True, the costly sacrifice of Hamilton's life in 1804 had shocked. the nation and the sermon of the elder Beecher occasioned by it had extended his parish throughout the land. True, also, the untimely death of Rice Jones,* a promising young lawyer of Kaskaskia, in 1809, growing out of a challenge to fight a duel had resulted one year later in the adoption of a law by the governor and judges of the territory making a fatal resuJt in a duel murder and all taking part in it principals to the crime.

When Mr. Peck came to St. Louis a succession of duels had recently occurred there and some good men had been sacrificed. He announced that he would preach upon the subject of dueling. Before the apappointed time two more duels had been fought and two men had died as the result thereof. He preached from Isaiah 1:15, "Your hands are full of blood."

Of this sermon he himself has written:

"The old Baptist church house, which stood on the corner of Third and Market streets, was crowded by all classes, amongst whom I discovered the Hon. David Barton, then a senator in Congress, whose lamented brother was one of the victims, and the late Rev. Samuel Mitchell, whose eldest son was another. I did my utmost to hold up the practice of duelling to the abhorrence of all right-minded men as a crime of no small magnitude against God, against man, against society."

Doubtless the sermon was published in some one or more of the numerous sheets edited by Mr. Peck and though I have not been able to find it, we may well believe it deserves to rank among the potential addresses which make up the literatrue of the time on that subject. This clarion note of the pioneer was sounded a full generation prior to the time when those gifted sons of Illinoist fell upon the Pacific

* Reynolds Pioneer History of Illinois, 173. Parish, Historic Illinois, 334. In the fifties a band of young men went from Illinois to the Pacific coast-E. D. Baker, William Ferguson and David Logan from Springfield, Charles E. Lippincott from Cass county, James A. McDougal from Jacksonville. There they met with numerous other kindred spirits. Some of them were Whigs and some Democrats, but all were anti-slavery. The same sort of struggle for possession was going on in California as in Kansas, and the pro-slavery leaders of the Pacific slope regarded these men who lived north of the Ohio river as being of the class whom they chose to call cowards, and they made up their minds that the best way to carry their point was to challenge them to fight duels and kill them off in relays; and so they entered into a combination, that A, B, C and D should in turn challenge Gilbert, Ferguson, Broderick, Baker. Lippincott, Logan and the rest. And Gilbert was killed and Ferguson was killed and Broderick was killed, and Baker pronounced funeral orations over their dead bodies, and he stirred the nation on the subject as it had not been stirred before. Strong men and women who sat at their firesides, from the eloquence of this man on this important subject, taught their boys new lessons on this particular subject.

Baker was an orator of the finest type. His orations rivaled the best productions of the orators of history. He said to the American people: "The code of honor is a delusion and a snare. It palters with the hope of a true courage and binds it at the feet of crafty and cruel skill. It surrounds its victims with the pomp and grace of the procession, but leaves him bleeding on the altar. It substitutes cold and deliberate preparation for courageous and manly impulse, and arms the one to disarm the other. Its pretense of equality is a lie. It is equal in all the form; it is unjust in all the substance. It is a shield emblazoned with the name of chivalry to cover the malignity

of murder."

The speech went ringing through the confines of the nation, and young men and women took new ideas on the subject.

It was now Lippincott's turn; and he was challenged to meet a man named Tevis on that fatal field where Gilbert, Ferguson and Broderick had already fallen. Lippincott was the son of a minister; a young man of fine spirit, reared among the best of influences. He promptly accepted, although it wrung his heart to think of the possible effect upon his aged father. He realized that the hated practice of dueling would continue until some northern man went to that field and came back alive. He scorned to practice for the occasion, but was known to have an unerring aim. The duel resulted in the death of Tevis, and there were no more challenges from the advocates of slavery.

As an evidence that the public conscience was being aroused against duelling, it is worth recalling that the man who killed Broderick was in 1880 a candidate for presi

slope "tangled in the meshes of the code of honor," a full generation before Baker's marvelous philippics, pronounced over their dead bodies, stirred the nation on the subject as it had not been stirred before; a full generation before Lincoln and Bissell and Potter had through ridicule and derision induced the American people practically to make an end of duelling.

THE FIGHT AGAINST SLAVERY.

When Peck came west the people of the Illinois country had been familiar with slavery for a hundred years. The Frenchman, Renault, about 1720, had brought a cargo of San Domingo negroes to St. Phillippe, and during the next twenty years sold or indentured them to the citizens. A few whites and Indians were already so indentured: The French government, before this time, had legalized slavery in the American colonies. The Paris treaty of 1763 contained a provision by which England confirmed the French inhabitants of Illinois in this species of property. When the territory was ceded to the United States. in 1784 by Virginia the right was further recognized and protected in the deed of cession.

Later, when a bill was introduced in Congress, providing for the abolition of slavery in the territory of the Northwest to be effective

dential elector in California, and enough of his party associates voted against him so that he was the only defeated candidate on his party ticket. Here was a moral indictment against a duelist a generation after the fact.

