Worst President

[bishop]

lincoln preserved the union.

[The Dunedan]

By suspending the Constitution, illegally issuing the first Exectutive Order, imprisoning 60,000 people on trumped-up charges of "Sedition," permitting W. T. Sherman to engage in a genocidal campeign of destruction and rampage throughout the South, getting the whole idea of Income Taxation started, not to mention that the whole idea of "Preserving the union" flies in the face of having a Republic in the first place. Prior to the Civil War, the US was referred to as the "united States of America" not "United States of America." Spot the difference? Until Dishonest Abe came along, each State was more or less it's own nation, and could leave whenever it chose to do so. Several States had done ( or threatened to do ) so already, if only for a very breif period. Maine, I believe it was, seceeded for about two weeks in early 1841. Lincoln, however, at the behest of Northern industrialists, needed to keep the South within the Union in order to preserve his tax base. At the time, Southern states were paying over 3/4 of the Federal budget. If the CSA had been allowed to brea away peacefully, all that money would have had to come from the Northern portion of the country, where all of Lincoln's big-money contributers and backers were. You can see how this all worked out.

Which he had no right to do. After the Civil War it was basically made that no State could leave the Union. At that point it effectively ceased to be a "union" and became, for all intents and purposes, an Empire.

I also want to make it clear that I think ending slavery in the US was a great, great, great thing.

It's just that we aren't really a union anymore.

[The Dunedan]

KSoDBartman:
Exactly.

[dotcoma]

Saying Lincoln invaded the South to end slavery is like saying George Bush invaded Iraq to end terrorism.

[PatrickHenry]

Originally posted by theophysics, http://www.infoplease.com/ce6/history/A0825448.html There you go, found the article with less SPIN on it.

Sorry, you source doesn't support your statements. Gotta find another for that purpose or just say it is something personl about Jimmy. From your source:

President Carter applied economic pressure by halting oil imports from Iran and freezing Iranian assets in the United States. At the same time, he began several diplomatic initiatives to free the hostages, all of which proved fruitless. On Apr. 24, 1980, the United States attempted a rescue mission that failed. After three of eight helicopters were damaged in a sandstorm, the operation was aborted

See, "diplomatic initiatives" another term for negotiations, "rescue mission" with helicopters is force(I assume you meant military force). Furthermore,

On Jan. 20, 1981, the day of President Reagan's inauguration... the hostages were freed

President Reagan was elected in November 1980. I am sure the hostages and their families WISH they had been released that day.

Finally, there are allegations of the October Surprise that accuse the Reagan campaign of undermining the Carter Administration's attempts to negotiate the hostage release. This was once a mainstream story, then debunked, and now has been resurrected. What you believe really depends on your POV.

The debunkation: http://hnn.us/articles/4249.html
The resurrection: http://www.consortiumnews.com/archive/xfile.html

I live in Springfield, IL, where saying anything remotely derogatory about Abraham Lincoln is likely to get you lynched. I'm no fan of him either (I'm originally from the deep south) and have to endure near-daily exhortations of how wonderful he was.

[PatrickHenry]

Kevin, why doncha like "Honest Abe?"

Originally posted by PatrickHenry, Kevin, why doncha like "Honest Abe?"

He was a racist hypocrite scumbag. Not to mention a lawyer. What more do I need?

Remember I'm originally from the south as well, where you're likely to get your face beat in if you mention General Sherman without an epithet before and after his name.

[PatrickHenry]

Abe was the first Republican President...
I could see by the smilie you were jesting. Is your antipathy simply from being reared as a Johnny Reb?

[sixmillman]

Oh my God! Is this the root of all political arguments in 2004. The Civil War. We seased to be individual states and became a nation. And everything has been downhill since.

[bishop]

heh...

imo, the civil war is OVER. people ought to get over it.

[Comrade]

What is wrong with you people. Nixon was evil.

[sixmillman]

Just to be clear to those who would have us believe that the reasons for the civil war were just the beginning of some huge shadow government, and that slavery was an incidental excuse used by the evil industrialist of the north I supply for your consideration the following FIRST paragraphs of Declarations of Secession for Georgia, Mississippi, Texas, and South Carolina.

