Posted on 08/20/2004 5:43:21 AM PDT by TexConfederate1861
Imagine that America had a Chief Justice of the United States who actually believed in enforcing the Constitution and, accordingly, issued an opinion that the war in Iraq was unconstitutional because Congress did not fulfill its constitutional duty in declaring war. Imagine also that the neocon media, think tanks, magazines, radio talk shows, and television talking heads then waged a vicious, months-long smear campaign against the chief justice, insinuating that he was guilty of treason and should face the punishment for it. Imagine that he is so demonized that President Bush is emboldened to issue an arrest warrant for the chief justice, effectively destroying the constitutional separation of powers and declaring himself dictator.
An event such as this happened in the first months of the Lincoln administration when Abraham Lincoln issued an arrest warrant for Chief Justice Roger B. Taney after the 84-year-old judge issued an opinion that only Congress, not the president, can suspend the writ of habeas corpus. Lincoln had declared the writ null and void and ordered the military to begin imprisoning thousands of political dissenters. Taney’s opinion, issued as part of his duties as a circuit court judge in Maryland, had to do with the case of Ex Parte Merryman (May 1861). The essence of his opinion was not that habeas corpus could not be suspended, only that the Constitution requires Congress to do it, not the president. In other words, if it was truly in "the public interest" to suspend the writ, the representatives of the people should have no problem doing so and, in fact, it is their constitutional prerogative.
As Charles Adams wrote in his LRC article, "Lincoln’s Presidential Warrant to Arrest Chief Justice Roger B. Taney," there were, at the time of his writing, three corroborating sources for the story that Lincoln actually issued an arrest warrant for the chief justice. It was never served for lack of a federal marshal who would perform the duty of dragging the elderly chief justice out of his chambers and throwing him into the dungeon-like military prison at Fort McHenry. (I present even further evidence below).
All of this infuriates the Lincoln Cult, for such behavior is unquestionably an atrocious act of tyranny and despotism. But it is true. It happened. And it was only one of many similar constitutional atrocities committed by the Lincoln administration in the name of "saving the Constitution."
The first source of the story is a history of the U.S. Marshal’s Service written by Frederick S. Calhoun, chief historian for the Service, entitled The Lawmen: United States Marshals and their Deputies, 1789–1989. Calhoun recounts the words of Lincoln’s former law partner Ward Hill Laman, who also worked in the Lincoln administration.
Upon hearing of Laman’s history of Lincoln’s suspension of habeas corpus and the mass arrest of Northern political opponents, Lincoln cultists immediately sought to discredit Laman by calling him a drunk. (Ulysses S. Grant was also an infamous drunk, but no such discrediting is ever perpetrated on him by the Lincoln "scholars".)
But Adams comes up with two more very reliable accounts of the same story. One is an 1887 book by George W. Brown, the mayor of Baltimore, entitled Baltimore and the Nineteenth of April, 1861: A Study of War (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1887). In it is the transcript of a conversation Mayor Brown had with Taney in which Taney talks of his knowledge that Lincoln had issued an arrest warrant for him.
Yet another source is A Memoir of Benjamin Robbins Curtis, a former U.S. Supreme Court Justice. Judge Curtis represented President Andrew Johnson in his impeachment trial before the U.S. Senate; wrote the dissenting opinion in the Dred Scott case; and resigned from the court over a dispute with Judge Taney over that case. Nevertheless, in his memoirs he praises the propriety of Justice Taney in upholding the Constitution by opposing Lincoln’s suspension of habeas corpus. He refers to Lincoln’s arrest warrant as a "great crime."
I recently discovered yet additional corroboration of Lincoln’s "great crime." Mr. Phil Magness sent me information suggesting that the intimidation of federal judges was a common practice in the early days of the Lincoln administration (and the later days as well). In October of 1861 Lincoln ordered the District of Columbia Provost Marshal to place armed sentries around the home of a Washington, D.C. Circuit Court judge and place him under house arrest. The reason was that the judge had issued a writ of habeas corpus to a young man being detained by the Provost Marshal, allowing the man to have due process. By placing the judge under house arrest Lincoln prevented the judge from attending the hearing of the case. The documentation of this is found in Murphy v. Porter (1861) and in United States ex re John Murphy v. Andrew Porter, Provost Marshal District of Columbia (2 Hay. & Haz. 395; 1861).
