Confederate plaque in Texas Capitol to come down after vote

AUSTIN, Texas — A historically inaccurate brass plaque honoring confederate veterans will come down after a vote this morning, WFAA has learned.

The State Preservation Board, which is in charge of the capitol building and grounds, meets this morning at 10:30 a.m. to officially decide the fate of the metal plate.

I was going to ask you to check whether this quote was valid or not, because about one thing I a absolutely and fully trust you, is the willingness to disprove any smear against Lincoln. If this quote was made up, I believed you would be able and willing to prove it.

And then I found this reference, so I now believe this quote was not made up.

Godless Liberal?

If you take the time to look, you'll find many quotes from Lincoln on the subject of religion.
These show Lincoln was not less religious than, for examples, our Founders, or even current President.
I would put Lincoln's Christian faith as vastly stronger than any recent Democrat President.

Here is a link to several such Lincoln quotes.

As for Herndon's claims, he is the Michael Cohen of that day-- not to be believed.
Again I refer you to Lincoln's own words on the subject.
Among my favorite is:

"I have been driven many times upon my knees by the overwhelming conviction that I had no where else to go.
My own wisdom and that of all about me seemed insufficient for that day."

Wikipedia has an page on Lincoln's religious views. They cite someone who was in New Salem at the time and disputed Herndon's story. Herndon was 16 in 1834 and living 20 miles away in Springfield, so he wouldn't have first-hand knowledge of Lincoln's activities or of any burned manuscript at the time.

The young Lincoln may have had deist or unorthodox theist views, but whether he was the scoffer Herndon portrays is much less certain. In an age of revivalism, he may have been skeptical about some of the religious transports and ecstasies that went on at revivals, and Herndon may have interpreted that as a more thoroughgoing atheism.

Later on, Lincoln apparently believed in a biblical God, but wasn't convinced that salvation was available. He had inherited much of Calvinism from his early years, but it didn't "take right." He got the fatalism, but not the hope. Lincoln was an Old Testament believer but had hesitancies when it came to other Christian dogmas. The phrase "theistic rationalism" has come to be applied to the beliefs of his middle years.

Curiously, some have seen young Lincoln as a Universalist, a believer that all will be saved, and there are even comments by contemporaries to that effect, saying that his youthful manuscript existed and proclaimed the doctrine of universal salvation. That doctrine is quite the opposite of Calvinism or the post-Calvinist fatalism that is so closely associated with the mature Lincoln, so even without Herndon's tales the question of Lincoln's religion is a difficult one.

As he grew older, Lincoln drew closer to Christian orthodoxy and to organized Christianity, but I think he always considered himself something of an outsider, a feeling that would have been encouraged by early anxieties about whether he was saved or damned.

There was much continuity between Lincoln's views and those of the Founders - Washington, Adams, and Jefferson - but there will always be some controversy surrounding Lincoln's beliefs.

Thanks both.

This quote from Lincoln may well understate his lifelong respect for Christianity, but certainly does express the depths of his later feelings:

"When I left Springfield

I asked the people to pray for me.
I was not a Christian.
When I buried my son, the severest trial of my life, I was not a Christian.
But when I went to Gettysburg and saw the graves of thousands of our soldiers, I then and there consecrated myself to Christ."

"Born again" was never said of Lincoln, so far as I know, but may not be so far from truth.

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