At the present time Val is editing and doing a spell check on a letter for me from SHAPE. I have every intention of showing Mr. Beck the error in his thinking. I also have other letters that I may post if I can get permission
If you desire to send Mr. Beck a letter here is his contact info--
Then Beck should love Obama because he's doing exactly what HE said he'd do - and what he wants to do isn't that much different from what Lincoln wanted.
Here is the letter I sent to Glen beck for SHAPE. Many thanks to Val for spell check and editing.
GP **************************************************
Mr. Beck,
On February 23rd, I watched with unabashed horror to see you talk about "honor" using as an example President Abraham Lincoln! Of course, you cannot really be blamed for your ignorance since the Lincoln myth has been so well established that the facts of the man’s life have been overwhelmed by it. But, Sir, rest assured that the concept of Lincoln and honor are as compatible as gasoline and matches.
With regard to the greatest lie referable to Lincoln – that is, that he was "the Great Emancipator", the fact is Lincoln was a man of his time and therefore what we today would call a racist. His position on slavery, the "Negro", his place in the nation and the nature of his humanity are made obvious by comments both before and during his presidency. It would take far too long to document all of Lincoln’s remarks on this subject, but in a speech given in 1858 at Charleston, Illinois, Lincoln stated the following:
"I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races; 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."
This is typical of Lincoln’s utterances on this subject. He also believed that "the African" should not remain in the United States but should be "encouraged" to immigrate to colonies established for that purpose either in Africa – where President Monroe had already established the nation of Liberia – or Haiti in the West Indies or in Central and South America. Indeed, Lincoln arranged for a firm in New York to begin making arrangements for such colonies during the war at a cost of several million dollars according to papers like the New York Herald and the Tribune.
As for the Emancipation Proclamation: that document was a piece of military strategy and had nothing whatsoever to do with ending slavery. To begin with, it freed not one slave in any state that remained in the Union or in territories under Union control. Where such slaves were actually freed, the Union government ordered that they be re-enslaved and returned to their owners. And as slaves they remained until the 13th Amendment to the Constitution. Lincoln used this bit of deceit in hopes that Confederate soldiers would fear for the safety of their families and desert to return home to protect them against the bloody slave insurrections that the federal government and Union military was sure would arise upon its publication. Needless to say, the Union was amazed to discover that the vast majority of Southern slaves preferred to remain true to "their families" and not indulge in the murder of women, children and old people.
As for the misnamed "Civil War": Lincoln is quoted as saying, "war came"; but it didn’t "come". Lincoln started it. He wanted war. He had no intention of allowing the Southern states whose money - extracted through confiscatory tariffs - was being paid into the coffers of Northern commercial interests such as railroads, shipping and mining as well as filling the coffers of the central government while the South received little in return. As well, with the inclusion of new states and territories in the Mid-West and West, the South saw itself becoming a permanent minority, a cash cow held in perpetual serfdom by Northern political and commercial interests. Having determined that there was no future for their people in the old Union, Southern statesmen determined to secede – as was their constitutional right – and establish a new Union more in keeping with their well being. As a Congressman, Abraham Lincoln had no problem with the concept of secession. In 1847 on the floor of the United States House, Lincoln stated:
"Any people, anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up and shake off the existing government, and form a new one that suits them better. This is a most valuable, a most sacred right, a right which we hope and believe is to liberate the world."
In early December of 1860, President-elect Abraham Lincoln had instructed General Winfield Scott, head of all Federal forces, to prepare a plan to hold or retake the forts after Lincoln's inauguration on March 4th, 1861 despite the agreement � signed by President Buchanan. In early February, a very � aggressive attack plan was presented by Scott to again reinforce Fort Sumter but � Buchanan would not agree and his Cabinet declared that such a plan would constitute an act of war and would be interpreted as such by the � South. On February 25th, President Jefferson Davis of the Confederacy � sent a three-man Peace Commission to Washington to discuss many issues � including the transition of Fort Sumter from Union to Confederate hands. Abraham Lincoln was inaugurated on March 4th, 1861 as President of the United States and refused to talk with the members of the Peace Commission who were � still trying to make headway in Washington. Lincoln also announced that � tariffs would continue to be collected at Fort Sumter for the coffers of the � Union regardless of the secession of South Carolina from the Union. Indeed, Lincoln even joked that any state could leave the Union so long as it continued to send tariff revenues to Washington. However, Lincoln also made it clear that, unlike previous presidents, he regarded secession to be � constitutionally illegal and that he was willing to use military force to prevent or overcome any state that attempted to employ it. Thus, military coercion ˆ the waging of war by the central government against the people and states of the South which had been rejected by the People, the Nation and the Federal Government prior to Lincoln’s inauguration became the stated � intention of that same United States Government under its 16th President.
On March 9th, Lincoln proposed that Fort Sumter be reinforced though his Cabinet overwhelmingly opposed this action because it was believed that to do so would lead to war. Lincoln continued to attempt to � persuade his Cabinet to approve reinforcing Sumter but failed again at a Cabinet meeting on March 15th . Finally, on March 29th he was able to convince � the Cabinet to approve his plan although the members knew it would lead to � war. On April 6th Lincoln gave the order to reinforce Fort Sumter and, for all intents and purposes, the War of Secession ("Civil War") began.
