Confederately Correct - Will the REAL Lincoln please stand up?
By Invictus Veritas
I want to begin to look into the many, many flat out lies and just complete and total myths that the north's propaganda machine has cranked out into the hearts and minds of generation after generation, and which have led to the demonizing of all things Confederate. It was not enough for the north and the federalists to have won the war. They went on to also supplant, falsify, and to utterly destroy and conceal the true reasons that the War for Southern Independence was fought. This was something all too well known by those gallant men who fought, bled and died for the cause of a free and Independent Southern Nation. General Patrick Cleburne, who is known as the "Stonewall Jackson of the West" once said ,"Surrender means that the history of this heroic struggle will be written by the enemy; that our youth will be trained by Northern school teachers; will learn from Northern school books their version of the War; will be impressed by all the influences of history and education to regard our gallant dead as traitors, and our maimed veterans as fit subjects for derision."
I will seek to lay bare the truths about why our ancestors so bravely and valiantly fought and died. I will begin by looking at the real man that sat in the White House. I have entitled this, "Will the Real Lincoln Please Stand Up?"
We were all taught in school about " Good ol' Honest Abe." How a pure of heart, gentle man saw a great injustice being committed by the "mean ol' racist" Southern people and set his face like a flint to sweep in and save a downtrodden and enslaved people through an act of benevolence. This man, so they say, would save his country from being torn apart and would be, in turn, murdered because of his good deeds. However, when we begin to look into the life of "Ol' Honest Abe", his sterling character, "honesty" and overall reputation as a great leader, begins to unravel at the seams. As the old saying goes..."That dog won’t hunt".
So, let's take a look at what I like to call the "Epitome of a Hypocrite". I will start with a quote from Lincoln himself.
"Don't interfere with anything in the Constitution. That must be maintained, for it is the only safeguard of our liberties. And not to Democrats alone do I make this appeal, but to all who love these great and true principles." --August 27, 1856 Speech at Kalamazoo, Michigan
While we’re on the subject of the Constitution, let’s begin to look at the many ways "Good Ol' Honest Abe" trampled on that very document. In his first four months in office, he…
1. Failed to call Congress into session after the South fired upon Fort Sumter, in direct violation of the Constitution.
2. Called up an army of 75,000 men, bypassing the Congressional authority in direct violation of the Constitution.
3. Unilaterally suspended the writ of habeas corpus, a function of Congress, violating the Constitution. This gave him the power, as he saw it, to arrest civilians without charge and imprison them indefinitely without trial—which he did.
4. Ignored a Supreme Court order to restore the right of habeas corpus, thus violating the Constitution again and ignoring the Separation of Powers which the Founders put in place exactly for the purpose of preventing one man’s use of tyrannical powers in the executive branch.
5. When the Chief Justice forwarded a copy of the Supreme Court’s decision to Lincoln, he wrote out an order for the arrest of the Chief Justice and gave it to a U.S. Marshall for expedition, in violation of the Constitution.
6. Unilaterally ordered a naval blockade of Southern ports, an act of war, and a responsibility of Congress, in violation of the Constitution.
7. Commandeered and closed over 300 newspapers in the north, because of editorials against his war policy and his illegal military invasion of the South. This clearly violated the First Amendment freedom of speech and press clauses.
8. Sent in armed forces to destroy the printing presses and other machinery at those newspapers, in violation of the Constitution’s Freedom of the Press and Free Speech, our 1st Amendment.
9. Arrested the publishers, editors and owners of those newspapers, and imprisoned them without charge and without trial for the remainder of the war, all in direct violation of both the Constitution and the Supreme Court order aforementioned.
10. Arrested and imprisoned, without charge or trial, another 15,000-20,000 U.S. citizens who dared to speak out against the war, his policies, or were suspected of anti-war feelings. (Relative to the population at the time, this would be equivalent to President G.W. Bush arresting and imprisoning roughly 150,000-200,000 Americans without trial for “disagreeing” with the Iraq war; can you imagine?)
11. Sent the Army to arrest the entire legislature of Maryland to keep them from meeting legally, because they were debating a bill of secession. They were all imprisoned without charge or trial, in direct violation of the Constitution.
12. Unilaterally created the state of West Virginia in direct violation of the Constitution. (I dare you to show me in the Constitution, where a President has the authority to split a state.)
13. Sent 350,000 Northern men to their deaths to kill 350,000 Southern men in order to force the free and sovereign states of the South to remain in the Union they, the people, legally voted to peacefully withdraw from, all in order to continue the South’s revenue flow into the North.
