A Political Consultant at the Lincoln-Douglas Debates
By Charlie Clark
MEMO FROM: The Illinois Field Rep.
RE: The Lincoln-Douglas Golden Opportunity
DATE: August 28, 1858
The circus atmosphere of last night's stemwinder in Freeport confirms the strategy I've been mulling all summer: We hook our client into this Lincoln-Douglas debate spectacular with some orchestrated showings by hecklers.
Yeah, I know the buggy whip makers are loathe to bet the campaign budget on an ad hoc team of Illinois loudmouths.
But my contacts in both the Lincoln and Douglas camps say the full-throated press coverage will attach to these joint candidate gigs, even though they're scheduled in such backwaters as Jonesboro, Charleston, Galesburg, Quincy and Alton.
I guarantee my boys' placement at front-row, platform center (don't make me reveal the chits I called in on this), so assure those buggy moguls that our state-of-the-art heckling will be heard over any fireworks, brass bands or soaring stump rhetoric that either Senate hopeful rolls out.
We've got a straight shot at turning the threat of foreign-made buggy whips into the race's dominant theme.
You were right in your telegram that incumbent Douglas is not technically on board for our buggy whip tariffs (he did nod once when Waldo from the lobbying division gave him the whipping gesture from the gallery).
And given his druthers, the Little Giant would opt to push his messy, popular sovereignty take on the free-soil issue, which for our specialty clients is a yawner.
But a quick look at the math shows exactly why Douglas is our man.
The Democrats' Senate majority is a deceptively frail 30-20.
If they lose even a few to these greenhorn Republicans, our years of schmoozing the noon hour at the Willard would soon be in the dustbin.
This gangly Lincoln character (I'd tag him the least charismatic pol of the century) is likely to use that squeaky voice to drone on about the evils of slavery.
But those clunkers he invokes--``Let us unite as one people'' and ``all men are created equal''--have tanked at every focus group the guys in opposition research have convened.
Our heckler brigade, equipped with banners in red, white and blue, will counter him with our road-tested slogan ``Buggy American.''
Of course, it's a bit cryptic, but authorities who monitor these events have ruled we can't come out and use ``magic words'' like ``Vote for Douglas'' and still expect front-row privileges.
If Douglas drifts off message (or worse, completely blows off our line), then we have other arrows in our quiver.
My whiskey expense account has been a huge hit with gentleman of the press.
The full roster of Illinois tabloids are joined at most events by first-tier scribes from New York and St. Louis, who are wowed when the torchlight crowds top 15,000.
We feed them dope on Lincoln's wimpy oppostion to the Mexican War, and we float rumors that old Abe accepts freebies from cronies at the Illinois Central Railroad.
The payback?
The buggy whip argument gets the same front-page play at that highfalutin' noise about abolitionism.
Men wise in the ways of politics know that three months in a campaign is eternity.
But you may safely inform the distinguished patrons who put bread on our table that come November, this Lincoln upstart will be toast.
If we really do our job, this whole obsession with ending slavery will be back-burnered--indefinitely.
Charlie Clark is a frequent contributor to The Idler.