Under Lincoln, the bloodiest war in American history was waged killing not only more soldiers than have ever died in any other war but contained some of the most horrid abuses of men women and children – white and black – as had ever been practiced since the days of the Mongol hordes. Men like William Sherman, Philip Sheridan and Benjamin "Beast" Butler had their atrocities masked by the handsome blue uniforms of the Union army, but their deeds are every bit as foul as any committed by the Waffen SS. And if you believe that Andersonville was a concentration camp, you should learn of such vile dens as Camp Douglas, Camp Merton, Point Lookout and Elmira (Hellmira) in New York where thousands upon thousands of helpless prisoners were tortured and murdered by the "noble Union" or read about the trials and tribulation of the Immortal 600. All of this was done with the knowledge and approval of the Union government – including Abraham Lincoln. Should you choose do a little research about these matters – all of which are covered in Union records – you might feel differently about honoring the man who brought them about.
As for the North, Lincoln unilaterally suspended habeas corpus in 1862, an action limited to Congress and jailed newspaper owners, editors and reporters who disagreed with him and his war. He often sent mobs to destroy their offices and equipment. Read the book, "Lincoln’s Wrath" and learn about the destruction of civil liberty in the North! He also used sympathetic news outlets to push government propaganda. You rail against today’s media – and rightly so – but Lincoln did the same thing. He also arrested political figures who either disagreed or even might disagree with him (the Mayor of Baltimore being one), used the military to prevent states that had not seceded from doing so (Maryland) and used them again to assure his election to a second term in New York and Ohio. Do you consider this "honorable"?
Lincoln is the father of big government and even his most profound acolytes triumphantly acknowledge his presidency as being "the second American revolution". His illegal war destroyed our constitutional republic and the principles set forth by our Founding Fathers whom you constantly put forth as men to be revered and followed. The Founding Fathers would have condemned Abraham Lincoln absolutely.
Lincoln also gave us the income tax, took inflation in the North to near 80% with his printing of money and taxed nearly everything you can think of. (Does any of this remind you of the current occupant of the White House?) Economically, Lincoln’s policies were a nightmare (http://www.tax.org/Museum/1861-1865.htm) His policies allowed buyers to purchase bonds with greenbacks while the interest accrued to them was paid in gold (funded, in part, by specie payments of customs duties). Investors enjoyed a bountiful windfall, since government securities purchased with depreciated currency were redeemed with gold valued at the prewar level. Taxpayers essentially made up the difference. Because most bonds were acquired by the wealthy or by financial institutions, the program concentrated investment capital in the hands of those likely to use it, much as Alexander Hamilton’s debt plan had sought to do
The Union government’s decision to implement a broad system of internal taxation not only insured a valuable source of income, but shielded the northern economy from the sort of ruinous inflation experienced by the South. Despite another $150 million greenback issue, the overall northern inflation rate reached only 80 percent, comparable with the domestic rates during World Wars I and II. The Internal Revenue Act of 1862, enacted by Congress in July, 1862, soaked up much of the inflationary pressure produced by Greenbacks. It did so because the Act placed excise taxes on just about everything, including sin and luxury items like liquor, tobacco, playing cards, carriages, yachts, billiard tables, and jewelry. It taxed patent medicines and newspaper advertisements. It imposed license taxes on practically every profession or service except the clergy. It instituted stamp taxes, value added taxes on manufactured goods and processed meats, inheritance taxes, taxes on the gross receipts of corporations, banks, and insurance companies, as well as taxes on dividends or interest they paid to investors. To administer these excise taxes, along with the tariff system, the Internal Revenue Act also created a Bureau of Internal Revenue, whose first commissioner, George Boutwell, described it as "the largest Government department ever organized."
The majority of internal taxes and tariffs duties were regressive, consumption-oriented measures that affected lower income Americans more severely than those with higher incomes. In response, Republicans looked to reinforce the system’s fairness by implementing a supplementary system of taxation that more accurately reflected taxpayers’ "ability to pay." The income tax addressed this need.
The first federal income tax in American history actually preceded the Internal Revenue Act of 1862. Passed in August 1861, it had helped assure the financial community that the government would have a reliable source of income to pay the interest on war bonds. Initially, Salmon Chase and Thaddeus Stevens, Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, wanted to implement an emergency property tax similar to the one adopted during the War of 1812. This way, the government could adapt the administrative system that state and local governments had developed for their own property taxes. But legislators understood such a property tax as a direct tax. Article 1, Section 9 of the Constitution required the federal government to apportion the burden among states on the basis of population rather than property values. Emphasizing population over property value would actually render the tax quite regressive. Residents of lower-density western states, border states, and poor northeastern states stood to bear a greater burden than those of highly-populated urban states, despite the latter’s valued real estate. Their representatives also complained that a property tax would not touch substantial "intangible" property like stocks, bonds, mortgages, or cash.
As an alternative, policy makers sought to follow the example of British Liberals, who had turned to income taxation in order to finance the Crimean War without heavy property taxation. Justin Morrill, (R-VT), Chairman of the Ways and Means Subcommittee on Taxation and the architect of the regressive tariff structure, introduced a proposal for the first federal income tax. Because it did not tax property directly, congressional leaders viewed the income tax as indirect, and thus immune from constitutional strictures.
