“Can the people of a United States Territory in any lawful way, against the wish of any citizen of the United States, exclude slavery from its limits prior to the formation of a State constitution?”

Mr. Lincoln had long and carefully studied the import and effect of this interrogatory, and nearly a month before, in a private letter, accurately foreshadowed Douglas’s course upon it: 

“You shall have hard work,” he wrote, “to get him directly to the point whether a territorial legislature has or has not the power to exclude slavery.  But if you succeed in bringing him to it—­though he will be compelled to say it possesses no such power—­he will instantly take ground that slavery cannot actually exist in the Territories unless the people desire it and so give it protection by territorial legislation.  If this offends the South, he will let it offend them, as at all events he means to hold on to his chances in Illinois.”

On the night before the Freeport debate the question had also been considered in a hurried caucus of Lincoln’s party friends.  They all advised against propounding it, saying, “If you do, you can never be senator.”  “Gentlemen,” replied Lincoln, “I am killing larger game; if Douglas answers, he can never be President, and the battle of 1860 is worth a hundred of this.”

As Lincoln had predicted, Douglas had no resource but to repeat the sophism he had hastily invented in his Springfield speech of the previous year.

“It matters not,” replied he, “what way the Supreme Court may hereafter decide as to the abstract question whether slavery may or may not go into a Territory under the Constitution, the people have the lawful means to introduce it or exclude it, as they please, for the reason that slavery cannot exist a day or an hour anywhere unless it is supported by local police regulations.  Those police regulations can only be established by the local legislature, and if the people are opposed to slavery they will elect representatives to that body who will by unfriendly legislation effectually prevent the introduction of it into their midst.  If, on the contrary, they are for it, their legislation will favor its extension.  Hence, no matter what the decision of the Supreme Court may be on that abstract question, still the right of the people to make a slave Territory or a free Territory is perfect and complete under the Nebraska Bill.”

In the course of the next joint debate at Jonesboro’, Mr. Lincoln easily disposed of this sophism by showing:  1.  That, practically, slavery had worked its way into Territories without “police regulations” in almost every instance; 2.  That United States courts were established to protect and enforce rights under the Constitution; 3.  That members of a territorial legislature could not violate their oath to support the Constitution of the United States; and, 4.  That in default of legislative support, Congress would be bound to supply it for any right under the Constitution.