Lincoln wasn't even shot. It was all a hoax to get away from his crazy wife. He then shoved autograph seeker John Wilkes Booth out of his presidential box in Ford's Theatre and had him shot by federal troops to complete the coverup.
Posted on 09/27/2010 1:27:31 PM PDT by RandysRight
Goody! A Lincoln thread! What could possibly go wrong?
I thought Abe was great. Sherman is a personal hero.
All ahead full. The Threadnaught has cleared the harbor.
Conservatives....adore Lincoln
Lincoln wasn't even shot. It was all a hoax to get away from his crazy wife. He then shoved autograph seeker John Wilkes Booth out of his presidential box in Ford's Theatre and had him shot by federal troops to complete the coverup.
Lincoln, Hamilton, and all the other big government originalists are the model for modern conservatism.
The civil war was about slavery. Sorry. The Confederacy was based on it and so was the Southern economy. You cannot rewrite history no matter how much you want to. This effort started at the end of the war and I was shocked to find it still going on today. So for this pathetic revisionism, that rears its ugly head here occasionally, I will enshrine the following from the message to the Confederate Congress April 29th 1861 from Jefferson Davis:
“As soon as the Northern States that prohibited African slavery within their limits had reached a number sufficient to give their representation a controlling voice in the Congress, a persistent and organized system of hostile measures against the rights of the owners of slaves in the Southern States was inaugurated and gradually extended. A continuous series of measures was devised and prosecuted for the purpose of rendering insecure the tenure of property in slaves... Senators and Representatives were sent to the common councils of the nation, whose chief title to this distinction consisted in the display of a spirit of ultra-fanaticism and whose business was... to awaken the bitterest hatred against the citizens of sister states, by violent denunciation of their institutions; the transaction of public affairs was impeded by repeated efforts to usurp pairing the security of property in slaves, and reducing those States which held slaves to a condition of inferiority. Finally a great party was organized for the purpose of obtaining the administration of the Government, which the avowed object of using its power for the total exclusion of the slave States from all participation in the benefits of the public domain acquired by all the States in common, whether by conquest or purchase; of surrounding them entirely by States in which slavery should be prohibited; of thus rendering the property in slaves so insecure as to be comparatively worthless, and thereby annihilating in effect property worth thousands of millions of dollars. This party, thus organized, succeeded in the month of November last in the election of its candidate for the Presidency of the United States. In the meantime the African slaves had augmented in number from about 600,000 at the date of the adoption of the constitutional compact to upward of 4,000,000. In moral and social condition they had been elevated from brutal savages into docile, intelligent, and civilized agricultural laborers, and supplied not only with bodily comforts but with careful religious instruction. Under the supervision of a superior race, their labor had been so directed as not only to allow a gradual and marked amelioration of their own condition, but to convert hundreds of thousands of square miles of the wilderness into cultivated lands covered with a prosperous people; towns and cities had sprung into existence, and had rapidly increased in wealth and population under the social system of the South;... and the productions in the South of cotton, rice, sugar, and tobacco, for the full development and continuance of which the labor of African slaves was and is indispensable had swollen to an amount which formed nearly three-fourths of the exports of the whole United States and had become absolutely necessary to the wants of civilized man. With interests of such overwhelming magnitude imperiled, the people of the Southern States were driven by the conduct of the North to the adoption of some course of action to avert the danger with which they were openly menaced.”
This next quote comes from a speech in Savannah on March 21st 1861 by Alexander Stephens, VP of the Confederacy.
