Abe Lincoln was a dictator??? (Need Help combating loony argument)

[erod]

Hi FRiends,

I have two brothers who I love very much, they’re young and libertarian Ron Paul supporters, sigh. We get along and I’m hoping that one day they’ll come back to conservatism, but they have bought into a theory that I don’t think makes much sense:

Abe Lincoln was a dictator.

There are many websites dedicated to this nonsense you can Google "Abe Lincoln dictator" and get some weird stuff, if you want to check it out.

I need your help in busting this myth are there any books I can read on this subject to dispel this stuff? Do you know any of the arguments to combat this nonsense? Ie. Lincoln did not want to free the slaves.

Thanks for taking time out of your day to help me out, -Erod

[SoothingDave]

Tell me more about the glorious southern culture that both blacks and whites shared in and loved.

And you wonder why sites like FR get called racist.

[Oratam]

Lincoln started us down the road to the giant Federal Government we are fighting today. He’s no hero.

Agreed. When historians call slavery America's "Original Sin" this is why I believe it. It's as though it snaked its way into the Constitution to serve as our country's undoing.

[erod]

Economically I agree with a lot of his policies, but on things like defense he really alienates me, which is why I could never support him.

[rockrr]

His father-in-law owned slaves. Grant purchased one and manumitted him.

[manc]

Lincoln is put into our minds as an angel and he is far from that.
he took many rights away, he was also fighting a war out west killing the indians and taking their land etc which we do not hear about much.

[Still Thinking]

I don’t think you’d find too much agreement with the use of the word “dictator” but he wasn’t a great president either. He unilaterally enforced the continuation of an originally voluntary confederation between the states, which they desired to leave when the feds didn’t act in its original spirit. He suspended some Constitutional rights because they were inconvenient. Sorta like FDR with an (R) after his name.

[Zionist Conspirator]

"Palaeos" have always hated Abraham Lincoln and worshiped the antebellum, Jeffersonian South epitomized by John Randolph's famous saying: "I am an aristocrat. I love liberty. I hate equality." These people are deeply anti-moralist, and their opposition to such issues as "gay rights" has nothing to do with morality and everything to do with local autonomy vs. a tyrannical federal government. Indeed, they often attribute leftist social engineering to moralism. Then of course there is the racial factor; "palaeos" are primarily henotheistic and civilizationist, almost allergic to the concept of universals.

As for Lincoln personally, what other President in American history had a greater excuse to suspend the Constitution and the upcoming election? Yet he did neither.

Abraham Lincoln was merely a Federalist--Federalism being one of the two great traditions of Constitutional interpretation we've had from the beginning. He was the heir of Washington, Hamilton, the Adams's, Fisher Ames, Noah Webster, Paul Revere, (the post-ratification) Patrick Henry, Daniel Webster, Henry Clay, and Zachary Taylor. If he was a "dictator," then so were all the above. But try prying that into the thick head of a "palaeo" aristocratic Jeffersonian libertarian.

"After the duel, gentlemen are invited to brandy and cigars on the veranda!" I am a native and lifelong product of the Upper South, and this whole political tradition is totally alien to me.

[equalitybeforethelaw]

Tell me more about the glorious southern culture that both blacks and whites shared in and loved.

Simple, just look at all things easily recognized as American, and trace their provenance from the South - music, literature, cuisine, law... The South, unlike the North, was divided only by race but held to one culture. The North, until very recentlly (circa 1950s) was a collection of ethnic ghettos (i.e., Irish, Italian, Ukranian, Swedish, Jewish, Dutch, Wasps, Blacks etc). The reason there is no North Eastern culture is because these groups never assimilated and melted, but remained isolated within their ghetto. You didn’t marry outside of your clan. This never happened in the South, there was a true melting of all cultures in the South, to include the black culture. It is a shared culture. About the only thing culturally I recognize to the North East is “show tunes” or the musical. This likely comes from England rather than NY. So why is it that the NE never developed any identifiable culture?

There was one culture that the NE did develop and that was the pious assholiness of puritanism. I guess after they got bored burning witches they thought burning the South was great sport.

[LexBaird]

You wrote: Geez, Soothingdave is about as nuanced as a democrat calling people racists if they don’t agree with them. Eat it hack.

You also wrote: Ask yourself one simple question, why did Yankees hate black people so much?

Hmmm.

