Posted on 11/18/2012 11:43:36 AM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
With only a limited theatrical release last week, Steven Spielberg’s latest work of imaginative fiction is scheduled for wide release today. I know Hollywood plays fast and loose with history, but when they go out of their way to get the wallpaper in Lincoln’s office exactly right, and use a recording of his actual watch as the sound effect for his movie watch, but pay little deference to his actual statements or opinions… something must be said.
People are seriously calling the Lincoln movie a “much needed civics lesson.” In reality it’s essentially a 2.5 hour courtroom drama about slavery that never happened. Reviews everywhere celebrate the performance of Daniel Day-Lewis in the title role, and he should be celebrated. He stunningly and artfully brought the fictional character of our grade school textbooks to life.
The film focuses entirely on the final years of Lincoln’s life, from the tail end of the war to his inevitable assassination (spoiler alert). Lincoln and his dagger-tongued Cabinet bicker about how to end the war and slavery at the same time. The Confederates want to negotiate a peace, and so does Lincoln, but see they’ve just got to end slavery before the war ends, not after… because… well no reason really.
Starting the story at the end allows the writers to conveniently ignore the uncomfortable history that lead up to it. Sort of how “Passion of the Christ” allowed Mel Gibson to ignore anything Jesus actually taught. Here’s some of what was suspiciously left out.
Before the movie began Lincoln imposed a blockade on Southern ports with no declaration of war from Congress. He suspended habeas corpus, which is the protection against unlawful imprisonment. When a Chief Justice of the Supreme Court called this unconstitutional Lincoln signed his own arrest warrant for the Justice...
(Excerpt) Read more at examiner.com ...
It’s a good movie. It clearly shows the Republican Party as the party of abolition, and the Democrats as the slave party. It has a few Hollywood moments, but tries to show the complexity of the moment.
It was much simpler than most people think. It was all about the North controlling the South for their monetary gain.
While searching for my ancestors on census records before the war, I was surprised to see that the South was very prosperous. I was astounded at how many had wealth in excess of $50,000 and that was in 1850 in the area around Valdosta, Georgia.
The South could sell their products to England and Europe and get good prices. They then used that money to buy products made in England etc.
The North wanted to force the South to sell and buy from them by placing tariffs on trade between the U.S. and Europe. They might have even been specific as to what was taxed but I don’t know that.
The North used slavery as their weapon to create hatred toward the South. Never mind that these same New Englanders were perfectly happy to engage in the most evil part of slavery, the slave trade.
Every Southern state had banished the slave trade. So the New Engendars now had no profit from slavery at all and became abolitionist.
“Every Southern state had banished the slave trade. So the New Engendars now had no profit from slavery at all and became abolitionist.” -——
Can you recommend one or more sources of documentation as to when the Southern states banned the slave trade, and the extent to which New Englanders were owners/operators of slaving ships, in addition to British, Portugese and possibly others?
Lincoln was smart enough (and he really was smart), to make the war about keeping the nation united. That is why the Northern troops called themselves “Union” not “slavery fighters”.
These same Northern troops also called Southerners, Rebels or Secessionists. Not “slavers”.
The EP was clearly an extra-legal declaration like much of Lincoln’s actions.
You can look it up yourself, It is common knowledge that all states had banned the slave trade. It should be easy to find.
The Northern slave ships is just my guess based on the fact that most of the shipping was from the N.E,
I have often wondered how they would react to my house full of stuff.
I’m really surprised.
The north was resource rich with Coal, Iron, Zinc, sulfer from the rust belt states, gold and silver from the west, and they had the gateway ports to Europe which also was Industrializing. It had higher population, higher birthrate and higher education (all unsourced unverified, speculative observations). The north was the Industrial arm of the U.S.
The south was largely agrarian, it ports not as enticing as Boston, New York, Baltimore — being almost all Caribbean which probably gave them good access to bat guano, but to much access to other agrarians and not enough raw materials for rapid Industrialization. Not to mention Huge swaths of swamp land.
No, they couldn’t industrialize as fast as the North as part of the fight was about industrialization and the changing attitudes that go with it. Look at the Missouri Compromise and the Tallmadge Amendment for example of changing attitudes, and that was some 40 years pre-civil war. The scope, attitude and sympathies of slavery two generations before the civil war. It’s hard for me to fathom how people can disassociate slavery as the reason for the Civil War.
The longer they waited, the further the encroachment came and probably subsumed in a brief one sided war upon just 2 or 3 states that maintained a secession.
