In October of 1860, the editor of the Atlantic, James Russell Lowell endorsed Abraham Lincoln for president. The Atlantic has taken this opportunity to reprint his endorsement.Rebel Girl has pulled out some interesting passages below, but you can click "The Election in November" to read the rest—a facinating window in the the country we were then and the one we are now.
"...The true danger to popular forms of government begins when public opinion ceases because the people are incompetent or unwilling to think. In a democracy it is the duty of every citizen to think; but unless the thinking result in a definite opinion, and the opinion lead to considerate action, they are nothing.
...We are persuaded that the election of Mr. Lincoln will do more than anything else to appease the excitement of the country. He has proved both his ability and his integrity; he has had experience enough in public affairs to make him a statesman, and not enough to make him a politician. That he has not had more will be no objection to him in the eyes of those who have seen the administration of the experienced public functionary whose term of office is just drawing to a close. He represents a party who know that true policy is gradual in its advances, that it is conditional and not absolute, that it must deal with fact and not with sentiments, but who know also that it is wiser to stamp out evil in the spark than to wait till there is no help but in fighting fire with fire. They are the only conservative party, because they are the only one based on an enduring principle, the only one that is not willing to pawn tomorrow for the means to gamble with today. They have no hostility to the South, but a determined one to doctrines of whose ruinous tendency every day more and more convinces them.
The encroachments of Slavery upon our national policy have been like those of a glacier in a Swiss valley. Inch by inch, the huge dragon with his glittering scales and crests of ice coils itself onward, an anachronism of summer, the relic of a bygone world where such monsters swarmed. But it has its limit, the kindlier forces of Nature work against it, and the silent arrows of the sun are still, as of old, fatal to the frosty Python. Geology tells us that such enormous devastators once covered the face of the earth, but the benignant sunlight of heaven touched them, and they faded silently, leaving no trace but here and there the scratches of their talons, and the gnawed boulders scattered where they made their lair. We have entire faith in the benignant influence of Truth, the sunlight of the moral world, and believe that slavery, like other worn-out systems, will melt gradually before it. 'All the earth cries out upon Truth, and the heaven blesseth it; ill works shake and tremble at it, and with it is no unrighteous thing.'"
12 comments:
I love the part about the thinking not being worth anything if it doesn't lead to decisions and action.
In that connection: how can anyone still be undecided about this Presidential election? It absolutely baffles me. Unless, of course, hesitations about Obama are simply the outcome of unconscious (or not so much) racism.
There is a clear choice here.
Thanks for this provocative post, RG!
"The worst difficulties from which we suffer do not come from without. They come from within...They come from a peculiar type of brainy people, always found in our country, who if they add something to our culture, take much from its strength. Our difficulties come from the mood of unwarrantable self-abasement into which we have been cast by a powerful section of our own intellectuals."
- Winston Churchill, on Leftists
I like the level of discourse back then as well - thanks!
And then are are R.E. Emerson and William Sloane Coffin--both of whom claim that it is our duty and responsibility to move to action, else we be but "sluggard intellect," and to have a "lover's quarrel with America," a constant critiquing, a conversation with the abstract and its concrete constituent parts, rather than jingoism.
Does that mean hesitations about McCain are the result of ageism?
Flawed logic, 8:41!
Why can't some voters just be for their cause or person without becoming judgmental about the other side?
Like the clash of civilizations we have now entered a clash of ideologies. History tends to repeat itself because as several generations pass, people either fail to learn the severity of the past or it just gets watered down into one big blur. I think it’s because they themselves never had to experience socialism or fascism first hand. I think the obvious choice here is for the Republicans otherwise we’re heading toward a socialistic society, which in the United States would also bring about a constitutional crisis.
Heading towards socialism, 3:14?
One of the foundations for redistributing wealth is the progressive income tax. Here's what Teddy Roosevelt--one of John McCain's heroes--said in about redistributing wealth back in 1910:
"No man should receive a dollar unless that dollar has been fairly earned. Every dollar received should represent a dollar’s worth of service rendered – not gambling in stocks, but service rendered. The really big fortune, the swollen fortune, by the mere fact of its size, acquires qualities which differentiate it in kind as well as in degree from what is possessed by men of relatively small means. Therefore, I believe in a graduated income tax on big fortunes, and in another tax which is far more easily collected and far more effective – a graduated inheritance tax on big fortunes, properly safeguarded against evasion, and increasing rapidly in amount with the size of the estate."
I like all this history.
Thanks, 10:38.
"the sunlight of the moral world" - just lovely! Let's hope it's so ---
Well, 10:31, I don't see the flawed logic.
There is a stark choice to be made of these two candidates--how is it possible that some are undecided? That's an authentic mystery to me.
As for the hesitations about Obama, I'm referring to people who offer no reason for their doubts about him except that he's "strange" (manifestly untrue) or that they don't "trust" him (why on earth----?), or that they just don't feel "comfortable" with him. Having heard many interviews of that kind, one has to think about racism....
But that leaves my first and main point untouched, at any rate.
To 8:41/11:56:
Would that point also be interpreted as "loved" by you if it included a definitive decision not to vote for Obama? You're saying that the thinking is worth something if it leads to a decision: OK, what about this scenario--Voter A decides adamantly to vote for McCain because he thinks Obama is nothing but a fast-talking shyster. That must be fine with you based on what you said, because Voter A made a decision and took action on it.
You just don't get it--you can't understand how some people could vote differently than you, whether they decided five months ago or whether they decide in a voting booth on Tuesday.
Don't you see that it appears that you're saying, "Decisiveness is good as long as you decide my way?"
I don't think you really mean that, do you?
The dems will say you're racist because you don't support Obama. Not supporting Obama has nothing to do with race. It's about his flawed policies and agenda. In fact it's the dems who inject race into everything. They even played the race card on the Clintons. Imagine that paradox! I would have no problem voting for a black candidate whose policies and agenda were in tune with mainstream America. Although a Christian, Obama stands for a “Muslim Brotherhood” type socialist transformation of OUR America. Anyone who can’t see that is just fooling themselves.
There's this black guy who contributes on FOX. Can't recall his first name but his last name is Steel. I believe he’s a mayor of some city back east. He's a pretty sharp thinker, is in line with mainstream values and if he was on a ticket, I would certainly vote for him.
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