Lincoln, Douglas, and Slavery: In the Crucible of Public Debate

Front Cover
University of Chicago Press, 1993 - History - 324 pages
Winner of the Speech Communication's Winans-Wichelns Award for Distinguished Scholarship in Rhetoric and Public Address. Zarefsky examines the dynamics of the seven 1858 Lincoln-Douglas debates, placing them in historical context and explaining the complicated issue of slavery in the territories, their focal point. He elucidates the candidates' arguments, analyzes their rhetorical strategies, and shows how public sentiment is transformed.

From inside the book

Contents

The Issues and the Men
1
The Senatorial Campaign
40
The Conspiracy Argument
68
The Legal Argument
111
The Historical Argument
141
The Moral Argument
166
The Aftermath of the Debates
198
The Debates and Public Argument
223
Copyright

Other editions - View all

Common terms and phrases

About the author (1993)

David Zarefsky is dean of the School of Speech and professor of communication studies at Northwestern University.