14. US Constitution Article III…Section 3. Treason against the United States shall consist only in levying War against them. Lincoln waged war upon his own country. Unless one considers secession legal and that the Confederacy was a sovereign nation. (And of course I do believe that the South was an Independent Nation, but I am including this for the Unionists who say we weren't.)
15. Lincoln sent Union troops door to door in areas of Maryland, a Union state, to confiscate weapons. This is a clear violation of the 2nd Amendment of the Constitution.
16. Lincoln ordered the arrest of thousands Marylanders for the crime of 'suspected Southern sympathies'. Lincoln ordered the arrest of US Congressman Henry May representing Maryland. Lincoln also had most of the Maryland State Legislature, and most of the Baltimore city council, the police commissioner of Baltimore, the mayor of Baltimore, and thousands of prominent Maryland citizens arrested.
These people were arrested and held in Military prisons, without trial, some of them for years. On April 25th, 1861, when it looked as though Maryland may secede from the Union, Lincoln sent a letter to General Winfield Scott giving him permission to bombard Maryland's Cities. This war criminal Lincoln couldn't wait to bombard innocent civilians. We call that “terrorism” these days.
17. Lincoln issues the Emancipation Proclamation. This is a direct violation of the US Constitution and the US Supreme Court’s decision on the matter. Oh and by the way, the Emancipation Proclamation DID NOT free any slaves. It freed the slaves in the South, which he had ZERO authority to do, but not those in the north. Once again, no country has the right to create laws for another country.
18. The Lincoln administration allowed the taking of private property for public use without just compensation or due process of law. This is a clear violation of the 5th Amendment. A prime example is the Union army stealing Robert E Lee's home, Arlington House, which they used as headquarters. Since dead Union soldiers were stacking up like cordwood, they started burying them in Lee's yard. There were so many Union soldiers’ graves here, that the site would eventually become Arlington National Cemetery.
19. The Lincoln Administration routinely used water torture against the thousands of the Union’s prisoners arrested and jailed without trail. This violates the 8th Amendment, "Cruel and unusual punishment".
Just a few short years prior to the war, Lincoln said this, "I have borne a laborious, and, in some respects to myself, a painful part in the contest. Through all, I have neither assailed, nor wrestled with any part of the constitution."
--October 30, 1858 Speech at Springfield
Just three short years after having made that speech, his convictions on this same subject, having now been tried in the crucible of truth and time, yielded the tree's true fruit, one not of integrity and character but one of tyranny. Evidenced in action, not in allegory. Time and again Lincoln trampled on the very document that he previously claimed to have “neither assailed, nor wrestled with .”
Golly Abe... that doesn't sound very “honest” to me. On the subject of what should happen to folks who violate the Constitution, Lincoln said this…
"The people -- the people -- are the rightful masters of both congresses, and courts -- not to overthrow the constitution, but to overthrow the men who pervert it."--September 16 and 17, 1859 Notes for Speeches at Columbus and Cincinnati.
That’s good advice Abe, I wonder if that's what the South was doing?
One of many of the downright lies that we are taught in school is that because Lincoln freed the slaves he must have cared a great deal for blacks and been the greatest abolitionist ever. After all, he did abolish slavery. So let’s look at what Lincoln, thought about these issues in his own words.
"I do but quote from one of those speeches when I declare that "I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so." Lincoln's First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1861.
"Do the people of the South really entertain fears that a Republican administration would, directly, or indirectly, interfere with their slaves, or with them, about their slaves? If they do, I wish to assure you, as once a friend, and still, I hope, not an enemy, that there is no cause for such fears." The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln edited by Roy P. Basler, Volume IV, "Letter to Alexander H. Stephens" (December 22, 1860), p. 160.
Interesting to note, by the way... General Lee (Commander of the Confederate armed forces) freed every one of the slaves his wife inherited from her father, before the war ended. General Grant (commander of the Union armed forces) still kept slaves AFTER the war and did not free them until forced. When asked why he still had slaves, his response was," Good help is hard to find".
So what did (Ol' Honest Abe) really think of Blacks?
“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. I say upon this occasion I do not perceive that because the white man is to have the superior position the negro should be denied everything.”
Abraham Lincoln
(1809-1865) 16th US President
Source:Fourth Debate with Stephen A. Douglas at Charleston, Illinois, September 18, 1858
(The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln edited by Roy P. Basler, Volume III, pp. 145-146.)
So, what then, was the war fought over? The answer is the same answer virtually every war has been fought over... money.
The South had been paying between 70- 85 % of all the taxes of the entire nation. Lincoln further tried to enforce an additional 40% tax. When this happened it was the last straw for the South. The South so very badly wanted to avoid war that it agreed to an additional 10%, but Lincoln refused this offer, soo the war began.
