Free Republic

Abraham Lincoln's spiritual beliefs are notoriously difficult to pin down. It's a source of endless debate for historians trying to reconcile Lincoln's words and actions into a coherent faith. Tony Kushner, for his part, does not portray the sixteenth president as a religious man at all in his screenplay for the recent blockbuster Lincoln. Kushner alters the historical record, though, in his one direct reference to Lincoln's faith. Near the end of the film, Kushner has Lincoln tell his wife that with the war over, he wishes to visit Jerusalem, the place "where David and Solomon walked." Yet in the...

Before he left the Dallas Cowboys to come home again, Jon Kitna had one request of the two principals who run Lincoln High School: Give me your worst students. The other teachers told him to stop. This was last February and it was going to be hard enough to teach three algebra classes in the middle of a semester. He was two months gone from an NFL career that went for 16 years, after all. Yes, this was his old high school, the one where he was a star quarterback in the early 1990s, but didn’t the new football coach...

“Anyone who embarks on a study of Abraham Lincoln … must first come to terms with the Lincoln myth. The effort to penetrate the crust of legend that surrounds Lincoln … is both a formidable and intimidating task. Lincoln, it seems, requires special considerations that are denied to other figures.” — Robert W. Johannsen Lincoln, the South, and Slavery Indeed, it would not seem a safe time to critique the wisdom, motivations, and character of Abraham Lincoln. Steven Spielberg’s reverential motion picture epic Lincoln fills screens across America. The public increasingly accepts him as America’s greatest leader. Academics from the...

Rep. Allen West was finally forced to concede a couple weeks back, and his currently wrapping up his term --- but he's said that he'll continue to look for ways to serve the country, I don't think we've seen the last of him. Real Clear has the audio: MARTIN: So what’s next for you?WEST: Look, you know, God closes a door so that he can open up greater doors. I will continue to, you know, stand up and fight for this country. That’s my goal. I have two daughters, 19 and 16, and I want to make sure that they...

Burly-and-bearded country singer Trace Adkins ruffled all the usual feathers and bruised all the usual feelings when he dared to wear a Confederate battle flag earpiece in full view of gasping national TV viewers while singing “The Christmas Song” in the Yankee stronghold of Rockefeller Center on November 28. Adkins, who belches out such venerable neo-country chestnuts as “Honky Tonk Badonkadonk” and “Brown Chicken, Brown Cow,” was subjected to the predictably rage-stroking vilification that comes whenever anyone suggests that the American South has ever been anything beyond a rancid cultural cesspool of lynching, incest, bestiality, racism, toothlessness, retardation, and yes,...

Steven Spielberg’s film LINCOLN clearly takes the politically correct, Northern view of Lincoln and wraps it up in the shroud of the moral fight against slavery. Thus, it decides mostly to focus on Lincoln’s fight in January 1865 to pass the Thirteenth Amendment, which outlawed slavery in the United States and its territories. Though the portrayal of this fight has its nuances, it doesn’t include the extensive evidence suggesting that Lincoln could be an ambitious, secretive tyrant. It also excludes such facts that, just before the Civil War began, President Lincoln had actually expressed support for a Thirteenth Amendment to...

I'm conservative/libertarian. My family are all Obama 'Rats/moochers/OWS types. We had just watched the movie "Lincoln". I opined that it was good (and unusual) to see a Hollywood movie cast middle-aged, white, male Republicans in a favorable light. Yes, of course, the conversation immediately became about race. A few of my family said that at some point in history Republicans became and Democrats and vise-versa. I thought my head was going to explode. I am a huge fan of history and absorb it - especially the civil war. But I had never heard this before. Should I buy more duct...

Everett Stadig recuperating in the hospital after being shoved and breaking his hip. Photo courtesy of Everett Stadig. Denver, Colo., Nov 21, 2012 / 04:49 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- The arrest of a prominent Denver relator who allegedly assaulted a senior citizen collecting signatures for a pro-life petition has lead to new developments in three unsolved rape cases. “Were it not for Mr. Costello’s arrest at the grocery store in July, there would have been no new leads, and there would have been no charges filed in connection with these three unsolved sexual assaults,” Lynn Kimbrough of the Denver District...

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...