The second ruling contained a letter from Judge W.M. Merrick, the judge of the Circuit Court of the District of Columbia, explaining how, after issuing the writ of habeas corpus to the young man, he was placed under house arrest. Here is the final paragraph of the letter:
After dinner I visited my brother Judges in Georgetown, and returning home between half past seven and eight o’clock found an armed sentinel stationed at my door by order of the Provost-Marshal. I learned that this guard had been placed at my door as early as five o’clock. Armed sentries from that time continuously until now have been stationed in front of my house. Thus it appears that a military officer against whom a writ in the appointed form of law has first threatened with and afterwards arrested and imprisoned the attorney who rightfully served the writ upon him. He continued, and still continues, in contempt and disregard of the mandate of the law, and has ignominiously placed an armed guard to insult and intimidate by its presence the Judge who ordered the writ to issue, and still keeps up this armed array at his door, in defiance and contempt of the justice of the land. Under the circumstances I respectfully request the Chief Judge of the Circuit Court to cause this memorandum to be read in open Court, to show the reasons for my absence from my place upon the bench, and that he will cause this paper to be entered at length on the minutes of the Court . . . W.M. Merrick Assistant Judge of the Circuit Court of the District of Columbia
As Adams writes, the Lincoln Cult is terrified that this truth will become public knowledge, for it if does, it means that Lincoln "destroyed the separation of powers; destroyed the place of the Supreme Court in the Constitutional scheme of government. It would have made the executive power supreme, over all others, and put the president, the military, and the executive branch of government, in total control of American society. The Constitution would have been at an end."
Exactly right.
August 19, 2004
Thomas J. DiLorenzo [send him mail] is the author of The Real Lincoln: A New Look at Abraham Lincoln, His Agenda, and an Unnecessary War, (Three Rivers Press/Random House). His latest book is How Capitalism Saved America: The Untold Story of Our Country’s History, from the Pilgrims to the Present (Crown Forum/Random House, August 2004).
Copyright © 2004 LewRockwell.com
If congress did their job back during Marbury vs. Madison, that court decision would have been declared invalid by congress. Congress is supposed to set the limitations of the Judiciary since they are the elected representatives.
Congress could end Judicial tyranny today if they got backbone. Unfortunately, we have a disloyal Democrat party and a weak spined group of Republicans there right now.
Hello, N-S, proposing a minimum standard credential for participation on the board today?
Not me. TexConfederate seems to think that nobody but another PhD can dispute Tommy.
The President, charged by the Constitution to take care that the laws be executed, has seen fit to arrest the process of this Court, and to forbid the Deputy Marshal to execute it. It does not involve merely the question of the power of the Executive in civil war to suspend the great writ of freedom, the habeas corpus. When this rule was ordered to give efficiency to that writ, no notice had been given by the President to the Courts of the country of such suspension here, now first announced to us, and it will hardly be maintained that the suspension could be retrospective.
Wether his PHD is in Economics or History is beside the point. His sources are irefutable.
But his conclusions are crazy.
Suspension of Civil Liberties in Maryland:
The Case of Richard Bennett Carmichael
Maryland State Archives
350 Rowe Boulevard
Annapolis, MD 21401
Phone: (410) 260-6400
Internet: mdsa.net
e-mail: archives@mdsa.net
Overview
"... if you have unquestionable proof that Judge Carmichael has uttered treasonable language in his charge to the grand jury... arrest him and bring him to Fort McHenry."
During the Civil War, Judge Richard Bennett Carmichael was a presiding circuit court judge for Kent, Queen Anne, Caroline, and Talbot counties. In November 1861, federal officials arrested three men charged with interfering with the election process after they heckled Unionists at a rally. Opposed to the arbitrary arrests and abuse of civil liberties, Carmichael instructed grand juries to indict the persons who made or abetted such arrests. As a result, Secretary of State William Seward ordered Judge Carmichael's arrest. On May 27, 1862, Federal troops entered Carmichael's courtroom in Easton where he was pistol whipped and dragged from the Talbot County Circuit Court bench.
