It made Little Dug awful mad to face that line of argument. He said such talk proved Lincoln was an abolitionist, and as for his bein’ in a conspiracy to spread slavery it was a lie, “an infamous lie.” Well, I always did think conspiracy was a pretty strong word for Lincoln to use. Strictly speakin’, I reckon ’twa’n’t one, but all the same it didn’t look right. Douglas couldn’t deny that when he got the Missouri Compromise repealed he let slavery into territory that the government had set aside to be free. He couldn’t deny that Judge Taney had decided that Congress couldn’t prevent people takin’ slaves into this territory. There was some other things which fitted in with these which Douglas couldn’t deny. Mr. Lincoln argued from what they’d done that there wa’n’t any reason why they shouldn’t go on and apply the same legislation to all the other free parts of the country, said he believed they would in time if they thought it would pay better. The more I heard ’em argue the more I felt Lincoln was right. Suppose, I says to myself, that they take it into their heads to open Illinois? What’s to stop ’em? If slaves can be took into Nebraska by the divine right of self-government, what’s to prevent the divine right of self-government lettin’ ’em in here? Of course, there was an old law settin’ aside the Northwest to freedom, but if the Missouri Compromise could be repealed, why couldn’t that? Then, again, what’s to prevent the Supreme Court decidin’ that Congress couldn’t keep slaves out of a state just as it had decided that Congress couldn’t keep ’em out of a territory. The more I thought of it the more I see there wa’n’t anything to prevent men like Douglas and Buchanan tryin’ some day to apply the same line of argument to Illinois or Pennsylvania or New York or any other free state that they was usin’ now.