Michigan Library Collected Works of Lincoln project.

In 1858, the United States were coming unraveled over the question of slavery, among several vexing issues.  The radical abolitionists, such as Harriet Beecher Stowe and William Lloyd Garrison were unbending in their calls for immediate abolition, irrespective of consequences. Garrison himself, at times,  had called for dissolution of the Union over the question. Those on the other side of the question were just as unbending. Lincoln stood in the middle, for both the preservation of the Union and the abolition of slavery. It was a lonely stance at the time, as blood was already being spilled in the western territories. Lincoln pointed out that the founders attempted to address the long-term quandry by banning the slave-trade after 1808 in the Constitution. Obviously, this did not work, but he maintained that the effort was a noble intent, and warned against vilifying the Founders because their solution was imperfect. He appealed to the Declaration of Independence as the core set of ideas by which America should be defined, and by which all decisions should be judged.

This is an account of Lincoln's remarks, as transcribed by a stenographer:

[begin excerpt]

(Chicago Press and Tribune, August 21, 1858. The fragmentary text of this speech as given in the Press and Tribune was widely copied in other papers. Although there are reports in other papers originating from other correspondents, only this one gives a verbatim transcription of any considerable portion of the speech.)

These communities, by their representatives in old Independence Hall, said to the whole world of men: ``We hold these truths to be self evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.''

This was their majestic interpretation of the economy of the Universe. This was their lofty, and wise, and noble understanding of the justice of the Creator to His creatures. [Applause.]

Yes, gentlemen, to all His creatures, to the whole great family of man. In their enlightened belief, nothing stamped with the Divine image and likeness was sent into the world to be trodden on, and degraded, and imbruted by its fellows. They grasped not only the whole race of man then living, but they reached forward and seized upon the farthest posterity. They erected a beacon to guide their children and their children's children, and the countless myriads who should inhabit the earth in other ages.

Wise statesmen as they were, they knew the tendency of prosperity to breed tyrants, and so they established these great self-evident truths, that when in the distant future some man, some faction, some interest, should set up the doctrine that none but rich men, or none but white men, were entitled to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, their posterity might look up again to the Declaration of Independence and take courage to renew the battle which their fathers began---so that truth, and justice, and mercy, and all the humane and Christian virtues might not be extinguished from the land; so that no man would hereafter dare to limit and circumscribe the great principles on which the temple of liberty was being built. [Loud cheers.]

Now, my countrymen (Mr. Lincoln continued with great earnestness,) if you have been taught doctrines conflicting with the great landmarks of the Declaration of Independence; if you have listened to suggestions which would take away from its grandeur, and mutilate the fair symmetry of its proportions; if you have been inclined to believe that all men are not created equal in those inalienable rights enumerated by our chart of liberty, let me entreat you to come back. Return to the fountain whose waters spring close by the blood of the Revolution.

Think nothing of me---take no thought for the political fate of any man whomsoever---but come back to the truths that are in the Declaration of Independence.

You may do anything with me you choose, if you will but heed these sacred principles. You may not only defeat me for the Senate, but you may take me and put me to death. While pretending no indifference to earthly honors, I do claim to be actuated in this contest by something higher than an anxiety for office. I charge you to drop every paltry and insignificant thought for any man's success. It is nothing; I am nothing; Judge Douglas is nothing. But do not destroy that immortal emblem of Humanity---the Declaration of American Independence.