Everything I Know About Lincoln....
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yongrel
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and yet when I took the official AP History test my junior year (the one given to every AP History student in the country) there were 3 questions that either said explicitly or implied that the Civil War was fought to end slavery.
I hate public schools.
I hate public schools.
Hook
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Duckman
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I first began to reconsider my opinions about Lincoln when I saw Ken Burns' Civil War series years ago on PBS.
Lincoln was VERY unpopular for most of the war. NYC saw huge draft riots (there had never before been a draft in US history). There is a scene in the Ken Burns series which quotes a London newspaper describing the US Civil War as a war for empire, since the obvious sentiment of the Southern states was that they wanted to leave the US peacefully.
IMO Lincoln was one of the first Presidents to take large amounts of unconstitutional power and set a very bad precedent from there on.
Unfortunately, in the 20th century it is almost impossible to attack Lincoln without being percieved as pro-slavery or racist. This is very unfortunate. I totally and vehemently despise both slavery and racism as inhuman. I am glad the Civil War ended slavery (although it took another 100 years to make a dent in racism). I do think Ron Paul's suggestion that we could have bought our way out of slavery is insightful and enlightening in an age where too many people feel war is the only answer to the world's most significant problems.
Lincoln was VERY unpopular for most of the war. NYC saw huge draft riots (there had never before been a draft in US history). There is a scene in the Ken Burns series which quotes a London newspaper describing the US Civil War as a war for empire, since the obvious sentiment of the Southern states was that they wanted to leave the US peacefully.
IMO Lincoln was one of the first Presidents to take large amounts of unconstitutional power and set a very bad precedent from there on.
Unfortunately, in the 20th century it is almost impossible to attack Lincoln without being percieved as pro-slavery or racist. This is very unfortunate. I totally and vehemently despise both slavery and racism as inhuman. I am glad the Civil War ended slavery (although it took another 100 years to make a dent in racism). I do think Ron Paul's suggestion that we could have bought our way out of slavery is insightful and enlightening in an age where too many people feel war is the only answer to the world's most significant problems.
chipvogel
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A President that looses his life in service to his country becomes deified and thems fightin words if you say otherwise.
Abraham Lincoln Quote
"I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been in favor of bringing about in anyway the social and political equality of the white and black races - that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any other man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race. I say upon this occasion I do not perceive that because the white man is to have the superior position the negro should be denied everything."
I wonder why we never covered this in history classes?
Abraham Lincoln Quote
"I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been in favor of bringing about in anyway the social and political equality of the white and black races - that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any other man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race. I say upon this occasion I do not perceive that because the white man is to have the superior position the negro should be denied everything."
I wonder why we never covered this in history classes?
SovereignMN
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From the Simpsons:
Proctor: All right, here's your last question. What was the cause of the Civil War?
Apu: Actually, there were numerous causes. Aside from the obvious schism between the abolitionists and the anti-abolitionists, there were economic factors, both domestic and inter--
Proctor: Wait, wait... just say slavery.
Apu: Slavery it is, sir.
Proctor: All right, here's your last question. What was the cause of the Civil War?
Apu: Actually, there were numerous causes. Aside from the obvious schism between the abolitionists and the anti-abolitionists, there were economic factors, both domestic and inter--
Proctor: Wait, wait... just say slavery.
Apu: Slavery it is, sir.
Kregener
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The Real Lincoln
• He was a consummate politician who spoke out of both sides of his mouth, saying one thing to one audience and the opposite to another.
• He was adamantly opposed to racial equality, actually using the words "superior and inferior" to describe the "appropriate" relation between the white and black races.
• He opposed giving blacks the right to vote, to serve on juries, or to intermarry with whites.
• He supported the legal rights of slave owners and pledged his support of a constitutional amendment that would have prohibited the federal government from ever interfering with Southern slavery.
• He was a mercantilist and a political tool of corrupt Northern business interests.
• He was a railroad industry lobbyist who championed corporate welfare.
