POLITICALLY CORRECT HISTORY - LINCOLN MYTH DEBUNKED

LewRockwell.com ^ | January 23, 2003 | Thomas J. DiLorenzo, PHD

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Politically Correct History by Thomas J. DiLorenzo The political left in America has apparently decided that American history must be rewritten so that it can be used in the political campaign for reparations for slavery. Congressman Jesse Jackson, Jr., of Chicago inserted language in a Department of Interior appropriations bill for 2000 that instructed the National Park Service to propagandize about slavery as the sole cause of the war at all Civil War park sites. The Marxist historian Eric Foner has joined forces with Jackson and will assist the National Park Service in its efforts at rewriting history so that it better serves the political agenda of the far left. Congressman Jackson has candidly described this whole effort as "a down payment on reparations." (Foner ought to be quite familiar with the "art" of rewriting politically-correct history. He was the chairman of the committee at Columbia University that awarded the "prestigious" Bancroft Prize in history to Emory University’s Michael A. Bellesiles, author of the anti-Second Amendment book, "Arming America," that turned out to be fraudulent. Bellesiles was forced to resign from Emory and his publisher has ceased publishing the book.) In order to accommodate the political agenda of the far left, the National Park Service will be required in effect to teach visitors to the national parks that Abraham Lincoln was a liar. Neither Lincoln nor the US Congress at the time ever said that slavery was a cause – let alone the sole cause – of their invasion of the Southern states in 1861. Both Lincoln and the Congress made it perfectly clear to the whole world that they would do all they could to protect Southern slavery as long as the secession movement could be defeated. On March 2, 1861, the U.S. Senate passed a proposed Thirteenth Amendment to the US Constitution (which passed the House of Representatives on February 28) that would have prohibited the federal government from ever interfering with slavery in the Southern states. (See U.S. House of Representatives, 106th Congress, 2nd Session, The Constitution of the United States of America: Unratified Amendments, Document No. 106-214, presented by Congressman Henry Hyde (Washington, D.C. U.S. Government Printing Office, January 31, 2000). The proposed amendment read as follows: ARTICLE THIRTEEN No amendment shall be made to the Constitution which will authorize or give to Congress 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. Two days later, in his First Inaugural Address, Abraham Lincoln promised to support the amendment even though he believed that the Constitution already prohibited the federal government from interfering with Southern slavery. As he stated: I understand a proposed amendment to the Constitution . . . has passed Congress, to the effect that the Federal Government shall never interfere with the domestic institutions of the States, including that of persons held to service. To avoid misconstruction of what I have said, I depart from my purpose, not to speak of particular amendments, so far as to say that, holding such a provision to now be implied constitutional law, I have no objection to its being made express and irrevocable (emphasis added). This of course was consistent with one of the opening statements of the First Inaugural, where Lincoln quoted himself as saying: "I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so." That’s what Lincoln said his invasion of the Southern states was not about. In an August 22, 1862, letter to New York Tribune editor Horace Greeley he explained to the world what the war was about: 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; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union. Of course, many Americans at the time, North and South, believed that a military invasion of the Southern states would destroy the union by destroying its voluntary nature. To Lincoln, "saving the Union" meant destroying the secession movement and with it the Jeffersonian political tradition of states’ rights as a check on the tyrannical proclivities of the central government. His war might have "saved" the union geographically, but it destroyed it philosophically as the country became a consolidated empire as opposed to a constitutional republic of sovereign states. On July 22, 1861, the US Congress issued a "Joint Resolution on the War" that echoed Lincoln’s reasons for the invasion of the Southern states: Resolved: . . . That this war is not being prosecuted upon our part in any spirit of oppression, nor for any purpose of conquest or subjugation, nor purpose of overthrowing or interfering with the rights or established institutions of those states, but to defend and maintain the supremacy of the Constitution and all laws made in pursuance thereof and to preserve the Union, with all the dignity, equality and rights of the several states unimpaired; and that as soon as these objects are accomplished the war ought to cease. By "the established institutions of those states" the Congress was referring to slavery. As with Lincoln, destroying the secession movement took precedence over doing anything about slavery. On March 2, 1861 – the same day the "first Thirteenth Amendment" passed the U.S. Senate – another constitutional amendment was proposed that would have outlawed secession (See H. Newcomb Morse, "The Foundations and Meaning of Secession," Stetson Law Review, vol. 15, 1986, pp. 419–36). This is very telling, for it proves that Congress believed that secession was in fact constitutional under the Tenth Amendment. It would not have proposed an amendment outlawing secession if the Constitution already prohibited it. Nor would the Republican Party, which enjoyed a political monopoly after the war, have insisted that the Southern states rewrite their state constitutions to outlaw secession as a condition of being readmitted to the Union. If secession was really unconstitutional there would have been no need to do so. These facts will never be presented by the National Park Service or by the Lincoln cultists at the Claremont Institute, the Declaration Foundation, and elsewhere. This latter group consists of people who have spent their careers spreading lies about Lincoln and his war in order to support the political agenda of the Republican Party. They are not about to let the truth stand in their way and are hard at work producing "educational" materials that are filled with false but politically correct history. For a very different discussion of Lincoln and his legacy that is based on fact rather than fantasy, attend the LewRockwell.com "Lincoln Reconsidered" conference at the John Marshall Hotel in Richmond, Virginia on March 22. January 23, 2003 Thomas J. DiLorenzo [send him mail] is the author of the LRC #1 bestseller, The Real Lincoln: A New Look at Abraham Lincoln, His Agenda, and an Unnecessary War (Forum/Random House, 2002) and professor of economics at Loyola College in Maryland. Copyright © 2003 LewRockwell.com Thomas DiLorenzo Archives Really Learn About the Real Lincoln Now there is a study guide and video to accompany Professor DiLorenzo's great work, for homeschoolers and indeed anyone interested in real American history. http://www.fvp.info/reallincolnlr/

