Bump
Posted on 02/12/2011 6:06:39 AM PST by Notary Sojac
Bump
You could be talking about Washington or any of the Founders in that statement as well.
Are you a pacifist? Is there anything worth fighting for?
“It should be noted that the author does not present any footnotes for his opinions, and sets up false authority for his assertions. He cannot know what Lincoln read or thought. Instead, he must rely on opinions and vague quotes from second and third hand sources. That is not scholarly work.”
Despite the faith that Lincoln supporters engender, it is true that sometimes you don't know what you think you know. And that seems to be the case with you
Your misinformation continues to be focused on the contention that you and others seem to know what Lincoln was thinking, and that the speculative comments of others can be accepted in whole as absolute truth.
Consider your attempts to refute the irrefutable...that the author cannot know Lincoln's reading habits or true thought patterns. But in truth, that construct is essentially a contrivance, a red herring, that superficially supports the author's agenda of creating another Lincoln myth.
One of your most favorite methods of attack is the “where is the documentation” argument, which you now abandon with great surety, citing publications that you claim do not engage in documentation, and imploring that that is acceptable.
How silly! Most here may have not seen your repeated demands for documentation, but it is your hallmark of authenticity. Conversely, I have even seen you posit obscure, undocumented term papers as full evidence of your position, and defend that with great certainty.
Opinions aside, it is only by his behavior, primarily verbal behavior by which we “know” him. And it is the repeated vacillations by which we know him best.
You do not address important contradictions in the context of each other.... his house divided speech, his comments to Greeley, or his support of the Thirteenth Amendment (1861). Nor do you admit any irregularities between Guelzo’s “war rationale” quote and the long passage you introduced from Clay's eulogy.
No, you seem to be perfectly comfortable with his contradictions and offer amazing acceptance:
“...but in other forums, where he didn't have Douglas breathing down his neck he may have expressed himself differently. Is that equivocation? Only to the extent that politicians don't always use the same tone and words with every audience.”
So you do admit to his equivocations, and offer up the same explanation as I did, all the while using denial that you were doing so.
Nor, and most importantly do you contrast any of those equivocations and his repeated promises to retain the tariff flow, followed by his invasion of Ft. Sumter and Pensacola.
Lincoln won two open elections, dealt with a sometimes fractious Congress, and had his actions reviewed by an independent judiciary. That's hardly the definition of a tyrant.
The city had fallen to the Union army invasion on September 2, 1864, and was intact at the time of its capture.
General Sherman gave the order to burn all public buildings, machine shops, depots, and arsenals which obviously caused a massive engulfment of the entire city. The residents were not able to prevent the burning of between 3200 and 5000 buildings, with only about 400 surviving.
*bump*
The more I learn about Lincoln, the more I like him.
May be, may be not. It is clearly fair to say that the slaves had the right to take up the sword to win their own freedom.
There were no slave revolts during the Civil War. None.
Most manumitted slaves stayed on the old plantations as sharecroppers post-bellum. Loyalty to the beatings and whippings I guess.
Come clean on this: You're a huge admirer of Theo Bilbo ..... his oratorical style, at any rate, which consisted of fixing on one word and ranting it over and over.
You throw the word "slaver" around as if you thought it had a Velcro backing.
"So's your old man, and you're another!!" <sigh>
I take it back -- Theo Bilbo wouldn't touch a "retort" like that with a seven-foot pole.
He looks like a man who has an honest question about the reliability of the quote, and its provenience. There are plenty of bogus quotes floating around the Internet; and the passage cited would seem to be sufficiently trenchant, that anyone who's read David Donald, Wm. Herndon, Bruce Catton, or Carl Sandburg might reasonably wonder why he hadn't seen the quote before, if it had any power to illuminate Lincoln and his policies. That is why we all recognize the "House Divided" quotes instantly. So why not this one?
It's a fair question.
Thank you for posting!
Woodworth, Steven E. Jefferson Davis and His Generals: The Failure of Confederate Command in the West. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1990.
Sherman did indeed burn significant portions of Atlanta, starting on November 11 after ordering its evacuation and agreeing with a truce towards that end. He also rescinded that order of evacuation and modified his plans after the mayor and clergymen pleaded with him.
I found a fascinating document here: http://www.civilwarhome.com/atlantaevacuation.htm
This page recreates correspondence between General Sherman and General Bell.
“the fact that he would uses the sword to force them upon others”
May be, may be not. It is clearly fair to say that the slaves had the right to take up the sword to win their own freedom.”
I would agree the slaves did indeed have that right, the Sword is only legitimately used against what you might call tyrants or oppressors.
Which is just to say someone else who would uses the sword to impose their will upon you. The slaves would most certainty fall into the category where the sword was a legitimate recourse.
This fact of course left the south living in a state of perpetual military readiness and fear, and made the cost of slavery extraordinary.
So much in fact that the institution was dieing state by State, and would not have made it past the 1940’s(In union), much sooner had the south achieved its independents. This is due to both the greatly diminished ability of the south to put down slave revolts and keep slaves from fleeing to the United States (who would no longer return them).
Great article!
It is amazing how similiar this battle between Lincoln and the democrats still is today.
The Confederate democrats played the same class warfare games then that the Progressive democrats do today.