• He once represented a slave owner in a case in which he sought to recover his runaway slaves. Lincoln lost the case and the slaves gained their freedom.
• He advocated sending all blacks back to Africa, Central America, or Haiti – anywhere but the U.S.
• He proposed strengthening the Fugitive Slave Law.
• He opposed the extension of slavery into the territories so that "free white people" would not have to associate with blacks or compete with them for jobs.
• He opposed black citizenship in Illinois and supported the state’s constitution which prohibited the emigration of black people into the state.
• He was the head of the Illinois Colonization Society, which advocated the use of state tax dollars to deport the small number of free blacks that resided within the state.
• He nullified the early emancipation of slaves in Missouri and Georgia early in the war.
• He sent troops to New York City to put down a draft riot by shooting hundreds of them in the streets.
• He was an enemy of free-market capitalism.
• He started a war over tax collection that ended up killing 620,000 Americans and wounding and maiming even more.
• He conjured up the spectacular lie that no such thing as state sovereignty ever existed to "justify" his invasion and conquest of the Southern states.
• He refused to meet with Confederate peace commissioners before the war to work out a peaceful compromise.
• He provoked the upper South – Virginia, North Carolina, Arkansas and Tennessee – to secede by launching a military invasion of their sister states.
• He supported economic interventionism through protectionist tariffs, corporate welfare, and central banking that would plunder one section of the country (the South) for the benefit of his Northern political supporters.
• He started a war without the consent of Congress; illegally declared martial law; illegally blockaded Southern ports; illegally suspended habeas corpus and arrested tens of thousands of political opponents; illegally orchestrated the secession of West Virginia; shut down hundreds of opposition newspapers and imprisoned their editors and owners; deported the most outspoken member of the Democratic Party opposition, Congressman Clement L. Vallandigham of Ohio; confiscated private property, including firearms; ignored the Ninth and Tenth Amendments; tolerated the arrest of ministers who refused to publicly pray for him; arrested duly elected members of the Maryland legislature as well as Congressman Henry May of Baltimore; and supported a law that indemnified federal officials from all of these illegal acts.
• He orchestrated the rigging of Northern elections.
• Introduced the slavery of conscription and income taxation.
• Censored all telegraph communication.
• Waged war on civilians by having his armies bomb Southern cities and destroy or steal crops, livestock and private property throughout the South.
• Created an enormous political patronage system that survives today.
• Allowed the unjust mass execution of Sioux Indians in Minnesota.
• Destroyed the system of federalism and states’ rights that was created by the founding fathers, thereby destroying the voluntary union.
• Promoted generals for their willingness to use troops as cannon fodder.
• Created an internal revenue bureaucracy that has never diminished in size and power
Six Myths About Lincoln
Myth #1: Lincoln invaded the South to free the slaves. Ending slavery and racial injustice is not why the North invaded. As Lincoln wrote to Horace Greeley on Aug. 22, 1862: "My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and it is not either to save or destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it"
Congress announced to the world on July 22, 1861, that the purpose of the war was not "interfering with the rights or established institutions of those states" (i.e., slavery), but to preserve the Union "with the rights of the several states unimpaired." At the time of Fort Sumter (April 12, 1861) only the seven states of the deep South had seceded. There were more slaves in the Union than out of it, and Lincoln had no plans to free any of them.
The North invaded to regain lost federal tax revenue by keeping the Union intact by force of arms. In his First Inaugural Lincoln promised to invade any state that failed to collect "the duties and imposts," and he kept his promise. On April 19, 1861, the reason Lincoln gave for his naval blockade of the Southern ports was that "the collection of the revenue cannot be effectually executed" in the states that had seceded.
Myth #2: Lincoln's war saved the Union. The war may have saved the Union geographically, but it destroyed it philosophically by destroying its voluntary nature. In the Articles of Confederation, the Declaration of Independence, and the Constitution, the states described themselves as "free and independent." They delegated certain powers to the federal government they had created as their agent but retained sovereignty for themselves.
