August 31, 1858
> “He [Lincoln] said the question is often asked, why this fuss about ni***rs? It is dictated that their position is a small matter, but let us inquire whether it is or not. His speech at the June convention had been much commented upon, and he read an extract from it, and showed wherein it had been misrepresented as to the ultimate triumph or extinction of slavery; that, although the agitation of the question was commenced in '54 with the avowed object of putting a stop to it, yet, the agitation was still increasing. The policy then adopted professed to leave the subject to the people of the territories and save politicians further trouble. Buchanan and Douglas have often promised us that this agitation would cease, but it is still going on, and only last winter was the hottest of any time yet.”
Is this the part of the opening of his speech that you are asking me about? Or was it some other part? I believe I can see an inherent problem with the part I quoted. Can you see it?
[Handandy #430] Speech at Carlinville, Illinois [1] August 31, 1858 “He [Lincoln] said the question is often asked, why this fuss about ni***rs?” ....
Please advise what is the cause of your confusion. How many speeches of Lincoln at Carlinville, Illinois on August 31, 1858 in The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, Volume 3, on page 77 did you find?
There is the remarkably similar content from a Lincoln speech at Clinton, Illinois but that is not at page 77 and is given in a different city on a different date.
The same may be said for the remarkably similar content in the Lincoln speech at Elwood, Kansas, but that was more than a year later, in a different city, and also not on Volume 3, page 77.
I cannot see a problem with Lincoln’s speech in your post. However, you do seem to have hidden something Lincoln said by using asterisks. Perhaps you quoted Wikipedia rather than the Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln.
Of course, the fifth Lincoln-Douglas debate was entirely different, on a different date, in Galesburg, Illinois, at Volume 3, page 77, page 235. There, Lincoln denigrated the Mexican race.
However, before he denigrated the Mexican race on page 235, on page 231 Lincoln observed,
Nothing in the Constitution or laws of any State can destroy a right distinctly and expressly affirmed in the Constitution of the United States.The right of property in a slave is distinctly and expressly affirmed in the Constitution of the United States.
Therefore, nothing in Constitution or laws of any State can destroy the right off property in a slave.