Stephen A. Douglas facts for kids

Kids Encyclopedia Facts

Quick facts for kids Stephen A. Douglas
Portrait by Julian Vannerson

United States Senator from Illinois
In office March 4, 1847 – June 3, 1861
Preceded by	James Semple
Succeeded by	Orville H. Browning
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Illinois's 5th district
In office March 4, 1843 – March 3, 1847
Preceded by	Constituency established
Succeeded by	William Richardson
Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of Illinois
In office February 15, 1841 – June 28, 1843
Preceded by	Seat established
Succeeded by	James Shields
7th Secretary of State of Illinois
In office November 30, 1840 – February 15, 1841
Governor	Thomas Carlin
Preceded by	Alexander P. Field
Succeeded by	Lyman Trumbull

Personal details
Born	Stephen Arnold Douglass (1813-04-23)April 23, 1813 Brandon, Vermont, U.S.
Died	June 3, 1861(1861-06-03) (aged 48) Chicago, Illinois, U.S.
Resting place	Stephen A. Douglas Tomb, Chicago
Political party	Democratic
Spouses	Martha Martin (m. 1847; died 1853) Adele Cutts (m. 1856)
Children	4
Signature

Stephen Arnold Douglas (April 23, 1813 – June 3, 1861) was an American politician and lawyer from Illinois. He was one of two nominees for president in the 1860 presidential election, losing to Abraham Lincoln.

Douglas was nicknamed the "Little Giant" because he was short in physical stature but a forceful and dominant figure in politics.

Early life and education
Career
Death
Marriage and family
Position on slavery
Legacy
- Old University of Chicago
- Memorials
Images for kids
See also

Early life and education

Douglas was born Stephen Arnold Douglass in Brandon, Vermont, on April 23, 1813, to physician Stephen Arnold Douglass and his wife, Sarah Fisk. Douglas's father died when Douglas was just two months old. Douglas, his mother, and older sister moved to the farm she and her bachelor brother, Edward Fisk, had inherited from their father. Douglas received an elementary education at the local school in Brandon. He decided to enroll as a student at Brandon Academy in order to pursue a professional career. Soon, however, his family relocated to New York. He was 17 years old at that time. Douglas continued his education at nearby Canandaigua Academy. He began the study of Latin and Greek and showed particular skill as a debater. At this point, he may have already been looking forward to a career as a politician.

In 1833, aged just 20, Douglas decided he had had enough of New York and wanted to seek his fortunes out West. Despite his mother's protests and the fact that he had not yet completed his studies at the academy, Stephen ventured out on his own. The newer states of the west had easier conditions for admission to the bar and he was eager to begin his professional career. Upon hearing that Jacksonville in Illinois was a thriving settlement, he decided to try his luck there. In Jacksonville, Douglas befriended attorney Murray McConnel, a friendship that would continue throughout Douglas' life.

Douglas was admitted to the state bar in Illinois in March 1834.

Career

Stephen A. Douglas

Douglas experienced early success in politics as a member of the newly formed Democratic Party, serving in the Illinois House of Representatives and various other positions. He resigned from the Supreme Court of Illinois upon being elected to the United States House of Representatives in 1843. Douglas became an ally of President James K. Polk, and favored the annexation of Texas and the Mexican–American War. He was one of four Northern Democrats in the House to vote against the Wilmot Proviso, which would have banned slavery in any territory acquired from Mexico.

The Illinois legislature elected Douglas to the United States Senate in 1847, and Douglas emerged as a national party leader during the 1850s. Douglas was a candidate for president at the 1852 Democratic National Convention, but lost the nomination to Franklin Pierce.

Seeking to open the west for expansion, Douglas introduced the Kansas–Nebraska Act in 1854. Though Douglas had hoped the Kansas–Nebraska Act would ease sectional tensions, it elicited a strong reaction in the North and helped fuel the rise of the anti-slavery Republican Party. Douglas once again sought the presidency in 1856, but the 1856 Democratic National Convention instead nominated James Buchanan, who went on to win the election.

