Posted on 02/04/2003 3:42:54 AM PST by kattracks
Washington (CNSNews.com) - A video presented at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington appears to suggest that former President Abraham Lincoln would have supported modern-day, left-of-center political causes such as homosexual rights, abortion rights and the modern feminist agenda.
One tourist from Wisconsin, who viewed the video in the memorial's Lincoln Legacy Room, called it "awful" and said the "political correctness of it is beyond words." Other visitors to the memorial told CNSNews.com they believe the video clearly implies that Lincoln would have supported left-wing political causes.
A National Park Service spokesman told CNSNews.com he was "reluctant" to comment on the Lincoln video because the whole issue had the "potential to be quite controversial."
The video features an actor who sounds like Lincoln speaking about the Civil War and slavery. He then leads into clips of Martin Luther King's 1963 March on Washington.
About halfway through the approximately eight-minute video, footage of modern-day marchers is shown over "Lincoln's" booming voice as patriotic music and songs associated with the civil rights movement play.
At this point, the video shows snippets from modern-day marches. A sign reading, "The Lord is my Shepard and Knows I am Gay" kicks off a series of visuals featuring left-wing social causes, while "Lincoln's voice" and patriotic music blare.
The other visuals include signs reading "Gay & Lesbian Sexual Rights," "Council of Churches Lesbian Rights," "National Organization for Woman" (NOW), "Reagan's Wrongs Equal Woman's Rights," "ERA Yes," "Ratify the Era," "I had an illegal abortion in 1967 - Never Again," "Keep Abortion Legal," "I am pro-choice America," a Vietnam-era video clip of a woman asking: "President. Nixon where are our men?" and a sign reading, "Who will Decide NARAL (National Abortion Rights & Reproductive Action League).
The video features the theme song of the civil rights movement, "We Shall Overcome," and continues with visual display of liberal causes, including signs reading "In Opposition to King Richard [Nixon]," "U.S. out Now," "Equal Opportunity for All," "Peace," "Hell No We Won't Go," "No More Lies, Sign the Treaty Now Coalition," and marchers chanting U.S. Out Now" (crowd chanting).
The video also features an excerpt from a Martin Luther King speech and then progresses into a banner reading "Pass the Brady [Gun Control] Bill Now." Pro-life demonstrators appear in the video once, in a brief clip where they are shown clashing with abortion rights activists. No other political causes that could be considered right-of-center appear in the video.
'Beyond Words'
CNSNews.com asked several of the tourists visiting the memorial what they thought of the video and whether they believed it implied Lincoln would support modern-day causes such as homosexual rights and abortion rights.
"I liked it... I think [Lincoln] would have [supported homosexual and abortion rights] because that's how Lincoln was; he was very supportive of the people. He didn't care who you are and what you are, he loved everybody," said Elizabeth Baksi, a high school student from Houma, La., after viewing the video.
Darre Klain of Baltimore, Md., also agreed that Lincoln would have supported today's liberal political causes as implied in the video.
[Lincoln] seemed like a very progressive, forward-thinking man, ahead of his time," Klain said.
But Paul Meisius of Sheboygan, Wis., rejected the video's message as he interpreted it, and he chastised the National Park Service for showcasing it.
"That's awful," Meisius said as he finished watching the video. "The political correctness of it is beyond words. I don't think that's proper. They are giving themselves credit to be able to say whatever they want about Lincoln's political views," Meisius told CNSNews.com.
"Our national monuments are being stripped of their true heritage. They are being uprooted and taken and changed. It's an atrocity that they are rewriting history in the sense that these people have political agendas," Meisius said.
Meisius, who was visiting Washington, D.C., with his wife and five children, believes the video is an attack by revisionist historians.
"The wrongness and incorrectness of this -- this stripping of the true essential biblical aspects of our foundation - are being replaced by political correctness," he said.
Angela Brewer, a program instructor for the Close Up Foundation, a citizenship education organization, denied the Lincoln video implied the former president would have supported modern-day, left-wing social causes.
"[The Lincoln Memorial] has frequently has been used as a backdrop for groups that seem to me to be liberal. I don't know that there is a particular purpose behind [the video]," Brewer said.
Gary Perkins, who coordinates exhibits at the Sweetwater Historical Museum in Green River, Wyo., has written about the difficulty our national museums face when presenting historical materials. Perkins believes that the National Park Service may be guilty of historical overreach with the video in question.
"We do not know what Abraham Lincoln thought of gay rights. We have no clue, he never talked about it," Perkins said after hearing CNSNews.com's description of the Lincoln Memorial video.
"We can't really infer he supported gay rights," Perkins added.
'Quite Controversial'
Bill Line, a spokesman for the National Park Service's National Capital Region, told CNSNews.com that the Discovery Channel produced the video for the Lincoln Memorial.
Asked if the video intentionally makes it appear as though Lincoln would have supported homosexual rights, abortion rights and feminist causes, Line was unequivocal in his initial answer.
"I have seen the video, and I don't know how you can contrive that out of it," Line said.
However, after specific examples of "liberal causes" were pointed out to him, Line backed away from his previous comment.
"I am reluctant, quite frankly, to say much to you because I don't know the whole other premise that you are coming from or the background or the fuller context that the story is being written in, and it has potential to be quite controversial," Line explained.
Finally, Line announced he needed to see the video again before he would have any official comment.
"It's been a while since I reviewed the videotape. Before I can adequately comment and give to you something you can use in your story, I need to go and review that videotape myself," Line said.
