Circa1865

Abraham Lincoln repeatedly stated that he was opposed to the political and social equality of the races, that he was not an abolitionist, and was supportive of colonizing black people from the United States to elsewhere. Lincoln himself admitted that his invasion of the South in 1861 was to “save the Union,” not to end slavery. His own State of Illinois amended its constitution to prohibit the emigration of black people, and Illinois Senator Lyman Trumbull, a Lincoln confidante, expressed the Republican Party’s position on the expansion of slavery into the Territories: “All the occupied territory shall be preserved for the benefit of the white Caucasian race – a thing that cannot be except by the exclusion of slavery.” Trumbull further identified his party as “the white man’s party” and pledged that he would never consent to “Negro equality” on any terms.

Bernhard Thuersam, www.Circa1865.org

The Real Abraham Lincoln

“Ask any school child: “Who freed the slaves?” and he’ll answer, “Abraham Lincoln.” But few school children are taught that in 1847 Lincoln defended a Kentucky slave owner, Robert Matson, in his attempt to recover runaway slaves. He was under no compulsion to take the case; he did so willingly.

Lincoln believed that the white and black races could not live together because blacks were inferior. In addition, he was obsessed for years with the idea of repatriating the slaves to Africa. He was following in the footsteps of his political mentor, Henry Clay, who championed the return of slaves to their native land.

One colonization plan was attempted to Haiti under Lincoln’s direction, which ended in disaster. Eliminating all Negroes from American soil would be a “glorious consummation,” Lincoln proclaimed on July 6, 1852, during a speech delivered in the Illinois State House. In 1857, as an Illinois legislator, he urged his colleagues to appropriate money to remove all freed Negroes from the State.

In 1860, he advocated the peaceful departure of all blacks so that “their places be . . . filled by free white laborers.” To denounce Lincoln as a racist is too easy, since the vast majority of whites North and South, were racists by today’s standards. The misconception today is that racism was exclusive to the South.

While practicing law in Illinois in 1847, Lincoln was hired to represent slave owner Robert Matson in the return of fugitive slaves Jane Bryant and her four children. His partner in the case was Usher Linder, who as attorney general of Illinois gave an anti-abolition speech in 1837, which resulted in the murder of abolitionist Elijah Lovejoy. [Lincoln] came down squarely in favor of slavery by seeking the return of Jane Bryant and her four children to slavery.

The man whom history has enshrined as the Great Emancipator not only spoke in support of slavery, but also actively worked for a slave owner to recover his runaways.

Lincoln apologists have tried to explain away his behavior in this case by claiming that his business was law, not morality. And that somehow the conduct of attorney Lincoln with his pragmatic approach to the law excused this attempt to send a mother and her children back into slavery.

Lincoln’s indifference to the fate of Jane Bryant and her children in hopes of a legal fee foreshadowed his indifference to the enormous loss [of life] in a war that he could have easily prevented, or ended at any time. Nearly every other country in the world ended slavery peacefully during the 19^th century through compensated emancipation.”

(Lincoln’s Defense of Slavery, J.D. Haines, Southern Mercury, May/June 2005, excerpts pp. 14-15)