The first income tax was moderately progressive and not graduated, imposing a 3% tax on annual incomes over $800 that exempted most wage earners. These taxes were not even collected until 1862, making alternative financing schemes like the Legal Tender Act critical in the interim. The Internal Revenue Act of 1862 expanded the progressive nature of the earlier act while adding graduations: It exempted the first $600, imposed a 3% rate on incomes between $600 and $10,000, and a 5% rate on those over $10,000. The act exempted businesses worth less than $600 from value added and receipts taxes. Taxes were withheld from the salaries of government employees as well as from dividends paid to corporations (the same method of collection later employed during World War II). In addition, the "sin" excise taxes imposed in the 1862 act were designed to fall most heavily on products purchased by the affluent. Thaddeus Stevens lauded the progressivism of the tax system:
"While the rich and the thrifty will be obliged to contribute largely from the abundance of their means . . . no burdens have been imposed on the industrious laborer and mechanic . . . The food of the poor is untaxed; and no one will be affected by the provisions of this bill whose living depends solely on his manual labor."
But the war grew increasingly costly (topping $2 million per day in its latter stages) and difficult to finance. The government’s ability to borrow fluctuated with battlefield fortunes. The Confederate navy harassed northern shipping, reducing customs receipts. And inevitable administrative problems reduced the expected receipts from income and excise tax collection.
In response, Congress approved two new laws in 1864 that increased tax rates and expanded the progressivism of income taxation. The first bill passed in June upped inheritance, excise, license, and gross receipts business taxes, along with stamp duties and ad valorem manufacturing taxes. The same act proceeded to assess incomes between $600 and $5,000 at 5%, those between $5,000 and $10,000 at 7.5%, and established a maximum rate of 10%. Despite protest by certain legislators regarding the unfairness of graduated rates, the 1864 act affirmed this method of taxing income according to "ability to pay." An emergency income tax bill passed in July imposed an additional tax of 5% on all incomes in excess of $600, on top of the rates set by previous income tax bills. Congress had discovered that the income tax, in addition to its rhetorical value, also provided a flexible and lucrative source of revenue. Receipts increased from over $20 million in 1864 (when collections were made under the 1862 income tax) to almost $61 million in 1865 (when collections were made under the 1864 act and emergency supplement).
The affluent upper middle classes of the nation’s commercial and industrial centers complied widely with the income tax. 10% of all Union households had paid some form of income tax by war’s end; residents of the northeast comprised 15% of that total. In fact, the northeast, a sector of American society that owned 70% of the nation’s wealth in 1860, provided the most critical tax base, remitting 75% of the revenues. In total, the North raised 21% of its war revenue through taxation, as opposed to the South, which raised just 5% this way.
Federal taxes were also instrumental in instituting a system of national banking during the war. The National Banking Acts of 1863 and 1864 imposed a system of "free banking" — banks established by general incorporation as opposed to specific charters — on a national level. State banks were granted national charters and allowed to issue national bank notes (these notes were separate from Greenbacks). One third of a national bank’s capital had to consist of federal bonds, since the new national notes were to be backed by federal bonds. The National Banking Acts thus served as another means to induce bankers to purchase bonds. In an attempt to avoid increased regulation, however, many state banks declined to seek national charters. To remedy this problem, the 1864 act imposed a 10% tax on state bank notes to drive them out of existence. As a result of this tax, the number of national banks tripled by the war’s end, while their purchase of U.S. bonds nearly quadrupled.
Barack Obama claims Lincoln is his idol and perhaps you believe that he is embracing what his policies and ethics have no right to claim. But in fact, Obama is right! Lincoln is in fact exactly what Obama now is – and that is something against which you have railed so long and hard. Therefore, it makes no sense that you raise as your hero a man who was and did exactly what Barack Obama wishes to be and do. If you are honest in your claim that you wish to return to the Founders, then you cannot do that and embrace Abraham Lincoln. If you want to discuss men of honor, there are no better examples than the likes of George Washington and Thomas Jefferson or if you wish to cite men of Lincoln’s era then I suggest Robert E. Lee or Jefferson Davis.
Respectfully,
George Purvis
VP Southern Heritage Advancement Preservation and Education
Here is another very good letter I received by email. GP ***************************************************
Honest Abe Wasn't Honest By Pastor John Weaver
John Chapter 18 beginning with verse 37: "Pilate therefore said unto him, art thou a King then? Jesus answered, thou sayest that I am a King. To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth. Everyone that is of the truth heareth my voice. Pilate sayeth unto him, what is truth? And when he had said this, he went out again unto the Jews, and sayeth unto them, I find in him no fault at all." Now I want you to see how totally and absolutely blind Pilate was to the truth. Truth was standing right in front of him and he did not see him. He was unable to discern the truth. You see the Bible says in 11 Timothy Chapter 3:16 "All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto every good works." So the Bible then is the written word of God. It is the written truth. Jesus Christ said in John 14:6 "I am the way, the truth and the life and no man cometh unto the Father but by me." So Jesus Christ then is the living truth. Now you put these two together, the written truth and the living truth, and Jesus Christ said in John 12:48 "Verily, Verily I said unto you, he that rejecteth me, (that is the living truth,) and receiveth not my words, (that is the written truth), hath one that judgeth him in the last day even the word which I have spoken." Now, the truth is, many people ask for truth, but they really do not want it. Now the reason I am giving you this introduction is because I am going to bring a message today which I have entitled "Honest Abe wasn't so Honest."