About this time the matter was brought into ridicule in various ways. A State Auditor of Illinois, an Irish gentleman of much vanity, excited the risibilities of two young ladies in Springfield, who wrote an anonymous paragraph or two in the newspaper here, at which he took offense. It sought to bring him into some degree of ridicule as a statesman, as a politician.

The article was dated from "The Lost Townships" and was signed "Rebekah." Shields demanded the name of the author. Another article followed, written by Mr. Lincoln. Shields again demanded the name of the author. The editor spoke to Mr. Lincoln about it. Mr. Lincoln said, "Tell him I wrote it."

Shields challenged him to fight a duel. Lincoln promptly accepted, and they started across the river to fight it out. Lincoln selected broad swords, with a board ten inches high planted between them. Whenever either party receded more than three feet from the board he yielded the fight. Shields said that was ridiculous. Lincoln said fighting duels was ridiculous. The thing came to nothing. Two other challenges grew out of it. A little later an Illinois colonel, who had commanded an Illinos regiment at Buena Vista, and then a member of Congress, sat in his seat and listened to a Virginia member say that the day had been won at Buena Vista by a certain Mississippi regiment. The Illinois colonel resented that, and proved by the record that the Mississippi regiment wasn't within a mile and a half of the place where the fight occurred. The commander of the Mssissippi regiment challenged the Illinois member to fight a duel. He chose muskets, loaded to the muzzle, at forty paces, the participants to advance ten paces as long as there were two left. The Mississippian stated that was brutal. The Illinois colonel said fighting duels was brutal. Of course, a courageous Mississippan couldn't fight under those conditions, and so it was called off. The Mississippian was afterwards president of the southern confederacy and the Ilinois colonel became Governor of Illinois.

A little later a very large man from Wisconsin was a member of Congress, and a little man from Virginia took offense at something he said on the floor of the House and challenged him to fight a duel. These names are so significant to the story that I give them. The Wisconsin Congressman was named Potter and the Virginian Pryor, and they went out to fight. While they were gone the House was in session, and a wag answered for both in their absence; when Potter's name was called he said, "Gone to keep a Pryor engagement;" and when Pryor's name was called he said, "Gone to be made into Potter's clay." Potter selected bowie knives. The Virginian said that wasn't a gentlemanly way to fight. Potter replied there was no gentlemanly way to fight.

These various incidents furnished the humorous side, the ludicrous side of the dueling question, and Baker's melting eloquence, burning as it went, furnished the sentimental side; and the newspapers of the country took up the question, and nobody since has had any respect for the duelist.

*From an address delivered by Judge Humphrey in the Baptist Church at Springfield January 21, 1906.

in the year 1800, it was defeated. The territorial authorities passed laws favorable to the slaveholder. The governor, himself a slaveholder, enforced the laws in favor of slavery and used the veto power against all efforts to abolish slavery or to mitigate the condition of those subject to its rigors.

When the territory was admitted as a state the legislature promptly passed a slave code. Perhaps nothing more barbarous or less humane ever marred our history as a state. By this law freedom and emancipation were made difficult and inconvenient while involuntary servitude wac made easy and convenient. The effect of the law was such that a man who was free might under certain circumstances become a slave by lapse of time. Kidnaping was so difficult of prosecution that it became not only profitable but almost respectable. It cannot be said that the people of Illinois were opposed to slavery. The state extends far to the south; her eastern, southern and western boundaries washed for hundreds of miles by great rivers all running to the southward, the only highways of commerce, her commercial relations were early identified with the slaveholding states, and so with laws favorable to slavery, with a population which had never voted against slavery, with state officials and a legislature promoting the interests of slavery, with the channels of commercial intercourse running chiefly to slaveholding centers, and with a thousand persons in Illinois actually held in slavery, Illinois was waiting for a man strong enough to organize the hosts of freedom as the powers of slavery had long been organized.

The man and the occasion met in 1822 and the man was John M. Peck. He came to the state in April of that year and the first battle between the forces of freedom and slavery was fought at the polls in the following August. The very strength of the slave party became its weakness. Its votes were divided between two candidates, while the anti-slavery vote was united on Edward Coles, and he was elected governor, although he received less than one-third of the votes cast. The weakness of the anti-slavery forces at the time is shown by the fact that the pro-slavery majority in the legislature promptly submitted for the vote of the people a resolution for a convention to amend the constitution, the object being to form a constitution in favor of slavery. When it is understood that no such resolution for a convention to amend the constitution could even be submitted except by a two-thirds vote of the members of the General Assembly, the overwhelming majority of the pro-slavery forces is made further to appear. The submission to the people was to be at the general election of August, 1824, and now the work or organization for the great struggle was on. It mattered not to Peck that the prominent men of the state, the politicians who appeared in the open, were mostly arrayed on the side of those who favored the convention. Coles, Cook, Birkbeck, a few others, himself and the Lord were on the side of fredom. The anti-slavery party, less numerous than its opponents, far excelled them in literary talent. A small fund was raised into which went Coles' salary for the entire term. The brilliant Cook had no

1 Moses' History of Illinois, Vol. 1, p. 321.

equal on the stump. Birkbeck was a good writer.* Peck was omnipresent fighting with voice and pen. This was his opportunity. For years he had been traveling the territory and nothing had escaped him. He knew every locality, who had made it, and who controlled it. No politician equaled him in acquaintance with the population. As teacher, preacher, missionary, author and publisher, he had canvassed the field and his mailing list was extensive and valuable.

