Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 4.djvu/104

94 The uncompromising slavery wing of the Democratic party nominated John C. Breckinridge for President and Joseph Lane, Oregon's first territorial governor and present senator, for Vice President. Stephen A. Douglas headed the regular Democratic ticket and Abraham Lincoln was the Republican chieftain.

In Oregon there was a new alignment alike of leaders and of the rank and file—despite the wonderful personal popularity of Oregon's favorite son Joseph Lane, and the passionate oratory of Delazon Smith his chief campaigner, Oregon cast her vote for Abraham Lincoln for President of the United States. The combined Douglas and Lincoln vote was 9,480, while Breckinridge and Lane polled 5,074; and from this computation we see that a trifle more than one third of the voters of Oregon were apparently prepared to follow the programme of disunion and secession. Colonel Baker, by a coalition of republicans and Douglas democrats, was chosen United States Senator, and left almost immediately for Washington to take up his official duties; but he left behind him the courageous inspiration of his lofty patriotism—he had played upon and touched both the heart and conscience of the young Commonwealth, and while the months that followed were months of waiting and watching and of prayer, as elsewhere in the Union, there was never any real question, after the wonderful rousing of the public mind and the public heart of Oregon, largely wrought by his matchless eloquence and high ideals, that should war, that saddest of all conflicts, a civil war, ensue, the brave young State would stand by the flag of the Fathers and the cause of human liberty. At the city of San Francisco, en route for Washington, Colonel Baker, in fiery and impassioned rhetoric, nailed his banner and Oregon's to the Nation's masthead.

He said "As for me, I dare not, will not, be false to