Happy 200th...

[Gate Troll]

...Abraham Lincoln. Well, somebody had to.   

[HawkeyeSPF]

And what about Charles Darwin?

Happy Birthday to them both.

[Pepin The Breve]

  Cheers to one of the great heads behind evolution theory! 

[Anonymous Prodigy]

And Charles Van Doren. I liked Quiz Show.

[Gate Troll]

Give Darwin his own thread. This one's for Abe. Oh, by the way, The Mint's going to change the reverse of the Lincoln cent for the second time.

[Jerba]

Give Darwin his own thread. This one's for Abe. Oh, by the way, The Mint's going to change the reverse of the Lincoln cent for the second time.

Seconded. Saving the union, preventing the spread of slavery westward, preserving the Constitution, and ultimately freeing the slaves and showing true charitable and humane leadership all deserve a moment of consideration. Happy Birthday to an honest politician and a good man, we need a few more of them around.

[macheteman]

lol, lincoln was one of the least humane and least constitutional presidents the USA has ever had. not only did he illegally make West Virginia into a state, he also put Maryland officials and leaders in prison without charge. i don't care who you are, putting innocent people in prison is NOT humane.

not to mention, he only brought slavery into the war so that England wouldn't side with the south.

despite all that, he DID preserve the union, even though his methods were... less than stellar.

-mm

[sickofpalantirs]

ah the good old war of northern aggression side.

[Gate Troll]

lol, lincoln was one of the least humane and least constitutional presidents the USA has ever had. not only did he illegally make West Virginia into a state, he also put Maryland officials and leaders in prison without charge. i don't care who you are, putting innocent people in prison is NOT humane.

Yeah, I'm not a huge fan of him. The man was a fool. He got some birthday greetings from me, but not much more.
He ignored the constitutional right of every state to secede, obviously forgetting that the states were the U.S.A and
instead thinking that the states were boundaries in the U.S.A. Not only that, he threatened the C.S.A at Fort Sumter
with warships, forcing them to attack. If they hadn't, every #$&*@! union fort in dixie would have refused to surrender.
Funny thing, the winners write the text books so relatively few of the south and even fewer outside it ever hear the
other side of the story. And after what Lincoln did to Maryland we so should have seceded.
Hence my avatar, the Crossland banner.

not to mention, he only brought slavery into the war so that England wouldn't side with the south.

Too true... 

despite all that, he DID preserve the union, even though his methods were... less than stellar.

His methods were a war of aggression. 

-mm

Yeah, I'm a Johnny Reb. 

[Jerba]

Wow. I don't even think I know how to respond to that.

I don't know enough about the detentions to warrant a response, pardon my ignorance. I do know that treason is the usual charge, it seems he could have been preempting the secession of Maryland. That seems like it would have saved lots of lives to me.

The 'warships' sent to Sumter were going to restock the fort which was out of supplies. You are right in one manner, they were sent to pressure a settlement of some sort. Not to start the war, but to force the south to make a decision-- they just made the wrong decision.

As far as 'states rights' are concerned -- I used to be totally on your side (I'm pretty conservative myself). The problem with the argument is that 'states' do not have rights. People, citizens, have rights States have powers -- per the 10th Amendment which grants all powers not given to the federal government to the states (which all those states ratified to enter the union). Nullification and secession completely undermine the federal order of the constitution. While the feds should be limited, as it is in the constitution, the south was out of line by seceding with the election of Lincoln in 1860.

Lincoln argued long before the war that slavery should not be expanded into the west. And whatever our contemporary beliefs on Lincoln, I think we all have to agree that slavery had to be eradicated. The south's economic system was corrupt because of slavery and it had to be replaced. Unfortunately no political compromises were going to allow the gradual destruction of the institution as the Founding Fathers had hoped, the Compromise of 1850, Missouri, and Bleeding Kansas prove that.  Yes, the Emancipation Proclamation was a tool of war and politics when it was issued. The Union aligned slave states on the border: Kentucky, West VA, Maryland, etc. were not subject to the emancipation proclamation. It was meant to foment slave rebellion (against the CSA govt) in the south and give a sense of moral superiority to the Union cause. In the end, it served to make the practice of slavery illegal in the US -- finally.

I think the Union was worth fighting for, I'm glad I don't have to have a passport to go south. And I believe Lincoln to be a decent guy. I feel bad for him that it was he that had to deal with it, but thankful it was a man like him. We are all better off.

[Gate Troll]

     But the states did have the right to secede. You see, citizens used to be considered primarily citizens of their state, not citizens of the U.S.A. The U.S.A was simply a complicated alliance states which had the purpose of keeping from constant squabbles. When we won the War of Independence we were 13 different entities. Those entities chose to band together for the purpose of common protection and trade and the furtherance of mutual interests, in fact, many of the founding fathers referenced the newly formed U.S.A as a 'confederation'. The federal government is the states; and not the other way around. The reason a confederation is preferable to a large federal government is this: It keeps government smaller and thus reduces unnecessary bureaucracies and infringements to people's rights. The people of the north outnumbered those of the south thus allowing the northerners to push the south around. And they got sick of it, exercised their constitutional right and got aggressively attacked by Lincoln.

[sickofpalantirs]

while the question than is, were we supposed to be a confederation of states, or a country with states.

I tend to agree with an older friend of ours, southernors tend to say slavery wasn't what the war was about cause they can't argue against it, when it really was about slavery.

[Jerba]

You are correct about the Revolution and the initial country-- it was a confederation of sorts. Hence the title of our first attempt at government: The Articles of Confederation. This was far to unwieldy and left the nation poor, in debt and without adequate defense of enemies both "foreign and the domestic".

Believe me, I want a small govt. with limited bureaucracy too. It's my career in DC to work on that! That was one of the intentions of the Constitution. It set about to create a central govt stronger than the one under the articles of confederation but also attempted to preserve state and individual power through the governing doctrine of the seperation of powers through divided governance (aka federalism). Everything not specifically enumerated is reserved to the state power or individual liberty. The constitution works, but it has been severely tread upon by the progressive movement since the days of Theodore Roosevelt, Wilson, and especially FDR and Johnson.

Lincoln was not an aggressor, imo. And states don't have the right to hold slaves and shouldn't. Anywho, I kindly disagree with your premise but agree with the need for a small govt. Its always fun to debate. It shows me I need tp study the topic more too! Its been fun!

[Gate Troll]

@SoP: State's rights were the main issue, Lincoln attempted to shift focus onto slavery to make it look like the Civil War was a ‘holy' war to free the slaves. It wasn't. The way Lincoln freed the slaves to spite the South is partially responsible for the horrible anti-black racism that the blacks in the South endured. Southerners felt bitter that they had lost and their slaves had been freed by Lincoln and they took it
out on the blacks.

@jerba: I agree with you about slavery; it was wrong, and needed to be abolished. See above.
However, forcing the South into a corner at Fort Sumter and rattling their sabers in the face
of the newly-formed C.S.A was only asking for a conflict. The Union was spoiling for a fight
and I believe that Lincoln not only turned a blind eye, but tried to precipitate a war of agression towards the South. Sadly the result of the war, combined with the senseless and pointless murder of
Lincoln only made government bigger, and hurt the South a great deal.

[MR. Lurtzy]

I take it you're from the south.