He knew the boundaries of Illinois had been fixed by Congress for the definite purpose of creating an interest with the North and East; that the new State was dedicated to the work of saving the Union when the great national struggle between freedom and slavery should come. He knew Pope's argument on that subject in the house of Congress and accepted it as the voice of prophecy. He regarded this as the preliminary skirmish of that greater struggle to come and that he himself had "come to the kingdom for such a time as this." The issue involved moral questions and furnished a new text for every waking hour. He spoke with an unction and his arguments carried a "thus saith the Lord."

PECK'S BATTLE FOR FREEDOM.

For eighteen months the battle raged. In the whole Mississippi Valley there had been such a campaign. While Coles was the nominal leader, Peck was the real head of the movement and the organization was his. He established newspapers, printed pamphlets, tracts, hand-bills. He organized anti-slavery societies, with headquarters in St. Clair County, and fourteen auxiliary societies in other counties." He also organized the counties each with a county central committee and subordinate committees in every neighborhod, all under his personal supervision.

He traveled continuously, edited newspapers, distributed documents, preached and extorted from every rostrum and in every church, schoolhouse or private residence where his foot rested. His passion fired the zeal of his brother preachers and thus wherever he went he left a blazing trail which burned on with ever widening influence until election day. He also secured the assistance of able writers in other states, including the noted philanthropist, Roberts-Vaux, of Philadelphia, where Peck had been a student. Prominent men who had been in favor of the convention yielded to his influence and joined the anti-slavery party, or became neutral and half-hearted in the struggle. The election occurred on Aug. 2, 1824, and resulted in an overwhelming victory for the party of liberty.

It must be remembered that since the Declaration of Independence there had been no triumph of freedom against slavery in a political contest in the United States and the victory was significant. As indicating the fullness of the vote, the record shows that 11,612 persons voted at the August election and only 4.532 at the presidential election a few months later. It does not appear that Peck ever took part in

* Flowers History of the English Settlement in Edwards county, 198 et seq.

1W. H. Brown Historical sketch of the early movement in Illinois for the legalization of slavery, p. 37.

2Publication 10. Illinois Historical Library, 310.

3Moses History of Illinois, Vol. 1. p. 322.

4Moses History of Illinois Vol. 1, p. 324.

any other political campaign or was ever after specially interested in any election.

That his conduct in this stirring election was able, diplomatic and dignified is shown by the fact that his old time friendships were retained regardless of party. His influence was much greater after than before, all recognized that he spoke and acted from conviction and his arguments carried conviction. It is believed that no influence other than his discreet action could have paralyzed the activities of men like Ninian Edwards and Sidney Breese, who were relied upon by the convention party, but who did not assist their supposed friends. No historian since has been able to locate those men in the campaign of 1824.

PECK'S WORK AS EDUCATOR.

I have given at some length his connection with the contest over slavery, but while it lasted eighteen months, it was only an episode in Peck's life and did not divert him from his life work. He was a preacher and a moralist but he could not comprehend a life of religion and morality unassociated with the best of schools. The educational idea was a passion with him. This passion possessed him in his youth and it never left him. Scarcely had he arrived at St. Louis before he organized a church and a school. He was the pastor of the church. He was the teacher of the school. His idea of education was a "mind trained to habits of thinking, to logical reasoning, to readiness of speech."1

In 1819 he was planning a school for higher education. He visited Upper Alton, with a view to such location, then removed his family to St. Charles, Mo., and opened St. Charles Academy, but the teacher who filled the various chairs was absent so much on preaching tours that the school was scarcely born before it died. He had much to do with the passage of the Illinois schoo! law, passed in 1825.,

In 1826 he visited the State capital at Vandalia. There he met many public men and ministers and secured their promise of coöperation to establish an institution of learning at Rock Spring, in St. Clair county, on ground to be donated by himself. The outside help amounted to little more than a nominal board of trustees. Peck did the work and carried the burdens.

was set apart for The charge con

In 1825 a young man named John Milcot Ellis gospel work in the Old South Church in Boston. tained the instruction "to build up an institution of learning which shall bless the west for all time." Ellis came at once to Kaskaskia and spent the next four years in looking for a proper location for his school. One day he passed on horseback by Rock Spring and found the brawny Peck chopping logs for a building. "What are you doing here, stranger?" asked Ellis, and Peck replied, “I am building a theological seminary." A strong friendship ensued. A strong friendship ensued. Each cheered and encouraged the other in his enterprise. Peck visited his friends in New England and secured a small fund for his new school, and in November,

1Babcock's Life of fohn M. Peck, 151.

2Roy, Fifty Years of Home Missions, Publication No. 10, Illinois Historical Library, 278 3The Pioneer School, a history of Shurtleff College, 33.