many States to evade the law. It was in
the nature of a conspiracy against the government. The ring-leaders
were Abolitionists, who were exciting the negroes to excesses. He was
utterly at a loss to understand how senators, who had sworn to obey
and defend the Constitution, could countenance these palpable
violations of law.[373]

In spite of similar untoward incidents, the vast majority of people in
the country North and South were acquiescing little by little in the
settlement reached by the compromise measures. There was an evident
disposition on the part of both Whig and Democratic leaders to drop
the slavery issue. When Senator Sumner proposed a repeal of the
Fugitive Slave Act, Douglas deprecated any attempt to "fan the flames
of discord that have so recently divided this great people,"[374]
intimating that Sumner's speech was intended to "operate upon the
presidential election." It ill became the Senator from Illinois to
indulge in such taunts, for no one, it may safely be said, was
calculating his own political chances more intently. "Things look
well," he had written to a friend, referring to his chances of
securing the nomination, "and the prospect is brightening every day.
All that is necessary now to insure success is that the northwest
should unite and speak out."[375]

When the Democrats of Illinois proposed Douglas's name for the
presidency in 1848, no one was disposed to take the suggestion
seriously, outside the immediate circle of his friends. To graybeards
there was something almost humorous in the suggestion that five years
of service in Congress gave a young man of thirty-five a claim to
consideration! Within three short years, however, the situation had
changed materially. Older aspirants for the chief magistracy were
forced, with no little alarm, to acknowledge the rise of a really
formidable rival. By midsummer of 1851, competent observers thought
that Douglas had the best chance of winning the Democratic nomination.
In the judgment of certain Whig editors, he was the strongest man. It
was significant of his growing favor, that certain Democrats of the
city and county of New York tendered him a banquet, in honor of his
distinguished services to the party and his devotion to the Union
during the past two years.

Politicians of both parties shared the conviction that unless the
Whigs could get together,--which was unlikely,--a nomination at the
hands of a national Democratic convention was equi