“They said Lincoln was a tyrant, (check) bent on amassing power (check)and ruining democracy (check).”
Those copperheads were pretty smart. No way they could see Obama in our future, but it was Lincoln, who determined once and for all that the federal government reined supreme, that eventually allowed a dictator be elected.
“They demanded an immediate end to hostilities, believing contrary to all available evidence that the Southern states would return to the Union if only Lincoln would stop the shooting.”
True. Had Lincoln stopped hostilities early on there was a good chance that Southern states would have come back to the union. By 1863...not so much.
Rhetoric aside, follow the money. It’s nearly always about power and money——“Any people, anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up and shake off the existing government, and form a new one that suits them better. This is a most valuable, a most sacred right, a right which we hope and believe is to liberate the world”.
Abraham Lincoln – U.S. Congress, 1847
A little over 10 years later after the South attempted precisely that, Lincoln, when asked, “Why not let the South go in peace”? replied; “I can’t let them go. Who would pay for the government”? “And, what then will become of my tariff”?
Abraham Lincoln to Virginia Compromise Delegation March 1861