But I will leave you with some quotes from on of the greatest president of this country. And some quotes from a traitor who was captured while fleeing in woman's clothing. However, I fear you are to blind to see the moral difference between the two.
Or perhaps you agree with Davis? I learned a different lesson in my 20+ years in the military. I served alongside people of all races and found some to be good, some to be average, and some to be bad. We were instructed at boot camp that it didn't matter if we were lite green or dark green, we were all green and all Marines.
Lincoln’s comments on slavery
"I have always hated slavery, I think as much as any abolitionist." The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln edited by Roy P. Basler, Volume II, "Speech at Chicago, Illinois" (July 10, 1858), p. 492.
"In 1841 you and I had together a tedious low-water trip, on a Steam Boat from Louisville to St. Louis. You may remember, as I well do, that from Louisville to the mouth of the Ohio there were, on board, ten or a dozen slaves, shackled together with irons. That sight was a continual torment to me; and I see something like it every time I touch the Ohio, or any other slave-border. It is hardly fair for you to assume, that I have no interest in a thing which has, and continually exercises, the power of making me miserable. You ought rather to appreciate how much the great body of the Northern people do crucify their feelings, in order to maintain their loyalty to the constitution and the Union.... ....I am not a Know-Nothing. That is certain. How could I be? How can any one who abhors the oppression of negroes, be in favor of degrading classes of white people? Our progress in degeneracy appears to me to be pretty rapid. As a nation, we began by declaring that ``all men are created equal.'' We now practically read it ``all men are created equal, except negroes.'' When the Know-Nothings get control, it will read ``all men are created equal, except negroes, and foreigners, and catholics.'' When it comes to this I should prefer emigrating to some country where they make no pretence of loving liberty---to Russia, for instance, where despotism can be taken pure, and without the base alloy of hypocracy." Abraham Lincoln - Letter to Joshua F. Speed, 1855
"I hate it because of the monstrous injustice of slavery itself. I hate it because it deprives our republican example of its just influence in the world." The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln edited by Roy P. Basler, Volume II, "Speech at Peoria, Illinois" (October 16, 1854), p. 255.
"What I do say is, that no man is good enough to govern another man, without that other's consent. I say this is the leading principle - the sheet anchor of American republicanism." The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln edited by Roy P. Basler, Volume II, "Speech at Peoria, Illinois" (October 16, 1854), p. 266.
"Slavery is founded in the selfishness of man's nature---opposition to it, is [in?] his love of justice. These principles are an eternal antagonism; and when brought into collision so fiercely, as slavery extension brings them, shocks, and throes, and convulsions must ceaselessly follow. Repeal the Missouri compromise---repeal all compromises---repeal the declaration of independence---repeal all past history, you still can not repeal human nature. It still will be the abundance of man's heart, that slavery extension is wrong; and out of the abundance of his heart, his mouth will continue to speak.... ...The doctrine of self government is right---absolutely and eternally right---but it has no just application, as here attempted. Or perhaps I should rather say that whether it has such just application depends upon whether a negro is not or is a man. If he is not a man, why in that case, he who is a man may, as a matter of self-government, do just as he pleases with him. But if the negro is a man, is it not to that extent, a total destruction of self-government, to say that he too shall not govern himself? When the white man governs himself that is self-government; but when he governs himself, and also governs another man, that is more than self-government---that is despotism. If the negro is a man, why then my ancient faith teaches me that "all men are created equal;" and that there can be no moral right in connection with one man's making a slave of another."
Abraham Lincoln - Peoria Speech, 1854
"This is a world of compensations; and he who would be no slave, must consent to have no slave. Those who deny freedom to others, deserve it not for themselves; and, under a just God, can not long retain it."
---Abraham Lincoln, Letter to Henry L. Pierce, 1859
Jefferson Davis quotes on slavery.