This was widely understood in the North as well as the South in 1861. As the Brooklyn Daily Eagle editorialized on Nov. 13, 1860, the Union "depends for its continuance on the free consent and will of the sovereign people of each state, and when that consent and will is withdrawn on either part, their Union is gone." The New York Journal of Commerce concurred, writing on Jan. 12, 1861, that a coerced Union changes the nature of government from "a voluntary one, in which the people are sovereigns, to a despotism where one part of the people are slaves." The majority of Northern newspapers agreed.
Myth #3: Lincoln championed equality and natural rights. His words and, more important, his actions, repudiate this myth. "I have no purpose to introduce political and social equality between the white and black races," he announced in his Aug. 21, 1858, debate with Stephen Douglas. "I, as well as Judge Douglas, am in favor of the race to which I belong having the superior position." And, "Free them [slaves] and make them politically and socially our equals? My own feelings will not admit of this. We cannot, then, make them equals."
In Springfield, Ill., on July 17, 1858, Lincoln said, "What I would most desire would be the separation of the white and black races." On Sept. 18, 1858, in Charleston, Ill., he said: "I will to the very last stand by the law of this state, which forbids the marrying of white people with Negroes."
Lincoln supported the Illinois Constitution, which prohibited the emigration of black people into the state, and he also supported the Illinois Black Codes, which deprived the small number of free blacks in the state any semblance of citizenship. He strongly supported the Fugitive Slave Act, which compelled Northern states to capture runaway slaves and return them to their owners. In his First Inaugural he pledged his support of a proposed constitutional amendment that had just passed the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives that would have prohibited the federal government from ever having the power "to abolish or interfere, within any State, with the domestic institutions thereof, including that of persons held to labor or service by the laws of said State." In his First Inaugural Lincoln advocated making this amendment "express and irrevocable."
Lincoln was also a lifelong advocate of "colonization" or shipping all black people to Africa, Central America, Haiti--anywhere but here. "I cannot make it better known than it already is," he stated in a Dec. 1, 1862, Message to Congress, "that I strongly favor colonization." To Lincoln, blacks could be "equal," but not in the United States.
Myth #4: Lincoln was a defender of the Constitution. Quite the contrary: Generations of historians have labeled Lincoln a "dictator." "Dictatorship played a decisive role in the North's successful effort to maintain the Union by force of arms," wrote Clinton Rossiter in "Constitutional Dictatorship." And, "Lincoln's amazing disregard for the Constitution was considered by nobody as legal."
James G. Randall documented Lincoln's assault on the Constitution in "Constitutional Problems Under Lincoln." Lincoln unconstitutionally suspended the writ of habeas corpus and had the military arrest tens of thousands of Northern political opponents, including dozens of newspaper editors and owners. Some 300 newspapers were shut down and all telegraph communication was censored. Northern elections were rigged; Democratic voters were intimidated by federal soldiers; hundreds of New York City draft protesters were gunned down by federal troops; West Virginia was unconstitutionally carved out of Virginia; and the most outspoken member of the Democratic Party opposition, Congressman Clement L. Vallandigham of Ohio, was deported. Duly elected members of the Maryland legislature were imprisoned, as was the mayor of Baltimore and Congressman Henry May. The border states were systematically disarmed in violation of the Second Amendment and private property was confiscated. Lincoln's apologists say he had "to destroy the Constitution in order to save it."
Myth #5: Lincoln was a "great humanitarian" who had "malice toward none." This is inconsistent with the fact that Lincoln micromanaged the waging of war on civilians, including the burning of entire towns populated only by civilians; massive looting and plundering; rape; and the execution of civilians (See Mark Grimsley, "The Hard Hand of War"). Pro-Lincoln historian Lee Kennett wrote in "Marching Through Georgia" that, had the Confederates somehow won, they would have been justified in "stringing up President Lincoln and the entire Union high command" as war criminals.
