An Unexpected Result of the Lincoln Assassination

150 years ago tonight, between 10:00-10:30 pm EST, John Wilkes Booth shot and fatally wounded Abraham Lincoln at Ford's Theatre in Washington D.C.  He would die from those wounds around 7:22 am the next morning.

The violent death of a man who caused so much unnecessary violent death & destruction in the Confederate States is not viewed as a great tragedy by many. Some, on the other hand, liken his death to that of Christ's, believing he paid the ultimate price to save our nation from a national sin.

Regardless of how you view his assassination, one consequence of that event cannot be ignored. If Abraham Lincoln had not been shot & killed, it's likely that we would not have as racially diverse of a nation that we have today. What am I talking about? If a real history lesson doesn't interest you, then you might as well stop reading now...

Despite all of the mythologizing of "The Railsplitter" as "The Great Emancipator," a factual look at history will teach you that Abraham Lincoln didn't want black people to be in this country at all, as slaves or free people, and certainly not as citizens. If Lincoln would have had his way, all blacks would have been shipped off after the war. Don't believe me?

Lincoln himself was, as most white people were at the time, a racist. In the fourth of his historic debates with Stephen Douglas during the 1858 Illinois senate race, Lincoln said the following in regards to racial equality:

"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, that 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; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any other man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race." 

Though he realized in 1858 that it would be impractical, Lincoln desired freeing the slaves and colonizing them outside of the United States, in either Liberia, Haiti, Central America or Africa (pretty much anywhere but the U.S.). He met with a group of black men at the White House on April 14, 1862 to discuss and encourage them to support this very matter! In December of 1862, he delivered his second annual message to Congress (what is now known as the State of the Union address), and in it he proposed three new amendments to the Constitution, one of which (if adopted) would have given Congress authority to "appropriate money and otherwise provide for colonizing free colored persons with their own consent at any place or places without the United States." Lincoln never gave up completely on the idea of colonization. In early 1865, while discussing with Union general (and good friend of Lincoln) Benjamin Butler about what to do with black soldiers after the war, Lincoln expressed, "I believe that it would be better to export them all to some fertile country with a good climate, which they could have to themselves."

Lincoln's (and the Radical Republicans') opposition to the westward expansion of slavery also was not born out of good will toward blacks. They wanted blacks to not be mixed with the white man at all! Take the words of Lincoln himself as proof...

"There is a natural disgust in the minds of nearly all white people to the idea of indiscriminate amalgamation of the white and black races ... A separation of the races is the only perfect preventive of amalgamation, but as an immediate separation is impossible, the next best thing is to keep them apart where they are not already together. If white and black people never get together in Kansas, they will never mix blood in Kansas..."
 
These are all very inconvenient truths for those who would push the myth of "Lincoln the Great Emancipator." The Emancipation Proclamation itself was merely a war measure, designed to insight a mass uprising of slaves to seek freedom and then force them (enslave them) into the Union ranks to fight for that freedom. Though Lincoln held the opinion that the seceded states were not actually separated from the Union, he could only hold that opinion as long as he could militarily oppress the south into submission (which is hardly a government of, for, and by the people when it's held together by the sharp end of a bayonet). In reality, Lincoln's Emancipation freed no slaves, as it was limited to the slaves in states outside of his control. Meanwhile, to the slaves in the states where he did have control (Kentucky, Delaware, Maryland, Missouri and in certain areas of the Confederacy that were firmly held by Union military force) he did not extend the effects of Emancipation. In the two years of war prior to the Emancipation, Lincoln even fired two generals who had freed the slaves in their areas of operation!  

Of course, many will never accept such a fact based view, and will cling tightly to the mythological Lincoln they most likely learned about in school. Without a doubt, Lincoln was a masterful politician, and he celebrated his ability to manipulate the thinking of others. In regard to the extent he would go in order to preserve the flow of Southern cash into the federal coffers, Lincoln once told a newspaper editor that "I shall adopt new views so fast as they shall appear to be true views." Unfortunately he continues to manipulate the masses today through those who worship him and bolster his myth, but we here in the Sons of Confederate Veterans are committed to an honest look at the facts, and we honor the service of all honorable Confederate veteran, regardless of race or skin color. 

An honest look at these undeniable facts makes it reasonable to assume that if not for a bullet to the head of Abe Lincoln, there would have been no 14th or 15th Amendments in their current form, maybe even no 13th Amendment to free the slaves, and there almost certainly wouldn't be any black people in the United States today. Unlike Lincoln toward the black Union soldiers, white Confederate veterans were grateful to the brave blacks Confederates who fought along side them in the struggle against federal tyranny, and they both were proud of their service to that cause.

DEO VINDICE!
- Jonathan McCleese
Sergeant-at-Arms
Admiral Raphael Semmes Camp #1321
Sons of Confederate Veterans