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[thatdewd]

No it's not. In fact, it is law. See the Judiciary Act of 1789: "And be it further enacted, That the Supreme Court shall have exclusive jurisdiction of all controversies of a civil nature, where a state is a party, except between a state and its citizens; and except also between a state and citizens of other states, or aliens, in which latter case it shall have original but not exclusive jurisdiction." Now unless the actions of the secessionists in ACW were in fact a criminal act (got my vote), it was a civil controversy.

ROFLMAO - The States didn't think so. They considered it a right, and they exercised that right. No one took measures to stop them from exercising that right when they did it, so there was no "civil controversy" requiring legal action. If the states that remained in the Constitutional union objected, then they should have filed a grievance with the Court. The Southern States had no reason to. You are just as illogical as your alter-ego.

[GOPcapitalist]

A confederate state obtains a favorable ruling on the right of secession under the US constitution. The seven states then legally secede from the Union. Would a newly elected Lincoln be willing to ignore the highest court in the nation in his first act as president?

Such is speculation, but I would have to say yes. I take this position with reason based on what he did in the Merryman case almost immediately after his election. In the event that you are unfamiliar with the circumstances of that case, Merryman, a Maryland resident, was arrested following The Lincoln's suspension of habeas corpus there. He sought a writ of habeas corpus for his arrest in federal court and the case landed in the U.S. Circuit Court in Maryland. Merryman's case landed in the courtroom Supreme Court Chief Justice Roger Taney, who was "riding the circuit" court as supreme court justices did in those days. According to judicial procedures, Taney issued a summons by federal Marshall to Merryman's imprisoners for a hearing on his habeas corpus request, which was refused on the grounds of The Lincoln's suspension. As a result of repeated refusals to respond to the court, Taney issued a ruling from the U.S. Circuit Court declaring The Lincoln's suspension of habeas corpus unconstitutional.

