Whatever one thinks of him – and I made clear in Price
of Demagogues that I think that his ambition consistently outran his
judgment – Stephen A. Douglas was a singular character. John Mason Peck writes,
“His political commitments were by no means purely selfish. Identifying his
fate with that of the Union, Douglas struggled from 1854 to 1861 to control the
sectional bitterness that he had done so much to unleash.” I suppose that must
be entered in the plus side of the ledger, but ought we to praise a man who
excites a mob to break the windows of a house simply because he stays around
afterwards to help sweep up the street?
Readers who wish to make up their own minds might consider
taking up the biography that is generally considered definitive — Stephen
A. Douglas by Robert W. Johannsen, the distinguished professor history at
the real University of Illinois. Johannsen said that he tried to explain Douglas, not defend him; one appreciative
critic wrote that Johannsen was “sparing in his judgments and tends to
let his narrative carry its own interpretation.”
Originally published by Oxford University Press
in 1973, the book was reissued by the University of Illinois Press in 1997.
This article appears in Mar 27 – Apr 2, 2014.