"African slavery, as it exists in the United States, is a moral, a social, and a political blessing." ~Davis
"My own convictions as to negro slavery are strong. It has its evils and abuses...We recognize the negro as God and God's Book and God's Laws, in nature, tell us to recognize him - our inferior, fitted expressly for servitude...You cannot transform the negro into anything one-tenth as useful or as good as what slavery enables them to be." ~Davis
"It [slavery] was established by decree of Almighty God...it is sanctioned in the Bible, in both Testaments, from Genesis to Revelation...it has existed in all ages, has been found among the people of the highest civilization, and in nations of the highest proficiency in the arts...Let the gentleman go to Revelation to learn the decree of God - let him go to the Bible...I said that slavery was sanctioned in the Bible, authorized, regulated, and recognized from Genesis to Revelation...Slavery existed then in the earliest ages, and among the chosen people of God; and in Revelation we are told that it shall exist till the end of time shall come. You find it in the Old and New Testaments - in the prophecies, psalms, and the epistles of Paul; you find it recognized, sanctioned everywhere.". ~Davis
“And some quotes from a traitor who was captured while fleeing in woman’s clothing.”
That is an interesting comment (clothing). Can you provide historical sources and photographs for your claim that you believe to be true?
Are you that insecure? I was referring to your pretense of moral superiority.
BTW, I am in my 70's, so I can only dream of the days when I enjoyed TKD sparring.
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>>OIFVeteran wrote: "And I find your constant lying to be sickening. You claim to be a veteran, but I find that highly unlike with your twisted, hateful view of American history."
I have told no lies, so that makes you the liar. I also told you that I love my country; and because I love my country, and because I took an oath to support and defend the Constitution against all enemies, I am obliged to expose Lincoln for destroying the checks and balances that were put in place by men far superior to him, as well as for destroying the lives of perhaps a million or more Americans in an unconstitutional war.
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>>OIFVeteran wrote: "But I will leave you with some quotes from on of the greatest president of this country. And some quotes from a traitor who was captured while fleeing in woman's clothing. However, I fear you are to blind to see the moral difference between the two."
No one, post-war, believed it could be proven that Davis was a traitor; so he was released from prison. Davis didn't make war against the United States; Lincoln did:
"Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort." [Law, "Constitution of the United States and Amendments." 1787, Article III, Sect. 3]
Yes, the traitor was Lincoln, who, as an American citizen, made war against the United States. Someone should have told Abe, "If you don't like the Constitution, there is an amendment process available to change it." Instead, he usurped power and destroyed the Union, along with half the countryside. Not unsurprising, you will find Lincoln-like doctrine in Mein Kampf:
"For it was not these [American] states that had formed the Union, on the contrary it was the Union which formed a great part of such so-called states. The very extensive special rights granted, or rather assigned, to the individual territories are not only in keeping with the whole character of this federation of states, but above all with the size of its area, its spatial dimensions which approach the scope of a continent. And so, as far as the states of the American Union are concerned, we cannot speak of their state sovereignty, but only of their constitutionally established and guaranteed rights, or better, perhaps, privileges." [Adolf Hitler, "Mein Kampf: Manheim Translation." Houghton Mifflin Company, 1999, p.566]
Compare with: First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1861, in Roy P. Basler, "The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln Vol 4." Rutgers University Press, 1953, pp.253-254
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>>OIFVeteran wrote: "Or perhaps you agree with Davis?"
I certainly do not agree with him on slavery, but I am 150 years too late to tell him about it. I would, however, like to thank him for his service in the Mexican-American War, but I am too late for that, as well. You do know he was a West Point graduate, don't you?
How about you? Do you agree with Lincoln on slavery? Do you believe it was right for his hero (Henry Clay) to be a slaveholder? Do you believe it was right for him to marry into a slave-holding family? Do you believe Lincoln was superior to blacks, as he claimed to be? Do you believe Lincoln was right in his goal of seeking a lily-white nation by colonizing the blacks back into a nation where they did not want to go? Do you believe Lincoln was right in seeking to forever enshrine slavery into the Constitution (with the Corwin Amendment?) Just curious . . .
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>>OIFVeteran wrote: "I learned a different lesson in my 20+ years in the military. I served alongside people of all races and found some to be good, some to be average, and some to be bad. We were instructed at boot camp that it didn't matter if we were lite green or dark green, we were all green and all Marines."
Every branch of service teaches that all blood runs red.
You can feel free to climb down off your moral high-horse, any time. I will never accept that you are morally superior to me -- equals, perhaps, but not superior.
BTW, many of my friends are retired Marines, and most, if not all have similar opinions of Lincoln to mine. So this discussion has nothing to with who served in what branch. Why not try to debate the issues?
