I’m reading Doris Kearn Goodwin’s “Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln,” and there’s one passage that I find particularly remarkable. Goodwin writes about Lincoln’s sole term in congress, with coincided with the tail end of the Mexican-American war (or “the U.S. Intervention,” as it’s known in Mexico):
Lincoln voted with his Whig brethren on a resolution introduced by Massachusetts congressman George Ashmun, which stated that the war had been “unnecessarily and unconstitutionally” initiated by the president.
The following week, on January 12, 1848, Lincoln defended his spot resolutions and his vote on the Ashmun resolution in a major speech. He claimed that he would happily reverse his vote if the president could prove that first blood was shed on American soil; but since he “can not, or will not do this,” he suspected that the entire matter was, “from beginning to end, the sheerest deception.” Having provoked both countries into war, Lincoln charged, the president had hoped “to escape scrutiny, by fixing the public gaze upon the exceeding brightness of military glory…that serpent’s eye, that charms to destroy.” […] Lincoln employed the bizarre simile of the president’s confused mind “running hither and thither, like some tortured creature, on a burning surface, finding no position, on which it can settle down, and be at ease.”
This maiden effort was not the tone of reasoned debate that later characterized Lincoln’s public statements. Nor did it obey his often-expressed belief that a leader should endeavor to transform, yet heed, public opinion. Compelling as Lincoln’s criticisms might have been, they fell flat a t a time when the majority of Americans were delighted with the outcome of the war. The Democratic Illinois State Register charged that Lincoln had disgraced his district with his “Treasonable assault upon President Polk,” claimed that “henceforth” he would be known as “Benedict Arnold,” and predicted that he would enjoy only a single term. Lincoln sought to clarify his position, arguing that although he had challenged the instigation of the war, he had never voted against supplies for the soldiers. To accept Polk’s position without question, he claimed, was to “allow the President to invade neighboring nation…whenever he may choose to say he deems it necessary.”
It’s fun to think that we’re writing the first draft of history. But, really, it seems we’re just falling into old, established patterns, repeating the same mistakes that we made 150 years ago.
That’s why those of us who study history aren’t at a loss for words, or for actions, when situations arise.
History does not repeat itself, but the example Lincoln and others have set in similar circumstances provides an excellent guide for the course we can take today.
Here’s another example: In Immigrant Georgia, New Echoes of an Old History.
Or, I should add, the course we should avoid (as the article on Georgia demonstrates).
I was given this book for Valentine’s Day. It was the last time I saw it. Lisa has been reading it every night since then, and frequently will call to my attention to a passage.
I can’t remember the last time I read fiction, that’s how bad (or good) it’s gotten. I have about 5-6 books waiting as we speak. I bought Lisa Mornings on Horseback for her birthday. Maybe I should get that back from her and read it. I love McCullough’s writing.
I’m glad you’re reading DKG’s book on Linclon. I’ve lived very closely with Lincoln and Lee over the past 40 years. Goodwin does a nice job of finding a new viewing port on Lincoln. And, Waldo, you’re right to be alert to foreshadowings of modern issues.
I am a Republican largely because of Lincoln. I doubt that he’d be very impressed with where we are now, but I sense that a good deal of his spirit lingers in the back corners of the better angels of the Republican Party, properly understood.
Beyond partisanship, though, Lincoln was sui generis and really can’t be exclusively claimed by either of the modern political parties. That a man of his background, limitations and gifts came to the top of the political scrum precisely when he did, and exited precisely when the great issues had been bloodily resolved, is substantial indication to me that there is a Divine Providence who shapes elements of our history and that, at least at one point, He thought it important that things turn out a certain way. Any other political leader of the time would have led to very different results.
the war had been “unnecessarily and unconstitutionally” initiated by the president.
What’s really interesting about Lincoln’s vote on this resolution is how it contrasts with his view of executive war power in later years. A large majority of Americans in 1861 (which, by definition, excluded the South) were opposed to the Union invasion of the Confederacy. I wonder on which side of the M-D line Lincoln’s troops first shed blood.
