Thanks Gracey, I couldn't remember who had it.
Posted on 02/07/2003 5:24:37 AM PST by Jimmyclyde
2. The fake Lincoln quote: (I think this is only the 2nd or 3rd time you've been called on this one.)
Dr. Mark Kleiman, a professor at Harvard University, contributed the following:I tried to verify the purported Lincoln anti-prohibition quote. Yes, we have no bananas.
The standard reference is The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, (8 vols.) Roy P. Basler, Ed., Rutgers University Press, 1953. It gives reports (though not verbatim texts) of several of Lincoln's speeches in the legislature, including remarks on December 14 1840 on "Payment of Interest on the Public Debt" and on December 19 "Concerning Expenditures for Public Printing," but nothing on December 18, and nothing at all about alcohol or temperance (according to the index) during Lincoln's entire period of service in the legislature except the great and unduly neglected speech to the Washington Temperance Society of Springfield on February 22 1942. The index also gives no reference to the Maine Liquor Law of 1846, the first prohibition act, or to the word "prohibition."
A more recent source is Abraham Lincoln: Speeches and Writings, (2 vols.) Library of America, 1989. Again, nothing on that date, and nothing on "alcohol" "temperence" "prohibition" or "Maine Liquor Law" in the entire period, except for the Washington Temperance address (which I hope someone with a scanner will post here).
While it's impossible to be sure that Lincoln didn't say something, I will give fifty to one that there is no authentic record of any such speech anytime in Lincoln's career. That's based on the results of my search, but also on three other observations:
1. The term "prohibition" does not appear to have been in the contemporary political vocabulary with respect to alcohol control laws.
2. Lincoln stood well enough with the temperance movement to be invited to give the Washington's Birthday address to the Washington Temperance Society of Springfield in 1842. It's hard to believe that this would have been true if prohibition had been a live issue and Lincoln on the pro-liquor side of it.
3. Temperance, along with abolition, nativism, the protective tariff, and women's rights, was among the movements that constituted the original Republican party. Lincoln was bold in attacking the nativist (American or "Know-nothing") wing, but if he had picked a quarrel with the temperance faction there would surely be some record of it. In his campaign against Douglass in 1858, he was forced to deny Douglass's charge that in his youth he had kept a "grocery" (package-goods store and tavern), but his supposed anti-prohibition views never became an issue.
After a little more research (to his credit) Dr. Kleiman came back with the following:
I have to take back what I said about there being no evidence of Lincoln's supporting a prohibition law in Illinois.
The Basler collection has a letter from Lincoln to Henry Whitney on June 7, 1855, lamenting the electoral defeat of Lincoln's friend Logan -- "worse beaten than any man ever was since elections were invented" -- and adding "It is conceded on all hands that the prohibitory law is also beaten." The "also" suggests that Lincoln was a supporter of the law.
From Dale Gieringer, head of California NORML:
I believe Mark K. is right that the Lincoln quote is apocryphal.
It was investigated by a Lincoln scholar at the request of Ollie Steinberg of the Minnesota Grassroots party. Like Mark, he found no record of any speech by Lincoln on the alleged date (Dec 18, 1840).
I've been told that according to the Home Book of Quotations (16th edition), it was fabricated in the 1880s - apparently by anti-Prohibitionists in Atlanta courting the Negro vote. Lincoln was well-known for his temperance sympathies. According to Herbert Asbury's "The Great Illusion," he authored a dry law modeled on the Maine law, which was rejected by Illinois voters in a special referendum on June 4, 1855. He was also alleged to have authored and signed a total abstinence pledge in 1846. According to temperance authorities, Lincoln was reluctant to sign the 1862 whiskey tax that helped fund the Civil War, on grounds it would condone the liquor trade. According to a temperance leader who spoke with him on the day of his assassination, Lincoln predicted that the next great question after slavery would be abolition of the traffic in legalized liquor.
I'm sorry to say that the Lincoln quote seems bogus, since I had it printed on California NORML's matchbooks. It's so good, I feel tempted to quote it as "attributed to Lincoln."
Well roscoe, -- this may indeed be the 20th time you've been drunk enought to think you're 'busting' me, but who else cares? - Good grief....
2. The fake Lincoln quote: (I think this is only the 2nd or 3rd time you've been called on this one.) Dr. Mark Kleiman, a professor at Harvard University, contributed the following: I tried to verify the purported Lincoln anti-prohibition quote. Yes, we have no bananas. The standard reference is The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, (8 vols.) Roy P. Basler, Ed., Rutgers University Press, 1953. It gives reports (though not verbatim texts) of several of Lincoln's speeches in the legislature, including remarks on December 14 1840 on "Payment of Interest on the Public Debt" and on December 19 "Concerning Expenditures for Public Printing," but nothing on December 18, and nothing at all about alcohol or temperance (according to the index) during Lincoln's entire period of service in the legislature except the great and unduly neglected speech to the Washington Temperance Society of Springfield on February 22 1942.
1942!!! BUSTED AGAIN ROSCOE!!!
