Thursday, February 12, 2009

Lincoln

Thomas DiLorenzo wrote a piece on historian William Marvel's 2006 book "Mr. Lincoln Goes To War".

If you're interested in historical truth, as opposed to rhetoric, this piece is worth reading. DiLorenzo has written two books on Lincoln, Lincoln Unmasked and The Real Lincoln.

Here's a little bit of historical truth in respect to why the Civil War began, from Dilorenzo's piece:
Marvel does not hide the fact, as most other Lincoln "scholars" do, that Seward, on Lincoln’s instructions, orchestrated the passing through the U.S. Senate of a "constitutional amendment specifically prohibiting congressional interference with slavery" in the South. The Amendment, known as the Corwin Amendment, did pass the House and Senate before Lincoln’s inauguration. In his first inaugural address Lincoln explicitly pledged his support for the amendment. In that speech Lincoln also said that there need be "no bloodshed" unless a state refused to pay the tariff tax, which had just been doubled (the Morrill Tariff) two days before Lincoln’s inauguration. Since the Southern states that had seceded had no intention of paying taxes to the U.S. government any more than they intended to pay them to the British government, this was an explicit threat of war over tax collection.

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