Instantly this Officer with his revolver drawn pushed on Judge Carmichael and seized him by the breast of his coat. The other officer closed in also. I could not then see Judge Carmichael, but could see they were surging and pulling at him. I saw three pistols snapped at him in the scuffle. In dragging him from his seat the person of the Judge was again concealed from me for some short time. I saw however the officers in front of him striking at him with the barrels of the revolvers. In a short time the Judge covered with blood was dragged from his seat and platform. I soon after left courtroom. Several citizens meantime had been struck with the barrels of the revolvers by the deputies above named. I saw no citizen display a weapon of any sort or offer the least shadow of opposition or resistance.
Taken to Fort McHenry, Judge Carmichael spent six months in various Union prisons without a trial and was unconditionally released on December 4, 1862.
After the war, Judge Carmichael served in the Maryland House of Delegates and preside over the Maryland Constitutional Convention of 1867. He died October 21, 1884.
PRIMARY RESOURCES:
DESCRIPTION: Richard Bennett Carmichael
DATE CREATED/PUBLISHED:
SOURCE: J. Thomas Scharf, History of Maryland from the Earliest Period to the Present Day. Vol. 3. Hatboro, PA: Tradition Press, 1967.
RESPOSITORY: Maryland State Archives
DESCRIPTION: Fort McHenry
DATE CREATED/PUBLISHED:
SOURCE: J. Thomas Scharf, History of Maryland from the Earliest Period to the Present Day. Vol. 3. Hatboro, PA: Tradition Press, 1967.
RESPOSITORY: Maryland State Archives
DESCRIPTION: Letter, William H. Seward to John A. Dix
DATE CREATED/PUBLISHED: October 3, 1861
NOTES: "It seems to me that that functionary should be arrested even in his court if need be and sent to Fort Lafayette. You may proceed accordingly."
SOURCE: United States. War Dept., United States. Record and Pension Office., United States. War Records Office., et al. The war of the rebellion: a compilation of the official records of the Union and Confederate armies. Series 2 - Volume 2. (Washington, DC. Government Printing Office, 1897): 85
DESCRIPTION: Letter, John A. Dix to H. H. Goldsborough (p. 576, p. 577)
DATE CREATED/PUBLISHED: May 23, 1862
NOTES: "I am disposed however, to defer to your judgment, and if you have unquestionable proof that Judge Carmichael has uttered treasonable language in his charge to the grand jury and that the officers of the court have been so biased and are so controlled by the disloyalty of the judge as to render a fair trial hopeless, then the deputy provost-marshall, Mr. McPhail, is authorized on consultation with you to arrest him and bring him to Fort McHenry."
SOURCE: United States. War Dept., United States. Record and Pension Office., United States. War Records Office., et al. The war of the rebellion: a compilation of the official records of the Union and Confederate armies. Series 2 - Volume 1. (Washington, DC. Government Printing Office, 1894): 576-577.
DESCRIPTION: Docket entry, Talbot County Circuit Court, indicating that the activities of the court have been interrupted because of the arrest of Judge Richard Bennett Carmichael
DATE CREATED/PUBLISHED: May 27, 1862
SOURCE: TALBOT COUNTY CIRCUIT COURT (Minutes) [MSA C1892, 1-43-4-6]
RESPOSITORY: Maryland State Archives
DESCRIPTION: Letter J. L. McPhail to W. W. Morris
DATE CREATED/PUBLISHED: May 27, 1862
NOTES: "You will receive the Hon. Judge R. B. Carmichael .... The charges will be sent in the morning."
SOURCE: United States. War Dept., United States. Record and Pension Office., United States. War Records Office., et al. The war of the rebellion: a compilation of the official records of the Union and Confederate armies. Series 2 - Volume 1. (Washington, DC. Government Printing Office, 1894): 600.
DESCRIPTION: Register of prisoner, R. Carmichael
DATE CREATED/PUBLISHED: May 28, 1862
SOURCE: Selected Records of the War Department Relating to Confederate Prisoners of War, 1861-1865. Microfilm No. 598. Roll 96. Volumes 305-310. Register of Prisoners and Ledger of Prisoners' Accounts, 1861-65: Fort McHenry, Md. Military Prison.
REPOSITORY: National Archives
DESCRIPTION: "An Exciting Scene at Easton. Arrest of Judge Carmichael and Others on The Charge of Treason."
DATE CREATED/PUBLISHED: May 29, 1862
SOURCE: The Maryland Newsheet Collection
REPOSITORY: Maryland State Archives
DESCRIPTION: Letter, Col. Samuel Hambleton and James Lloyd to James A. Pearce providing a detailed account of Carmichael's arrest.
