Thus in the midsummer of 1850 did the nation, with intense relief, see the imminent disaster of civil discord averted,--or was it only postponed? It was ominous that no men who were deeply in earnest in public affairs were sincerely satisfied. The South saw no gain which offset the destruction of the balance of power by the admission of California. Thinking men at the North were alarmed at the recognition of the principle of non-intervention by Congress concerning slavery in the Territories, a principle which soon, under the seductive title of "popular sovereignty" in the Territories, threatened even that partial restriction heretofore given by the Missouri Compromise. Neither party felt sufficiently secure of the strength of its legal position to be altogether pleased at seeing the doctrine of treating the slave in the Territories as "property" cast into the lottery of the Supreme Court. Lincoln recognized the futility of this whole arrangement, and said truly that the slavery question could "never be successfully compromised." Yet he accepted the situation, with the purpose of making of it the best that was possible. The mass of the people, less far-sighted, were highly gratified at the passing of the great danger; refused to recognize that a more temporary compromise was never patched up to serve a turn; and applauded it so zealously that in preparing for the presidential campaign of 1852 each party felt compelled to declare emphatically--what all wise politicians knew to be false--the "finality" of the great Compromise of 1850. Never, never more was there to be a revival of the slavery agitation! Yet, at the same time, it was instinctively felt that the concord would cease at once if the nation should not give to the South a Democratic President! In this campaign Lincoln made a few speeches in Illinois in favor of Scott; but Herndon says that they were not very satisfactory efforts. Franklin Pierce was chosen, and slavery could have had no better man.