concert, yet it looks very much as if the thing was
agreed upon and done with a mutual understanding after
the conference; and while we do not know that it was
absolutely so, yet it looks so probable that we have
a right to call upon the man who knows the true reason
why it was done to tell what the true reason was.
When he will not tell what the true reason was, he
stands in the attitude of an accused thief who has
stolen goods in his possession, and when called to
account refuses to tell where he got them. Not
only is this the evidence, but when he comes in with
the bill having the provision stricken out, he tells
us in a speech, not then but since, that these alterations
and modifications in the bill had been made by him,
in consultation with Toombs, the originator of the
bill. He tells us the same to-day. He says
there were certain modifications made in the bill in
committee that he did not vote for. I ask you
to remember, while certain amendments were made which
he disapproved of, but which a majority of the committee
voted in, he has himself told us that in this particular
the alterations and modifications were made by him,
upon consultation with Toombs. We have his own
word that these alterations were made by him, and not
by the committee. Now, I ask, what is the reason
Judge Douglas is so chary about coming to the exact
question? What is the reason he will not tell
you anything about How it was made, by whom
it was made, or that he remembers it being made at
all? Why does he stand playing upon the meaning
of words and quibbling around the edges of the evidence?
If he can explain all this, but leaves it unexplained,
I have the right to infer that Judge Douglas understood
it was the purpose of his party, in engineering that
bill through, to make a constitution, and have Kansas
come into the Union with that constitution, without
its being submitted to a vote of the people.
If he will explain his action on this question, by
giving a better reason for the facts that happened
than he has done, it will be satisfactory. But
until he does that—until he gives a better
or more plausible reason than he has offered against
the evidence in the case—I suggest to him
it will not avail him at all that he swells himself
up, takes on dignity, and calls people liars.
Why, sir, there is not a word in Trumbull’s
speech that depends on Trumbull’s veracity at
all. He has only arrayed the evidence and told
you what follows as a matter of reasoning. There
is not a statement in the whole speech that depends
on Trumbull’s word. If you have ever studied
geometry, you remember that by a course of reasoning
Euclid proves that all the angles in a triangle are
equal to two right angles. Euclid has shown you
how to work it out. Now, if you undertake to
disprove that proposition, and to show that it is
erroneous, would you prove it to be false by calling
Euclid a liar? They tell me that my time is out,
and therefore I close.