Of course the Progressive democrat Wilson mentioned in the article was the first democrat after the Civil war elected President and was supported by the Confederate socialists known as the ‘People’s party’. Wislon also brought on many Confederate democrats into his administration and heavily supported the KKK.
The Confederate democrats were always very anti-capitalism and anti-Wall Street just as the Progressive democrats still are today.
The Progressive democrats stil also practise ‘Slavery economics’ as well just as their predeccesors the Confederate democrats did.
Also as a side note -
The very first actions geared towards an agenda of ‘Seperation of Church and State’ was also started by the Confederate democrats as well. Confederate democrats began boycotting religious ceremonies in the Congress because Republicans were inviting black Americans to participate.
For me that was the begininng of the Progressive democrat agenda for ‘Seperation of Church and State’ which is a Progressive policy of Marxist ideology.
This left-wing agenda started with the Confederate democrats and then was championed by the Progressive democrats.
Not at all. This is just another Ivy League screed defending the Northeast's champion and benefactor, Lincoln, on all points against all comers -- another Marble Man snowjob.
Guelzo is a triple-dipped Ivy Leaguer (Harvard, Penn, and Princeton) who holds a chair at Gettysburg College endowed in honor of Henry Luce III and a Lincoln Society regular, and an honoree of the Abraham Lincoln Institute (for Abraham Lincoln: Redeemer President, 1999).
He most assuredly has a culturally-bound and affiliation-bound point of view about Lincolniana.
[Article] His embrace of classical-liberal economics was the force that moved all his achievements.....
And yet so many of Lincoln's associates, such as Ben Butler, were engaged not in "Randite" classical-liberal economics, but in access capitalism and crony capitalism, which was the actual model of the Gilded Age.
There’s nothing “screed” about it.
General Sherman to General Schofield, August 1, 1864: "You may fire from ten to fifteen shots from every gun you have in position into Atlanta that will reach any of its house. ... Thomas and Howard will do the same." [rb: This confirms General Hood's comment on your link that Sherman fired into the homes of women and children.]
General Sherman to General George H. Thomas, November 11, 1864: "… Last night we burned Rome, and in two or more days will burn Atlanta ..."
General William D. Whipple to General D. S. Stanley, November 13, 1864: "General Sherman left Kingston yesterday morning; camped at Allatoona last night; will probably reach Atlanta to-morrow, whence he starts on his trip south. He has already burnt Rome, and says he is going to burn Atlanta and other towns south."
Here is a short description of what happened to Atlanta from the following web site about the Atlanta fire [Sherman in Georgia]
Under Sherman's orders Capt. O. M. Poe "thoroughly destroyed Atlanta, save its mere dwelling-houses and churches." The destruction was by fire purposely applied to buildings, and permitted to spread, as was expected, from house to house until the defenseless city was almost entirely reduced to ashes. No efforts were made to prevent the spread of the conflagration, and scarcely any structure was designedly spared. Only about 450 buildings escaped this ruthless burning, among them many churches, which in those days generally stood apart from other buildings. The thoroughness of the destruction can be realized, when we consider that by the census of 1860 Atlanta had a population of 10,000, which in 1864 had increased to 14,000. More than 4,000 houses, including dwellings, shops, stores, mills and depots were burned, about eleven-twelfths of the city.
Contrast Atlanta with Confederates in Pennsylvania in 1863:
A Rebel Address: Gen. Early to the Citizens of York [Source: Southern Confederacy, Atlanta, Georgia, July 11, 1863]:
York, Penn, June 30, 1863
To the Citizens of York:
I have abstained from burning the railroad buildings and car shops in your town, because, after examination, I am satisfied that the safety of the town would be endangered, and acting in the spirit of humanity which has characterized my Government and its military authorities, I do not desire to involve the innocent with the same punishment of the guilty. Had I applied the torch without regard to consequences, I would have pursued a course that would have been fully vindicated as an act of just retaliation for the unparalleled acts of brutality perpetrated by your army on our soil. But we do not war on women and children, and I trust that the treatment you have met with at the hands of my military will open your eyes to the [can’t read two or three words] under which it is apparent to all you are groaning.
J. A. Early,
Major General, C.S.A.
True, General Early had extracted food and money from York under the threat that he would burn the town if they didn't pay and provide food. They paid, and thus Early received some compensation for Union damage down South.
From The Yankee Gazette, Westietown, PA, July 1, 1863:
Reports from our friends in York state that a "seedy looking lot of armed men proceeded into York with the intent of capturing the city last Saturday, followed closely by a long column of Virginia soldiers clad in butternut and gray flying the red Confederate battle flag. Their commander was the general Early, the same fellow who raided Adams County last week. After securing the city his troops marched to the fairgrounds where they encamped for the night. The following morning they set out early leaving a terrified civilian population behind and unmolested. It is curious that the Confederates do not raid private homes and stores, but an officer of a North Carolina regiment informed our correspondent that General Lee had issued orders banning such activity and any culprit 'caught in the act of theft from Yankee citizens would be tried and shot for defiance of this order.'"
That is not to say that some Confederate troops did not plunder homes, but it apparently was not nearly as widespread as looting and burning by Union troops in the South.
Leper, outcast, unclean, eh??
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.