Why are you desperately quoting this putz? Methinks he was speaking of himself.

This was the guy that issued a presidential order [emancipation proclamation] freeing only slaves in the South; while being silent about slaves in 3 northern states. So he issued an Order freeing slaves that only applied to a region in which his order had no effect. Abe should have remained silent on the issue instead of removing all doubt as to what he was about. History has been overly kind to Abe.

People who don't have the vaguest concept about military strategy make me laugh. Don't you think Mr Lincoln fully understood that? Don't you think he knew what would happen if he Emancipated the slaves in the Boarder States? Don't you think he already knew that he needed to win the War of Rebellion first then he could deal with the slavery issue in the remaining states?

Go ahead and spout some lame platitudes. It will amuse me

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Abe Lincoln is just like a 19th century Aaron Rodgers. When he and the north or America at large had success, it was in spite of him. Or just good luck. Whenever anything went wrong, it's because he was stat whoring and freelancing and screwing things up. The concept that a man could be flawed and make mistakes, as part of a war involving millions of people is ludicrous. The generals don't deserve any credit. Any poor weather that affected troop movements is just an excuse and a real president would be able to move them anyways. He cared more about making broad proclamations than actually accomplishing anything.

Exactly, the EP had nothing to do with freeing the slaves. That was my point, Grasshopper.

Looks like Ive tweaked another of your idols. 😂

Do you know that Lincoln proposed and drafted legislation to send all Blacks back to Africa?

Lincoln was a compromiser; for god sake he picked a southerner to be his VP, who opposed the 14th Amendment. If Lincoln was president until 1940 slavery would have never been outlawed if it was up to him and if it would have pissed-off one significant faction.

Lincoln was advised from the outset of the hostility by his military strategists and other politicians [European countries were pressuring] to issue the EP, he resisted because he didn't think he needed to take such a drastic step. He assumed he could win a battle or two or 10 and the war would end. He only did it because the South kicked butt badly and repeatedly for the first 1.5 years of the war and ole' Abe got scared.

Now, let's assume the North held its own in the war from the outset; the EP would have never been issued.
Once the war ended Lincoln would have been focused on reconciliation, he never would have torqued off the South and said you cant have your slaves. Plus, it would have crippled their economy, if there was any left. Now, when would Lincoln have gotten around to freeing the slaves? Answer: NEVER! Because he'd fear it would start or lead to fracture or another war.

You heard his famous speech, right? if I could end this war by freeing the slaves I would; if I could end the war by not freeing one slave I would [something like that anyways].

You need to read guys like Zinn! And dont think selectively. And I'm glad the Packers beat the Bears. It was a good game. The Bears once has a DB named Lincoln glad he didn't play Sunday.

As usual the point you try to make misses the mark entirely and you end up rambling on talking gibberish all the while you think it is clever and witty.


Nope. see above. See my prior post. It makes me laugh.



Absolutely. The question is why? You suppose it to be because Mr Lincoln was some kind of evil man. Contrary to that opinion he was looking at ever solution he could come up with to allow them to live their own lives without feeling the hated of the White man. In addition he was a 19th century man with the facts as they knew them. Wasn’t convinced they were as intelligent as the White men. If he lived today he would have changed his mind. He did on many occasions in his time when presented with new information. You see him as a static person and judge him using 21st century ideals. They are irrelevant when looking at the 19th century.



The art of compromise was one of his greatest assets. You belittle it but he was extremely effective by using it.
Second comment is totally false. If you read his speeches you would have seen that he thought slavery would die out when not fed by opening new land to slavery. By not allowing slaves in to the US. By freeing slaves when their owners moved to free states. He also proposed compensating the owers in order to free their slaves.



He wasn't as gullible or as afraid as you think he was. But if it helps you justify your thought process knock yourself out.

The war was not about slavery. The war was to reunite the nation. You are looking at two separate issues and trying to justify a weak position. Mr Lincoln was opposed to slavery. Yet he knew he didn’t have the Constitutional right to simply proclaim all the slaves are free because he said so. It would never hold up in court. He found a way to do so by making it a military consideration.
In addition if he made the Proclamation early in the war it would have looked like he was weak and desperate. He had to wait and issue it after it looked like the Union would win. Image is everything.


Yeah right.

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Lincoln wasn't as great of a president as schools teach us. JFK as well. If they hadn't been assassinated they'd just be another President. Lincoln was better than Kennedy though.

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I used to admire Lincoln a lot more than I do now.

Until I learned:

1. "To protect the Union" he suspended habeas corpus.
2. "To protect the Union" he protected slavery in part of the Union while emancipating those in others.
3. "To protect the Union" he accepted working conditions for free labor in the north that were in many cases worse than those of slaves in the south. (Plantation slaves were not free to choose, but their diet and living and working conditions were actually often better in material terms than their free counterparts in the industrial north.)
4. "To protect the Union" he engaged in the most costly war in American history, far more costly in terms of destruction of human and capital wealth (i.e. people) than I had realized. (I had heard the "most costly" phrase before, but until I started studying economic history I hadn't known how costly.

I don't consider him evil as some of my libertarian/anarchist types do, because his actions were a major contributor to real improvement of the lot of blacks in America. But I also don't consider him anywhere close to greatness in the way that Washington and Jefferson, say, were great.