“I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been in favor of bringing about in anyway the social and political equality of the white and black races—that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any other man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race.”
-Abraham Lincoln
I’ve never liked Abraham Lincoln. At all. He is worshipped largely because of the massive revisionism that followed his assassination. Lincoln was probably the worst enemy of freedom who ever occupied the Oval Office. He rounded up thousands of political disssidents and threw them in prison when they had committed no crimes. He was an unapologetic racist who preserved slavery in the Union states as long as he possibly could. Lincoln turned the Senate into a puppet theater by appointing ‘Senators’ to pretend to represent the rebel states. He sent General Sherman on a mission of pure and simple terrorism, to murder civilians and to destroy the homes and farms of ordinary Southerners who had never offered any injury to any other person. Abraham Lincoln was a sack of sh*t who should have ended his time in office through impeachment rather than death.
Waldo’s post is somewhat amusing regarding repeating history. Lincoln also was the first (and only) president to formally repeal the right of habeas corpus. The press, and the Democratic Party, howled that he was a tyrant bent on destruction of our civil liberties during a time of war.
the “Battle Cry of Freedom” provides a great amount of history on Lincoln’s civil liberties fight with the media.
Many people are highly critical of Lincoln’s less than concern for the Constitution or civil liberties during the Civil War. However, given that our nation was facing a peril unlike any other, history has probably judged that Lincoln made the right move.
I don’t know if that makes it “amusing.” Let’s go with “extra interesting.”
While I disagree with your comment (and probably Kearns’ analysis), this one’s on my pile of bought-yet-unread books. Perhaps I’ll move it to the top.
So far I’m quite enjoying it. Most of my reading has been related to the human and earth sciences recently, so this is a pretty severe shifting of gears for me. I expect I’ll settle into the book about halfway through.
What I find most valuable about the book is the perspective on slavery and racism that it offers. Racism is a very touchy topic for me; I find slavery simply unfathomable, which speaks poorly of my mental and empathetic capacities.
Though you’ll hate this, James, the parallels to the gay rights movement come to me time and time again while learning about the slavery debate of the 1850s. Nothing other than righteous indignation has come of this so far; I’m not sure that anything more will.
ATA, politcalopion,
We should not have to worship a man as a infallible god to acknowledge his greatness as a President.
So we don’t have to settle on the judgement that “Lincoln made the right move.” It is well within our rights to criticize Lincoln’s overreach and to question wether or not it was needed to actually win the Civil War. But we can still give him his just due as one of our greatest Presidents.
Lincoln made all sorts of bad military decisions (and good ones). Maybe the war would have been won sooner or he would not have had such a nasty reelection campaign if he would have ruled with a lighter touch. Fodder for endless speculation.
But still, they are very valid questions, and particularly valid considering today: do we learn from the past?
Are we in the mess that we are in now, because of our contemporary heavy-handed administration? Remember, Lincoln almost ran the war into the ground, and quite possible won because of shear luck or just simply running the clock out. We might not be so lucky.
I can say this for sure, this administration has certainly not asked us to appeal to the angles of our better nature or have given us anything, anywhere near in stature to the Gettysburg Address.
Now ATA,
To address your absolute dismissal of Lincoln, I find it to be quite reactionary.
Even the most prominent black abolitionist of the time thought that the races could not live together.
He was a man of his time. Were you not one of the people defending Andrew Jackson under that banner? Maybe not.
But, was Lincoln racists, sure.
Was Lyndon Johnson racist, damn straight, but he gave us the Civil Rights Bill.
Was Harry Truman racist, damn straight, but he was the first President EVER to give an address to the NAACP (at the Lincoln Memorial no less).
And it is not just simply a case of political opportunism: there where real and serious personal costs for these men as a result of this acts.
And as for the emancipation opportunism conspiracy theory. It is bunk, I have the complete volumes of Lincoln’s writing and I can tell you his moral disgust at the institution of slavery was absolute.
And please pick up Goodwin’s book if you want to discover how intertwined the politics of the Abolitionists where with the then nascent Republican party. And what a huge roll they played in Lincoln getting the nomination and winning the election in ’60.
And as far as Sherman goes, I believe he would answer you, “War is hell”.
If Lincoln was personally disgusted by slavery then his comments on blacks being inferior become even more reprehensible. A man who was a product of his time and upbringing and knew only one way to think about something is someone easier to understand. Not necessarily to excuse, but certainly to understand. Wheras the man who truly knows better and still spouts racist and pro-slavery rhetoric in order to advance himself politcally is a coward and twice the sinner as the man who didn’t know any better.
I don’t think that Lincoln should have allowed the Civil War to begin in the first place. Fundamentally, I don’t think that the idea of forcing states to be part of a political body that they no longer support was worth over 600,000 American lives. I’m not impressed with the impact that the war ultimately had on the situation of Southern blacks. Sharecroppers after reconstruction were just as much slaves as they were prior to the emancipation proclamation. Blacks still had no real status as citizens, berefit of voting rights and terrorized or murdered at will by the Klan. I have a hard time calling that ‘freedom.’ Freedom for Southern blacks was won by non-violent activism led by blacks in the 20th century. Not by a white mans’ war in the 19th. I say this as a confirmed hawk who generally believes in the use of military force for the cause of freedom.
The Civil War was a massive waste of human life in an idiotic pissing contest that didn’t need to happen. I suggest that it would have been better to part ways with a handshake, ban slavery in all Union states, declare amnesty for every slave who could make it to the Union border and pursue a long-term diplomatic and economic course aimed at bringing Confederate states back into the fold, one by one. Slavery in the Confederacy would have collapsed under pressure from the labor movement that emerged in the early 20th century (assuming that the American labor movement would have emerged in such a alternate future). Please discuss and critique.
ATA’s comment that Lincoln “preserved slavery in the United States as long as he possibly could” is a monumentally ignorant remark. Lincoln made clear for sound political reasons that the purpose of the War was to protect and restore federal property and authority and to preserve the Union. This was not based on any interest in maintaining slavery. It was based on the necessity of having a clear purpose that would promote enlistments and secure the border states. Lincoln drafted the Emancipation Proclamation early in the War, but withheld its issuance until the Union Armies had achieved meaningful victory on the battlefield. Lincoln had no intent to prolong slavery a day longer than necessary to achieve his primary political objective of preserving the Union.
Re his racial attitudes, Lincoln was one of a mere handful of prominent politicians of his day who were willing to say flat out that slavery was a moral wrong. He distinguished himself among even these few by the cogency of his arguments against the institution. While I have no doubt that there were very few mid-19th Century white Americans whose attitudes toward blacks would pass muster by today’s standards of racial tolerance, Lincoln was clearly out front in his racial attitudes. The quoted material in ATA’s comment was Lincoln’s way of maintaining political viability in southern Illinois. But he also made clear at the same time that in terms of equality of opportunity to enjoy the fruits of his own labor, the African-american was every bit the equal of the white man. Frederick Douglass, no fan of Lincoln’s in the first couple of years of Lincoln’s presidency, recounted that Lincoln was the only white man who had ever treated him (Douglass) as an equal without condescension or affectation.
ATA,
Are you serious?
I mean, you comments are really not worth debating. you are so reactionary its pitiful: somehow managing to wear both the Confederacy apologist hat and the race batting hat at the same time.
I am going to assume that you are joking, right?
Because, CSA apologists are always trying to say that slavery would have collapsed on its own . . . I mean thats like saying that Japan would have surrendered if we would not have dropped the A-bomb . . . its just silly what-ifs and I would have done this and that because I am perfect,
I know, I have great one; FDR was a war criminal who should have been hanged because he knew how evil Hitler was and that WWII was going to kill 60 million and he should have gotten in a submarine and floated to Berlin and killed Hitler. Since he didn’t do that he sucks.