“The (Confederate) Constitution has put at rest forever the agitating questions relating to our peculiar institutions- African slavery as it exists among us- the proper status of the negro in our form of civilization. This was the immediate cause of the late rupture and present revolution. Jefferson, in his forecast, had anticipated this, as the “rock upon which the old Union would split” He was right. What was conjecture with him, is now a realized fact. But whether he fully comprehended the great truth upon which that rock stood and stands, may be doubted. The prevailing ideas entertained by him and most of the leading statesmen at the time of the formation of the old Constitution were, that the enslavement of the African was in violation of the laws of nature; that it was wrong in principle, socially, morally, and politically. It was an evil they knew not well how to deal with; but the general opinion of the men of that day was, that, somehow or other, in the order of Providence, the institution would be evanescent and pass away...Those ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong. They rested upon the assumption of the equality of races. This was an error. It was a sandy foundation, and the idea of a Government built upon it- when the “Storm came and the wind blew, it fell.” Our new Government is founded upon exactly the opposite ideas; its foundations are laid, its cornerstone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery, subordination to the superior race, is his natural and moral condition. This, our new Government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth......It is the first government ever instituted upon principles in strict conformity to nature, and the ordination of Providence, in furnishing the materials of human society. Many Governments have been founded upon the principles of certain classes; but the classes thus enslaved were of the same race, and in violation of the laws of nature. Our system commits no such violation of nature’s laws. The negro by nature, or by the curse against Canaan, is fitted for that condition which he occupies in our system. The architect in the construction of buildings lays the foundation with the proper material- the granite- then comes the brick or the marble. The substratum of our society is made of the material fitted by nature for it, and by experience we know that it is the best, not only for the superior but for the inferior race, that it should be so. It is, indeed in conformity with the Creator. It is not for us to inquire into the wisdom of His ordinances or to question them.”
Oddly enough, whenever these two speeches are reproduced and posted the discussion stops dead in its tracks. A separate and equally discredited proposition put forward is that the South fought for “State’s Rights” and not slavery. Well, I will not post it here, but anyone can Google it. Just enter: “Confederate Constitution text” and read the results. The Confederacy reproduced the U.S. Constitution almost exactly except for a minor change in how the president was elected, and the major changes of giving Constitutional protections for slavery. That’s right; they reproduced exactly the hated federal system right down to the suspension of habeas Corpus in times of rebellion. So that argument is completely discredited from the start. Yet it is still made as people try and change history for emotional reasons. But history is history and it doesn’t change.
The Lincoln Administration is when everything started to go south.
A person’s view of Lincoln depends on whether they’re a Northerner or a Southerner. I’m a Southerner. Lincoln was America’s first despot.
Abe was a good guy. I love how saving the union is somehow unrestrained tyranny, but an economy based on owning people is just a trivial thing.
Don’t confuse some incredibly honorable men of the south, and respect for some amazing technological things they accomplished, with respect for the political ideals of their system. Abe did the right thing,,,,
(I know,,, i know,,, it wasn’t about slavery,,,yawn lol.)
Very good info.
It would be more true to say it depends on whether they are a statist or a libertarian. There are plenty of northerners who recognize the truth.
Thanks, but it won’t matter.
Slim’s FR Policy 32-A:
“Serious participation in a Lincoln thread is more of a guaranteed time waster than a bottle of tequila and a visit to http://www.badgerbadgerbadger.com/";
“Ramming speed Scottie, I need ramming speed!”
“I’m giving her all I’ve got Captain!”
Oh I know. Just remember, it wasn’t about slavery, LOL!
Interesting issue--one that I haven't seen before--but I haven't met many libertarians who believe it's ok for one man to own another man.
I say that because when you go after Abraham Lincoln, you automatically go after the Republic. This puts yourself in the position of supporting the Confederacy and slavery.
Oh, yeah; I've read and heard all the arguments about “States Rights”. But reading the U.S. Declaration of Independence and the Constitution proves that ‘The People’ have rights; states have powers (no rights - those come from our Creator).
The Southern states tried to turn human beings into livestock property, ignoring that important statement about “all men are created equal”.
No matter how many arguments, that is what the Civil War was about. Freeing an enslaved people. Babbling about States Rights is just smoke and mirrors.
And yeah, the victors always write the history.
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