Myth #6: War was necessary to end slavery. During the 19th century, dozens of countries, including the British and Spanish empires, ended slavery peacefully through compensated emancipation. Among such countries were Argentina, Colombia, Chile, all of Central America, Mexico, Bolivia, Uruguay, the French and Danish colonies, Ecuador, Peru, and Venezuela. (Lincoln did propose compensated emancipation for the border states, but coupled his proposal with deportation of any freed slaves. He failed to see it through, however). Only in America was war associated with emancipation.
The Unknown Lincoln
Lincoln has long been portrayed as a folksy, hayseed country lawyer. But the truth is, he was the highest-paid trial lawyer in Illinois whose clients included the Illinois Central Railroad, which at the time was the biggest corporation in the world. He "was one of the most skillful and highly paid attorneys of the region" who was "ready support either side of any case.... Lincoln’s earnings placed him among the wealthy elite." He was essentially a lobbyist for the Northern plutocracy and its anti-populist, mercantilist policies.
Lincoln has also been portrayed as a champion of personal liberty and a defender of the Constitution. He frequently promised to uphold the law and the Constitution. But the "Lincoln No One Knows" suspended the writ of Habeas Corpus, the only personal liberty law in the Constitution, and ordered the military to arrest tens of thousands of Northern citizens for merely voicing opposition to his administration. This number included hundreds of Northern newspaper editors and owners who criticized the Lincoln administration. None of these individuals was ever served a warrant and some spent four years in military prison without any due process. A member of Congress, Clement L. Vallandhigham of Ohio, was deported because of his outspoken opposition to the Lincoln administration.
Lincoln signed into law the first military conscription law which, at the time, was considered to be unconstitutional by the chief justice of the US Supreme Court, Roger B. Taney. Taney issued a private opinion, but the issue was never brought to the Supreme Court during Lincoln’s time. The New York Evening Press denounced the conscription law as "slavery, accursed slavery," and there were violent draft riots in Ohio, Illinois, New York, Pennsylvania, Kentucky, Indiana, New Jersey, and Wisconsin. Lincoln’s own son Robert remained at Harvard until 1864, when newspapers began making a stink about his lack of military service. Lincoln then placed him in a safe and secure place as an "official escort to notables" (including his father) on General Grant’s staff. His military "service" only lasted three months, however.
What led Lincoln to "countermand early efforts to free some slaves," Garrison asks. He refers here to the efforts early in the war by Union Generals John Fremont and David Hunter to issue orders to emancipate slaves in Missouri and Georgia, respectively, that were owned by secessionists (loyal Unionists could keep their slaves). Lincoln rescinded both orders. As Garrison wrote, "During a ten-month period, repeated efforts at emancipation were thwarted by Lincoln."
Garrison labels this behavior a mystery, but it is not so mysterious if one takes Lincoln’s word when he said that his "paramount objective" was to destroy the secession movement, not to do anything about slavery.
The "rail splitting," hayseed lawyer was in fact a master politician. This is why a supposed political "novice" got the upper hand over Congress, as Garrison explains in one chapter. Lincoln the master politician launched an invasion without consent of Congress, blockaded Southern ports, suspended Habeas Corpus, and essentially declared himself dictator. "It was almost as though the nation’s lawmaking body didn’t exist," writes Garrison.
And "how did a tenderhearted man direct wholesale slaughter for month after month?" Garrison notes how Lincoln was a master micromanager of the war effort. He paid numerous visits to the headquarters of various regiments, repeatedly reviewed troops, directly made many military appointments himself, rather than leaving it to his generals, and paid special attention to weapons. He developed "an enthusiasm for testing weapons of every kind and size" to be used to bombard both Confederate soldiers and Southern civilians. He even "considered the use of body armor and may have tried it on himself."
Lincoln mythology includes tales of how many times he supposedly wept over the news of acquaintances being killed in the war, and in his 1860 campaign biography he claimed to have been emotionally devastated over having shot a turkey as a child. But as hundreds of thousands of men were killed in the war, and hundreds of thousands more maimed for life, no one around Lincoln "reported anything approaching a public display of emotion" upon learning of such massive battlefield deaths, writes Garrison.
