Replies

Show that during Lincoln's life.
In re: "his plans of white-separatism, repatriation and a divided continent."

I have cited numerous speeches (by Lincoln) inumerable times - his fear of amalgamation, his speech before a group of blacks in the White House (documented in the New York papers, Basler and others). How many times does one have to quote the man?

You have little that supports your premise. Although Lincoln might well have been glad to snap his fingers and have all negroes resettled elsewhere, that wasn't going to happen. He began to clear the way -- as you well know -- for full civil right for them. He did this with both his public proclamations and private letters:

"...peace does not appear as distant as it did. I hope it will come soon, and come to stay; and so come as to worth the keeping in all future time. It will have then been proved that, among free men, there can be no successful appeal from the ballot to the bullet; and that they who take such appeal are sure to lose their case, and pay the cost. And then, there will be some black men, who can remember that, with silent tongue, and clenched teeth, and steady eye, and well-poised bayonet they have helped mankind on to this great consumation; while, I fear, there will be some white ones, unable to forget that, with malignant heart, and deceitful speech, have strove to hinder it."

A. Lincoln

8/23/63

"When you give the Negro these rights," he [Lincoln] said, "when you put a gun in his hands, it prophesies something more: it foretells that he is to have the full enjoyment of his liberty and his manhood

...By the close of the war, Lincoln was reccomending commissioning black officers in the regiments, and one actually rose to become a major before it was over. At the end of 1863, more than a hundred thousand had enlisted in the United States Colored Troops, and in his message to Congress the president reported, "So far as tested, it is difficult to say they are not as good soldiers as any." When some suggested in August 1864 that the Union ought to offer to help return runaway slaves to their masters as a condition for the South's laying down its arms, Lincoln refused even to consider the question.

--"Lincoln's Men" pp 163-64 by William C. Davis

Also:

"I know as fully as one can know the opinions of others that some of the commanders of our armies in the field who have given us some of most important successes, believe the emancipation policy and the use of colored troops, constitute the heaviest blow yet dealt the rebellion, and that at least one of those important successes could not have been achieved when it was but for the aid of black soldiers....I submit these opinions as being entitled to some weight against the objections, often urged, that emancipation, and arming the blacks, are unwise as military measures, and were not adopted, as such, in good faith. You say you will not fight to free negroes. Some of them seem willing to fight for you; but no matter. Fight you then, exclusively to save the Union... negroes, like other people act upon motives. Why should they do anything for us if we will do nothing for them? If they stake their lives for us, they must be prompted by the strongest motive--even the promise of freedom. And the promise, being made, must be kept....

"it is also unsatisfactory to some that the elective franchise is not given to the colored man. I would myself prefer that it were now conferred on the very intelligent, and on those who serve our cause as soldiers."

4/11/65

Lincoln had been setting the stage for equal rights for at least a year -- as you well know.

Private

General Hunter

Executive Mansion

Washington D.C. April 1, 1863

My dear Sir:

I am glad to see the accounts of your colored force at Jacksonville, Florida. I see the enemy are driving at them fiercely, as is to be expected. It is mportant to the enemy that such a force shall not take shape, and grow, and thrive, in the south; and in precisely the same proportion, it is important to us that it shall. Hence the utmost caution and viglilance is necessary on our part. The enemy will make extra efforts to destroy them; and we should do the same to perserve and increase them.

Yours truly

A. Lincoln

_________________________________________________________ Hon. Andrew Johnson

Executive Mansion,

My dear Sir:

Washington, March 26. 1863.

I am told you have at least thought of raising a negro military force. In my opinion the country now needs no specific thing so much as some man of your ability, and position, to go to this work. When I speak of your position, I mean that of an eminent citizen of a slave-state, and himself a slave- holder. The colored population is the great available and yet unavailed of, force for restoring the Union. The bare sight of fifty thousand armed, and drilled black soldiers on the banks of the Mississippi, would end the rebellion at once. And who doubts that we can present that sight, if we but take hold in earnest? If you have been thinking of it please do not dismiss the thought.

Yours truly

______________________________________________

Private

March 13, 1864

Executive Mansion

Washington

Hon. Michael Hahn

My dear sir,

I congratulate you on having fixed your name in history as the first free-state Governor of Louisiana. Now you are about to have a convention which among other things, will probably define the elective franchise. I barely suggest for your private consideration, whther some of the colored people may not be let in -- as for instance the very intelligent, and especially those who have fought gallantly in oyr ranks. They would probably help, in some trying time to come, to keep the jewll of liberty within the family of freedom. But this is only a suggestion, not to the public, but to you alone.

Yours truly

Lincoln meant to expand equal rights to black soldiers because his inate sense of justice could allow no less.

Lincoln was -not- a white separatist any more than he was a white supremacist. You backed off that line, and you'll back off this one too.

Walt