Confederate Effort Was Not About Slavery

You also won't see DiLorenzo posting Lincoln's brave statement to the Illinois House in 1837, when he and one other member objected to the Illinois House's statement of opposition to abolitionism. The editors of the Collected Lincoln say that it was, they think, the first state legislative statement against slavery on record. It was several months after the murder of Lovejoy, and the author of "Lincoln's Virtue" points out that it was issued in the teeth of intense anti-abolitionist sentiment in Illinois.

This is a remarkable fact. Lincoln and his fellow single legislator were the ONLY two Illinois state representatives to stand against the justice of slavery in the Illinois House in 1837. As Miller, author of "Lincoln's Virtue" points out, there was NO political incentive to do this for a young, ambitious Whig, in a Democratic, anti-abolitionist state, to do something like this. It's a remarkable document. Here's the text:

March 3, 1837

The following protest was presented to the House, which was read and ordered to be spread on the journals, to wit:

``Resolutions upon the subject of domestic slavery having passed both branches of the General Assembly at its present session, the undersigned hereby protest against the passage of the same.

They believe that the institution of slavery is founded on both injustice and bad policy; but that the promulgation of abolition doctrines tends rather to increase than to abate its evils.

They believe that the Congress of the United States has no power, under the constitution, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the different States.

They believe that the Congress of the United States has the power, under the constitution, to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia; but that that power ought not to be exercised unless at the request of the people of said District.

The difference between these opinions and those contained in the said resolutions, is their reason for entering this protest.''

DAN STONE,

A. LINCOLN,

Representatives from the county of Sangamon.

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