Informed of how the federal army had pillaged, plundered, burned, and raped its way through the defenseless Shenandoah Valley in 1864, Lincoln only conveyed "the thanks of a nation" to General Philip Sheridan, the chief plunderer, and added his personal gratitude.
Hundreds of thousands of Northerners favored a peaceful resolution but were conscripted into Lincoln’s army. When their deaths were brought up, Lincoln claimed that they were "endeavoring to purchase with their blood and their lives the future happiness and prosperity of the country."
Lincoln is also hailed as a champion – if not savior – of American democracy. But his notion of democracy was quite odd. In his December 8, 1863, Message to Congress he declared that "democracy" could be restored to the conquered Southern states if ten percent of the population could be found who were Unionists and could be used to govern the other 90 percent – with the "support" of Federal troops. "Use only trusted Union men," Lincoln proclaimed, and "exclude all others."
Perhaps more importantly, Lincoln’s stated purpose in the war was to destroy the principle of the Declaration of Independence that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed. Southerners no longer consented to being governed by Washington, DC, so Lincoln waged total war against them for four long years. Of course, he didn’t put it this way but instead sugarcoated his objective with language about "saving the Union." At the time many Americans – including dozens of Northern newspaper editors – considered the act of compelling a state to remain in the Union at gunpoint to be destructive of the voluntary union of the states. And they were right.
• He was a consummate politician who spoke out of both sides of his mouth, saying one thing to one audience and the opposite to another.
• He was adamantly opposed to racial equality, actually using the words "superior and inferior" to describe the "appropriate" relation between the white and black races.
• He opposed giving blacks the right to vote, to serve on juries, or to intermarry with whites.
• He supported the legal rights of slave owners and pledged his support of a constitutional amendment that would have prohibited the federal government from ever interfering with Southern slavery.
• He was a mercantilist and a political tool of corrupt Northern business interests.
• He was a railroad industry lobbyist who championed corporate welfare.
• He once represented a slave owner in a case in which he sought to recover his runaway slaves. Lincoln lost the case and the slaves gained their freedom.
• He advocated sending all blacks back to Africa, Central America, or Haiti – anywhere but the U.S.
• He proposed strengthening the Fugitive Slave Law.
• He opposed the extension of slavery into the territories so that "free white people" would not have to associate with blacks or compete with them for jobs.
• He opposed black citizenship in Illinois and supported the state’s constitution which prohibited the emigration of black people into the state.
• He was the head of the Illinois Colonization Society, which advocated the use of state tax dollars to deport the small number of free blacks that resided within the state.
• He nullified the early emancipation of slaves in Missouri and Georgia early in the war.
• He sent troops to New York City to put down a draft riot by shooting hundreds of them in the streets.
• He was an enemy of free-market capitalism.
• He started a war over tax collection that ended up killing 620,000 Americans and wounding and maiming even more.
• He conjured up the spectacular lie that no such thing as state sovereignty ever existed to "justify" his invasion and conquest of the Southern states.
• He refused to meet with Confederate peace commissioners before the war to work out a peaceful compromise.
• He provoked the upper South – Virginia, North Carolina, Arkansas and Tennessee – to secede by launching a military invasion of their sister states.
• He supported economic interventionism through protectionist tariffs, corporate welfare, and central banking that would plunder one section of the country (the South) for the benefit of his Northern political supporters.
• He started a war without the consent of Congress; illegally declared martial law; illegally blockaded Southern ports; illegally suspended habeas corpus and arrested tens of thousands of political opponents; illegally orchestrated the secession of West Virginia; shut down hundreds of opposition newspapers and imprisoned their editors and owners; deported the most outspoken member of the Democratic Party opposition, Congressman Clement L. Vallandigham of Ohio; confiscated private property, including firearms; ignored the Ninth and Tenth Amendments; tolerated the arrest of ministers who refused to publicly pray for him; arrested duly elected members of the Maryland legislature as well as Congressman Henry May of Baltimore; and supported a law that indemnified federal officials from all of these illegal acts.
• He orchestrated the rigging of Northern elections.
