POLITICAL INHERENCY OF GEOLOGY 331 
from the Government despite the latter’s strong opposition to the 
plan. Taking the matter into politics held out only hope. Amidst 
the political excitement of that day railroading held little of the 
public attention. Thus, railroad influence in public affairs was 
lost sight of for the next few years. That it was not dead was 
reflected every now and then in many political policies. The 
national trend is shown in the platforms of the political parties. 
When the national Democratic convention met in Charleston, in 
April, 1860, the platform offered by the majority of the resolutions 
committee, on which were delegates from 15 slave states, reflected 
the determined policy of Jefferson Davis and the South, but it 
made no allusion to railroad matters. This was, indeed, passing 
strange, especially in view of the fact that this theme was one 
which Davis had had so very much at heart. A minority report 
of the same committee, presented by Benjamin M. Samuels, of 
Iowa, strongly stressed Governmental aid to insure construction of 
a railway line to the Pacific Coast. The minority portion of the 
committee represented a majority of the people who had voted at 
the previous general election. After the Slave-state delegates 
bolted the convention the Samuels platform was speedily adopted. 
As the best known statesman of the day and as an active aspi¬ 
rant for the highest office in the gift of the Nation, Senator 
Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois, had an unique role to play. That 
he was no doubt early acquainted with the western railroad schemes 
is amply attested by not a few of his many political machinations 
which are otherwise so perfectly inexplicable. How close he ac¬ 
tually was to the Illinois railroad crowd will perhaps never be 
revealed, but it is probable that it w^as never nearer than his own 
political preferment dictated. The possibility of his winning over 
to the railroad support long before the opening of the national 
conventions seemed only a necessary consequence of his astute 
insight into the general situation. His stand on Squatter Sover¬ 
eignty was so pleasing to a very considerable portion of the Re¬ 
publicans that they were quite willing to support him for the 
Presidency. By thus more than off-setting any possible small de¬ 
flection of Southerners this insured his election. But when the 
Democrats split at Charleston with so large a withdrawal of Slave- 
state support certain victory was suddenly turned into certain 
defeat. 
