Glad you bought his book. Despite a few quotations, I don’t know how you can get around his conclusions. Moreover, to excuse the South as having done these because it was in a war, is puzzling. So the South gets to be statist in a war but the North doesn’t? As for Lincoln, what exactly was the response of Congress when he “abused” the financial process? At any rate, I know what Bensel concluded, I know his overall evidence, and I spent several hours with him discussing this and without question, he thinks the South was “more tyrannical” and the North less so. But at least someone here actually reads the material.
I look forward to discussing this further with you. Unfortunately, for the next few days I have to finish and file several trust tax returns due on September 15. This may keep me off the thread for a few days. I’m getting conflicting recommendations from my CPA, so I may not have any hair left when I’m done.
You asked what did Congress do when Lincoln “abused” the financial process? As I remember (harder to do as I get older), they indemnified and/or approved his actions. They do not have the authority to approve unconstitutional actions after the fact. It was a Republican-led Congress. During wartime, they were not going to condemn the first Republican president, a president who had choreographed the country into war while they were not in session.