[Vendome]

I think it took some sixty years of the North imposing their will on the South to pay for some war, I forget. ( /S)

 

 

I have excerpted this and formatted for easy reading.  From the secession of Georgia.

http://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/csa_geosec.asp

 

 

The material prosperity of the North was greatly dependent on the Federal Government; that of the the South not at all. In the first years of the Republic the navigating, commercial, and manufacturing interests of the North began to seek profit and aggrandizement at the expense of the agricultural interests.

 

Even the owners of fishing smacks sought and obtained bounties for pursuing their own business (which yet continue), and $500,000 is now paid them annually out of the Treasury. The navigating interests begged for protection against foreign shipbuilders and against competition in the coasting trade. Congress granted both requests, and by prohibitory acts gave an absolute monopoly of this business to each of their interests, which they enjoy without diminution to this day.

 

Not content with these great and unjust advantages, they have sought to throw the legitimate burden of their business as much as possible upon the public; they have succeeded in throwing the cost of light-houses, buoys, and the maintenance of their seamen upon the Treasury, and the Government now pays above $2,000,000 annually for the support of these objects.

 

Theses interests, in connection with the commercial and manufacturing classes, have also succeeded, by means of subventions to mail steamers and the reduction in postage, in relieving their business from the payment of about $7,000,000 annually, throwing it upon the public Treasury under the name of postal deficiency. The manufacturing interests entered into the same struggle early, and has clamored steadily for Government bounties and special favors.

 

This interest was confined mainly to the Eastern and Middle non-slave-holding States.

 

Wielding these great States it held great power and influence, and its demands were in full proportion to its power. The manufacturers and miners wisely based their demands upon special facts and reasons rather than upon general principles, and thereby mollified much of the opposition of the opposing interest. They pleaded in their favor the infancy of their business in this country, the scarcity of labor and capital, the hostile legislation of other countries toward them, the great necessity of their fabrics in the time of war, and the necessity of high duties to pay the debt incurred in our war for independence.

 

These reasons prevailed, and they received for many years enormous bounties by the general acquiescence of the whole country.

 

But when these reasons ceased they were no less clamorous for Government protection, but their clamors were less heeded-- the country had put the principle of protection upon trial and condemned it. After having enjoyed protection to the extent of from 15 to 200 per cent. upon their entire business for above thirty years, the act of 1846 was passed. It avoided sudden change, but the principle was settled, and free trade, low duties, and economy in public expenditures was the verdict of the American people. The South and the Northwestern States sustained this policy. There was but small hope of its reversal; upon the direct issue, none at all.

 

To be sure the other states should have included their gripes of offense in their secession declarations, though these and many more were extant of their positions. 

 

 

 

[Rockingham]

Was Lincoln a dictator? The best refutation is that despite the ongoing Civil War, free and fair elections were routinely held. Indeed, in 1864, Lincoln expected to lose reelection to the dovish McClellan -- and he would have if Sherman had not won the Battle of Atlanta.

Lincoln was a Unionist more than he was an abolitionist. Lincoln saw preservation of the Union as the highest goal, more so than ending slavery. Nevertheless, when the time was ripe, Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation. Despite the qualified nature of the measure, its practical effect was to end slavery, and that was fully recognized at the time.

[manc]

it won’t , crap

[manc]

EXACTLY

[manc]

sounds like one to me

[manc]

didn’t NH leave MA and still have in their constitution they have a right to still leave.
I think it is the only state which still has that but I await to be corrected

[Vendome]

NS is willing and capable of engaging. erod is a total nOOb and I feel like giving him a traditional welcome for people dumb enough to join our clan.

Permission to fire?

[equalitybeforethelaw]

As for Lincoln personally, what other President in American history had a greater excuse to suspend the Constitution and the upcoming election? Yet he did neither.

He didn’t suspend the Constitution but rather ignored it whole cloth. He didn’t suspend the 1864 elections, but made damn sure the casualty figures from Cold Harbor were not made public. Yea, he was a great all around guy. After imprisoning over 13,000 of his fellow Americans who disagreed with him politically, how much real competition was their to him.

[manc]

LOL I don’t think the OP thought he would get these kind of answers.
I guess he isn’t gong to let his brothers see these answers
LOL
thanks for the ping

[Vendome]

Have you ever read the about the prison for Confederate Soldiers in Chicago and their squalid conditions?

Don’t forget the torture.

?????????????

didn’t I just write that? Weirdo....

[equalitybeforethelaw]

didn’t I just write that? Weirdo..

No you wrote about squalid conditions, torture and squalid are two different things.