The ruling was delivered to proper authorities and The Lincoln personally. Rather than abide by it or appeal it though, he simply chose to ignore it because he did not like the results. Evidence exists that he even participated in a later-abandoned effort to have Taney arrested after the ruling. In light of this behavior on a high profile federal case immediately following his inauguration, it is not unreasonable to believe that The Lincoln would have done the same in other cases.

Would European powers be more inclined to recognize a confederacy that had obtained legitimacy through the court system?

Possibly, though such is unknowable. As it stood, the European powers heavily based their considerations of recognition on the battle performance of each side in the war. At times when the confederacy was winning, Britain in particular came very close to initiating the processes for formal recognition. At another time, Napoleon III of France offered to mediate the conflict between the two sides, as did the British cabinet under Palmerston. The only formal recognition came from the Vatican though, and as the tide turned in the war against the confederacy, so did the once-likely diplomatic recognitions from abroad.

Certainly, history would have looked more kindly on the confederates if they had first sought redress under the law.

If they had done so in the courts this is a possibility. But one cannot say that they did not attempt to carry out their secession in the legal framework of the existing government. The acts of secession themselves were carried out under this framework and the redress you discuss for the courtrooms WAS sought in the U.S. Congress.

[GOPcapitalist]

You just did a big long piece including discussion of Georgia's secession document and the free trade atmosphere resulting from lowering the tariff rates. That was in 1846.

Yes Walt. And that free trade atmosphere ceased to be consensus in 1860 and was striken from the law and replaced with protectionism in 1861. That's what made the confederates so mad over tariffs. It's commonly called the Morrill Act.

[thatdewd]

With words of peace, they obtained admission into the fort for spies, who betrayed the confidence reposed in their honor, and with the pledge that his purpose was pacific, arranged there a plot for the introduction of armed succor....

How true!

The betrayal of such a trust is the culmination of a long course of meditated duplicity in the Cabinet at Washington and is ample justification for no longer trusting either to their sense of honor or the sincerity of any professions they make if they desire to adjust the pending controversies in any other way but by an issue of force.

True again! Their intentions were made clear.

Here terminates, in a disgraceful exposure, the juggle with which the Lincoln Cabinet have been practicing to deceive the public for the last six weeks.

The publics of two Nations were betrayed by their lies and deceit. Peace was their enemy, and they plotted against it.

[Non-Sequitur]

I presented them as a pair to expose that myth for what it was, a myth.

You posted your interpretation of two orders which do not conflict with each other. Munitions and reinforcements would be landed only if the supply attempt was opposed.

He lied. Read the second order where it is revealed what the true and exact nature of the mission was.

Why would he lie to Major Anderson? He told him the same thing he told Governor Pickens, that an attempt to land supplies would be made and that reinforcements and munitions would be landed only if the mission was opposed.

It was Lincoln who did not want a peaceful resolution, and that is why he sent US Agent Fox to devise and lead a mission guaranteed to cause an incident sufficent for his warmongering purposes.

Sure, that's why he made sure that Pickens knew about it ahead of time. But this whole scheme that you've concocted would have fallen apart if Davis hadn't fired on Sumter. Pretty stupid of Jeff, wasn't it?

[GOPcapitalist]

Seven states published secession documents before the Morrill tariff passed.

That's a marxist fib, Walt. You've been shown this before. The Morrill tariff passed in two stages - one in the House, one in the Senate. It passed the House on a strictly sectional vote months before any state seceded. That was in May 1860.

By November 1860 The Lincoln had been elected and he was pledging to push the protectionist tariff through. He told one audience that it would be the single most important issue of the next congressional session if it did not pass before then.

With the bill already through the House and having the support of the incoming president, the only thing in its way by the time secession started was the evenly split Senate...and Lincoln's asserted priorities made it clear he was going to force protectionism through that senate. It passed the Senate a few days before his inauguration.