ALSO, if the war was fought over slavery, why did the north pass the Corwin Amendment in order to entice the South to stay in the Union? The Corwin Amendment, passed by the 36th United States Congress on March 2, 1861 said this, "No amendment shall be made to the Constitution which will authorize or give to Congress the power to abolish or interfere, within any State, with the domestic institutions thereof, including that of persons held to labor or service by the laws of said State". If all the South wanted was to preserve slavery then why in God's name didn’t they accept this? They would have gotten to keep slavery and never fire one single shot!! Instead they told Lincoln and the north to go to hell!
When the dust all settles on the subject of Lincoln, we can clearly see that this man was anything but what he has been portrayed to be. "America's Greatest President" was truly "America's Greatest Tyrant". It was for these reasons, that those men embraced and embodied the greatest spirit of the Founding Fathers, when they wrote in the Declaration of Independence against another tyrant and despot, the King of England, King George,"That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."
This is the truth.., This is "Confederately Correct".
Sources:
Water Torture: Mark Neely, "Fate of Liberty" pg. 110 On page 110 of Fate of Liberty he writes, "Handcuffs and hanging by the wrists were rare, but in the summer of 1863, the army had developed a water torture that came to be used routinely." Upon learning of the use of torture, no one in the Lincoln administration "expressed any personal outrage or personal feeling at all" over it, "including Lincoln’s secretary of state"
Calling of Troups without Congress: Abraham Lincoln and Civil Liberties in Wartime By The Honorable Frank J. Williams "In the 80 days that elapsed between Abraham Lincoln's April 1861 call for troops--the beginning of the Civil War--and the official convening of Congress in special session on July 4, 1861" Lincoln's Call for troops happened in April 1861. Congress did not convene until July of 1861
On 19 April 1861, President Lincoln issued a Proclamation of Blockade Against Southern Ports:
Whereas an insurrection against the Government of the United States has broken out in the States of South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Florida, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas, and the laws of the United States for the collection of the revenue cannot be effectually executed therein comformably to that provision of the Constitution which requires duties to be uniform throughout the United States:
And whereas a combination of persons engaged in such insurrection, have threatened to grant pretended letters of marque to authorize the bearers thereof to commit assaults on the lives, vessels, and property of good citizens of the country lawfully engaged in commerce on the high seas, and in waters of the United States: And whereas an Executive Proclamation has been already issued, requiring the persons engaged in these disorderly proceedings to desist therefrom, calling out a militia force for the purpose of repressing the same, and convening Congress in extraordinary session, to deliberate and determine thereon:
Now, therefore, I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, with a view to the same purposes before mentioned, and to the protection of the public peace, and the lives and property of quiet and orderly citizens pursuing their lawful occupations, until Congress shall have assembled and deliberated on the said unlawful proceedings, or until the same shall ceased, have further deemed it advisable to set on foot a blockade of the ports within the States aforesaid, in pursuance of the laws of the United States, and of the law of Nations, in such case provided. For this purpose a competent force will be posted so as to prevent entrance and exit of vessels from the ports aforesaid. If, therefore, with a view to violate such blockade, a vessel shall approach, or shall attempt to leave either of the said ports, she will be duly warned by the Commander of one of the blockading vessels, who will endorse on her register the fact and date of such warning, and if the same vessel shall again attempt to enter or leave the blockaded port, she will be captured and sent to the nearest convenient port, for such proceedings against her and her cargo as prize, as may be deemed advisable.
And I hereby proclaim and declare that if any person, under the pretended authority of the said States, or under any other pretense, shall molest a vessel of the United States, or the persons or cargo on board of her, such person will be held amenable to the laws of the United States for the prevention and punishment of piracy.
In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand, and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.
Done at the City of Washington, this nineteenth day of April, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-one, and of the Independence of the United States the eighty-fifth.
Lincoln failed to call Congress into session after the firing on Ft. Sumter.
http://www.abrahamlincolnsclassroom.org/…/abraham-lincoln-…/ "After Fort Sumter surrendered, Lincoln declined to call Congress back into session. Instead, he used his powers as commander in chief to mobilize the country. While acknowledging that Lincoln circumvented the Constitution after Fort Sumter, McPherson argued that the reason Lincoln did not call Congress into session was that seven states were to hold congressional elections in the spring of 1861. “Thus the special session could not meet until all representatives had been elected.” Of Lincoln’s invocation of presidential war powers, McPherson wrote: “The Constitution makes no mention of war powers; Lincoln seems to have invented both the phrase and its application.” James M. McPherson, Tried by War: Abraham Lincoln as Commander in Chief (Penguin Press HC, 2008)
Lincoln ignores Supreme Court Verdict on Habeas Corpus:
http://www.history.com/…/president-lincoln-suspends-the-wri… "Federal judge Roger Taney, the chief justice of the Supreme Court (and also the author of the infamous Dred Scott decision), issued a ruling that President Lincoln did not have the authority to suspend habeas corpus. Lincoln didn’t respond, appeal, or order the release of Merryman. But during a July 4 speech, Lincoln was defiant, insisting that he needed to suspend the rules in order to put down the rebellion in the South."
