SPRINGFIELD, Ill.: With the nation racing to come to grips with centuries of racial sins, officials plan to remove the Capitol lawn statue of Stephen A. Douglas, whose forceful 19th century politics helped forge modern-day Illinois but who also profited from slavery.
Just inside the Statehouse hangs another revered depiction of an Illinois legend and longtime Douglas rival who expressed white supremacist views: Abraham Lincoln. The immense painting in the governor’s second-floor office depicts a Sept. 18, 1858, debate between the two men that opened with these words from Lincoln, who was vying for Douglas’ Senate seat and was still two years away from running for president:
I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and Black races. ……
