Abraham Lincoln: “House Divided” Speech

Audience

Lincoln's immediate audience was the Illinois Republican Party, especially the thousand-plus delegates at the state nominating convention. The metaphor of the house divided, the savaging of their longtime foe Stephen Douglas, and the invocation of a conspiracy to spread slavery found receptive ears among the assembled party activists. The speech's logical structure and hard-hitting rhetoric impressed Douglas as well, who realized that Lincoln was a force to be reckoned with.

In a larger sense, Lincoln sent a clear message to the Republican Party, particularly to its eastern powerbrokers like Greeley and Seward in New York, that he would make Illinois the arena for a fight against Douglas. The speech galvanized the attention of voters regardless of party affiliation. Lincoln was less conscious of the audience south of the Mason-Dixon Line, however, who heard in the speech a threat to slavery emanating from the Republicans after Dred Scott. Southern hotspurs called this orientation “black Republicanism,” a form of political abolitionism. Lincoln's speech also heightened the awareness of northern Democrats that the Republicans were becoming a forceful sectional party that would have to be dealt with in the election of 1860. No Democrat realized this more than Stephen Douglas, as he prepared to answer Lincoln with countercharges of his own.