today we're looking at the lincoln douglas debates
hello welcome to the daily bellringer please don't forget to subscribe and take a look at
the questions down in the description um also i'd love to see your answer to question number
five in the comments so today's a special episode of the daily bell ringer because as you can see
we are on location at an actual site of the lincoln douglas debates uh this is where the
fifth debate took place in galesburg illinois between abraham lincoln and stephen douglas
here on the campus of knox college this debate took place on october 7th of 1858 where a crowd
of nearly 20 000 gathered here to see lincoln and douglas debate so what were the lincoln douglas
debates um this was a debate that took place as part of a senate congressional race where abraham
lincoln who was the republican was challenging arguably the most powerful man in congress
democrat stephen douglas for his senate seat all right and the two agreed to engage in a series of
debates prior to the election so to this day still the custom of candidates uh meeting and debating
issues before uh an election kind of traces its roots back to lincoln and douglas so unlike
today though when you see candidates debate and they only get like maybe five or six minutes to
talk to each other or give their stance on issues in these debates actually lincoln and douglas had
over an hour to each speak and basically uh to you know discuss issues uh or state their ideas
now up until 1913 actually the state legislature of illinois decided who was going to be the next
senator but lincoln douglas decided despite that that they were going to go and take their
message out to the people so a couple reasons why this was such an important debate of course the
primary issue being debated was the issue of slavery and of course stephen douglas was the main
congressman responsible for that kansas nebraska act and so a lot of people wanted to hear what he
had to say about the issue also his position as being the lead senator in the senate and possibly
the next president of the united states led to a lot of national attention for these debates
lincoln on the other hand was completely unknown nobody knew who this guy was he was a member of
this new republican party he was this lawyer from springfield that really nobody knew anything about
but really you know the his main gist of his best message was he needed to stop the spread
of slavery so there were a total of seven debates across the state of illinois one in each of the
seven congressional districts so there was one in ottawa freeport jonesborough charleston galesburg
quincy and the last one in alton uh illinois on october 15th of uh 1858 so these debates drew huge
crowds and it wasn't a debate like we see today where you know there's a moderator and the crowds
are kind of subdued and everything the crowds here it was almost like a carnival or a professional
sporting event where they were cheering and booing for the candidates that spoke so what did they say
lincoln his main thing was he he argued against the spread of slavery and i want to make it clear
he did not argue to end slavery he argued against the spread of slavery and not allowing it to go
any further into the west and he really built a big moral case against the spread of slavery and
he argued that going back to the founding of the nation that slavery doesn't work with the whole
system of all men are created equal and he argued that you know the slave states trying to push
for slavery in the west was actually part of a conspiracy i guess you would say for the south to
get more control and possibly push slavery across the entire nation and he pointed out the problems
in douglas's plan of popular sovereignty that he had put forth in the kansas-nebraska act that of
course had led to violence there in kansas during the bleeding kansas period douglas on the other
hand argued that popular sovereignty would work he was still sticking with popular sovereignty
and he argued that the problem with popular sovereignty was it was not properly policed
and that you know if they they got the elections worked out to where they were actually knew what
was going on with that that everything would work out fine with popular sovereignty and he
argued that the issue of slavery should be really left up to local governments that it shouldn't be
the federal government making the decision on slavery it should be the people in these
new states or territories themselves but from there douglas really got down into the dirt into
in these debates he really started using racist language giving racist ideologies for why slavery
should be able to expand and uh he really tried to paint abraham lincoln as being an
abolitionist and as the republican party being a party of abolitionists because the end of time you
gotta think abolitionists were considered to be extremist and so that's really what he was going
at despite lincoln clearly winning the debates in the end douglas was able to win this uh election
for senate now this is truly one of those cases of losing the battle but winning the war abraham
lincoln was very demoralized by this and thought you know he should just give up but what happens
is abraham lincoln now becomes a nationally known figure a lot of people are looking at this guy and
saying hey who is this guy that took on stephen douglas and was able to match him or at least
you know bro and beat him really in the debates themselves and so abraham lincoln being in these
debates is really what sets the stage for abraham lincoln then becoming a nationally known figure
and going on to become the 16th president of the united states and leading the nation
through the civil war alright so hopefully you learned something there and thanks for watching