South Carolina

The people of the State of South Carolina, in Convention assembled, on the 26th day of April, A.D., 1852, declared that the frequent violations of the Constitution of the United States, by the Federal Government, and its encroachments upon the reserved rights of the States, fully justified this State in then withdrawing from the Federal Union; but in deference to the opinions and wishes of the other slaveholding States, she forbore at that time to exercise this right. Since that time, these encroachments have continued to increase, and further forbearance ceases to be a virtue.

Georgia

The people of Georgia having dissolved their political connection with the Government of the United States of America, present to their confederates and the world the causes which have led to the separation. For the last ten years we have had numerous and serious causes of complaint against our non-slave-holding confederate States with reference to the subject of African slavery.

Mississippi

In the momentous step which our State has taken of dissolving its connection with the government of which we so long formed a part, it is but just that we should declare the prominent reasons which have induced our course.Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery-- the greatest material interest of the world. Its labor supplies the product which constitutes by far the largest and most important portions of commerce of the earth. These products are peculiar to the climate verging on the tropical regions, and by an imperious law of nature, none but the black race can bear exposure to the tropical sun. These products have become necessities of the world, and a blow at slavery is a blow at commerce and civilization. That blow has been long aimed at the institution, and was at the point of reaching its consummation. There was no choice left us but submission to the mandates of abolition, or a dissolution of the Union, whose principles had been subverted to work out our ruin.

Texas

Texas abandoned her separate national existence and consented to become one of the Confederated Union to promote her welfare, insure domestic tranquility and secure more substantially the blessings of peace and liberty to her people. She was received into the confederacy with her own constitution, under the guarantee of the federal constitution and the compact of annexation, that she should enjoy these blessings. She was received as a commonwealth holding, maintaining and protecting the institution known as negro slavery-- the servitude of the African to the white race within her limits-- a relation that had existed from the first settlement of her wilderness by the white race, and which her people intended should exist in all future time. Her institutions and geographical position established the strongest ties between her and other slave-holding States of the confederacy. Those ties have been strengthened by association. But what has been the course of the government of the United States, and of the people and authorities of the non-slave-holding States, since our connection with them?

For Southern States Slavery was the primary reason for secession from the Union. If not the only reason. Enlightened plantation owners cloaked themselves in the Constitution and States Rights to maintain their own status quo and justify their enslavement and repression of an entire race. It was as despicable then as it is now. The civil war shows how far they would go to not just have cheap labor but free labor.
For those of you, who choose to interpret the original Constitution as a document that protected the institution of slavery, shame. If that was the original intent of the founding fathers then it was a document that justified subversion.

I haven't heard anyone support the institution of slavery. So you can pack that up and take it home. What we ARE saying is that the states had a right to secede.

[bishop]

i've always had quite a good laugh at the arguments of civil war apologists.

funny thing too - these states are the biggest welfare states as far as federal aid is concerned. washed up, useless boondocks imo.

[bishop]

if states had a right to secede, then lincoln had a right to defend the union.

[sixmillman]

KSoDBartman

I haven't heard anyone support the institution of slavery. So you can pack that up and take it home. What we ARE saying is that the states had a right to secede.

Yes they had that right, and they exercised it to perpetuate the institution of slavery a practice we now all consider aborhent. And then in the 60's George Wallace and Mississippi used "States Rights" as a justification to force Blacks to the back of the bus, to seperate water fountains, into lousy schools, from attending universities, into seperate restrurants.

I for one am thankfull that the rest of the nation has the right to enforce laws that end that kind of discrimination in States that would enforce them.
So if you want to blame someone for forcing the US Government to revoke the states right to sucesion, Blame South Carolina, Mississippi, Georgia, Tennesse, Virginia,Texas,Alabama who squandered that right and the lives of thousands to perpetuate their own imorality.

[slinkyredfoot]

the way i see it, the whole Lincoln argument is moot anyway, because the poll question is: "who was the worst president of the TWENTIETH century. Last time i checked, the Civil War occured in the NINETEENTH century. :rolleyes: