[LS]

I agree. We discuss this in "Patriot's History of the United States"---how the only solution that would have given the freedmen 40 acres and a mule legally would have been for Lincoln to label the rebels, well, rebels guilty of treason. Now, if he had done that, he could have given large-scale pardons to the vast majority of southerners and used it to break up the plantations of the wealthy slaveowner planters. It would have been legal, constitutional, and would have saved us all a LOT of trouble.

[rhombus]

What would it have done to an economy that depended on cotton?

[Dead Dog]

That, and actually educating and training former slaves in Civics.

[Little Bill]

Lincoln was an inclusionist, to my mind, he was a Southerner by birth, and only wanted to presue the traditional Wigg party line, National Bank and Federally sponsored internal improvements.

I personally do not think that he wanted a war, he said that repeatedly. He got one and if he had lived I think that the country would have been very different.