You may ask for the truth and not really want the truth. And the evidence is that people ask for the truth and really don't want it, is they refuse to listen to it, and to hear it and to receive it once it is given. Do you remember what Jesus Christ said in John 8:32? He said "You shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free." But that is only true if you receive the truth and apply the truth. You may hear truth all of your life, but if you do not receive it and apply it, it does you absolutely no good. Now if you have listened carefully to the last three lessons, you will already know that old honest Abe was not so honest. In fact, he was a deceitful and dastardly wicked man. He was a liar. He was a warmonger, and the blood of thousands of men is upon his head. Now, I want you to understand that truth makes us very uncomfortable. And the reason it makes us uncomfortable is because it means that we have to readjust our thinking and our attitude. I never have forgotten when I first learned, when you really start studying the Bible it messes up a lot of good sermons. It really does. I mean you know, you can preach and say a lot of good things you think until you really start studying and realize that what you had been saying wasn't true at all. And once you begin to delve into what truth really is, all of the propaganda that we have heard all these years and all of the ideas that we have absorbed, all of a sudden we realize, hey, everything we have been taught from a child is just about a lie. And we have to readjust our thinking and refocus our thinking and we are forced to recognize that our hope is not in man, but in Jesus Christ. You see once you begin to study, you find out some of our heroes were not so great and they really weren't heroes at all.
I want you to turn in your Bibles very quickly to Psalm 118. 1 think this verse is very appropriate for two reasons. Number one, this is the middle verse in the Bible. Number two, the contents of this verse. Look at Psalm I 18. And let's read verse 8 and then we shall read verse 9 since it is a parallel verse. Psalm 118:8, God says "It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in man." Isn't that interesting? Middle verse, "It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in man." And the next verse, "It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in Princes." So what He is telling us is that men will always fail us. Men will always let us down. Only Christ is our hope and only Christ is our success. Now you and I must want truth, not just for ourselves, but for others as well. Let me give you two quotes to begin with. The first one is by Robert E. Lee and this is what he said concerning the truth about the war. He said, "Everyone should do all in his power to collect and disseminate the truth in the hope that it may find a place in history and descend to posterity. History is not the relation of campaigns and battles, and Generals or other individuals, but that which shows the principles for which the South contended and which justified her struggle for those principles." Then the second quote is from Benjamin H. Hill. We live in Benhill County. AndBenhill County was named after Benjamin H. Hill. And Ben Hill said this, "We owe it to our dead, to our living, and to our children to preserve the truth and repel the falsehoods so that we may secure just judgment from the only tribunal before which we may appear and be fully and fairly heard and that tribunal is the Bar of History." Now, the truth is the South and Christian Principles have been horribly maligned by the North. In fact, I could tell you today that it has not just been horribly maligned, it has been perverted as well. For instance, our conquerors teach that the Constitution stood for a national government and not a compact between the sovereign states. Our conquerors teach that the advocates of secession were traitors to the United States government and deserved to be hanged after the war was over. They teach that what we were engaged in was a Civil War because we were not a Republic of States, but a Nation. And by the way, the war was not a Civil War, it was not between people of the same Nation, it was between people of two different Nations, because the Confederate States of America had already been dually and lawfully organized. So it was not a Civil War at all. Our conquerors teach that the South fought to hold their slaves. That was not why the South fought. And they also taught that the slaveholders were cruel and barbarous, which we have already seen to be a lie. They also teach that it was Abraham Lincoln who cut the shackles of slavery, which is certainly not true. They also teach that the Emancipation Proclamation set the slaves free. That is not true as well. They teach that the Confederate government was formed to destroy the Union and it was only Lincoln's wise policies that saved that Union and that is certainly not true. They teach that the assassination of Abraham Lincoln was one of the greatest blows that ever befell the South and they teach that Abraham Lincoln was a friend of the negro and a friend of the South, which is a lie as well. So everything about our History has been perverted and maligned by the North. Lincoln was not interested in preserving the Constitution anymore than he was interested in preserving the South.
There is a woman by the name of Mildred Rutherford who wrote a book a number of years ago and the book has recently been reprinted and the name of it is "A True Estimate of Abraham Lincoln." And in her book she documents ten distinct constitutional violations by Abraham Lincoln. I want to give them to you and then I want to give you some quotes from the friends, from the Cabinet and from the Party of Abraham Lincoln, to show you that people who were alive back then knew exactly that Abraham Lincoln was violating the Constitution on every hand. Here are the ten that Mildred Rutherford lists:
1. First of all coercion in 1861, which was a violation of Article 4. And of course that's where Lincoln tried to coerce the South into fighting and of course into surrendering to him basically.
2. Lincoln violated the Constitution when he violated the Laws of Neutrality, which was the Trent Affair, Article 6, Clause 2, which was a violation of international law. Now if you don't know what the Trent Affair was, it is very interesting because the Confederate Government had sent some representatives to England to present our cause there before the English Parliament and our Confederate men were on an English ship named the Trent. And the United States government came and took the Confederate men off a British ship and imprisoned them. You say, well, what's so bad about that, because of the laws of Neutrality, and remember the War of 1812 was fought over the same issue because the English was doing that to our citizens. And what happened, the North was humiliated in this. Those men had to be released and William Seward had to write an apology to the English government because the English government would not even negotiate. They said you will either release those men or there is going to be war between you and England as well as the South and England. So, Lincoln when he violated the Constitution in this area, by the way, do you know what he did for the Captain who arrested those men and took them off of the English Ship? He gave him a gold medal. Didn't matter to him that he violated the Constitution.
