Posted on 02/17/2008 10:45:07 PM PST by Dawnsblood
But would they? Considering how fanatically isolationist the Republican leadership of the time was, would a President Wilkie or a President Landon have supported a Lend-Lease or funded an increase in the military in 1940 or instituted a peace-time draft? The answer has to be no. And given that, what would a world where Britain had fallen and Europe and much of Asia was dominated by a Nazi Germany look like?
Herbert Hoover could arguably be called the worst Republican President. He couldn’t have prevented the ‘29 crash and the Great Depression, but if he had been competent, he could have responded to it in a way that would have precluded the election of FDR and the New Deal that followed. Republicans still haven’t caught up to that, 75 years later . . . .
And judging by his actions as Governor of MA, he certainly could take action when needed.
#2. Billy Carter's brother.
#3. Richard Nixon.
Considering this year’s Presidential primaries I’m afraid the worst President is yet to come.
Above Lincoln-Feingold.
Of course you would. Why?
Good post!
I like the choices.
Can I nominate FDR for #4 worst?
So you are trying to tell me that a country trying to come out of a depression wouldn’t take advantge of a butt-load of customers and therefore jobs!
What’s wrong with this picture?
As I said any fool that didn’t should be taken out and shot!
Yep. Lend-lease. The Destroyers-for-bases treaty. U.S. rearmament. Peace time conscription. None would have happened under a Republican president. Oh they might have sold some arms to Britain or Germany or Italy for cash, but without U.S. support in 1940 and 1941 Britain would have gone under. Given the isolationist position of the Republican leaders of the time they would have let them go. And where would that leave the world? And us?
bookmark
Runners up are Franklin Pierce, Ulysses S. Grant (very much the Rudy of his time, in more ways than one), and Bill Clinton.
Read all my posts on the thread. I was not listing him the worst, but simply as a one who was not a good President.
Just because he did do it doesn’t mean no one else would.
This man didn’t make the times. Except for the depression. His hands are all over that.
This is like saying Clinton created the Tech boom.
Tampering with Northern elections: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/backroom/1085357/posts?page=1209#1209
Here is a list of some of Lincoln's violations of the Constitution including violation of the first six amendments to the Constitution: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-backroom/1311758/posts?page=3252#3252
Another summation: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1529149/posts?page=282#282
Ignoring the rule of law: http://www.tourolaw.edu/patch/Merryman/ and http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1358652/posts?page=71#71.
If you wish to see it, I have a lengthy post from a deleted thread providing details of the house arrest of the judge mentioned in the last link above.
Remember all the suppressed or destroyed Northern newspapers and arrested editors, proprietors, and writers?
Remember how the North stopped prisoner exchange resulting in unnecessary deaths of prisoners on both sides?
Remember how the North (Seward or Stanton, IIRC) turned down an offer from the South to buy medicines for Northern prisoners in Southern prisons and allow Northern doctors to bring the medicines and treat the Northern prisoners, months before the problems developed at Andersonville?
The concern for northerners is touching when contrasted with the lack of interest for the suffering of southerners under Tyrant Jeff’s heel.
You complain about what you say are Lincoln's constitutional violations. Well, let's be fair. It has been well documented that newspaper reporters were jailed under Davis, newspapers suppressed, habeas corpus suspended, people locked up without trial, martial law declared, and so forth and so on. So his record in that area is little different than Lincoln's. But lets look at some of his other actions. Illegal war, for example. There can be no doubt that firing on Sumter would constitute an act of war. Members of his own cabinet made that plain to him. Article 1 of the confederate constitution says that only congress can declare war. Legally Davis should have gotten approval to start the war, something easily done since the confederate congress was in session at the time. Yet he didn't.
The confederate constitution requires a supreme court. One was never established and there is no evidence that either Davis or his congress really wanted one.
Late in 1864 Davis sent emissaries to Europe promising and end to slavery in exchange for European recognition. Not only did Davis lack the power under the constitution to make such a promise, it's questionable if slavery could even have been outlawed at all. Yet he made the promise.
Private business. In his book on the confederacy, William Davis details how the Davis government virtually nationalized whole industries like salt, liquor, and textiles. Davis seized private property without compensation, conscripting slave labor for military purposes and placing a levy on all agricultural produce, without compensation. He also forced private ship owners to reserve most of their cargo space for government goods, again without compensation. In short, private enterprise was meaningless under Davis.
Taxes. Contrarty to what their constitution required, the Davis government enacted a tariff that had protectionist features. It enacted an income tax, similar to ones later enacted by the U.S. and which were later declared unconstitutional. But there would have been no such review under Davis. And by the end of the war, Davis was advocating tax rates that were almost confiscatory in nature.
War crimes. You tossed that in at the end, though I'm not sure how you can classify refusing to exchange prisoners or providing medical supplies to the confederacy as illegal. Still, Davis was no virgin in those areas himself. Confederate proclamations said that certain Union generals and officers would be executed if captured rather than be treated a POWs. Black Union soldiers were sent to slavery rather than treated as prisoners. Free blacks were abducted and sent south to slavery. War crimes all.
Face it, Rustbucket. Your problem with Lincoln is that he won. That he faced down illegal and unconstitutional Southern secession and fought the rebellion with every tool available. And in doing so he defeated your Davis and sent the confederacy to the dustbin of history. That's why you rate him low.
Sure. And the Democrats claim that Gore would have done just as well after 9/11. There is no way of disproving their claims, but all evidence points otherwise. Just like all evidence indicates that the isolationist Republicans would have sat there while Europe fell.
Bump
If the country had not been run into the ground by your hero there would have been much less of an America First drive by that time.
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