FRAGMENT OF SPEECH AT EDWARDSVILLE, ILL.,

Sept. 13, 1858.

I have been requested to give a concise statement of the difference, as I understand it, between the Democratic and Republican parties, on the leading issues of the campaign.  This question has been put to me by a gentleman whom I do not know.  I do not even know whether he is a friend of mine or a supporter of Judge Douglas in this contest, nor does that make any difference.  His question is a proper one.  Lest I should forget it, I will give you my answer before proceeding with the line of argument I have marked out for this discussion.

The difference between the Republican and the Democratic parties on the leading issues of this contest, as I understand it, is that the former consider slavery a moral, social and political wrong, while the latter do not consider it either a moral, a social or a political wrong; and the action of each, as respects the growth of the country and the expansion of our population, is squared to meet these views.  I will not affirm that the Democratic party consider slavery morally, socially and politically right, though their tendency to that view has, in my opinion, been constant and unmistakable for the past five years.  I prefer to take, as the accepted maxim of the party, the idea put forth by Judge Douglas, that he “don’t care whether slavery is voted down or voted up.”  I am quite willing to believe that many Democrats would prefer that slavery should be always voted down, and I know that some prefer that it be always voted up; but I have a right to insist that their action, especially if it be their constant action, shall determine their ideas and preferences on this subject.  Every measure of the Democratic party of late years, bearing directly or indirectly on the slavery question, has corresponded with this notion of utter indifference whether slavery or freedom shall outrun in the race of empire across to the Pacific—­every measure, I say, up to the Dred Scott decision, where, it seems to me, the idea is boldly suggested that slavery is better than freedom.  The Republican party, on the contrary, hold that this government was instituted to secure the blessings of freedom, and that slavery is an unqualified evil to the negro, to the white man, to the soil, and to the State.  Regarding it as an evil, they will not molest it in the States where it exists, they will not overlook the constitutional guards which our fathers placed around it; they will do nothing that can give proper offence to those who hold slaves by legal sanction; but they will use every constitutional method to prevent the evil from becoming larger and involving more negroes, more white men, more soil, and more States in its deplorable consequences.  They will, if possible, place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is in course of ultimate peaceable extinction in God’s own good time.