At one point in the long, tedious process Lincoln succumbed to despair. Jesse K. Dubois, a fellow legislator who became Lincoln’s good friend, recalled that “Lincoln came to my room one evening and told me that he was whipped—that his career was ended—that he had traded off everything he could dispose of, and still had not got strength enough to locate the seat of government at Springfield.” Yet, he said, “I can[’]t go home without passing that bill. My folks expect that of me, and that I can[’]t do—and I am finished forever.” Robert L. Wilson of the Long Nine also remembered discouraging moments: “The contest on this Bill was long, and severe; its enemies laid it on the table twice, once on the table till the fourth day of July and once indefinitely postponed it.” Removing bills from the table “is always attended with difficulty; but when laid on the table to a day beyond the Session, or when indefinitely postponed, [it] requires a vote of reconsideration, which always is an intense Struggle.” But the once-discouraged Lincoln rallied his troops. “In these dark hours, when our Bill to all appearance was beyond recussitation and all our opponents were jubilant over our defeat, and when friends could see no hope, Mr Lincoln never for one moment despaired, but collect[ed] his Colleagues to his room for consultation.” His “practical common Sense, his thorough knowledge of human nature then, made him an overmatch for his compeers and for any man that I have ever known.”
Source: Abraham Lincoln ∶ A Life ▫𓂃
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