Governor Carlin wanted the legislature to modify the internal improvements system, for the state could not pay the interest on the debt needed to support it. As the House of Representatives discussed the governor’s proposal in its temporary quarters at the Second Presbyterian Church, Lincoln once again tried to salvage what the Democrats referred to as “Infernal Improvements.” He argued “that at least some portion of our Internal Improvements should be carried on … at least one work calculated to yield something towards defraying its expense, should be finished and put in operation.” When he voted for an unsuccessful proposal to have joint-stock companies take over the system, with the state owning some shares, the Springfield Register sneeringly declared that Lincoln “has blown his pledges to the winds, and has left the system to shift for itself. What an example of good faith!” The jibe was unfair, for Lincoln voted repeatedly to sustain the system, including the Illinois and Michigan Canal. When it was proposed that work on the canal be suspended, he said “we should lose much by stopping the work on the Canal—that a mutual injury would result to the State by suspending all operations there.… The embankments upon the Canal would be washing away, and the excavations filling up.” Although the legislature did not kill the internal improvements system de jure, it did so de facto.
Source: Abraham Lincoln ∶ A Life ▫𓂃