Memo to Fox News: Abraham Lincoln Didn't Debate a Freed Slave, and This Freed Slaved Didn't Win a Senate Seat in 1858

Here's a recent Fox News graphic on the famous "Lincoln Douglas" debates, which took place as part of the 1858 Illinois Senate race that Lincoln lost.



As anybody who has taken high school history knows, Frederick Douglass (pictured above) is the freed slave known for buying his freedom and then writing several versions of his compelling autobiography and publishing a newspaper. He did not win the 1858 Senate race in Illinois. He did not travel across the state of Illinois and debate Abraham Lincoln in a series of debates.

Stephen A. Douglas is the white guy Abraham Lincoln lost the Senate race to. He's the guy Lincoln debated. It was a white guy. A white guy who supported the awful Dred Scott decision and the expansion of slavery in areas other than the south (if that's what the white people in the territories decided they wanted.)

More here on the "Fox and Friends" gaffe.