Lincoln Re-Examined

         On the Illinois state quarter is the image of undoubtedly the most famous politician that has hailed from the state. He is one of the four presidents that faces grace the National Monument at Mt. Rushmore. He gazes upon us all at our nations’ capital by means of the prominent Lincoln Memorial. On the five-dollar bill his image is a constant reminder of his legacy as President.  On February 12^th we celebrate his birthday with a national holiday. It could be said that he is not only the Illinois’ most famous politician but in addition the most celebrated President in American history.

        Can it be confidently said that we truly know the man known as “The Great Emancipator” who died some 139 years ago come April? Or has time embellished the mythical Lincoln legacy?

The Emancipation Proclamation

Perhaps the event next to the Gettysburg Address the thing that Abe Lincoln is most famous for is the Emancipation Proclamation of which is commonly connected with freedom for slaves. But what in actuality did the Emancipation Proclamation do for the freedom of slaves?

 The Emancipation Proclamation was written on September 22, 1962 and put into effect on January 1, 1963. Its date is nearly a year and a half after the first battle at Bull Run and nearly 2 years after the first state succeeded from the North. Its text is as follows-

Whereas, on the twenty-second day of September, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-two, a proclamation was issued by the President of the United States, containing, among other things, the following, to wit:

"That on the first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, all persons held as slaves within any State or designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States, shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free; and the Executive Government of the United States, including the military and naval authority thereof, will recognize and maintain the freedom of such persons, and will do no act or acts to repress such persons, or any of them, in any efforts they may make for their actual freedom.

"That the Executive will, on the first day of January aforesaid, by proclamation, designate the States and parts of States, if any, in which the people thereof, respectively, shall then be in rebellion against the United States; and the fact that any State, or the people thereof, shall on that day be, in good faith, represented in the Congress of the United States by members chosen thereto at elections wherein a majority of the qualified voters of such State shall have participated, shall, in the absence of strong countervailing testimony, be deemed conclusive evidence that such State, and the people thereof, are not then in rebellion against the United States."

Now, therefore I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, by virtue of the power in me vested as Commander-in-Chief, of the Army and Navy of the United States in time of actual armed rebellion against the authority and government of the United States, and as a fit and necessary war measure for suppressing said rebellion, do, on this first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and in accordance with my purpose so to do publicly proclaimed for the full period of one hundred days, from the day first above mentioned, order and designate as the States and parts of States wherein the people thereof respectively, are this day in rebellion against the United States, the following, to wit:

Arkansas, Texas, Louisiana, (except the Parishes of St. Bernard, Plaquemines, Jefferson, St. John, St. Charles, St. James Ascension, Assumption, Terrebonne, Lafourche, St. Mary, St. Martin, and Orleans, including the City of New Orleans) Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia, (except the forty-eight counties designated as West Virginia, and also the counties of Berkley, Accomac, Northampton, Elizabeth City, York, Princess Ann, and Norfolk, including the cities of Norfolk and Portsmouth[)], and which excepted parts, are for the present, left precisely as if this proclamation were not issued.

And by virtue of the power, and for the purpose aforesaid, I do order and declare that all persons held as slaves within said designated States, and parts of States, are, and henceforward shall be free; and that the Executive government of the United States, including the military and naval authorities thereof, will recognize and maintain the freedom of said persons.

And I hereby enjoin upon the people so declared to be free to abstain from all violence, unless in necessary self-defence; and I recommend to them that, in all cases when allowed, they labor faithfully for reasonable wages.

And I further declare and make known, that such persons of suitable condition, will be received into the armed service of the United States to garrison forts, positions, stations, and other places, and to man vessels of all sorts in said service.

And upon this act, sincerely believed to be an act of justice, warranted by the Constitution, upon military necessity, I invoke the considerate judgment of mankind, and the gracious favor of Almighty God.

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 first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty three, and of the Independence of the United States of America the eighty-seventh.

Lincoln’s own secretary of state, William Seward, scoffed at the proclamation when he stated “We show our sympathy with slavery by emancipating slave where we cannot reach them and holding them in bondage where we can set them free.”2

In reality, Lincoln’s Proclamation would be today’s political equivalent of Osama bin Laden signing an emancipation proclamation saying that all of the “enemy combatants” held at Guantanamo Bay are now free.