Anyway, the real plight of African-Americans, does not stem from the Civil War, it stems from the failure of the Repbulicans to “stay the course” on Reconstruction.
Very real and major gains in self-determination, civil rights, and economic freedom where made by the former slaves in the south. And mostly done by the blacks themselves–protected by those evil baby killin’ Union troops.
The real betrayal was in the era of Redemption.
I suggest that you read: “Reconstruction: America’s Unfinished Revolution, 1863-1877”, by Foner; or “Black Reconstruction in America 1860-1880”, by Du Bois.
Also, all of the gains made by blacks during reconstruction where not sand castles.
A large majority of the African-American middle class, from which the Civil Rights movment was born, had its begings in that era.
I have enjoyed what I’ve read of this book so far.
Lincoln’s ideas of working the voters at election time are a lesson for us all. It is that grassroots effort used back then which organized voters in the localities and made an impact on the outcome of the election. I saw this while working on Tim Kaine’s election last fall–the localities bore the brunt of the legwork and it did pay off. Had we done a little more legwork, Creigh Deeds would have been the Attorney General instead. : )
The differences between the candidates’ views at various times in their early political career were either so minute or like a chasm, depending upon the issue being discussed. I have wondered what the outcome of the Civil War would have been given a different President from that group. And, while it was weird to think of people actually “appointing” Senators, I realize how far we’ve actually come since that time. Hopefully, campaign reforms being discussed at the national level will pass to again make necessary changes to a system that has become corrupt.
The parallels between what was going on then and events occurring now are very striking. Although I usually read ATA’s posts with a frown, believe it or not, I really appreciated this line:
…Lincoln was probably the worst enemy of freedom who ever occupied the Oval Office. He rounded up thousands of political dissidents and threw them in prison when they had committed no crimes…
Can we not say the same things now? There are so many stories about the aftereffects of 9/11 and the Patriot Act that this accurately reflects what is occurring today as well.
In addition, ATA said,
…The Civil War was a massive waste of human life in an idiotic pissing contest that didn’t need to happen…I say this as a confirmed hawk who generally believes in the use of military force for the cause of freedom…
I still contend that we did not have to be in this war, that there was no need for us to invade Iraq, or to bring “freedom” to a country whose political and religious ideas do not really support the type of democracy we enjoy here in the United States. I do applaud the efforts of our troops who are in Iraq and elsewhere. [My brother will be going over there in April or May.] There are far too many bad stories in the press and not enough stories about the good things that are actually occurring overseas. But I still believe it is a “pissing contest” brought about by Bush and his administration to further their own agenda—personal, financial or otherwise.
“Team of Rivals” is an apt title for this work. I wonder what DKG would entitle a volume about the current administration. I’m sure prospective titles by posters would reflect their political leanings. : )
Could not President Wilson, or President Roosevelt (Japanese internment camps anyone?) could he also be considered the worst enemy of freedom who ever occupied the Oval Office. Or how bout Harry Truman, he tried to break a union strike, by drafting them into the army! Military state?
I am not at all proposing we not fight excess of executive power. Fight’em like hell.
But they are frequent in our history. And some of them have also have been perpetuated by the lefts most revered heros. Does that make them right? No!
So do we throw the babies out with the bath water?
“Angles of our better nature” … I’ll spend the whole weekend trying to make that misspelling make sense. Maybe a highly poetic photographer or cinematographer came up with that phrase …
Ha, very nice, indeed.
I mean, whoops.
as far as “a highly poetic photographer or cinematographer”. Maybe, I do both.
check out my web site:
http://www.jonphillipsheridan.com
But here is the real poetry:
“I am loath to close. We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.”
Can it get any better?
My favorite is, “The mystic chords of memory”.