3. He suspended the Writ of Habeas Corpus, Article 1, Section 9, Clause 2.
4. He declared war without the consent of Congress in 1861, which is a violation of Article 1, Section 8, Clause 11 and 12. 5. He made West Virginia a State in violation of Article 4, Section 3, Clause 1. He just separated Virginia and made West Virginia a State all by himself.
6. He denied the freedom of speech in the Valandeham Imprisonment, which was a violation of the first Amendment.
7. He blockaded Ports of the States that were held by the Federal government to still be in the Union. You don't block your own Ports.
8. The Liberty of the Press was taken away - that is a violation of the First Amendment.
9. Violation of the Fugitive slave law, which was violation of Article 4, Section 2, Clause 3.
Now, may I remind you last week that Lincoln confessed to six of these Constitutional violations in his joint resolution to Congress, trying to get Congress to validate everything that he had done illegally and unlawfully. So he himself acknowledged six of them. Now the amazing truth is this: there were many people who were friends of Lincoln in his Cabinet and in Congress who recognized that what Lincoln was doing was unconstitutional and wrong. For instance, Godwin in The Nation says this, "The first real breech in the Constitution was President Lincoln using his war power to abolish slavery." He said Lincoln had no authority to do that. Thaddeus Stevens who was of Lincoln's own party and was a radical Republican and here is what he said, "I will not stultify myself by supposing that Mr. Lincoln has any warrant in the Constitution for dismembering Virginia." Thaddeus Stevens says Lincoln had no Constitutional Warrant to divide Virginia, yet he did. McClure, who was a friend of Lincoln's said "Mr. Lincoln swore to obey the Constitution, but in 18 months violated it by his Emancipation Proclamation." They knew. Mr. Rhodes said "There was no authority for the Proclamation by the Constitutional Laws, nor was there any statute that warranted it". So they realized Lincoln had absolutely no grounds for doing what he did. Wendell Phillips, of the Cooper Institute, said in 1864 "I judge Mr. Lincoln by his acts, his violations of the Law, his overthrow of Liberty in the Northern States. I judge Mr. Lincoln by his words, his deeds, and so judging him, I am unwilling to trust Abraham Lincoln with the future of this country." So here was a leading man of the Cooper Institute saying Lincoln cannot be trusted. Percy Gregg said, "Listen, Lincoln never hesitated to violate the Constitution when he so desired. The Chief Justice testified to this. Lincoln suspended with Writ of Habeas Corpus in 1861. He allowed West Virginia to be formed from Virginia, contrary to the Constitution. He issued his Emancipation Proclamation without consulting his Cabinet and in violation of the Constitution." Isn't it amazing how everyone of these men are acknowledging, not necessarily all at once, but at least several of his unconstitutional acts. Charles Sumner, who was another radical republican and a member of his own party said this: "When Lincoln reinforced Fort Sumter and called for 75,000 men without the consent of Congress, it was the greatest breach ever made in the Constitution and would hereafter give the President the Liberty to declare war whenever he wished without the consent of Congress." Now that was Charles Sumner. Charles Frances Adams was a historian of Massachusetts. Listen to what he said. "How can we justify the acts of Mr. Lincoln's administration? An unconstitutional policy called for unconstitutional coercion. An unconstitutional coercion called for anunconstitutional war. An unconstitutional war called for an unconstitutional despotism. Authority uncontrolled and unlimited by men, by constitution, by the Supreme Court or by Law was Lincoln's war policy." Let me paraphrase that. Lincoln did whatever he wanted to do. He was not constrained by the Constitution. He was not constrained by Law. He was not constrained by the Supreme Court. So when the Supreme Court ruled against him, he just kept going and did whatever he was going to do anyhow - totally irresponsible. Now, may I remind you that these men were not Lincoln's enemies. They were his friends. They were in his Cabinet. They were in his party. So Lincoln did not hesitate to violate the Constitution whenever he chose to do so, nor would he abide by the decisions of the Supreme Court. Let me put it to you like this: Lincoln was a tyrant in the strictest sense of the term. Why?Because Lincoln used lawful power unlawfully.
Everyone in here has heard of J.P. Morgan, the great financier. Listen to what J.P. Morgan said, "I supported President Lincoln. I believed his war policy would be the only way to save the country, but I see my mistake. I visited Washington a few weeks ago and I saw the corruption of the present Administration and so long as Abraham Lincoln and his Cabinet are in power, so long will the war continue, and for what? For the preservation of the Constitution of the Union? No! But for the sake of politicians and governmental contractors." That was J. P. Morgan. He said, I understand what is going on. There is no fight to preserve the Union. There is no fight to preserve the Constitution. There is only a fight to reward the benefactors of Abraham Lincoln. That's it! Horace Greeley said this: "I cannot trust honest old Abe. He's too smart for me." The word is really not smart. The word is cunning, deceitful. Layman said, who was one of Lincoln's partners, "Mr. Lincoln did not possess a single quality for his office as president. People said he was good and honest and well meaning, but he never pretended that he was great. He was only nominated by means of a corrupt bargain, entered into by Simon Cameron of Pennsylvania and Caleb Smith of Indiana, provided Lincoln would pledge them Cabinet positions. These pledges Lincoln fulfilled, and thus made himself a party to corrupt bargains." That was his own law partner that said that.