Lincoln Signs Justice Taney's Arrest Warrant:
https://www.lewrockwell.com/…/lincolns-presidential-warran…/ "Frederick S. Calhoun, the Chief Historian for the United States Marshal's Service, at the Department of Justice, recently wrote a 200 year history of Federal Marshals, entitled, The Lawmen: United States Marshals and their Deputies, 1789–1989 (Smithsonian Institute, Washington, D.C. 1989). This historical study gives a detailed account of an arrest warrant, signed by President Abraham Lincoln, in the early days of his administration. The warrant was to arrest the Chief Justice of the United States, Roger B. Taney, following his opinion in the case of Ex parte Merryman (May, 1861). The account is found in the chapter entitled, "Arrest of Traitors and Suspension of Habeas Corpus." It was taken from the private papers of the Federal Marshall, Ward Hill Laman, at the Huntington Library in Pasadena:"
Lincoln shuts down and arrests newspapers: Clinton Rossiter in "Constitutional Dictatorship" Literally hundreds of newspapers were shut down by the Lincoln administration, but "freedom of speech and press" somehow "flourished almost unchecked," wrote Rossiter.
"During the Civil War the federal government was responsible for the greatest amount of newspaper suppression in the nation’s history.More than 300 newspapers were shut down, most of them Democratic papers that were sympathetic to the Confederacy. Some historians have criticized President Abraham Lincoln for allowing such widespread constraints on the press. This article reconsiders the nature of Lincoln’s view of press freedom. Based on a letter the president sent to a Union general, it concludes that Lincoln changed his thinking about midwaythrough the war and began to believe that suppression of the press was not the appropriate policy." Abraham Lincoln and Press Suppression Reconsidered By David W. Bulla.
Lincoln's Arrest of Political Prisoners: Abraham Lincoln and Press Suppression Reconsidered By David W. Bulla "During the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln tried to preserve the tenets of a constitutional democratic republic as set forth by the founders in the Constitution.This proved to be a daunting challenge. After all, Lincoln suspended the writ of habeas corpus, a power given explicitly to Congress, and his administration arrested more than 14,000 political prisoners and suppressed more than 300 newspapers." "The administration's statistical record on arbitrary arrests is persuasive testimony that Lincoln was not particularly embarrassed by the policy. No careful work on the numbers of civilians arrested by military authorities or for reasons of state has ever been done by a historian, and those historians who have attempted an estimate previously have been writing with the goal of defending Lincoln in mind. Even so, the lowest estimate is 13,535 arrests from February 15, 1862, to the end of the war. At least 866 others occurred from the beginning of the war until February 15, 1862. Therefore, at least 14,401 civilians were arrested by the Lincoln administration. If one takes the population of the North during the Civil War as 22.5 million (using the 1860 census and counting West Virginia but not Nevada), then one person out of every 1,563 in the North was arrested during the Civil War." The Lincoln Administration and Arbitrary Arrests: A Reconsideration Mark E. Neely, Jr. "Lincoln immediately called out state militias, expanded the army and navy, spent millions of dollars without congressional appropriation and blockaded southern ports. He decreed by executive order that all people who discouraged enlistment in the Union army or otherwise engaged in disloyal practices would be subject to martial law. His executive order suspended the writ of habeas corpus, (which prevents the government from holding citizens without trial). Between 15,000 and 20,000 Americans were arrested on suspicion of disloyalty to the government. It is difficult to imagine a modern president ordering such actions." -Camp Verde Bugle
http://cvbugle.com/main.asp…
Lincoln's Army Destroys Newspaper Presses: "Lincoln’s opponents were relatively quiet the first year of the war. They opposed Lincoln’s decision to call out the militia, which is a congressional prerogative; challenged his order to blockade Southern ports, which they claimed was an act of war before Congress declared war; and disputed the income tax and the suspension of habeas corpus. Dissidents, most notably newspaper editors who differed with the administration, were being thrown in jail. Other newspapers received visits from uniformed troops who destroyed their presses or just locked the door and shut down operations"
http://quod.lib.umich.edu/…/--lincoln-s-critics-the-copperh…
we call it Mr.Lincoln's War,or The War of Northern Aggression
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