Because he did things in the name of "fighting rebellion" that were as bad as some of the stuff the original American rebels (those of 1775-1783) rebelled against, e.g. #1 and #4 above. The kind of things "compromisers" and "politicians" always justify in times of war. Just like Franklin D Roosevelt and William O. Douglas justified the mass internment of Japanese-Americans during WWII. Just like George W Bush and 99 out of 100 senators justified The Patriot Act to "fight terrorism".

Despite owning slaves, Washington and Jefferson were great men. Lincoln, like every other American president, was a politician. And politicians should not be celebrated the way great men should be celebrated.

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Wade, what do you think would have been the result had Lincoln not taken the steps he did? Would the war have lasted longer or ended sooner?

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I don’t doubt Lincoln wanted to end slavery; but it wasn't his priority #1, it was more like priority #22 and this is what history distorts. Dix didn’t get 2 INTs Sunday because he’s a great safety; he was a benefactor of circumstance, he was luckily in the right spot at the right time: Dix/INT = Lincoln/Slaves freed. It is a travesty that anyone mentions ending slavery and doesn’t mention Fred Douglass. In the day, if you want to see how people acted that were truly passionate about ending slavery study Douglass, study Harriet Tubman. Regarding Black slavery and civil rights Lincoln wasn’t worthy of carrying a single pubic hair of Douglass. Lincoln wasn’t evil, far from it; but Lincoln was also far from being a saint. He was just your middling white dude at that time that was glad he wasn’t Black and metaphorically if he had some spare change or a spare moment, he might drop it in the salvation army Santa Bucket outside Meier or donate an hour or two feeding homeless Blacks on Christmas.

WPR, you’re obfuscating facts concerning the timing of the release of the EP. The EP [or a facsimile to it] was drafted because war appeared imminent, which is also when it was drafted. Lincoln and his personal advisers were very politically crafty. It was not employed because Lincoln felt it would it would make it harder to prevent a quick end to the war.

we must work not to processing history through our knowledge of it. No one at the time knew the carnage that lied ahead. Surely, you’ve heard the stories about senators and congressmen taking their families on carriage rides to the bluff adjacent to the battle at Bull Run #1 to spectate and have a damned picnic lunch. Northerners had no idea the resolve that the South had.

The outset of the war shocked every northerner. After getting their asses repeatedly kicked; Abe got very scared. He realized that it was a real possibility Lee would come to Washington and WIN. Moreover, England [some say France too, but that is a bit more dubious] was chopping at the bit to get in on the South’s side, they wanted another crack after losing in 1776 and 1815; and they didn’t enter the fray because of the slavery issue. Some in the Confederate government wanted to “free the slaves” [and of course Jim Crow the crap out of ‘em] so England would join the war. Lincoln was terrified for very good reason.

WPR, the EP was issued 2 times! First time was in September ’62, with the caveat that if the South did not cease their rebellion by January 1, 1863, the EP would go into effect. But, it sounds like you do know a little of the timing. Lincoln first formally bounced the idea of issuing the EP to his cabinet in July 1862 and it was Seward that suggested it would look politically desperate to issue it when they were getting pummeled. So they waited until a battle that looked something other than another southern aswhoopin’ of the North occurred, this came at Sharpsburg.

I’m not “belittling” Lincoln’s ability to compromise; as a matter of fact I accentuated it. To Lincoln slavery was a political football to be tossed in any direction that would serve other agendas that were more important to him. You yourself have admitted the EP is a duplicitous politically motivated device. And the timing of its release, first with a warning, twice, unequivocally proves freeing slaves was damn close to the last thing on Abe’s mind. This is accentuated when one thinks of that he did feel Blacks were inferior.

Now let’s imagine that after issuing the EP in September ’62, Jeff Davis said, “okay, no mas.” Would Lincoln have said, “sorry just kidding, thanks for surrendering, I’m passionate and really serious about this slave issue, so the EP is still going into effect in January?” Of course not. And what the eff do you think would have happened if the Northern majority in 1863 passed legislation equal to the 14h Amendment and Abe signed it? Yes, you are probably right, the civil war would have resumed and that is something Abe would have fought against tooth and nail. Now how about in 1865? 1870? 1940? The ONLY reason the 14th Amendment was passed when it was was because the South was not only defeated, but destroyed.

Abe’s skill or infinity to compromise would have prevented him from ever trying to end slavery; you said it right, he’d sit back and hope it’d die out on his own. And given we have Jim Crow even today, that would not have been anytime soon.

Now, go back and decide what Douglass would have done if he was President! A war might have been fought for the actual purpose of ending slavery; he would not have treated it as a side dish political football, but the main course.

And here’s something to think about. No doubt after the war Abe’s focus would have been 100% on unification. By 1868, the south began to have a little more vitality. In 1868, if Abe was not shot would he have opposed [and probably defeated] the passage of the 14th Amendment for fear it would interfere with the unification?

Barfan, I don't think you can look at what Lincoln did politically and use it to say how felt or what issues he deemed more or less worthy. Part of politics then and now is picking and choosing which fights you have a chance of winning and also greatly driven by circumstances. If he had tried to end slavery immediately as his #1 priority once taking office, he would not have been able to get it passed. and what else would he have not been able to do if he had tried and failed with slavery. I don't know if anybody else would have been able to do more or get anything done any faster than Lincoln did. I'm sure there are plenty of theories of other paths he might have taken and some of them might even have been better, but nobody will ever know. In the end, Lincoln was president in what was probably the hardest period in American History and he got the country through it.

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