Now, I want to read something to you just for a moment that is rather lengthy but I want you to listen. I want to tell you why. You have never heard, probably, of a Judge by the name of Judge Henry Clay Dean. I have a book at home that has just been reprinted and the book is by Judge Henry Clay Dean and the title of the book is Crimes Of The Civil War. But it is not crimes of the South, it is crimes of the North and crimes of Abraham Lincoln. You know, I told you in time past, that Lincoln arrested 38,000 Northerners and had them imprisoned without a trial. Never pressed a charge against them. Well, Judge Henry Clay Dean was one of those that Lincoln arrested and put in prison without a trial. I want you to listen to first of all, his indictment of Lincoln and his government and then secondly, he is going to tell you why he was arrested. Now this is very informative. Remember this comes from a Judge who was alive, who suffered under Abraham Lincoln, who knew firsthand what was going on. Here is what Judge Henry Clay Dean writes:
"Our government is in nothing uniform except its' contempt of law and powerful only for the oppression of the people. Every officer seems to contemplate his office as an engine of destruction in which he is engaged to work the ruin of the particular department of government entrusted to his care. The Postmaster General has for the last five years been violating the mails. The Secretary of the Treasury has been squandering the public wealth. The Secretary of the Navy has been enfeebling our naval power. The Secretary of War all crimsoned with innocent blood is employing the army for the destruction of the Country. The Secretary of State has been subverting Constitutional law and disgracing our form of government at home and abroad. The Secretary of the Interior has been conniving with public jobbers to defraud the government of its' most valuable lands. The Attorney General is gravely burlesquing nonsense itself by defining Constitutional construction of unconstitutional laws and is in conspiracy with military commissions to murder innocent women. The President is administering the government through military satraps in a manner unknown to Republican systems and disgraceful to despotism's, which regard the character of those entrusted to power. We now witness among our kindred the debasement of a civilized people who are forced to submit to the insult and domination of barbarian negroes and foreign vagabonds. The courts of the Country are infamously corrupt. The state Legislatures and Congress are flagrantly accessible to bribes, which has become the only tangible basis of' special, and an essential necessity in general legislation. The people of the late Confederate States after encountering the terrible vicissitudes of war were overtaken by famine, which inflicted frightful forms of starvation and are now overrun and robbed by predatory invasions and endangered by the insurrection of domestic savages incited by foreign incendiaries."
Now this is just an overall view of the government in Lincoln's day by a Judge and here is why the Judge said that he was arrested. He says "I have a personal reason for the publication of this book. I suffered under the reign of Mr. Lincoln, (by the way I like that word, I suffered under the reign of Mr. Lincoln), which was a vibration between Anarchy and Despotism. Why was I arrested? I cannot tell! I have never seen anything like charges, and suppose there were none in such forms as would be recognized at any court of justice under the sun. And yet I am quite sure there was a cause for it which is this: I am a Democrat, a devoted friend of the Constitution of the United States, a sincere lover of the government and the Union of the States, am anxious for a reunion, and believe that the right and duty of a free man in a calm candid manner to discuss in a temperate spirit the best modes of effecting this purpose. I have dared to participate in these discussions freely, which I have done from convictions of duty. This was the cause of my arrest! This is my only offense clearly and elaborately stated. But all this availed me nothing so long as I was a Democrat. A faithful supporter of the Constitution, an ardent lover of the Union and believed and thought then that the integrity of the one was the only conservative power of the other."
So why was the Judge arrested? Well, Lincoln knew the influence and the power that Judge Henry Clay Dean had and he tried to bribe Judge Henry Clay Dean and get him on his side and the Judge refused. And of course he continued to speak out against Lincoln and the next thing he knew, he was arrested and thrown in prison and did not get out until after the war was over and Lincoln was dead. The only reason he was arrested was he disagreed with Lincoln.
