For the development of pioneer talent the New Salem Debating Society had been formed that winter, and had held some interesting meetings. There had been a number of men's meetings for the discussion of political subjects, which Abe Lincoln attended, but he had not yet appeared at the Debating Society. The spelling-match was to be preceded by a debate on the question, "Resolved that the negro is more unjustly treated than the Indian?" Abe Lincoln had been invited to take one side, whichever he chose, and had said he didn't care which he took, he could win. So he was given the negro side. On the night of the important occasion the little school house was packed with men and women and children. Candles gleamed brightly on shingles which had been fastened into the chinks of the logs, and a big fire burned in the wide fireplace. When Abe Lincoln arose to speak it seemed that his head would hit the rafters before he finally got straightened up. He wore jean pants five inches above his shoe tops, below which an expanse of blue yarn socks showed. His collarless shirt was fastened at the neck with a big white button. His coat-tail was so short that to sit on it would have been an impossibility, his heavy shock of black hair stood out sideways, and, as he ran his hands down into his pantaloon pockets and stood for a moment as if embarrassed, a smile passed over the audience and they awaited eagerly the funny stories they thought he would tell, ready to burst into laughter. After announcing his subject and beginning his speech, his hands came out of his pockets and his embarrassment disappeared. He forgot his surroundings in the earnestness of the thoughts he was giving expression to, and the men and women before him forgot they were not hearing a funny story and leaned forward listening earnestly. "One man says to another," he said, "'You work, you toil, you earn the bread, and I will eat it.' But I say to you that whether it be a king with a crown on his head that says this, or whether it be a class with the power to force men, it all means slavery for the man whose toil, whose work, whose labor is not his own.... Peter Cartwright and others say the question of slavery or no slavery is spreadin', and that unless it is settled there will come war.... Why don't the Government buy the slaves and set them free? This would be right--this would be just--this might save human life and great expense which at last has to be paid by human labor." Then he told them about a slave-pen he had seen in New Orleans where men were sold as the farmers about New Salem sold hogs, and he gave utterance to that basic thought of Democracy that no man is great enough to control another man's freedom of thought or action.