[Quix]

METHINKS
HE'S STILL
TRYING
TO
SELL
BOOKS
. . .
NOT SURE
FOR WHOM

Perhaps another possibility but less likely--he has an obsession with tweaking common sensibilities.

Or perhaps tweaking common sensibilities is a kind of fetish. . . perhaps winding up his blood chemicals allowing other activity less measuring up in calmer times.

'tis certainly a curiosity.

Thankfully, Lincoln doesn't give a rip at this point.

[WhiskeyPapa]

No it's not. In fact, it is law. See the Judiciary Act of 1789: "And be it further enacted, That the Supreme Court shall have exclusive jurisdiction of all controversies of a civil nature, where a state is a party, except between a state and its citizens; and except also between a state and citizens of other states, or aliens, in which latter case it shall have original but not exclusive jurisdiction." Now unless the actions of the secessionists in ACW were in fact a criminal act (got my vote), it was a civil controversy.

ROFLMAO - The States didn't think so. They considered it a right, and they exercised that right.

Not for long.

Walt

[Non-Sequitur]

Now you apparently deny the Court's authority altogether, when all I had done was point out a mistake and hoped we could argue it on appeal since it was obviously incorrect.

On the contrary, I believe that the Supreme Court ruling in Texas v. White was valid. And as a result of that I can say that the southern acts of secession were illegal because the court ruled that they were. It's you that said it was an invalid decision, apparently denying the court's authority.

[WhiskeyPapa]

Yes Walt. And that free trade atmosphere ceased to be consensus in 1860 and was striken from the law and replaced with protectionism in 1861.

After seven states had already seceded. The Morrill tariff couldn't hve passed had the rebellious states kept their seats.

Walt

[GOPcapitalist]

Sure, that's why he made sure that Pickens knew about it ahead of time.

To the contrary. The Lincoln's message to Pickens pledged no troops and asked that peaceful access be given for only that purpose. Nowhere did it say "if you don't comply, we'll fight our way in." The orders given to the yankee ships did say that latter part though. They contained explicit instructions on how to fight their way in over the inevitable confederate refusal to allow them entry.

[WhiskeyPapa]

They considered it a right, and they exercised that right.

Rights and laws are two different things. See the Declaration of Independence for a discussion of rights under Heaven vice the laws of men.

There was nothing illogical in what mac said. What you said was and is, pure BS.

Walt

[GOPcapitalist]

After seven states had already seceded.

No Walt. Contrary to your marxist lie, the Morrill Act passed the House in May 1860 and had the backing of the new president, all before any state seceded.

The Morrill tariff couldn't hve passed had the rebellious states kept their seats.

You are wrong again, Walt. The only remaining barrier to the act on the onset of secession in December 1860 was the Senate. The Senate was evenly split on a sectional basis. Had every southerner retained his seat and voted against it in a unanimaty similar to their delegation in the House, that would make it a tie vote. The VP then breaks the tie in favor of the bill and it passes.

[WhiskeyPapa]

Nowhere did it say "if you don't comply, we'll fight our way in."

This was the message delivered to Pickens per the Library of Congress:

"I am directed by the President of the United States to notify you to expect an attempt will be made to supply Fort-Sumpter with provisions only; and that, if such attempt be not resisted, no effort to throw in men, arms, or amunition will be made, without further notice, or in case of an attack upon the Fort--"

Here is Bruce Catton's account:

"A special messenger, said Lincoln, was going down to give Governor Pickens due notice, and to tell him that no troops would be landed if the delivery of the provisions be not opposed; the messenger, said the president, would reach Charlston long before Fox could get there...Table stakes in other words. Sending the outrider down to Governor Pickens, Lincoln was shooting the works. He was not forcing a war, but he was serving notice that he would fight rather than back down; more, he was setting the stage in such a way that Jefferson Davis, if he in his turn preferred to fight rather than to back down, would have to shoot first....

