Lincoln's "Tug" Letter to Sen. Lyman Trumbull
Dec. 10, 1860


President-elect Abraham Lincoln
Lyman Trumbull (1813--1896) began his political career as a Democrat but he left the party over the 1854 Kansas-Nebraska Act, championed by Illinois Senator Stephen A. Douglas.  He was elected to the Senate in 1855, succeeding James Shields, and opposed by the former Whig Abraham Lincoln.  The electiob went on for a full eleven votes in the state legislature, with Lincoln throwing his support to Trumbull to prevent the election of Gov. Joel Matteson, who had supported the Kansas-Nebraska Act.  Trumbull attended the first Republican National Convention in 1856, at Lincoln's urging, and the two men were both Republicans and good friends afterwards.         

Senator Lyman Trumbull of Illinois






Private, & confidential

Hon. L. Trumbull.

Springfield, Ills.
Dec. 10. 1860

 

My dear Sir:

Let there be no compromise on the question of extending slavery. If there be, all our labor is lost, and, ere long, must be done again. The dangerous ground---that into which some of our friends have a hankering to run---is Pop. Sov. Have none description of it. Stand firm. The tug has to come, & better now, than any time hereafter.

Yours as ever

A. LINCOLN.




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Source:  Basler, Roy P., Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln. Volume 4; Rutgers University Press, 1953, pp. 149--150.

Date added to website: March 1, 2026