"
Both prophecies were fulfilled. Douglas answered as was expected;
and though, in actual numbers, the Republicans of Illinois cast
more votes than the Democrats, a legislature was chosen that
rejected him to the Senate. Two years later, Lincoln, who in 1858
had not the remotest dream of such a thing, found himself the
successful candidate of the Republican party for President of the
United States.
To see how little Lincoln expected such an outcome it is only
necessary to glance at the letters he wrote to friends at the end
of his campaign against Douglas. Referring to the election to be
held two years later, he said, "In that day I shall fight in the
ranks, but I shall be in no one's way for any of the places." To
another correspondent he expressed himself even more frankly: "Of
course I wished, but I did not much expect, a better result. . .
. I am glad I made the late race. It gave me a hearing on the
great and durable question of the age, which I could have had in
no other way; and though I now sink out of view and shall be
forgotten, I believe I have made some marks which will tell for
the cause of civil liberty long after I am gone."
But he was not to "sink out of view and be forgotten." Douglas
himself contributed not a little toward keeping his name before
the public; for shortly after their contest was ended the
reelected senator started on a trip through the South to set
himself right again with the Southern voters, and in every speech
that he made he referred to Lincoln as the champion of
"abolitionism.
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