• Introduced the slavery of conscription and income taxation.
• Censored all telegraph communication.
• Waged war on civilians by having his armies bomb Southern cities and destroy or steal crops, livestock and private property throughout the South.
• Created an enormous political patronage system that survives today.
• Allowed the unjust mass execution of Sioux Indians in Minnesota.
• Destroyed the system of federalism and states’ rights that was created by the founding fathers, thereby destroying the voluntary union.
• Promoted generals for their willingness to use troops as cannon fodder.
• Created an internal revenue bureaucracy that has never diminished in size and power
Six Myths About Lincoln
Myth #1: Lincoln invaded the South to free the slaves. Ending slavery and racial injustice is not why the North invaded. As Lincoln wrote to Horace Greeley on Aug. 22, 1862: "My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and it is not either to save or destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it"
Congress announced to the world on July 22, 1861, that the purpose of the war was not "interfering with the rights or established institutions of those states" (i.e., slavery), but to preserve the Union "with the rights of the several states unimpaired." At the time of Fort Sumter (April 12, 1861) only the seven states of the deep South had seceded. There were more slaves in the Union than out of it, and Lincoln had no plans to free any of them.
The North invaded to regain lost federal tax revenue by keeping the Union intact by force of arms. In his First Inaugural Lincoln promised to invade any state that failed to collect "the duties and imposts," and he kept his promise. On April 19, 1861, the reason Lincoln gave for his naval blockade of the Southern ports was that "the collection of the revenue cannot be effectually executed" in the states that had seceded.
Myth #2: Lincoln's war saved the Union. The war may have saved the Union geographically, but it destroyed it philosophically by destroying its voluntary nature. In the Articles of Confederation, the Declaration of Independence, and the Constitution, the states described themselves as "free and independent." They delegated certain powers to the federal government they had created as their agent but retained sovereignty for themselves.
This was widely understood in the North as well as the South in 1861. As the Brooklyn Daily Eagle editorialized on Nov. 13, 1860, the Union "depends for its continuance on the free consent and will of the sovereign people of each state, and when that consent and will is withdrawn on either part, their Union is gone." The New York Journal of Commerce concurred, writing on Jan. 12, 1861, that a coerced Union changes the nature of government from "a voluntary one, in which the people are sovereigns, to a despotism where one part of the people are slaves." The majority of Northern newspapers agreed.
Myth #3: Lincoln championed equality and natural rights. His words and, more important, his actions, repudiate this myth. "I have no purpose to introduce political and social equality between the white and black races," he announced in his Aug. 21, 1858, debate with Stephen Douglas. "I, as well as Judge Douglas, am in favor of the race to which I belong having the superior position." And, "Free them [slaves] and make them politically and socially our equals? My own feelings will not admit of this. We cannot, then, make them equals."
In Springfield, Ill., on July 17, 1858, Lincoln said, "What I would most desire would be the separation of the white and black races." On Sept. 18, 1858, in Charleston, Ill., he said: "I will to the very last stand by the law of this state, which forbids the marrying of white people with Negroes."
Lincoln supported the Illinois Constitution, which prohibited the emigration of black people into the state, and he also supported the Illinois Black Codes, which deprived the small number of free blacks in the state any semblance of citizenship. He strongly supported the Fugitive Slave Act, which compelled Northern states to capture runaway slaves and return them to their owners. In his First Inaugural he pledged his support of a proposed constitutional amendment that had just passed the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives that would have prohibited the federal government from ever having the power "to abolish or interfere, within any State, with the domestic institutions thereof, including that of persons held to labor or service by the laws of said State." In his First Inaugural Lincoln advocated making this amendment "express and irrevocable."
Lincoln was also a lifelong advocate of "colonization" or shipping all black people to Africa, Central America, Haiti--anywhere but here. "I cannot make it better known than it already is," he stated in a Dec. 1, 1862, Message to Congress, "that I strongly favor colonization." To Lincoln, blacks could be "equal," but not in the United States.