If I ran that enterprise, I would have gladly given up Texas for a sympathetic Kentucky, Indiana, Ohio. The war would have been much different, but 1860 it was impossible to turn those states. For every decade that passed, the slave states grew weaker and by 1860 they’ve had enough.
Uh, So the U.S taxed the U.S and then went to war over it? Cause that’s what your saying. Those tariffs and taxes were provided for in the U.S Constitution and part of the legislative powers what do you think paid for the ports and railroads.
This must have been when we figured Taxation *with* representation wasn’t any better.
You are technically correct but give the wrong impression. The more numerous North used there power to impose tariffs which harmed another section of the country and helped themselves.
They did this rather than try to compete on an equal footing
I don’t understand your meaning. 1808 was the limit on the slave TRADE by the US Constitution. What do you mean states banning trade?
Sounds to me as if you’re talking about the RevWar, not the CW.
Unfortunately as gripping as that movie was, it ended on a thoroughly fraudulent note. The Mythbusters proved conclusively that no tank of oxygen or whatever it was in that tank would be enough to blow up a huge shark. Or any shark.
I don't care how logical the end was. Jaws is a very scary, entertaining movie. One of my favorite movies of all time. As for Lincoln, the OP article is kind of ridiculous. The movie is just about the last few months of Lincoln's life. It's not about the entire Civil War, Lincoln's entire life or even his entire presidency. I've read "Team of Rivals" (a great book by the way) and it would probably take at least six movies to film the whole book. I'm planning to see Lincoln this weekend. I figured Daniel Day Lewis would be great in it, but I had reservations about the casting of Sally Field as Mary Lincoln. Im not a big fan of hers and she is really too old to play Mary, but the reviews of her performance are good so far. I'm looking forward to seeing it.
That’s why they call it a movie.
Saw the movie yesterday. Was excellent, one of Spielberg’s finest. As a Civil War buff, it gave a fair accounting of most of the Union players in the war, the Northern Democrats, The Republicans including Thaddeus Stevens, brilliantly portrayed by Tommy Lee Jones and Lincoln himself. Lincoln is portrayed as a savvy morally flexible politician who was chided by his cabinet for his speechifying and bombasity. Now aside from the deification of American Blacks as starry eyed angels the movie avoided clichés. I enjoyed it, especially Daniel Day Lewis’ tenderness with his child and his complicated relationship with Mary Todd and his oldest Son. Also Lincoln correctly is conflicted about his using the Consitution as toilet paper for the sake of the war effort. Spielberg does not gloss over that fact. Go see the movie, it is pretty compelling.
Glad to hear you enjoyed it!
Sure, there was a general tariff and specific tariffs on certain items.
Some Northerners wanted the country to develop industries and favored tariffs as a way of encouraging native industries.
Southern planters figured they had enough money from slaves and cotton and didn't need to industrialize.
Far-sighted Southerners recognized that the South would benefit from industry as well, but the planters ruled the roost in the antebellum South.
Backwoodsmen and ordinary dirt farmers (South or North) who already satisfied their wants with what they had on hand really weren't all that concerned much over tariffs.
This had all become a minor issue in the late 1850s with all the agitation over slavery and abolitionism.
C'mon. John Brown, Dred Scott, Bleeding Kansas. Nobody was getting very agitated over tax rates in those years (unless you want to consider slavery a tax -- and maybe we should).
Anti-tariff forces had only to remain in Congress to defeat tariff legislation or bring down projected rates which may have been excessive.
Or they could have gotten behind one candidate in the presidential election, and possibly won.
But tariffs weren't uppermost in their minds, and already well before the election some Southern leaders were determined to break up the union.
The Emancipation Proclamation is an executive order issued to the executive agencies of the United States by President Abraham Lincoln on January 1, 1863, during the American Civil War. It was based on the president's constitutional authority as commander in chief of the armed forces; it was not a law passed by Congress. It proclaimed all slaves in Confederate territory to be forever free; that is, it ordered the Army to treat as free men the slaves in ten states that were still in rebellion, thus applying to 3.1 million of the 4 million slaves in the U.S. The Proclamation immediately resulted in the freeing of 50,000 slaves, with nearly all the rest (of the 3.1 million) actively freed as Union armies advanced. The Proclamation did not compensate the owners, did not itself outlaw slavery, and did not make the ex-slaves (called freedmen) citizens. It made the destruction of slavery an explicit war goal, in addition to the goal of reuniting the Union.
True, the EP did not "free the slaves" in all of the United States - that took a constitutional amendment - but it did free the slaves in the rebel states.
Agreed. I’m just a stickler for errors and limited in writing on this iPad.
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