The index also gives no reference to the Maine Liquor Law of 1846, the first prohibition act, or to the word "prohibition." A more recent source is Abraham Lincoln: Speeches and Writings, (2 vols.) Library of America, 1989. Again, nothing on that date, and nothing on "alcohol" "temperence" "prohibition" or "Maine Liquor Law" in the entire period, except for the Washington Temperance address (which I hope someone with a scanner will post here). While it's impossible to be sure that Lincoln didn't say something, I will give fifty to one that there is no authentic record of any such speech anytime in Lincoln's career.
I'LL BOOK THAT BET, BY YOLLY!!!
That's based on the results of my search, but also on three other observations: 1. The term "prohibition" does not appear to have been in the contemporary political vocabulary with respect to alcohol control laws. 2. Lincoln stood well enough with the temperance movement to be invited to give the Washington's Birthday address to the Washington Temperance Society of Springfield in 1842. It's hard to believe that this would have been true if prohibition had been a live issue and Lincoln on the pro-liquor side of it. 3. Temperance, along with abolition, nativism, the protective tariff, and women's rights, was among the movements that constituted the original Republican party. Lincoln was bold in attacking the nativist (American or "Know-nothing") wing, but if he had picked a quarrel with the temperance faction there would surely be some record of it. In his campaign against Douglass in 1858, he was forced to deny Douglass's charge that in his youth he had kept a "grocery" (package-goods store and tavern), but his supposed anti-prohibition views never became an issue. After a little more research (to his credit) Dr. Kleiman came back with the following: I have to take back what I said about there being no evidence of Lincoln's supporting a prohibition law in Illinois. The Basler collection has a letter from Lincoln to Henry Whitney on June 7, 1855, lamenting the electoral defeat of Lincoln's friend Logan -- "worse beaten than any man ever was since elections were invented" -- and adding "It is conceded on all hands that the prohibitory law is also beaten." The "also" suggests that Lincoln was a supporter of the law. From Dale Gieringer, head of California NORML: I believe Mark K. is right that the Lincoln quote is apocryphal. It was investigated by a Lincoln scholar at the request of Ollie Steinberg of the Minnesota Grassroots party. Like Mark, he found no record of any speech by Lincoln on the alleged date (Dec 18, 1840). I've been told that according to the Home Book of Quotations (16th edition), it was fabricated in the 1880s - apparently by anti-Prohibitionists in Atlanta courting the Negro vote. Lincoln was well-known for his temperance sympathies. According to Herbert Asbury's "The Great Illusion," he authored a dry law modeled on the Maine law, which was rejected by Illinois voters in a special referendum on June 4, 1855. He was also alleged to have authored and signed a total abstinence pledge in 1846. According to temperance authorities, Lincoln was reluctant to sign the 1862 whiskey tax that helped fund the Civil War, on grounds it would condone the liquor trade. According to a temperance leader who spoke with him on the day of his assassination, Lincoln predicted that the next great question after slavery would be abolition of the traffic in legalized liquor. I'm sorry to say that the Lincoln quote seems bogus, since I had it printed on California NORML's matchbooks. It's so good, I feel tempted to quote it as "attributed to Lincoln." http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/lincoln.htm
Well roscoe, once again, what can I say? You may have proved, with impeccable logic, that the key to the strawberry fields of your mind does exist.
Keep on rolling those ball bearings kiddo. --
Don't worry, just because your only two cites were fakes doesn't mean you won't be able to up with a new fake one someday.
Not to get anything stirred up here, but by way of explaination, When I was a doper, my doper friends and I commonly used the term "doper" as anything but a "perjorative." In a weird way, we actually were proud of the term. We called one another "doper" all the time, and identified other drug-users as "dopers" as a way of saying that they were "cool," thus okay to party with.
I probably used the term loosely which, to someone unaware of my background, could be intrepreted as a type of putdown, which was never my intention. I actually use the term with some affection.
Irrelevant. States really don't have a say: they must comply with federal dictates.
In states that have passed liberalizing laws IRT marijuana, the feds have descended to fill the jackboot role. Hint: medipot clinics in California.
What dictate is that, question beggar?
Oh, simple things like increased health-care costs [etc.]
Interesting example. Some people increase health-care costs by eating too much fast food; does that give taxpayers the right to ban McDonalds?
Not at all; a single amendment could cover a well-defined class of substances.
You're calling for the ending of the War on "Some" Drugs, but you really mean "all" drugs.
Then why didn't you say that?
The War is only on some drugs---the drugs alcohol and tobacco are already legal. Get it now?
You asked how drug abuse takes money out of my wallet. I told you. I never said that justifies the WOD; to the contrary, I said the WOD also takes money out of my wallet.
Your skills of logic are usually sharper than that.
Cool. But your parallel is false; drug use does not take your money like the WOSD does---taxpayer-funded health care and like programs do. The freedom-respecting answer is to either end taxpayer-funded health care and like programs, or at least to make benefits contingent on passing a drug test---not to punish ALL drug users for what SOME drug users do.
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