Thank you, thank you, thank you for civil exchange.
They don’t have that article in Audible format, do they? Though I haven’t read the article, I suspect I would come down on the side of “Abraham Lincoln AND the Progressives: the co-fathers of big government.” In short, I don’t believe that Lincoln was necessarily for big government, I believe that his actions ALLOWED big government to evolve.
FWIW.
In this article, Dr. Guelzo talks about how the Progressives, who used to hate Lincoln, decided to co-opt him like a hostage for their own wicked purposes. How many thousands of times have we heard liberals twist ideas and words to their cause? We should be onto it by now. As far as any of Lincoln's actions allowing big government, since when have Progressives asked for permission? They pass unconstitutional laws all the time and laugh off any questions about constitutionality - I know you've heard that one, too.
The huge danger for the conservative cause is that if we buy into the lie, and start hating Lincoln because Progressives pretend he's on their big-government side, then we fall right into their trap where they start harping on conservatives being for slavery and racism. That's their biggest ugly weapon that they've been using for decades. (See Breitbart).
I wish it were on audio - I don't know if it might be possible to run it through some voice recognition software. Dr. Guelzo might have the time to record it someday, since it's such a good piece.
Dr. Guelzo's excellent biography of Lincoln is available on Audible.
In this biography, he does an excellent job of talking about the philosophical differences between Jefferson and Lincoln, and their ideologies, and Lincoln's fight for the opportunity for the common man to rise above his station. Oh, I can't recommend it enough.
As far as Lincoln's actions allowing big government to evolve, Dr. Guelzo sums up this way:
"There is no doubt that the wartime emergency of 1861 to 1865 called out a significant increase in the size and scope of the federal government; what is important to notice, however, is that:
This increase was in response to a threat to the very life of the republic,Lincoln used federal powers in a true emergency, and then laid them down. Woodrow Wilson started to pretend that all of life was an ongoing emergency. It sounds familiar to "never let a crisis go to waste." Our fiscal emergency gave them words and power to expand the welfare state and the further unconscionable, unconstitutional powers yet again.It bears no proportional resemblance to the scope of modern “big government,” and
The increase shrank back to its prewar proportions with no sense of having established a permanent precedent, much less a government-knows-best philosophy."
You really should take the time to read the article.