It's Bad. It's Damned Bad.

I Was Born Feb. 12, 1809, In Hardin County, Kentucky. My Parents Were Both Born In Virginia, Of Undistinguished Families--second Families, Perhaps I Should Say. My Mother, Who Died In My Tenth Year, Was Of A Family Of The Name Of Hanks.... My Father ... Removed From Kentucky To ... Indiana, In My Eighth Year.... It Was A Wild Region, With Many Bears And Other Wild Animals Still In The Woods. There I Grew Up.... Of Course When I Came Of Age I Did Not Know Much. Still Somehow, I Could Read, Write, And Cipher ... But That Was All.

The Prudent, Penniless Beginner In The World, Labors For Wages Awhile, Saves A Surplus With Which To Buy Tools Or Land, For Himself; Then Labors On His Own Account Another While, And At Length Hires Another New Beginner To Help Him. This, Say Its Advocates, Is Free Labor-the Just And Generous, And Prosperous System, Which Opens The Way For All-gives Hope To All, And Energy, And Progress, And Improvement Of Condition To All.

One Is A Majority If He Is Right.

The Foregoing History May Not Be Precisely Accurate In Every Particular; But I Am Sure It Is Sufficiently So, For All The Uses I Shall Attempt To Make Of It, And In It, We Have Before Us, The Chief Material Enabling Us To Correctly Judge Whether The Repeal Of The Missouri Compromise Is Right Or Wrong.

The Father Of Waters Again Goes Unvexed To The Sea.