Lincoln was a statist pig that got what he had coming.
Lincoln was a statist pig that got what he had coming. Not according to the Richmond Examiner:
"No power in executive hands can be too great, no discretion too absolute, at such moments as these...we need a dictator. Let lawyers talk when the world has time to hear them. Now, let the sword do its work. Usurpations of power by the chief, for the preservation of the people from robbers and murderers, will be reckoned as genius and patriotism by all sensible men in the world now and by every historian that will judge the deed hereafter."
-- Richmond Examiner, May 8, 1861.
Quoted from "The Coming Fury" p. 360 by Bruce Catton
Sounds like Lincoln was the man for the job, don't ya think?
Walt
Lincoln was a statist pig that got what he had coming. Nah.
"The [London] Spectator continued:
"He is not malignant against foreign countries; on the contrary, thinks they have behaved rather better than he expected. No power in Europe can take offense at the wording of the [12/01/62] Message, nor can anyone say that the Republic bends to dictation, or craves in any undignified way for foreign forbearance. The words might have been more elegant, bur the astutest diplomatist could have accomplished no more, and might, perhaps, have shown a reticence less complete."
The gist of the message was epitomized: "Mr. Lincoln has from the first explained that he is the exponent of the national will. He has not merely recognized it. Amidst a cloud of words and phrases, which, often clever, are always too numerous, a careful observer may detect two clear and definite thoughts. 1. The President will assent to no peace upon any terms which imply a dissolution of the Union. 2. He holds that the best reconstruction will be that which is accompanied by measures for the final extinction of slavery." '
In the President's discussions of peace, said the Spectator, "He expresses ideas, which, however quaint, have nevertheless a kind of dreamy vastness not without its attraction. The thoughts of the man are too big for his mouth." He was saying that a nation can be divided but "the earth abideth forever," that a generation could be crushed but geography dictated that the Union could not be sundered. As to the rivers and mountains, "all are better than one or either, and all of right belong to this people and their successors forever." No possible severing of the land but would multiply and not mitigate the evils among the American States.
"It is an oddly worded argument," said the Spectator, "the earth being treated as If it were a living creature, an Estate of the Republic with an equal vote on its destiny." In the proposals for gradual emancipated compensation there was magnitude: "Mr. Lincoln has still the credit of having been first among American statesmen to rise to the situation, to strive that reconstruction shall not mean a new lease for human bondage." The President's paragraph was quoted having the lines; "Fellow-citizens, we cannot escape history. The fiery trial through which we pass will light us down in honor or dishonor to the latest generation," as though this had the attractive "dreamy vastness" that brought from the English commentator the abrupt sentence "The thoughts of the man are too big for his mouth."
Greeley and others could not resist the impact of some judgments pronounced on Lincoln abroad. Greeley did not accept these judgments. He questioned them sharply. He saw, however, that they had significance and they were of historic quality. Under the heading "Mr. Lincoln in Europe" the New York Tribune of January 10, 1863, reprinted from the Edinburgh Mercury:
“In Mr. Lincoln’s message, we appreciate the calm thoughtfulness so different from the rowdyism we have been accustomed to receive from Washington. He is strong in the justice his cause and the power of his people. He speaks without acerbity even of the rebels who have brought so much calamity upon the country, but we believe that if the miscreants of the Confederacy -were brought to him today, Mr. Lincoln would bid them depart and try to be better and braver men in the future. When we recollect the raucous hate in this country toward the Indian rebels, "we feel humiliated that this 'rail splitter' from Illinois should show himself so superior to the mass of monarchical statesmen.
"Mr. Lincoln's brotherly kindness, truly father of his country, kindly merciful, lenient even to a fault, is made the sport and butt of all the idle literary buffoons of England. The day will come when the character and career of Abraham Lincoln will get justice in this country and his assailants will show their shame for the share they took in lampooning so brave and noble a man, who in a fearful crisis possessed his soul in patience, trusting in God. ‘Truly’, Mr. Lincoln speaks, 'the fiery trial through which we pass will light us down in honor or dishonor to the latest generation.' There is little doubt what the verdict of future generations will be of Abraham Lincoln.
"Before two years of his administration has been completed, he has reversed the whole constitutional attitude of America on the subject of Slavery; he has saved the territories from the unhallowed grasp of the slave power; he has purged the accursed institution from the Congressional District; he has hung a slave trader in New York, the nest of slave pirates; he has held out the right hand of fellowship to the negro Republicans of Liberia and Hayri; he has joined Great Britain in endeavoring to sweep the slave trade from the coast of Africa! There can be no doubt of the verdict of posterity on such acts as these.
Within the light of the 'fiery trial' of which Mr. Lincoln speaks, another light shines clear and refulgent—the torch of freedom—to which millions of poor slaves now look with eager hope.
At home and abroad judgments came oftener that America had at last a President who was All-American. He embodied his country in that he had no precedents to guide his footsteps; he was not one more individual of a continuing tradition, with the dominant lines of the mold already cast for him by Chief Magistrates who had gone before. Webster, Calhoun, and Clay conformed to a classicism of the school of the English gentleman, as did perhaps all the Presidents between Washington and Lincoln, save only Andrew Jackson.
The inventive Yankee, the Western frontiersman and pioneer, the Kentuckian of laughter and dreams, had found blend in one man who was the national head. In the "dreamy vastness" noted by the London Spectator, in the pith of the folk words "The thoughts of the man are too big for his mouth," was the feel of something vague that ran deep in American hearts, that hovered close to a vision for which men would fight, struggle, and die, a grand though blurred chance that Lincoln might be leading them toward something greater than they could have believed might come true."
Walt
You would think Abe is on enough items. Do you think so?
Do we need additional reminders?
Nearly every monetary transaction bears his face.
Does everyone carry extra fives around in their wallet, just to remember his face?
Is this the money that Dick Chaney promised when he said we would have money that we could be proud of?
Perhaps we do need a statue, just to remind those in Richmond that Lincoln once visited the Viginian city.
Otherwise, the citizens of Richmond might forget Mr. Lincoln's visit, and he might fade into history.
And we can't let that happen.
After all, we might not get a five dollar bill in change today to remind us of Lincoln.
And that would be bad.
So maybe we need a statue.
In Richmond.