Stephen Arnold Douglas (né Douglass; April 23, 1813 – June 3, 1861) was an American politician and lawyer from Illinois. A Democrat, he served in the United States Senate for fourteen years and defeated Abraham Lincoln to win reelection in 1858, a campaign known for the pivotal Lincoln–Douglas debates. He was the representative of the Northern Democrats in the 1860 United States presidential election; with the Democrats split between northern and southern factions in the leadup to the American Civil War, he was defeated by Lincoln, the Republican nominee. During his senate career, Douglas was one of the brokers of the Compromise of 1850, which sought to avert a sectional crisis over the issue of slavery. To deal with the volatile issue of whether to extend slavery into US territories, Douglas became the foremost advocate of popular sovereignty, which held that the voters of each territory should be allowed to decide. At just 5 feet 4 inches (1.63 m) tall, Douglas was nicknamed the "Little Giant" because he was short in physical stature but a forceful and dominant figure in politics.
Born in Brandon, Vermont, Douglas migrated to Jacksonville, Illinois, in 1833 to establish a legal practice. He 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 was appointed to the Supreme Court of Illinois in 1841. In 1843, he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives. Douglas became an ally of President James K. Polk and favored Texas annexation and US involvement in 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 U.S. Senate in 1847, and he emerged as a national leader during the 1850s. Along with Senator Henry Clay of the Whig Party, he led the effort to pass the Compromise of 1850, which attempted to settle the slavery issues that arose after the Mexican–American War. Douglas was a candidate for president at the 1852 Democratic National Convention but lost the nomination to Franklin Pierce, who won the election. Seeking to open western territories for expansion, Douglas introduced the Kansas–Nebraska Act in 1854. Though Douglas had hoped the act would ease sectional tensions, it helped fuel the rise of the anti-slavery Republican Party. Douglas once again sought the presidency in 1856, but the Democratic convention nominated James Buchanan, who went on to win the election. Buchanan and Douglas split over the admission of Kansas as a slave state, and Douglas helped block admission, accusing the pro-slavery Kansas legislature of conducting an illegitimate election. Kansas eventually came into the Union as a free state.
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. Disagreements over slavery led Southern delegates to bolt from the 1860 Democratic National Convention. The rump convention of Northern delegates nominated Douglas for president, while Southern Democrats threw their support behind John C. Breckinridge, Buchanan's vice president. In the 1860 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. Campaigning throughout the country, North and South, during the election, Douglas warned of the dangers of secession and urged audiences to stay loyal to the United States. Lincoln's strong support in the North led to his victory. After the Battle of Fort Sumter at the start of the Civil War, Douglas rallied support for the Union, but he died in June 1861.
He was born Stephen Arnold Douglass in Brandon, Vermont, on April 23, 1813, the son of physician Stephen Arnold Douglass and Sarah (Fisk) Douglass. Douglas had an older sister, Sarah, who was called Sally. According to historian Martin H. Quitt, the younger Douglas dropped the second "s" from his name in 1846, the year after publication of Frederick Douglass's first autobiography. However, historian Reg Ankrom wrote that Douglas spelled his surname with one "s" as early as 1839. Douglas's paternal ancestors had migrated to New England in the 17th century, and his paternal grandfather, Benajah Douglass, served several terms in the Vermont House of Representatives. Douglas's father died of a stroke on July 1, 1813, as he cradled two-month-old Douglas.
Douglas, his mother, and his sister moved to the farm three miles north of Brandon that his mother and her brother Edward inherited from Douglas's father. On the farm, Douglas was responsible for chores including chopping wood and removing rocks from the land. During the winter, he received an elementary education at the Brandon District School. As a teenager, Douglas left the family farm for Middlebury and apprenticed himself to cabinetmaker Nahum Parker. He began reading political literature and engaging in discussions with his employer and other young men. Douglas enjoyed carpentry: "I have never been placed in any situation ... which I enjoyed to so great an extent as the cabinet shop". He returned to Brandon after he grew dissatisfied with Parker, who expected him to do housework. He began an apprenticeship with Brandon cabinetmaker Deacon Caleb Knowlton, but quit after falling ill in 1829.
Douglas moved back to the farm and enrolled at Brandon Academy, where he became a member of the debate club. On February 14, 1830, his sister married Julius N. Granger, a resident of Ontario County, New York; later that year, Douglas's mother married Granger's father, Gehazi. The whole family then relocated to the Granger farm in Clifton Springs, New York and Douglas continued his education at nearby Canandaigua Academy. He came to admire Andrew Jackson and Thomas Jefferson's ideas informed Douglas's political views; in debates with his peers he consistently argued for states' rights and limited government. He frequently gave speeches supporting Jackson and the Democratic Party, and his oratory caused his peers to esteem him more than any other student.
In January 1833, Douglas began to study law with attorneys Levi and Walter Hubbell. While clerking for the Hubbells, Douglas became friendly with Henry B. Payne, who was studying law at the nearby office of John C. Spencer. He was eager to begin his career and by June 1833, he recognized that if he stayed in New York or returned to Vermont, he would have to wait four years for admission to the bar. He decided to move west despite the protests of his mother, who feared a move would worsen his fragile health; she relented and gave him a small amount of money to facilitate his travels.
After a short stay in Buffalo, New York, and a visit to Niagara Falls, Douglas took a steamboat to Cleveland, Ohio. He initially hoped to establish himself in Cleveland, knowing that it would take him only a year to gain admission to the Ohio bar. Prosecutor Sherlock J. Andrews accepted Douglas as a clerk, but just five days later he was stricken with typhoid, and he was ill for four months. Henry Payne arrived in Cleveland soon after Douglas, and he took on the task of nursing Douglas back to health. After paying his medical and lodging bills with money his mother sent while he was ill, Douglas had forty dollars, which he used to continue traveling west.
Douglas took a canal boat from Cleveland to Portsmouth, Ohio, then traveled on to Cincinnati, Louisville, and St. Louis. Finding no opportunity in any of these cities, and almost out of cash, he decided his future lay in a small country town, so he moved to Jacksonville, Illinois. In Jacksonville, Douglas befriended attorney Murray McConnel, who advised Douglas to start a law practice in Pekin, which McConnel believed was destined to become a major shipping hub. With law books gifted by McConnel to replace the ones he had sold, Douglas waited in Meredosia for a steamboat to take him to Pekin. After a week, he learned the only boat that traveled this route had blown up in Alton.