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>>OIFVeteran wrote: "Lincoln’s comments on slavery: "I have always hated slavery, I think as much as any abolitionist." The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln edited by Roy P. Basler, Volume II, "Speech at Chicago, Illinois" (July 10, 1858), p. 492."
What did Lincoln say the next day? The reason I ask is, he was a master at speaking out of both sides of his mouth. This wasn't exactly the next day, but:
"I have again and again said that I would not enter into any of the States to disturb the institution of slavery. Judge Douglas said, at Bloomington, that I used language most able and ingenious for concealing what I really meant; and that while I had protested against entering into the slave States, I nevertheless did mean to go on the banks of Ohio and throw missiles into Kentucky to disturb them in their domestic institutions. I said, in that speech, and I meant no more, that the institution of slavery ought to be placed in the very attitude where the framers of this Government placed it, and left it. I do not understand that the framers of our Constitution left the people of the free States in the attitude of firing bombs or shells into the slave States." [Speech at Springfield, Illinois, July 17, 1858, in Roy P. Basler, "The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln Vol 2." Rutgers University Press, 1953, p.517]
Yea, right . . .
Are you aware that, as a trial lawyer, Lincoln never represented a runaway slave? He represented a free woman to keep from being sold into slavery, but never a runaway. He did, however, represent a slave-owner in an attempt to help recover his fugitive slaves. David Donald wrote this about "the Great Emancipator" at work in 1847:
"When [Robert Matson's] slaves [Jane Bryant and children] ran away and, with the backing of local abolitionists, brought suit for their freedom, on the ground that the Northwest Ordinance forbade the introduction of slavery into the state of Illinois, Matson employed Lincoln, along with Usher F. Linder, to defend him. Characteristically Lincoln admitted his opponents' main argument, that the slaves were free if Matson had brought them to Illinois for permanent settlement, but he invoked the right of transit, which the courts had guaranteed to slaveholders who were taking their slaves temporarily into free territory. He placed great stress on Matson's public declaration, at the time he brought the slaves into Illinois, that he did not intend the slaves to remain permanently in Illinois and insisted that "no counter statement had ever been made publicly or privately by him." The circuit court ruled against Lincoln and his client, who, it was reported, left immediately for Kentucky without paying his attorneys' fees. Neither the Matson case nor the Cromwell case should be taken as an indication of Lincoln's views on slavery; his business was law, not morality." [David Herbert Donald, "Lincoln." Touchstone, 1996, pp.103-104]
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>>OIFVeteran wrote: "In 1841 you and I had together a tedious low-water trip, on a Steam Boat from Louisville to St. Louis. You may remember, as I well do, that from Louisville to the mouth of the Ohio there were, on board, ten or a dozen slaves, shackled together with irons. That sight was a continual torment to me;" Abraham Lincoln - Letter to Joshua F. Speed, 1855
It appears that Lincoln was so tormented about those slave irons in 1841 that he became forgetful -- forgetful enough that by 1847 he was willing to accept a case seeking to put Jane Bryant and her children back in irons.
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>>OIFVeteran wrote: "I hate it because of the monstrous injustice of slavery itself. I hate it because it deprives our republican example of its just influence in the world." The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln edited by Roy P. Basler, Volume II, "Speech at Peoria, Illinois" (October 16, 1854), p. 255.
Abe believed it was a "monstrous injustice," except when he was "doing business," such as defending a slaveholder.
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>>OIFVeteran wrote: "What I do say is, that no man is good enough to govern another man, without that other's consent. I say this is the leading principle - the sheet anchor of American republicanism." The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln edited by Roy P. Basler, Volume II, "Speech at Peoria, Illinois" (October 16, 1854), p. 266.
Tell that to a couple of million southerners, most of which were NOT slaveholders.
Abe Lincoln was a master politician -- a liar so accomplished he would make Bill Clinton envious. He was also the consummate hypocrite, claiming in his inaugural that secession was the essence of anarchy, but defending it in the case of West Virginia. And, of course, no person who hated slavery as much as Lincoln claimed would have attempted to permanently enshrine slavery's legality into the Constitution, as he did.
The bottom line is, Jefferson Davis was a slaveholder, which was cruel; but Lincoln was a coniving, blood-thirsty tyrant, which was far, far worse.
Mr. Kalamata