Then you are calling Supreme Court Justice Campbell a liar (whose service was recommended by Supreme Court Justice Nelson). It's documented in President Davis' Rise and Fall of The Confederate Government, portions of which I have posted previously. Justice Campbell wrote:
He [Seward] authorized me to say that, before that letter could reach him [President Davis], he [Seward] would learn by telegraph that the order for the evacuation of Sumter had been made.Davis added the following [page 233]:
It will be observed that not only the commissioners in Washington, but also the Confederate government at Montgomery, were thus assured on the highest authority--that of the Secretary of State of the United States, the official organ of communication of the views and purposes of his government--of the intention of that government to order the evacuation of Fort Sumter within a few days from March 15, and not to disturb the existing status at Fort Pickens. Moreover, this was not the mere statement of a fact, but a pledge, given as the consideration of an appeal to the Confederate government and its commissioners to refrain from embarrassing the Federal administration by prosecuting any further claims at the same time. As such a pledge it was accepted, and while its fulfillment was quietly awaited, the commissioners forbore to make any further demand for reply to their note of March 12.Five days later, the Fort still occuppied, Justice Campbell demands an answer from Seward, the representative of Lincoln:
He [Seward] accounted for the delay as accidental, and not involving the integrity of his assurance that the evacuation would take place, and that I should know whenever any change was made in the resolution in reference to Sumter or to Pickens.Near the 1st of April, Justice Campbell again asked Seward for information: 'I asked him whether I was to understand that there had been a change in his former communications. His answer was, "None."'
On 7 April Seward replied to Justice Campbell again with the promise that "[f]aith as to Sumter fully kept. Wait and see."
Campbell then wrote "I read that intercepted dispatches disposed the fact that Mr. Fox, who had been allowed to visit Major Anderson, on the pledge that his purpose was pacific, employed his opportunity to devise a plan for supplying the fort by force, and that this plan had been adopted by the Washington Government, and was in process of execution."
Campbell was assured by Seward that "[b]efore this letter reaches you [a proposed letter by Campbell to President Davis], Sumter will have been evacuated." [p. 590] Finally Justice Campbell writes,
I think no candid man, who will read over what I have written, and consider for a moment what is going on at Sumter, but will agree that the equivocating conduct of the Administration, as measured and interpreted in connection with these promises, is the proximate cause of the great calamity.Lincoln lied, telling Supreme Court Justices Campbell & Nelson one thing, while doing another. A Japanese surprise attack.I have a profound conviction that the telegrams of the 8th of April, of General Beauregard, and of the 10th of April, of General Walker, the Secretary of War, can be referred to nothing else than their belief that there has been systematic duplicity practiced on them through me.
Since Justice Campbell dealt with only Seward and never spoke directly with Lincoln how do you know that Seward wasn't lying or, more likely, telling Justice Campbell what he believed Lincoln should do rather than what Lincoln planned to do?
No, I'm calling -you- a liar, and a fool.
Walt