As of press time, Line had not contacted CNSNews.com with further comment on the video.
'Left-wing gestapo'
Cultural critic David Horowitz was not surprised by the description of the video that CNSNews.com provided. Horowitz believes that left-wing political perspectives are the dominant philosophy of the curators of the U.S.'s national monuments. Horowitz, a former 1960s radical, is co-founder of the Los Angeles-based Center for the Study of the Popular Culture.
"The whole museum field has been taken over by the left wing Gestapo," Horowitz said.
"People have to wake up. This is the America hating left. It is in charge of our national monuments. It's a disgrace and testament to how the academic history profession is totally dominated by the political left," Horowitz said.
E-mail a news tip to Marc Morano.
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Nope. But at least I'm not trying to fight the Civil War still. Is General Sherman on the way to burn down your outhouse?
You accuse me of being divorced from reality while freely admitting that you still use confederate money. That's quite a stretch.
Then why did you say that the southern Black Codes and Jim Crow laws were based on those up North when the south had been enacting such laws for generations?
Because they were based on northern black codes. They had to eliminate all their slavery-based laws and replace them with "emancipation-acceptable" black codes like the north used. They used many of them as models to create their own new codes.
But how hard a job could redrafting the laws be? It doesn't look like clever lawyers and legislators needed much in the way of models to replace "slave" as "person of color" or other phrase. For whatever it's worth, Southern slave codes would certainly have antedated any Oregon laws, and those of Illinois or Indiana as well. Virginia's first slave code was passed in 1705.
But this lobbing of reproaches back and forth between North and South serves little purpose. As far as slavery and race are concerned, there is much to reproach in the conduct of both regions. What is significant about 19th century America is that the North was getting rid of slavery when the South was supporting it ever more passionately. Subsequently the North was reducing segregation while the South was building it up. Today, it certainly looks like Black-White relations are better in the South than in the North, but that doesn't alter the realities of past eras.
it was Lincoln's political opponents within his own party who were the true advocates of black suffrage. If anything, it was easier for them to achieve black suffrage with him dead and not there to interfere with the rest of Congress by promoting his exclusionary and conditional alternatives to full rights.
Probably only a minority of Northern voters wanted Black suffrage in 1865. The Fifteenth Amendment only came in 1870, and the problem in 1865 was still getting the Thirteenth Amendment ratified. Even in informed circles, most people didn't yet contemplate a constitutional amendment to guarantee Black suffrage. Whether Black civil rights was a local or a national issue was still at issue. Lincoln was behind the radicals but ahead of the electorate. It's impossible to tell whether Lincoln's proposal was his first or last answer to the question of Black suffrage after the war, because he didn't live to give that final answer.
It certainly was easier to get the Reconstruction amendments passed after Lincoln's death, but that's because the 13th Amendment was regarded by many as the nation's last tribute to Lincoln, and some of that spirit endured when the later amendments were proposed.
Would Lincoln have blocked egalitarian measures by Radical Republicans? It's impossible to say. He didn't live to complete his "arc of development." But Lincoln's emphasis in 1865 was on expanding the suffrage, but not on restricting it or on limiting its expansion. We don't know if Lincoln would have been carried along by the radicals or if he would have resisted them. It's likely that he would have been a stronger President than Johnson, but he could still have foundered. He certainly had some sympathy for the defeated Southerners, but he was more open to change than Johnson was. The idea that Lincoln's support for emancipation and limited Black suffrage were a result of radical pressure suggests that they might have moved him to still greater changes.
It is pretty clear that the radical trend wouldn't have been as strong had Lincoln lived, though, since it wouldn't have had him as martyr. Lincoln also would have had a stronger base of support than Johnson did. Had Lincoln not been killed, efforts for Black equality might have been less, but could have been longer-lived. An amendment to guarantee the vote to all voters regardless of color may or may not have been put through, but perhaps votes for the "talented tenth" of Black voters might have survived. It's likely though, that Southern opposition would have doomed even that.
But which would you prefer: a Lincoln who let Southern Whites back into power on their own terms, or one who would have pushed for racial equality? It looks to me like today's Confederates would have attacked him either way.
For example?
I dunno why. I never make unnecessary posts.
Walt
You thought I was serious? Yes, you are divorced form reality.
Well, that settles it then; we both agree that your statements are a joke.
Yes of course my statements to you were a joke, as any fool would have recognized from the beginning. When you ask a foolish question you can expect a jocular response. But you couldn't figure that out for yourself, you needed to be told. I am sorry for you, I genuinely pity fools.
OK, just remember to put in the sarcasm tag next time you complain about Lincoln.
Have you considered suing him for emotional distress? It's gotta suck to spend so much time complaining about something you niether lived thru or can do anything about.
Actually I spend very little time at it, I have many much better things to occupy my time with. Only when I am bored and want a few laughs do I visit this site to push the buttons of the Lincoln-lovers. But something can be done about the matter; the history can be revised to represent what really went on more accurately.
There are no saints. I have no problem whatsoever with your comments of correctly reporting history, but it is strange that there seems to be such an obsession with being anti-Lincoln on these threads.
We want the left to get over the segregation laws which are now defunct; but some on the right can't get over something that happened in the 1800's.
One reason is that the generally accepted history of Lincoln and his actions is seen by many as particularly distorted. Also, it is a reaction against the current attack on those wishing to honor and preserve their Confederate heritage, an attack which involves, among other things, further gross distortion of history.
I really am not deeply involved in this. I have no Confederate heritage myself, although I am sympathetic to those who do.
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