DATE CREATED/PUBLISHED: May 29, 1862
SOURCE: TALBOT COUNTY CIRCUIT COURT (Minutes) [MSA C1892, 1-43-4-6]
RESPOSITORY: Maryland State Archives
DESCRIPTION: Letter, Thomas H. Hicks to Abraham Lincoln, (Release of suspected conspirators)
DATE CREATED/PUBLISHED: May 30, 1862
NOTE: Thomas H. Hicks was the governor of Maryland, 1858-1862.
SOURCE: The Abraham Lincoln Papers at the Library of Congress. Series 1. General Correspondence. 1833-1916.
REPOSITORY: Library of Congress
DESCRIPTION: Letter, William Wilkins Glenn to unknown correspondent
DATE CREATED/PUBLISHED: May 31, 1862
NOTES: Includes statement from Judge Carmichael
SOURCE: Bayly Ellen Marks and Mark Norton Schatz, Between North and South: A Maryland Journalist Views the Civil War: The Narrative of William Wilkins Glenn, 1861-1869. London: Associated University Presses, 1976.
REPOSITORY: Original letter in the collections of the Maryland Historical Society, Baltimore
DESCRIPTION: Letter, George Vickers to William Price, (Arrests in Maryland)
DATE CREATED/PUBLISHED: June 3, 1862
SOURCE: The Abraham Lincoln Papers at the Library of Congress. Series 1. General Correspondence. 1833-1916.
RESPOSITORY: Library of Congress
DESCRIPTION: Letter, Samuel Hambleton to James A. Pearce, (Statement regarding arrest of Judge Richard Carmichael)
DATE CREATED/PUBLISHED: June 9, 1862
SOURCE: The Abraham Lincoln Papers at the Library of Congress. Series 1. General Correspondence. 1833-1916.
REPOSITORY: Library of Congress
DESCRIPTION: Letter, William Price to William H. Seward (Arrest of Judge Richard Carmichael)
DATE CREATED/PUBLISHED: June 9, 1862
SOURCE: The Abraham Lincoln Papers at the Library of Congress. Series 1. General Correspondence. 1833-1916.
RESPOSITORY: Library of Congress
DESCRIPTION: Letter, Abraham Lincoln to John W. Crisfield, (Arrest of Judge Richard Carmichael)
DATE CREATED/PUBLISHED: June 26, 1862
SOURCE: The Abraham Lincoln Papers at the Library of Congress. Series 1. General Correspondence. 1833-1916.
RESPOSITORY: Library of Congress
DESCRIPTION: Letter, A. Minor to Abraham Lincoln, (Arrest of Richard B. Carmichael)
DATE CREATED/PUBLISHED: July 1862
SOURCE: The Abraham Lincoln Papers at the Library of Congress. Series 1. General Correspondence. 1833-1916.
RESPOSITORY: Library of Congress
DESCRIPTION: Letter, Richard B. Carmichael to Abraham Lincoln, (Seeks release from prison)
DATE CREATED/PUBLISHED: July 22, 1862
SOURCE: The Abraham Lincoln Papers at the Library of Congress. Series 1. General Correspondence. 1833-1916.
RESPOSITORY: Library of Congress
DESCRIPTION: Letter, James A. Pearce to Abraham Lincoln, (Arrest of Judge Richard B. Carmichael)
DATE CREATED/PUBLISHED: August 8, 1862
SOURCE: The Abraham Lincoln Papers at the Library of Congress. Series 1. General Correspondence. 1833-1916.
RESPOSITORY: Library of Congress
DESCRIPTION: Letter John A. Dix to Augustus W. Bradford
DATE CREATED/PUBLISHED: February 10, 1862
NOTES: "Hon. R. B. Carmichael has for many months been on of the prime movers of disaffection and disloyalty on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. He was the author of a treasonable memorial to the legislature, published and circulated under his own signature while holding a place on the bench. His charges to the grand juries in his district have been inflammatory and insulting to the Federal Government. He has caused military officers to be indicted and has charged grand juries that it was their duty to find bills against all persons who had given information on which arrests had been made by order of the Government...."
