Playing Peoria is a phase often used, perhaps now in the past, about taking the temperature on a product or idea. I guess Peoria is (was) considered to be a microcosm of the nation's middle class. On this date, in 1854, playing Peoria meant something completely different than the colloquialism of today (or recent past). One hundred and sixty-one years ago Abraham Lincoln made a speech denouncing slavery and the Kansas-Nebraska Act which had been approved by congress about five months earlier. As one writer has noted, Lincoln was an "obscure lawyer and congressional hopeful." However, Lincoln actually won election to the Illinois House of Representatives on Nov. 7, 1854. Three days later he would declare his candidacy for the US Senate seat from Illinois. He would lose the senate election to Lyman Trumbell, but his Peoria speech would enunciate his principle of opposition to slavery. This speech would be the foundation for of later speeches, including some of those in the Lincoln Douglas debates of 1858.
Stephen Douglas introduced the Kansas-Nebraska Act in which he argued for popular sovereignty. That is, he wished to allow the settlers for each territory to decide for themselves whether or not to allow slavery. The act would overturn the Missouri Compromise which had previously set forth a latitude as the dividing line between free and slave-holding states. He also commented on a little recognized issue that much of the Northwest Territories were, at one time, under the control of a slave holding state, that being Virginia. However, he would note, at the time of creation the Northwest territories were legislated as being free. In this ground-breaking speech Lincoln would presage the the several years of violence that would follow the adoption of the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Lincoln said: "And in this aspect, it could not but produce agitation. Slavery is founded in the selfishness of man's nature---opposition to it, is [in?] his love of justice. These principles are an eternal antagonism; and when brought into collision so fiercely, as slavery extension brings them, shocks, and throes, and convulsions must ceaselessly follow." The violence resulting from the Kansas-Nebraska act was sufficiently gruesome and ugly for historians to tag the line from a newspaper to forever memorialize and etch this inhumanity--Bleeding Kansas. But yet, this speech did more than simply set forth Lincoln's opposition to slavery. It also set forth the basic principles upon which he would rely throughout his career. In this same Peoria speech Lincoln, going back to the Declaration of Independence, would say:
This quote is a longer version of what he had to say in what is now likely regarded as his most famous speech--"The Gettysburg Address." In that famous speech he said: "Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal." Lincoln would depend upon a document claiming that all men were created equal that was written by a Virginian who himself was a slave holder. Lincoln would alter, overtime, his views to a certain degree. For example, even though against slavery, at one time he supported the creation of a separate colony, or transport of the African-American population of the time to a resettlement area. It is often difficult for us in the twenty-first century to recognize the era in history of which events occurred and the different view of the world in play at that time.
What I do say is, that no man is good enough to govern another man, without that other's consent. I say this is the leading principle---the sheet anchor of American republicanism. Our Declaration of Independence says: "We hold these truths to be self evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, DERIVING THEIR JUST POWERS FROM THE CONSENT OF THE GOVERNED."
What we need to recognize is that events today, in our enlightened world, challenge the ideals of of the era in which we live. Just two days ago, for example, it was reported that a major sex-trafficking raid across the nation rescued 149 children. Interesting is that Wisconsin had the third highest number of children rescued, which was nine. As bad as that is, keep in mind that 57 adults in Wisconsin were rescued. Eleven traffickers were arrested. There is also the horror of what the Islamic State and other religious fundamentalists are doing through out the Mid-East. Maybe we should not be so smug in our views of prior generations.
As I complete this blog post, I think back two years and four months. It was on June 16, 2013 when I made my first "blog" post, recounting, on the 150th anniversary of Gettysburg the importance of a regiment from Minnesota played during that crucial battle. That post was actually accomplished as a Facebook status. My musings on Facebook turned into a regular event, so son suggested that using a blog format would be better than Facebook, so, in November 2013, I began the formal blog. The events of Peoria and Gettysburg were nine years and a bloody civil war apart. The blood of Bleeding Kansas would be mild compared to the blood of the Civil War. The Civil War would become one of the defining events of the nation. Yet, the events leading to war were formed well before, and would affect the nation long after. Lincoln's speech in Peoria is seemingly lost to history on an American public more interested in a tweet than our collective history. While this speech set forth and would form the foundation of Lincoln's views on slavery, it is well down the line in speeches recognized as important. We recognize the Gettysburg Address; we recognize his House Divided speech; Some may even recall his Cooper Union speech. Yet, in plain Peoria Lincoln would give the speech that was critical in setting forth his basic principles and would provide the basis for much of what he would say later in life. To this we owe a debt of gratitude, and a need to acknowledge the importance of Lincoln's playing in Peoria. While his Peoria speech is, comparatively, lost to history, what really matters is the ideals expressed on that fall day. It is to Lincoln's continued expression of those ideals, perhaps, to which the most gratitude is owed.
Images from Google Images
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