Now, in Mildred Rutherford's book, A True Estimate Of Abraham Lincoln, she gives a number of newspaper quotes and articles written in Lincoln's day before his inauguration and after his inauguration and I want to read some of these to you. Some of them are so sorrowful, they ought to make you weep. Others are downright humorous, but yet they show the situation that we were in at that period in our history. The New York Herald, on May 22, 1860, said this concerning Lincoln: "The candidate for President, Abraham Lincoln, is an uneducated man, a vulgar village politician, without any experience worthmentioning in the practical duties of statesmanship and only noted for some very unpopular votes, which he gave while a member of Congress." An uneducated, vulgar village politician! The New York Express in February of 1861, said this: "The tone of levity and frivolity which characterizes the speeches of Mr. Lincoln causes the hearts of our citizens to sink within them. They perceive already that he is not the man for the crisis and begin to despond of any extrication from the impending difficulties." What are they saying? Everybody realized that he is not going to get us out, he is going to get us in deeper. The Philadelphia Argus said, "The humiliating spectacle is thus presented by the President-elect indulging in the merest clap trap of a politician, thanking the people for voting for him, flattering their political pride and appealing to their sectional animosities." So he is trying to set one section against the other. Now I like this one: This was in The New York Tribune, June 4, 1863. They were quoting Alfred R. Wooten, who was the Attorney General of Delaware, now not a Southern State by any stretch of the imagination, and here is what the Attorney General said concerning Lincoln and his administration: "The administration is an insult to the flag and a traitor to their God. Russia never dared exercise the privileges, which Mr. Lincoln did, without reading a newspaper to see what the people thought. A hound might find Mr. Lincoln, but never will find him by an honest scent." That was the Attorney General of Delaware. A dog might find Lincoln but not by an honest scent. He didn't think too much of Mr. Lincoln. Wendell Phillips of the Cooper Institute, once again on August 22, 1862, said this: "The Union belongs to me as much as to Abraham Lincoln. What right has he or any official, our servants to claim that I shall cease criticizing his mistakes when they are dragging the Union to ruin? I find grave faults with Abraham Lincoln!" The New York World on April 13, 1864, "Mr. Lincoln is wholly unqualified for his position. The personal presence, the dignity nor the knowledge demanded in the magistrate of a great people. No branch of the Administration has been well and efficiently administered under him. His soul seems to be made of leather and incapable of any grand or noble emotion. You leave his presence with your enthusiasm dampened, your better feelings crushed, and your hopes cast to the wind. Even wisdom from him seems but folly." The New York World, June 2, 1864, says this: "That there is in the Republican Party a widely diffused impression of the feebleness, faithlessness and incapacity of Mr. Lincoln's Administration is notorious." What are they saying? Everybody in the Republican Party knew that Lincoln was wrong! The New York Herald, June 2, 1864 said "Anything for a change in this imbecile and torpid administration! Let us have a shaking up of its dry bones anything for a change!" I hope you know what an imbecile is? The New York World, June 4, 1864 said "The age of rail splitters and tailors of buffoons, bores and fanatics has succeeded." Translated, Lincoln is a bore, a buffoon, and a fanatic, he continues, "Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Johnson are both men of mediocre talent, neglected education, narrow views, deficient information and of course vulgar manners. A statesman is supposed to be a man of some depth of thought and extent of knowledge. Has this country with so proud a record been reduced to such intellectual poverty as to be forced to present two such names as Abraham Lincoln and Andrew Johnson for the highest stations in this most trying crisis of its history. It is a cruel mockery and bitter humiliation. Such nominations at this juncture are an insult to the common sense of the people. Has this country with so proud a record been reduced to such intellectual poverty as to be forced to present two such names as Abraham Lincoln and Andrew Johnson for the highest stations in this most trying crisis of its history?" And that came from New York. In other words, they realized these guys are buffoons. Now, this may surprise you when I say this, but I had to be selective of my quotes that I just used, not because I was trying to pick out the worst ones, but because there were a multiplicity of such quotes. I could have sat here for another hour reading to you things that Northerners said about Abraham Lincoln. When Abraham Lincoln was alive he was mocked and ridiculed and hated and despised. Even his infamous Gettysburg Address was viewed and pronounced as a failure by himself, by Secretary of State William Seward, by Edward Everett, who also spoke on that occasion and by W.H. Cunningham, who was a reporter for the Montgomery Missouri Star, who was there when he gave the address. But after his death, everything changed.
Let me tell you something. And I want you to keep this in mind, that Abraham Lincoln was not a Christian. Abraham Lincoln mocked and ridiculed the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Even his dearest intimates said that the only reason Abraham Lincoln went to church was to mock the preacher. After the preaching was over he would imitate him in a nasal, vulgar manner just to get laughs. Abraham Lincoln wrote a dissertation denying the deity of Jesus Christ and denying the inspiration of the scriptures. The dissertation was finally torn up by his partner with this statement: "You will never get elected if this gets out." Abraham Lincoln held séances in the White House. His law partner, his friends, and even his wife testified that Abraham Lincoln was not a Christian. Nicholah, his private secretary said this, "Mr. Lincoln did, not to my knowledge, in any way change his religious views, opinions or beliefs from the time he left Springfield to the day of his death". What did he say, he never was converted. He always hated Christ and hated Christianity. I like what General Don Piate says and this really puts the icing on the cake, if this is not a picture of politicians, I don't know what is. General Don Piate traveled with Lincoln whenever Lincoln was making his campaign speeches and here is what Piate said, "When a leader dies all good men go to lying about him. From the moment that covers his remains, to the last echo of the rule press, in speeches, in sermons, eulogies, reminiscences, we here nothing but pious lies. Abraham Lincoln has almost disappeared from human knowledge. I hear of him, I read of him in eulogies and biographies, but I fail to recognize the man that I knew and liked." So what is Piate saying? Everybody's writing lies; they are not writing the truth about Abraham Lincoln. William Stanton, who was Secretary of War, in a letter to President Buchanan, (you remember Buchanan preceded Lincoln,) expressed his contempt for Lincoln. None of his Cabinet really liked him. They thought he was an absolute fool. Do you know what William Stanton did after Lincoln was elected President? William Stanton, the Secretary of War, advised the revolutionary overthrow of the Lincoln Administration and that General George McClellan be installed as a military dictator. But after Lincoln was dead, William Stanton, who hated and despised Lincoln so, made this infamous quote, "Now he belongs to the ages." John Haag, who was Secretary of State, eulogized Lincoln, after his death and he called him "the greatest, the wisest, the Godliest man that has appeared on earth since Christ." Now remember what Piate said, when a leader dies, all men go to lying about him. Listen to what J.G. Holland wrote after Lincoln died "Lincoln unequalled since Washington in service to the Nation, Mr. Lincoln will always be remembered as an imminently Christian President. Conscience not popular applause nor love of power was the ruling motive of Lincoln's life. No stimulant ever entered his mouth." (I don't know if he drank or not, but he was partner in the ownership of a saloon, I can tell you that.) "No stimulant ever entered his mouth. No profanity ever came from his lips." (And yet he was known for his vulgar, filthy stories.) "Abraham Lincoln was the first of all men who have walked the earth since the Nazarene."