SOURCE: United States. War Dept., United States. Record and Pension Office., United States. War Records Office., et al. The war of the rebellion: a compilation of the official records of the Union and Confederate armies. Series 2 - Volume 2. (Washington, DC. Government Printing Office, 1897): 213
See also:
For Lincoln's opinion on the Carmichael case, see Roy P. Basler, ed. The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln. Vol. 5. New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1953, pp. 285-86.
Lincoln, Abraham, 1809-1865.: Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln. Volume 5.
To John W. Crisfield [1]
Executive Mansion,
Hon. John W. Crisfield. Washington, June 26. 1862.
My dear Sir: I have been considering the appeal made by yourself, and Senator Pearce in behalf of Judge Carmichael. His charge to the Grand-Jury, was left with me by the Senator, and, on reading it, I must confess I was not very favorably impressed towards the Judge. The object of the charge, I understand, was to procure prossecutions, and punishment of some men for arresting, or doing violence to some secessionists---that is, the Judge was trying to help a little, by giving the protection of law to those who were endevoring to overthrow the Supreme law---trying if he could find a safe place for certain men to stand on the constitution, whilst they should stab it in another place.
But possibly I am mistaken.
The Secretary of War and I have agreed that if the Judge will take the oath of allegiance, usually taken in such cases, he may be discharged. Please ascertain, and inform me whether he will do it. Yours very truly A. LINCOLN
Annotation
[1] ADfS, DLC-RTL. The circumstances of the arrest of Judge Richard B. Carmichael, whose release was requested by Representative Crisfield and Senator James A. Pearce of Maryland, are recounted in the report of General John A. Dix to Secretary Stanton, June 25, 1862, which reads in part as follows: "In October [October 3, 1861] last I was authorized by the Secretary of State to arrest Judge R. B. Carmichael of [Talbot County] the Eastern Shore of Maryland, if I should deem it expedient . . . and if necessary in his own Court. In the communication . . . was enclosed a printed memorial . . . to the Legislature of Maryland, signed by him and expressing the most disloyal sentiments. . . . I did not . . . deem it advisable to make the arrest at that time. Soon afterwards a Military arrest was made on the Eastern Shore . . . in a county in Judge Carmichael's District, by Officer of the Second Regiment of Delaware Volunteers. At the next term of the Court, the Judge charged the Grand jury that it was their duty to present all persons concerned in such arrest. . . . His charges in . . . other Counties as well as this, were of a most disloyal and offensive character. . . . Under the charge referred to the Hon. Henry H. Goldsborough, President of the Senate of Maryland and several officers of the 2nd. Delaware . . . I was informed that bills of indictment had been found against them. The trial of the Hon. Mr. Goldsborough was expected to take place in . . . May last, and four Officers of the Delaware Regiment were summoned as witnesses in his behalf. They came to me and expressed a great unwillingness to obey . . . as they had been presented by the Grand jury . . . and would be arrested if they made their appearance in the county. . . . I dispatched Mr. [Daniel H.] McPhail, Deputy Provost Marshal of the Baltimore Military Police with four police-men to Easton . . . where the Court was in session [May 23-27], to accompany the four officers . . . with instructions to arrest Judge Carmichael, if on consultation with . . . Mr. Goldsborough, it should be thought expedient. . . . It was, on full consideration, deemed expedient that the arrest should be made in Court in order that the proceeding might be the more marked. . . . When Mr. McPhail accompanied by two . . . policemen ascended the bench and respectfully announced to the Judge the order to take him into custody by the authority of the United States, he denied the authority of the Government and made a violent attack on one of the policemen. Mr. McPhail was thus compelled to use force to secure him, and he unluckily received a superficial wound on the head. . . ." (DLC-RTL). Judge Carmichael was released on Stanton's order, December 2, 1862.
I thought President Lincoln predicated his declaration of war, by blockade, on the as-yet unseceded States of Virginia and North Carolina on the premise that those States were insurrectionary because the federal courts and marshals could no longer discharge their functions?
[You, changing the subject] But his conclusions are crazy.
Please show by argument that DiLorenzo's conclusions are "crazy". Begin by defining "crazy" and showing how you propose to apply the word to historiography.
If you meant it.
First, the Taney warrant. There is no evidence supporting this contention except for 2 or 3 second person accounts. There is no physical evidence, no documentation, no escaping the fact that Taney never spent a day in jail but remained on the bench until he died. The physical evidence supporting the claim is non-existent.