During the Lincoln–Douglas debates, Douglas articulated the Freeport Doctrine, which held that territories could effectively exclude slavery despite the Supreme Court's ruling in the 1857 case of Dred Scott v. Sandford. In the 1860 presidential election, Lincoln and Douglas were the main candidates in the North, while most Southerners supported either Breckinridge or John Bell of the Constitutional Union Party. Ultimately, Lincoln's strong support in the North led to his victory in the election.

After the Confederate attack on Fort Sumter in April 1861, Lincoln decided to proclaim a state of rebellion and call for 75,000 troops to suppress it. Douglas met privately with Lincoln, looked over the proclamation before it was issued and endorsed it. He suggested only one change: Lincoln should call for 200,000 troops, not just 75,000 (in fact, Lincoln at the time was limited to calling out 75,000 by law). "You do not know the dishonest purposes of those men as well as I do," he said. To a friend, he stated, "I've known Mr. Lincoln a longer time than you have, or than the country has. He'll come out all right, and we will all stand by him."

Death

Douglas was struck by illness in May 1861 and was confined to his bed. Though his supporters initially expected a quick recovery, Douglas contracted typhoid fever and suffered from several other afflictions. He died on June 3, coincidentally on the same day as the Battle of Philippi, the first skirmish of the American Civil War.

Marriage and family

Adele Cutts, c. 1860

In March 1847, he married Martha Martin, the 21-year-old daughter of wealthy Colonel Robert Martin of North Carolina. The year after their marriage, Martha's father died and bequeathed her a 2,500-acre cotton plantation with 100 slaves on the Pearl River in Lawrence County, Mississippi. He appointed Douglas the property manager but, as a senator of the free state of Illinois, and with presidential aspirations, Douglas found the Southern plantation presented difficulties. He created distance by hiring a manager to operate the plantation while using his allocated 20 percent of the income to advance his political career. His sole lengthy visit to Mississippi was in 1848, and he made only brief emergency trips thereafter.

The newlyweds moved their Illinois home from Springfield to fast-growing Chicago in the summer of 1847. They had two sons: Robert M. Douglas (1849–1917) and Stephen Arnold Douglas, Jr., (1850–1908). Martha Douglas died on January 19, 1853, after the birth of her third child, a daughter. The girl died a few weeks later, and Douglas and the two boys were bereft.

On November 20, 1856, Douglas married a second time, to 20-year-old Adele Cutts, a southern woman from Washington, D.C. She was the daughter of James Madison Cutts, a nephew of former President James Madison, and Ellen O'Neal, a niece of Rose O'Neal Greenhow. Her mother was from a Maryland Catholic family and raised Adele as a Catholic. With Stephen's approval, she had his two sons baptized as Catholic and reared in that faith. She had a miscarriage in 1858 and became ill. The following year, Adele gave birth to a daughter, Rachel, who lived only a few weeks.

Position on slavery

For a century and a half, historians have debated whether Douglas opposed slavery. In his "Freeport Doctrine" of 1858, he repeatedly said that he did not care whether slavery was voted up or down, but only that white people had the right to vote it up or down. He disagreed with the Supreme Court's Dred Scott decision that Congress had no ability to regulate slavery in the territories. When Buchanan supported the Lecompton Constitution and admitting Kansas as a slave state (see Bleeding Kansas), Douglas fought him in a long battle that gained Douglas the 1860 Democratic nomination but ripped his party apart.

Graham Peck finds that while several scholars have said that Douglas was personally opposed to slavery despite owning a plantation in Mississippi, none has presented "extensive arguments to justify their conclusion".

Legacy

Old University of Chicago

Douglas endowed land on which a group of Baptists built the Old University of Chicago.

Memorials

Douglas's gravesite was bought by the state, which commissioned Leonard Volk for an imposing monument with a statue that was erected over his grave. Douglas's birthplace in Brandon, Vermont, has been memorialized as a museum and visitor center. Numerous places have been named after him: counties in Colorado, Georgia, Illinois, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, Nevada, Oregon, South Dakota, Washington and Wisconsin. Fort Douglas in Salt Lake City, the cities of Douglas and Douglasville in Georgia, and Douglas, Wyoming, were also named for him.

In 1869, a large park in Chicago was named Douglas Park in honor of the senator. In 2020 the park was renamed Douglass Park, after the abolitionists Frederick Douglass and Anna Murray Douglass.