Myth #4: Lincoln was a defender of the Constitution. Quite the contrary: Generations of historians have labeled Lincoln a "dictator." "Dictatorship played a decisive role in the North's successful effort to maintain the Union by force of arms," wrote Clinton Rossiter in "Constitutional Dictatorship." And, "Lincoln's amazing disregard for the Constitution was considered by nobody as legal."
James G. Randall documented Lincoln's assault on the Constitution in "Constitutional Problems Under Lincoln." Lincoln unconstitutionally suspended the writ of habeas corpus and had the military arrest tens of thousands of Northern political opponents, including dozens of newspaper editors and owners. Some 300 newspapers were shut down and all telegraph communication was censored. Northern elections were rigged; Democratic voters were intimidated by federal soldiers; hundreds of New York City draft protesters were gunned down by federal troops; West Virginia was unconstitutionally carved out of Virginia; and the most outspoken member of the Democratic Party opposition, Congressman Clement L. Vallandigham of Ohio, was deported. Duly elected members of the Maryland legislature were imprisoned, as was the mayor of Baltimore and Congressman Henry May. The border states were systematically disarmed in violation of the Second Amendment and private property was confiscated. Lincoln's apologists say he had "to destroy the Constitution in order to save it."
Myth #5: Lincoln was a "great humanitarian" who had "malice toward none." This is inconsistent with the fact that Lincoln micromanaged the waging of war on civilians, including the burning of entire towns populated only by civilians; massive looting and plundering; rape; and the execution of civilians (See Mark Grimsley, "The Hard Hand of War"). Pro-Lincoln historian Lee Kennett wrote in "Marching Through Georgia" that, had the Confederates somehow won, they would have been justified in "stringing up President Lincoln and the entire Union high command" as war criminals.
Myth #6: War was necessary to end slavery. During the 19th century, dozens of countries, including the British and Spanish empires, ended slavery peacefully through compensated emancipation. Among such countries were Argentina, Colombia, Chile, all of Central America, Mexico, Bolivia, Uruguay, the French and Danish colonies, Ecuador, Peru, and Venezuela. (Lincoln did propose compensated emancipation for the border states, but coupled his proposal with deportation of any freed slaves. He failed to see it through, however). Only in America was war associated with emancipation.
The Unknown Lincoln
Lincoln has long been portrayed as a folksy, hayseed country lawyer. But the truth is, he was the highest-paid trial lawyer in Illinois whose clients included the Illinois Central Railroad, which at the time was the biggest corporation in the world. He "was one of the most skillful and highly paid attorneys of the region" who was "ready support either side of any case.... Lincoln’s earnings placed him among the wealthy elite." He was essentially a lobbyist for the Northern plutocracy and its anti-populist, mercantilist policies.
Lincoln has also been portrayed as a champion of personal liberty and a defender of the Constitution. He frequently promised to uphold the law and the Constitution. But the "Lincoln No One Knows" suspended the writ of Habeas Corpus, the only personal liberty law in the Constitution, and ordered the military to arrest tens of thousands of Northern citizens for merely voicing opposition to his administration. This number included hundreds of Northern newspaper editors and owners who criticized the Lincoln administration. None of these individuals was ever served a warrant and some spent four years in military prison without any due process. A member of Congress, Clement L. Vallandhigham of Ohio, was deported because of his outspoken opposition to the Lincoln administration.
Lincoln signed into law the first military conscription law which, at the time, was considered to be unconstitutional by the chief justice of the US Supreme Court, Roger B. Taney. Taney issued a private opinion, but the issue was never brought to the Supreme Court during Lincoln’s time. The New York Evening Press denounced the conscription law as "slavery, accursed slavery," and there were violent draft riots in Ohio, Illinois, New York, Pennsylvania, Kentucky, Indiana, New Jersey, and Wisconsin. Lincoln’s own son Robert remained at Harvard until 1864, when newspapers began making a stink about his lack of military service. Lincoln then placed him in a safe and secure place as an "official escort to notables" (including his father) on General Grant’s staff. His military "service" only lasted three months, however.