The people had to do something to deify him in the sense that evidently they were going to try to gloss over everything that the North did wrong to the South and that he did wrong. Listen to what Henry Waterson wrote. This was upon the dedication of Lincoln's home. Get your airbags out. The dedication of Lincoln's home: "Your lowly cabin which is to be dedicated on the morrow may well be likened to the manger Bethlehem. The boy that went thence to a godlike destiny, to the Son of God the Father Almighty of him and us all. Thence his prompting except from God. His tragic death may be likened also to that other martyr whom Lincoln so closely resembled. There are utterances of his, which read like rescripts from the Sermon on the Mount. Reviled as Him of Galilee, slain even as Him of Galilee, yet as gentle and unoffending a man who died for me." You talk about likening Lincoln to Jesus Christ. That is blasphemous. Even if Lincoln had been a godly man, it is still blasphemous because Jesus Christ is unequalled. He is the monogonast. His only begotten son; monogonast is the Greek term, which means one of a kind. He is unique. There is none that can compare to Jesus Christ. J.M. Merrill and The Detroit Free Press said "Abraham Lincoln is so far above every other man in human history, that to compare him to others seems sacrilege. Nowhere on earth is there a historic character to compare our sainted martyr, Abraham Lincoln."
Albert Bushnel Heart wrote, "Abraham Lincoln was the greatest man of the Civil War period." If you would just change man to criminal, I would agree with it. Listen to the Sunday School types. "Abraham Lincoln is the Christian exemplar for children today." According to Judge Stewart, "Here in this New World country, with no pride of ancestry, arose the greatest man since the meek and lowly Nazarene. A man whose life had a greater influence on the human race than any teacher, thinker or toiler since the beginning of the Christian Era. You mean to tell me that Lincoln was greater than the Apostle Paul? That Lincoln was greater than the Apostle Peter, greater than the Apostle John? I think that Lincoln did not have near the influence that they wanted him.
I find an absolutely amazing and astounding contradistinction. Abraham Lincoln, the villain, the one who violated his oath of office repeatedly, the man who rent this country in pieces, that secretly and deliberately started the War in which a million people were wounded, a half-a-million died, Abraham Lincoln, the villain, is deified when Jeff Davis, who was a Godly and devout man and a Statesman who wanted to preserve the Constitution, is vilified. It's amazing!
Turn to two passages of scripture. I want you to look at Proverbs 17 and then the Book of Isaiah, Chapter 5. Let's look first at Proverbs 17 and look what God says. Proverbs 17:15: God says "He that justifieth the wicked and he that condemeth the just, even they both are an abomination to the Lord." When you justify, when you pronounce right, when you pronounce just, a wicked man, it is an abomination to God. And on the other hand when you condemn a righteous man, it is an abomination to God. Look in your Bibles to the Book of Isaiah Chapter 5, Verse 20: God says, "Woe to them that call evil good and good evil. That put darkness for light and light for darkness. That put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter." You see what has happened in our country since Abraham Lincoln, everything has been turned upside down and basically what has happened is this: evil men have been called good men and good men have been called evil men. You look today at our governmental structure, you look in our society and you find the men who are held up as our exemplars, as our heroes and the world is trying to make them "good" when in reality they are evil, wicked men plotting the overthrow of our government as we know it. All of our leaders keep talking about our democracy. We have never had a democracy, we have never had a democracy; well we have one now because we perverted the Republic. We were supposed to be a Republic, not a Democracy. What we find is those men who are real patriots, those men who are real Christians, those men who want what is right, they are now vilified and maligned and counted as worth absolutely nothing. They are to be gotten rid of and disposed of. God says, "Woe unto them that call evil good and that call good evil." Abraham Lincoln, old honest Abe, was not so honest. He was a wicked, ungodly individual who violated his constitutional oath and sunk this nation into perilous War.
For more Information Write: TRUTH AND SOUTHERN HISTORY
P. 0. Box 6847, West Columbia, SC 29171 (Permission Granted to Copy and Distribute)
About The Author.
Pastor John Weaver is a native of Georgia, and a graduate from Bob Jones University where he earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Theology and attended graduate school. He has been in Christian ministry for over 30 years.
Pastor Weaver has traveled across America preaching and lecturing in churches, colleges and conferences. John Weaver is an expositor of God's whole word. His preaching style is in the tradition of those early American pastors whose pulpits were the cradle of America's Christian Liberty.
There is another arrow in our quiver: Beck reveres Judge Andrew Napolitano whom he admits is a learned constitutional scholar. Beck usually agrees with the Judge or at least I've never heard him DISagree! Napolitano calls Lincoln "a tyrant". You cannot "pick and choose" truths.
That is true. I regret to say I haven't lisentened to Beck a lot, but he does appear to me to be a very smart man as far as history goes, or he at least has some good writers. I was really shocked when he started in about Lincoln and honor.