On April 8 a War Department clerk named Robert S. Chew showed up in Charleston bearing instructions writen by President Lincoln which read thus:"You will proceed directly to Charleston, South Carolina; and if, on your arrival there, the flag of the United States shall be flying over over Fort Sumter, and the Fort shall not have been attacked, you will procure an interview with Governor Pickens, and read to him as follows:"I am directed by the president of the United States to notify you to expect an attempt will be made to supply Fort Sumter with provisions only; and that, if such attempt be not resisted, no effort to throw in men, arms or ammunition will be made without further notice, or in case of attack upon the fort.

Chew delivered his message that evening".

--"The Coming Fury" pp. 299-303 by Bruce Catton

You've seen this before.

President Lincoln's method made sure the rebels would have to fire the first shot, which they maladroitly wasted no time in doing.

Walt

[Feiny]

It is my opinion that slavery was never abolished. We are all slaves to the I.R.S.

[GOPcapitalist]

This was the message delivered to Pickens per the Library of Congress: "I am directed by the President of the United States to notify you to expect an attempt will be made to supply Fort-Sumpter with provisions only; and that, if such attempt be not resisted, no effort to throw in men, arms, or amunition will be made, without further notice, or in case of an attack upon the Fort--"

Yes Walt. And it conveniently neglects the part about them fighting their way in with warships over a refusal to comply. That part was included only in the orders to the ships and military.

President Lincoln's method made sure the rebels would have to fire the first shot

He intended it that way and, by way of propaganda, claimed this to be so, but in reality that shot was fired by one of his own ships the day before the battle.

[thatdewd]

Your statement makes no sense. I am talking about 1860, before Lincoln takes office, before the first state attempts to secede. All the states are still in the union at this point.

LOL (you're making my sides hurt) - Why would they go to the Court to inquire about secession when they considered it a right and had no questions about it. That's silly. You're confusing issues. No wonder, given all the waltrot about it posted by the neo-unionists. They did not see secession as something requiring any Court action. It was simply a right, and they did it. Once again, if the other States that remained in the union thought it unlawful for them to do so, then they should have filed grievance before the Court.

It would have created a precedent...

LOL - It was a right established at the formation of the Constitutional union and did not require a "precedent".

[WhiskeyPapa]

The Morrill tariff couldn't hve passed had the rebellious states kept their seats.

You are wrong again, Walt.

"What makes emphasis on the tariff as a cause for secession particularly absurd is that the votes to pass the Morrill Tariff did not exist in Congress until *after* the secessionist Senators and Representatives resigned.

More generally, an emphasis on economic (in the narrow sense) issues as an explanation for secession is thoroughly misguided for the reasons given by Allen Nevins more than a half century ago in *The Ordeal of the Union*:

"One fact needs emphatic statement: of all the monistic explanations for the drift to war, that based upon supposed economic causes is the flimsiest. The theory was sharply rejected at the time by so astute an observer as Alexander H. Stephens. South Carolina, he wrote his brother on New Year's Day, 1861 was seceding from a tariff 'which is just what her own Senators and members of Congress made it.' As for the charges of consolidation and despotism made by some Carolinians, he thought they arose from peevishness, rather than a calm analysis of facts. 'The truth is, the South, almost in mass, has voted, I think, for every measure of general legislation that has passed both houses and become law for the last ten years.' The South, far from groaning under tyranny, had controlled the government almost from its beginning, and Stephens believed that its only real grievance lay in the Northern refusal to return fugitive slaves and to stop the antislavery agitation.

'All other complaints are founded on threatened dangers which may never come, and which I feel very sure would be averted if the South would pursue a judicious and wise course.' Stephens was right. It was true that the whole tendency of federal legislation 1842 to 1860 was toward free trade; true that the tariff in force when secession began was largely Southern- made; true that it was the lowest tariff the country had known since 1816; true that it cost a nation of thirty million people but sixty million dollars in indirect revenue; true that without secession no new tariff law, obnoxious to the Democratic Party, could have been passed before 1863--if then.

