Sept. 05--It has been a squandered summer in Springfield.
Sparring Gov. Bruce Rauner and Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan seem no closer to resolving either their differences or the state's financial crisis this Labor Day weekend than they were on Memorial Day.
To move forward, it might do these two well to look back -- to another Illinois financial crisis, to two men at least as disgusted with each other as Rauner and Madigan.
One of these men was Abraham Lincoln, and things got so heated that he wound up challenged to a duel.
Not a rhetorical duel, mind you, as in the public debates across the state in which Lincoln took on Stephen Douglas. If either Rauner or Madigan could make his case so decisively, this thing would be done by now.
This duel was the men-of-honor-seeking-satisfaction-with-lethal weapons kind of duel, Aaron-Burr-vs.-Alexander-Hamilton style.
Lincoln was not yet the "house divided against itself" Great Emancipator. This was a Lincoln not above trolling those with whom he disagreed, baiting them under a made-up handle.
Which, as August rolled into September in 1842, was exactly what Lincoln was doing to a Democrat named James Shields.
An Irish immigrant, Shields would go on to the unprecedented and still-unmatched distinction of becoming a U.S. Senator for three states: Illinois, Minnesota and Missouri. At this point, however, he was merely Illinois' auditor.
Illinois' state bank, which biographer David Herbert Donald notes Lincoln had staunchly defended in the legislature many times, had gone bust.
So Shields -- "quite properly," according to Donald -- announced the state could no longer accept its worthless notes for payment of taxes, only gold or silver.
This was a real problem for farmers and others who had now-worthless state scrip and precious little precious metal, as Lincoln wrote in a letter under the name "Rebecca" published in a Whig-friendly newspaper.
Lincoln was not content to simply note the economic hardship these people faced. He did not merely call Shields "a conceity fool" and "a dunce as well as a liar."
The future president, famously eloquent at Gettysburg many years later, took shots at Shields' manliness as well as his reputation for vanity, purporting to quote the auditor telling women admirers "it is not my fault that I am so handsome and so interesting."
Shields' widow would recall many years later, according to historian Michael Burlingame, that Shields "became very sensitive about it, for it created a great stir. People twitted him on the streets and when he went into stores he was made the butt of jokes."
We tweet, they twitted.
This was exacerbated when Lincoln's future wife Mary Todd, with a friend, penned a letter similarly teasing Shields.
Shields was not pleased. This was a man, Burlingame noted, who would threaten to kill a rival in one of his Senate races and once hit another attorney over the head with a law book saying, "If you have no law in your head, I'll bate some into it."
So it should not be entirely surprising that, upon finding Lincoln was behind the insults and unable to get a retraction or apology, he challenged Lincoln to a duel.
Lincoln accepted, though he almost immediately regretted it and sought counsel to come up with a way out that would preserve his dignity, integrity and, well, his future.
Duels were illegal in Illinois, but this form of deadly conflict resolution was still legal in Missouri. A site was selected just across the Mississippi River. The date set for Sept. 22.
Having been challenged, Lincoln was given a choice of weapons. Pistols were out of the question as Shields was an expert shot.
Lincoln, who dwarfed his opponent by 7 or 8 inches and enjoyed reach that was 3 or 4 inches greater, chose a long cavalry sword like those he had used in the Black Hawk War.
This was not exactly sporting. Combatants were supposed to be on equal footing and Lincoln's choice was intended to keep Shields at arm's length and then some.
At the dueling site, Shields and his entourage met with Team Lincoln. They hashed out a compromise, enabling the two men to shake hands and move on.
Shields withdrew his complaint. Lincoln could then say he was writing merely for political effect and didn't mean to inflict actual damage to Shields' personal reputation.
About 20 years after their near fight to the death, apparently bearing no grudge, President Lincoln nominated Shields for promotion to major general from brigadier general in the Union Army.
Lincoln was not keen on discussing the dueling episode, which earned him criticism from both Democrat and Whig commentators.
Donald wrote Lincoln was embarrassed that he had acted so foolishly, allowed emotions to get the better of him and that, while a lawyer, he had flirted with lawlessness.
"We have heard of Lincoln's saying that the acceptance of the challenge was the meanest thing he ever did in his life," the Chicago Press and Tribune said in a piece on dueling in April 1860.
On the plus side, according to Donald's 1995 "Lincoln," the regrettable affair taught Lincoln to be more judicious with his barbs, which nearly drew blood, and he never again published an anonymous letter, preferring to take on opposition directly.
The lesson here for Rauner and Madigan is not to take up arms. It is that simply opposing each other and lobbing verbal grenades is accomplishing nothing and the stalemate benefits no one.
Today as in 1842, the coffers have run dry. The sniping doesn't change that. Rauner and Madigan's lives aren't on the line, but the livelihoods in the Land of Lincoln are.
philrosenthal@tribpub.com