Aha, says Tommy. We have circumstantial evidence. We have Ward Lamon. We are to believe that Ward Lamon, by his account, was given the order to arrest Taney by Lincoln personally and just didn't do it. But I'm not aware of any other instance where Lincoln gave Lamon an order and Lamon just decided not to carry it out. Lamon was Lincoln's most loyal minion, and held no love for Taney so why on this occasion would Lamon ignore Lincoln's orders? Evidence like this would hardly stand up in court.
But, cries DiLusional, there is more. We are to believe that Taney told others that he was to be arrested. But we don't know what he based that on. The account comes not from Taney himself but from a second party some time after the threat of arrest had passed. And again Taney was never harmed, threatened, jailed, or in any way disturbed. He remained on the bench ruling on cases for another two years.
Wait, wait, yells Tommy, the icing on the cake is yet to come. Judge Merrick! Don't forget Judge Merrick! And here DiLusional goes off on a tangent. Nowhere in his account does Judge Merrick mention being jailed. Nowhere is an arrest warrant mentioned. Nowhere does DiLusional say that Judge Merrick remained on the bench until the Circuit Court of the District of Columbia was replaced in 1863 by the Supreme Court of D.C. And most of all nowhere does Tommy offer any support that this was done at the order of Abraham Lincoln. The title of this POS is "Lincoln’s 'Great Crime': The Arrest Warrant for the Chief Justice." If Lincolnd didn't personally order the arrest of Judge Merrick then how does his account support Tommy's insane claim that Linoln ordered the arrest of Chief Justice Taney? If Lincoln did issue the warrant then where is it?
So suck up Tommy's crap, I could not give a damn less. I honestly can't tell if the "Great Crime" was supposed to be the alleged warrant on Kerry or the suspension of habeas corpus, and I don't think Tommy is sure himself. Disagree with me all you want, and have Nolu Chan post 60,000 words in reply along the same lines as the dump he's already posted. Nothing he presented supports the claim that Lincoln issued a warrant for Taney. It's back to Lamon's account and Taney's ramblings, and the fact that nothing ever happened to Taney at all.
Oops. That should be "alleged warrant on Taney." That'll teach me to type posts and watch Fox n' Friends at the same time.
Judge Merrick is supposed to have been detained in October 1861, long after the rebellion had begun. Also, Judge Merrick was a judge in the District of Columbia. So what did any of this have to do with Virginia and North Carolina?
Except Wlat got Wlated a few months ago :)
Of course your "love" for the Great Tyrant could have something to do with YOUR ramblings.
I wonder if he is back under another guise......
And your and Tommy's loathing of Lincoln could have something to do with yours?
The object of the charge, I understand, was to procure prossecutions, and punishment of some men for arresting, or doing violence to some secessionists---that is, the Judge was trying to help a little, by giving the protection of law to those who were endevoring to overthrow the Supreme law---trying if he could find a safe place for certain men to stand on the constitution, whilst they should stab it in another place.
But possibly I am mistaken.
The Secretary of War and I have agreed that if the Judge will take the oath of allegiance, usually taken in such cases, he may be discharged. Please ascertain, and inform me whether he will do it. Yours very truly A. LINCOLN
Of course Lincoln should have said alleged secessionists, and then the only thing they were alleged to have done was heckling.
By Lincoln's own statement, he professed approval of doing violence to those who may allegedly heckle, with no due process of law.
By Lincoln's own statement, he approved of government agents entering a court and pistol whipping the judge sitting on the bench and then subjecting him to unlawful imprisonment, should the judge attempt to provide the protection of the law to those who have been subjected to unlawful government violence for alleged heckling.
Agents of the Executive branch subverted the Jucicial branch, and Lincoln personally approved.
I included all of the primary sources just for you, Nonsense.
Bullshit, as ususal.
What it has to do with them is that you are trying to deflect the point, a good one, by changing the subject and inviting our attention to irrelevancies.
The point is, Lincoln levied red war on two unseceded States because the courts weren't open. Then he did the same thing to Judge Merrick that, when supposedly done by North Carolina e.g. (accepting Lincoln's charge against them arguendo), merited sending an army.
He was a practical hypocrite, in other words. Have to close up now -- lightning all around! Zowie! That was close......'bye, y'all!
Another content free post from the Minister of Propaganda, as usual.
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