We have to ask ourselves why did Lincoln go through the hoopla of making a proclamation if, in effect, it did nothing to free the slave. Frankly put, it was a war tactic, rather than a genuine attempt renounce slavery. Lincoln himself later described his reasons for the emancipation proclamation in a letter to his Treasury Secretary Salmon P. Chase, as “war measure” and that the proclamation had no legal standing.3 It is unpleasantly apparent that Abraham Lincoln’s or the Union’s purpose for the Civil War was not and never was slavery.

My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union.4 I have no purpose to introduce political and social equality between the white and black races. There is a physical difference between the two, which, in my judgment, will probably forever forbid their living together upon the footing of perfect equality; I, as well as Judge Douglas, am in favor of the race to which I belong having the superior position. I have never said anything to the contrary.5

It painfully obvious that Abraham Lincoln’s “Emancipation Proclamation” ineffectively announced that slaves were “free” in every part of the country that was not under the control of the Union, although, in every jurisdiction in which Lincoln could successfully free slaves he specifically mandated that they were not to be unbound from the chains of slavery. It is still typical for curriculum in public schools to present the Civil War as a struggle to end slavery. Unfortunately, because of this presentation we loose out on the story of abolitionist and how we came to extinguish the institution of slavery. Also, we loose out on learning about the epic struggle between states rights and the power of the federal government that so many of our countrymen lived and died for.

Dictator Democracy

Throughout our history there has been a fair amount of controversial election results, as one can surely remember the 5-4 Supreme Court ruling in 2000 that ultimately decided our current President. However, during the Lincoln administration there was an election conflict that would make the 2000 Presidential election look like a child’s squabble in comparison.

In May of 1861, Maryland held a special election to fill ten empty seats in the Maryland House of Delegates. The special election was needed after ten men were forced to vacate their seats because they were “suspected” of harboring secessionist sympathies. A few of the men fled but most were arrested (without due process) and sent to military prison without trial. Dean Sprague author of the book “Freedom Under Lincoln” asserted that it was “perhaps the only election in American history in which every man who was nominated and elected . . . went to prison or into exile shortly afterward”.

By September 1861, Maryland was under complete military occupation, and President Lincoln was to ensure that the Maryland legislature would not convene to discuss remaining neutral in the war. According to the author of the book “The Real Lincoln” Lincoln sought to prohibit the legislature from meeting by force- “General Benjamin Butler was threatening to bombard Annapolis if the legislature met there.” Lincoln’s secretary of war, Simon Cameron, instructed General Nathan P. Banks: “If necessary, all or part of the members [of the Maryland legislature] must be arrested.”  In all 21 men including state legislators, a member of Congress, the mayor of Baltimore, and newspaper editors and publishers, were arrested and imprisoned at Fort Lafayette and elsewhere. Many others fled the state to avoid persecution from the occupying federal army.

In November there was supposed to be a regularly scheduled legislative election in Maryland, but it was suppressed from occurring legally. Lincoln ordered General Banks to send his troops to polling places to “protect Union voters” and to “arrest and hold in confinement till after the election all disunionists.” As its no surprise to us when dictator Saddam Hussein gets 99.9% of the vote in “elections” it was no surprise that as a result of this “election” in Maryland the Republican Party candidate won every single position up for contest in the election.

For all citizens in the Land of Lincoln it is important to our history and our future to know the man, the myth, and the legend known as “The Great Emancipator”. The dawning revelation is that much of what we are taught about in grade school about Abraham Lincoln and the Civil War is misleading at best. Seeing that the central purpose of the Civil War was not slavery, much educational resources must be devoted to truthfully examining our countries greatest internal conflict. America would like to hear more stories about the abolitionist movement, and how the United States finally abolished the horrible institution of slavery.  Learning the truth about the major causes of the Civil War need to be reexamined from a more truthful and not a mythological prospective. From that we can better understand our history and learn how and why the Civil War changed America forever.