so in 1858, when he challenges stephen douglass and they run a really public fight for the senate, lose lincoln, loses the senate. in 1855 to lyman trumbull in 58, he has to he finds himself somewhat conflicted on this issue. the nativists, the real nativists, don't really trust them. he may be talking to them privately and he may not be attacking them, but he's not exactly embracing anti-catholicism either. the irish douglass and his newspaper supporters are attacking lincoln for, as one newspaper writes, holding, entertaining a holy horror of all irishmen and other adopted citizens who have sufficient self-respect to believe themselves so to the --, lincoln would disenfranchize allies. every adopted citizen if he had the power. this is the charge that we hear in 58 that lincoln would secretly the franchise for african americans. and we know he's not quite there yet, but he can't publicly appeal to nativists either without fear of offending his own base, which now includes ten years of thousands of the german immigrants who came later moved to illinois, moved into the west, and overwhe

so the question is about stephen douglass, lincoln's great opponents in illinois. well, i mean, lincoln thought that i mean, douglass thought that lincoln was a nobody right up until he won the election 1860. they certainly didn't see themselves as equals. yeah. i mean, douglass douglass is an absolutely fascinating figure to understand in terms of the coming of the civil war. right. so he of course, i mean, i sketched out there for sort of big groups of known this. now, douglass, the most of the time in the 1850s is closest to the buchanan position, of course. right. so he is he is all i mean, douglass tried to take the line, and this is partly what's exposed in the lincoln-douglas debates in 1858. douglass is trying to take the line that slavery is just another issue which needs to be in and can only be compromise has to be compromise in order for the union to stay together, which is the greatest moral good, lincoln's line, of course, is that is that slavery is this insidious threat to the union and that a house divided against itself cannot stand. and we must, i