"In the official explanations which one Southern State after another published for its secession, economic grievances are either omitted entirely or given minor positions. There were few such supposed grievances which the agricultural states of Illinois, Iowa, Indiana, Wisconsin, and Minnesota did not share with the South--and they never threatened to secede. Charles A. Beard finds the tap-root of the war in the resistance of the planter interest to Northern demands enlarging the old Hamilton-Webster policy. The South was adamant in standing for 'no high protective tariffs, no ship subsidies, no national banking and currency system; in short, none of the measures which business enterprise deemed essential to its progress.' But the Republican platform in 1856 was silent on the tariff; in 1860, it carried a milk-and-water statement on the subject which Western Republicans took, mild as it was, with a wry face; the incoming President was little interested in the tariff; and any harsh legislation was impossible. Ship subsidies were not an issue in the campaign of 1860. Neither were a national banking system and a national currency system. They were not mentioned in the Republican platform nor discussed by party debaters. The Pacific Railroad was advocated both by the Douglas Democrats and the Republicans; and it is noteworthy that Seward and Douglas were for building both a Northern and a Southern line. In short, the divisive economic issues are easily exaggerated. At the same time, the unifying economic factors were both numerous and powerful. North and South had economies which were largely complementary. It was no misfortune to the South that Massachusetts cotton mills wanted its staple, and that New York ironmasters like Hewitt were eager to sell rails dirt-cheap to Southern railway builders; and sober businessmen on both sides, merchants, bankers, and manufacturers, were the men most anxious to keep the peace and hold the Union together."

--Nevins, *The Ordeal of the Union* quoted on pp. 212-213 of Edwin C. Rozwenc (ed.), *The Causes of the American Civil War* (Boston: D. C. Heath 1961).

In view of these facts, and in view of the fact that Southern pamphlets on the secession issue *invariably* emphasized the alleged danger to slavery represented by Lincoln and said comparatively little about economics (anyone who doubts this is invited to read Jon L. Wakelyn, ed., *Southern Pamphlets on Secession, November 1860-April 1861* [University of North Carolina Press 1996])--why have so many people emphasized issues like the tariff? I would say there are three reasons:

(1) It was a much more respectable justification for Southerners after the war than "we seceded because we believed--rightly or wrongly--that Lincoln's election would be a menace to slavery." (For the same reason the tariff "explanation" of secession was often used by Confederate representatives in Great Britain *during* the war.)

(2) The view of the South as the victim of Northern exploitation seemed to fit what happened *after* the war, when Northern capitalism reigned supreme and the South was very poor. It seemed logical to many people that this was what the South had seceded to resist and the North had fought to bring about. What tended to be forgotten is that in 1860 the South was wealthier than most nations in the world; that in per capita income of its *white* population it was about equal to the North; that it was making considerable progress in industrialization; and that Northern capitalists and bankers, so far from being determined to crush the South, were generally the most pro-Southern element in the Northern population. It was largely secession and the ensuing war which brought about the economic results Southerners later claimed they seceded to prevent.

(3) Finally, the economic explanation of the war fit in well with vulgarized Marxism--something which influenced a considerable number of non-Marxists from the Progressive Era onward."

-- From the moderated ACW nesgroup

Walt

[GOPcapitalist]

LOL (you're making my sides hurt) - Why would they go to the Court to inquire about secession when they considered it a right and had no questions about it.

That is exactly the point. It is also of note that the U.S. Supreme Court only hears timely and material cases. It does not issue advisory opinions at the request of a state seeking to secede. This does not technically prohibit the court from ruling on secession, but in order to do so it could not be an advisory request of the seceding state. Instead it would have to be on a case arising from a motion to block that act of secession - essentially meaning that the right to seek this ruling you speak of was with The Lincoln. As we all know, he opted not to do this. Instead he consciously chose the bloodiest path and form of warfare out of untold many options both military and diplomatic.

[4CJ]

No apology necessary. Both sides were wrong (by todays enlightened views).