Have any fellow FReepers seen this movie yet? If so, what did you think and would you recommend it?

Henry Clay Cochrane traveled thousands of miles around the world as a Marine in the mid- to late 1800s. But it was probably one of his shortest military journeys early in his career that made him famous. The Chester native earned the title of brigadier general after his Marine career ended. But his big moment in history came just as that career was starting. Cochrane was just 21 when he was one of 13 men selected to ride on a train from Washington, D.C., to Gettysburg with President Abraham Lincoln in November 1863. Cochrane was on hand when Lincoln delivered...

New Movie Propagates Lincoln Historical Myths If you are planning to see the new, Steven Spielberg directed, Lincoln movie you might want to invest in an accurate history book instead. While it is successfully dramatic, the movie rehashes several 150 year old myths about the Lincoln presidency and America’s most horrible war. First, to the movie’s credit, the script avoids a key, blatant lie that is currently being taught throughout American public schools today. The script focuses correctly on explaining how slaves were freed by the 13th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, not the Emancipation Proclamation. Abraham Lincoln’s proclamation did...

Abraham Lincoln is returning to the White House tomorrow – Lincoln the movie that is. The White House press office announced today that President Barack Obama will be hosting “cast and crew members” from the Steven Spielberg-directed film for a screening at the Executive Mansion on Thursday evening. DreamWorks had no comment on the screening. However, Deadline has learned that Spielberg, DreamWorks co-Chair and CEO Stacey Snider, producer Kathleen Kennedy as well as actors Daniel Day Lewis, Sally Field, Gloria Reuben and Tommy Lee Jones will all be there with the President and First Lady. Day Lewis plays the 16th...

The Abraham Lincoln of popular perception is a mythological figure. He has little to do with the actual 16th president.

Lincoln Assassination Eyewitness appears on television's "I've Got a Secret" on February 9, 1956. On a 1956 game show, a man appeared who had been present at Ford's Theatre on the night of April 14, 1865. (Note: Link over to the YouTube site provided to watch this amazing historical video.)

To audience laughter, Spielberg said he had deliberately sought to avoid such entanglements by asking for a release date after the elections. "Lincoln" is due for limited release November 9 and timed for the Hollywood awards season. "Don't let this political football play back and forth," the Oscar-winning director said he urged distributors, noting the "confusing" aspect in the film that shows how U.S. political parties back in Lincoln's time "traded political places over the last 150 years." In contrast to today, the Republican party to which Lincoln belonged was founded by anti-slavery activists and Republicans were often tagged "radicals."

Less than a month after reopening, the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool is full of algae, a sea of green overshadowing the nearly two-year, $34 million renovation of the famous site. [snip] “This is a direct consequence of the fact that this is a green project,” Johnson said. “The conditions are pretty good for algae, once it gets in there.”

The Time Abraham Lincoln and a Political Rival Almost Dueled on an Island Exactly 170 years ago today, the Mississippi River levee in Alton, Illinois, was crammed full of spectators awaiting the results of a highly anticipated duel — a smackdown between Abraham Lincoln and political rival James Shields. Only one man could emerge victorious. Onlookers held their breath in suspense as they spotted a boat approaching with a blood-soaked body draped over the bow. It had all started where so many skirmishes do: the Illinois state legislature. Though at the time Lincoln was a Whig and Shields was a...

. . . the truth is, academia and the educational establishment believe they are allowed to have their heroes - whether it's expressed by teacher's unions celebrating with an image of Che Guevera emblazoned on a t-shirt while marching in protest with communists, or whether it's expressed with giddiness over a Hollywood Lincoln movie that's not even been released yet, that kind of "celebratory" history is just fine and dandy. Am I the only one who sees the double-standards? Perhaps these folks view themselves as so intellectually and morally superior to the rest of us that they view their "celebratory"...

Thanks to one of my Facebook friends, I was just today alerted to the interview Romney gave CBS news on 8/27/2012. The video is here. In the interview, Romney says, "My position has been clear throughout this campaign. I'm in favor of abortion being legal in the case of rape and incest and the health and life of the mother." The health of the mother exception is universally recognized by authentic pro-lifers as a loophole you can drive Roe v. Wade through. Then Romney makes the following statement, clearly putting an end to any notion that he is pro-life in...