Abe Lincoln Gets His Chance Part 14

They thought it funny that his trousers were always too short. But they also laughed at his jokes, and they liked him. He made so many new friends that he decided to be a candidate for the Illinois legislature.

One day during the campaign he had a long talk with Major John T.

Stuart. Major Stuart had been Abe's commander in the Black Hawk War. He was now a lawyer in Springfield, a larger town twenty miles away.

"Why don't you study law?" he asked.

Abe pursed his lips. "I'd sure like to," he drawled; then added with a grin: "But I don't know if I have enough sense."

Major Stuart paid no attention to this last remark. "You have been reading law for pleasure," he went on. "Now go at it in earnest. I'll lend you the books you need."

This was a chance that Abe could not afford to miss. Every few days he walked or rode on horseback to Springfield to borrow another volume.

Sometimes he read forty pages on the way home. He was twenty-five years old, and there was no time to waste.

Meanwhile he was making many speeches. He asked the voters in his part of Illinois to elect him to the legislature which made the laws for the state. They felt that "Honest Abe" was a man to be trusted and he was elected.

Late in November Abe boarded the stagecoach for the ride to Vandalia, then the capital of the state. He looked very dignified in a new suit and high plug hat. In the crowd that gathered to tell him good-by, he could see many of his friends. There stood Coleman Smoot who had lent him money to buy his new clothes. Farther back he could see Mr. Rutledge and Ann, Hannah and Jack Armstrong, Mentor Graham, and others who had encouraged and helped him. And now he was on his way to represent them in the legislature. There was a chorus of "Good-by, Abe."

Then, like an echo, the words came again in Ann's high, sweet voice: "Good-by, Abe!" He leaned far out the window and waved.

He was thinking of Ann as the coach rolled over the rough road. He was thinking also of Sarah. If only she could see him now, he thought, as he glanced at the new hat resting on his knee.

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14

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The Legislature met for several weeks at a time. Between sessions, Abe worked at various jobs in New Salem and read his law books. Most of his studying was done early in the morning and late at night. He still found time to see a great deal of Ann Rutledge, and something of her gentle sweetness was to live on forever in his heart. After Ann died, he tried to forget his grief by studying harder than ever.

The year that he was twenty-eight he took his examination, and was granted a lawyer's license. He decided to move to Springfield, which had recently been made the capital of the state.

It was a cold March day when he rode into this thriving little town. He hitched his horse to the hitching rack in the public square and entered one of the stores. Joshua Speed, the owner, a young man about Abe's age, looked up with a friendly smile.

"Howdy, Abe," he said. "So you are going to be one of us?"

"I reckon so," Abe answered. "Say, Speed, I just bought myself a bedstead. How much would it cost me for a mattress and some pillows and blankets?"

Joshua took a pencil from behind his ear. He did some figuring on a piece of paper. "I can fix you up for about seventeen dollars."

Abe felt the money in his pocket. He had only seven dollars. His horse was borrowed, and he was still a thousand dollars in debt. Joshua saw that he was disappointed. He had heard Abe make speeches, and Abe was called one of the most promising young men in the legislature. Joshua liked him and wanted to know him better.

"Why don't you stay with me, until you can do better?" he suggested. "I have a room over the store and a bed big enough for two."

A grin broke over Abe's homely features. "Good!" he said. "Where is it?"

"You'll find some stairs over there behind that pile of barrels. Go on up and make yourself at home."

Abe enjoyed living with Joshua Speed, and he enjoyed living in Springfield. He soon became as popular as he had once been in Pigeon Creek and in New Salem. As the months and years went by, more and more people came to him whenever they needed a lawyer to advise them. For a long time he was poor, but little by little he paid off his debts. With his first big fee he bought a quarter section of land for his stepmother who had been so good to him.

The part of his work that Abe liked best was "riding the circuit." In the spring and again in the fall, he saddled Old Buck, his horse, and set out with a judge and several other lawyers to visit some of the towns close by. These towns "on the circuit" were too small to have law courts of their own. In each town the lawyers argued the cases and the judge settled the disputes that had come up during the past six months.

After supper they liked to gather at the inn to listen to Abe tell funny stories. "I laughed until I shook my ribs loose," said one dignified judge.

The other lawyers often teased Abe. "You ought to charge your clients more money," they said, "or you will always be as poor as Job's turkey."

One evening they held a mock trial. Abe was accused of charging such small fees that the other lawyers could not charge as much as they should. The judge looked as solemn as he did at a real trial.

"You are guilty of an awful crime against the pockets of your brother lawyers," he said severely. "I hereby sentence you to pay a fine."

There was a shout of laughter. "I'll pay the fine," said Abe good-naturedly. "But my own firm is never going to be known as Catchem & Cheatem."

Meanwhile a young lady named Mary Todd had come to Springfield to live.

Her father was a rich and important man in Kentucky. Mary was pretty and well educated. Abe was a little afraid of her, but one night at a party he screwed up his courage to ask her for a dance.

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"Miss Todd," he said, "I would like to dance with you the worst way."

As he swept her around the dance floor, he b.u.mped into other couples. He stepped on her toes. "Mr. Lincoln," said Mary, as she limped over to a chair, "you did dance with me the worst way--the very worst."

She did not mind that he was not a good dancer. As she looked up into Abe's homely face, she decided that he had a great future ahead of him.

She remembered something she had once said as a little girl: "When I grow up, I want to marry a man who will be President of the United States."

Abe was not the only one who liked Mary Todd. Among the other young men who came to see her was another lawyer, Stephen A. Douglas. He was no taller than Mary herself, but he had such a large head and shoulders that he had been nicknamed "the Little Giant." He was handsome, and rich, and brilliant. His friends thought that he might be President some day.

"No," said Mary, "Abe Lincoln has the better chance to succeed."

Anyway, Abe was the man she loved. The next year they were married.

"I mean to make him President of the United States," she wrote to a friend in Kentucky. "You will see that, as I always told you, I will yet be the President's wife."

At first Mary thought that her dream was coming true. In 1846 Abe was elected a member of the United States Congress in Was.h.i.+ngton. He had made a good start as a political leader, and she was disappointed when he did not run for a second term. Back he came to Springfield to practice law again. By 1854 there were three lively boys romping through the rooms of the comfortable white house that he had bought for his family. Robert was eleven, Willie was four, and Tad was still a baby.

The neighbors used to smile to see Lawyer Lincoln walking down the street carrying Tad on his shoulders, while Willie clung to his coattails. The boys adored their father.

Mary did, too, but she wished that Abe would be more dignified. He sat reading in his s.h.i.+rt sleeves, and he got down on the floor to play with the boys. His wife did not think that was any way for a successful lawyer to act. It also worried her that he was no longer interested in politics.

And then something happened that neither Mary nor Abe had ever expected.

Their old friend, Stephen A. Douglas, who was now a Senator in Was.h.i.+ngton, suggested a new law. Thousands of settlers were going West to live, and in time they would form new states. The new law would make it possible for the people in each new state to own slaves, if most of the voters wanted to.

Abraham Lincoln was so aroused and indignant that he almost forgot his law practice. He traveled around Illinois making speeches. There were no laws against having slaves in the South, but slavery must be kept out of territory that was still free, he said. The new states should be places "for poor people to go to better their condition." Not only that, but it was wrong for one man to own another. Terribly wrong.

"If the Negro is a man," he told one audience, "then my ancient faith teaches me that all men are created equal."

Perhaps he was thinking of the first time he had visited a slave market.

He was remembering the words in the Declaration of Independence that had thrilled him as a boy.