The American Spectator

Reader Mail

Might As Well Have Said It

4.14.09 @ 6:01AM

(Page 2 of 2)

A GIFT YOU GIVE YOURSELF
Re: Doug Bandow's Tax Freedom Day Today:

Y'know, I used to like getting a refund check from the government every year...until, late in the game, I realized I was just getting some of my money back, and a small percentage of it at that.

I'm afraid, this time around, it's just going to get worse before it gets any better.
-- Robert Nowall
Cape Coral, Florida

NO LINCOLN REVISIONISM
Re: William Davies' letter (under "A History Lesson") in Reader Mail's Misquoting an Ally:

Since his assassination and subsequent anointed "sainthood," there has been in reaction a small but scrappy "Lincoln was a dirtbag" industry. Whether modern day Southern romanticists angered over the "War of Northern Aggression" or libertarians who resent Lincoln for "rewriting the Constitution and increasing the power of the Federal government", both professional and amateur historians have striven to show the wider American public that Lincoln was not the swell guy he is made out to be. 

William Davies' letter seems to come out of the "dirtbag" business milieu if not an industry titan himself. Davies' objections boil down to two: 1.) Lincoln himself was a racist and 2.) He was not nearly as anti-slavery as people believe. 

These assertions can only be made by projecting modern attitudes into the past and ignoring the real political complexities of the time. 

It is true that by our standards, Lincoln held less than enlightened views of "African-Americans."  He didn't believe blacks could compete with whites in the long run. He also believed that it would be to the advantage of blacks and (not incidentally) to the United States to relocate to Haiti or some other protected settlement in Africa or Central America. That most are not knowledgeable of these things is the result of the historical disinterest common among Americans and not some conspiratorial duplicity fostered by descendents of the Federalist Party or the so-call Lincoln cult. In the context of the times, however, Lincoln's views toward blacks were advanced and -- at least as he saw it -- compassionate. These views in no way conflicted with his belief in the equality of all men before God. That men and women of different races could be unequal on earth and yet equal before the throne of heaven is hardly a notion unknown across the centuries of Christian theology. It was Lincoln's insight that because, when enslaved to another, a man could not fulfill his duties under Ten Commandments that he (along with its cruelties) protested the essential injustice of slavery. 

It is also true that Lincoln was not a radical abolitionist or, to modern eyes, completely consistent in his political dealings towards slavery. But we have to understand Lincoln in the context of his times. 1.) Lincoln believed he could contain slavery to the Southern states and prevent its spread outside the South; but he also believed that he could not constituently abolish slavery itself. 2.) Lincoln believed his higher duty was to preserve the Union. No Union, no chance to contain slavery, much less abolish it. It is in these circumstances that "legislation in 1861 [that] would have prevented Congress from making slavery illegal" Mr. Davies refers to must be understood. 

The Crittenden Compromise was a last ditch effort to prevent war and to bring South Carolina back into the fold. It would have enforced the restoration of the boundary drawn under the Missouri Compromise. It also provided several provisions favorable to Southerners such as a stricter fugitive slave law, federal compensation for owners of runaway slaves. More importantly to the South, territorial entry into the Union would have been on the basis of popular sovereignty. In addition, a congressional proviso in the compromise was to prevent the Constitution from being amended in such as to prohibit slavery in states where it already existed. The Crittenden Compromise enjoyed considerable support including Lincoln's. But in the end, it was Lincoln who rejected it as untenable. Reassured by the provision to restrain the right of slavery in states where it already existed, in the end Lincoln had to insist that the government could "entertain no proposition for a compromise in regard to the extension of slavery."

Lincoln was an idealist. But Lincoln also was a student of the politics of the possible. Most of all, Lincoln was a stalwart of the American principled necessity.  It is understandable and natural that many people of his time hated him and thought him less than a saint. But at this remove? It is difficult to see historical figures as they were. Most difficult is to understand a far removed time and people who think and feel differently than we do.  It is the rare conservative who doesn't have a spark of sympathy for the vast majority of farm boys and store clerks who served in the Confederate cause (even though they did not own slaves themselves) but because they believed it was their duty to defend their states, homes and families. Much of the time, the North's motives were less than honorable. Nevertheless, the North had to win. The Union had to be saved.
-- Mike Dooley

SHORT RUNNER
Re: Roger Scruton's The Long Run: http://spectator.org/archives/2009/04/09/the-long-run

In his article about avoidance of personal responsibility ("The Long Run," April 2009), Roger Scruton makes passing note that John Maynard Keynes was a homosexual but does not tie this aspect of the Englishman's life in with Keynes' promotion of economic irresponsibility. Mr. Scruton should have because the two are, indeed, related.

Keynesian economics is a live-for-today type philosophy. It favors current pleasures over the future. This dove-tails exactly with the childless homosexual view of life, and contrasts sharply with the view of parents who care as much, if not more, for the future as they do of the present for the sake of their children and grandchildren. .

And it is utter nonsense to argue that Keynes' private life should be kept separated from his professional life. When something as emotional as the forbidden sex is fundamental to a man's being as homosexuality was to Keynes, there can be no compartmentalization. Mr. Scruton who studies the culture should appreciate this more than most.

The essence of the Obama economic program is to rob from the future to avoid discomfort today. Call me politically incorrect, but I feel America would be better advised to move towards the Prophet's advice and away from the homosexual's.
-- Peter Skurkiss
Stow, Ohio

Letter to the Editor