What led Lincoln to "countermand early efforts to free some slaves," Garrison asks. He refers here to the efforts early in the war by Union Generals John Fremont and David Hunter to issue orders to emancipate slaves in Missouri and Georgia, respectively, that were owned by secessionists (loyal Unionists could keep their slaves). Lincoln rescinded both orders. As Garrison wrote, "During a ten-month period, repeated efforts at emancipation were thwarted by Lincoln."
Garrison labels this behavior a mystery, but it is not so mysterious if one takes Lincoln’s word when he said that his "paramount objective" was to destroy the secession movement, not to do anything about slavery.
The "rail splitting," hayseed lawyer was in fact a master politician. This is why a supposed political "novice" got the upper hand over Congress, as Garrison explains in one chapter. Lincoln the master politician launched an invasion without consent of Congress, blockaded Southern ports, suspended Habeas Corpus, and essentially declared himself dictator. "It was almost as though the nation’s lawmaking body didn’t exist," writes Garrison.
And "how did a tenderhearted man direct wholesale slaughter for month after month?" Garrison notes how Lincoln was a master micromanager of the war effort. He paid numerous visits to the headquarters of various regiments, repeatedly reviewed troops, directly made many military appointments himself, rather than leaving it to his generals, and paid special attention to weapons. He developed "an enthusiasm for testing weapons of every kind and size" to be used to bombard both Confederate soldiers and Southern civilians. He even "considered the use of body armor and may have tried it on himself."
Lincoln mythology includes tales of how many times he supposedly wept over the news of acquaintances being killed in the war, and in his 1860 campaign biography he claimed to have been emotionally devastated over having shot a turkey as a child. But as hundreds of thousands of men were killed in the war, and hundreds of thousands more maimed for life, no one around Lincoln "reported anything approaching a public display of emotion" upon learning of such massive battlefield deaths, writes Garrison.
Informed of how the federal army had pillaged, plundered, burned, and raped its way through the defenseless Shenandoah Valley in 1864, Lincoln only conveyed "the thanks of a nation" to General Philip Sheridan, the chief plunderer, and added his personal gratitude.
Hundreds of thousands of Northerners favored a peaceful resolution but were conscripted into Lincoln’s army. When their deaths were brought up, Lincoln claimed that they were "endeavoring to purchase with their blood and their lives the future happiness and prosperity of the country."
Lincoln is also hailed as a champion – if not savior – of American democracy. But his notion of democracy was quite odd. In his December 8, 1863, Message to Congress he declared that "democracy" could be restored to the conquered Southern states if ten percent of the population could be found who were Unionists and could be used to govern the other 90 percent – with the "support" of Federal troops. "Use only trusted Union men," Lincoln proclaimed, and "exclude all others."
Perhaps more importantly, Lincoln’s stated purpose in the war was to destroy the principle of the Declaration of Independence that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed. Southerners no longer consented to being governed by Washington, DC, so Lincoln waged total war against them for four long years. Of course, he didn’t put it this way but instead sugarcoated his objective with language about "saving the Union." At the time many Americans – including dozens of Northern newspaper editors – considered the act of compelling a state to remain in the Union at gunpoint to be destructive of the voluntary union of the states. And they were right.
Paul.Bearer.of.Injustice
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Freedom is the most powerful concept and idea, and is one and the same as LOVE... and even the mere mention of it speaks to the deepest parts of the soul.
Because of this power, evil politicians like Lincoln and Bush always invoke it blasphemously to gain blind agreement with their agendas. The sleepers feel the emotion invoked, but are blinded by their atrophied awareness, and become lambs to the slaughter.
God Bless Ron Paul and shedding light on consensus ignorance.
Viva la revolucion
Because of this power, evil politicians like Lincoln and Bush always invoke it blasphemously to gain blind agreement with their agendas. The sleepers feel the emotion invoked, but are blinded by their atrophied awareness, and become lambs to the slaughter.
God Bless Ron Paul and shedding light on consensus ignorance.
Viva la revolucion
