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Lincoln, Abraham, 1809-1865

"The Writings of Abraham Lincoln - Volume 2: 1843-1858"


Such separation, if ever effected at all, must be effected by
colonization; and no political party, as such, is now doing anything
directly for colonization. Party operations at present only favor or
retard colonization incidentally. The enterprise is a difficult one; but
"where there is a will there is a way," and what colonization needs most
is a hearty will. Will springs from the two elements of moral sense and
self-interest. Let us be brought to believe it is morally right, and at
the same time favorable to, or at least not against, our interest to
transfer the African to his native clime, and we shall find a way to do
it, however great the task may be. The children of Israel, to such
numbers as to include four hundred thousand fighting men, went out of
Egyptian bondage in a body.
How differently the respective courses of the Democratic and Republican
parties incidentally, bear on the question of forming a will--a public
sentiment--for colonization, is easy to see. The Republicans inculcate,
with whatever of ability they can, that the negro is a man, that his
bondage is cruelly wrong, and that the field of his oppression ought not
to be enlarged. The Democrats deny his manhood; deny, or dwarf to
insignificance, the wrong of his bondage; so far as possible crush all
sympathy for him, and cultivate and excite hatred and disgust against
him; compliment themselves as Union-savers for doing so; and call the
indefinite outspreading of his bondage "a sacred right of
self-government.


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