Great post, Daniel.  Nice to see someone talking sense.

I’m not sure when the idea developed that, if you criticize someone for one thing, but you don’t bother criticizing him for another, you must obviously endorse the latter.  (Thus, the fact that Bradford didn’t bother to criticize Jaffa’s claim that Lincoln was the architect of global democracy “proves” that Bradford believes the same thing as Jaffa, even though Bradford rejected all of Jaffa’s claims that he did bother to criticize.)

Scholars used to realize that “proof” required, well, proof.  Perhaps this development arises from Leo Strauss’s privileging of silence--the absurd idea, central to the Straussian hermeneutic, that what’s most important in a philosopher’s work is that which he doesn’t say.

For Strauss and the Straussians, that allows them to impute their own views to “political philosophers.” In this case, it appears that it allows Dr. Havers to impute views that he dislikes to people who, in his mind, have gone over to “the dark side"--even if he cannot cite their own words in support of his claim.

My fellow contributors seem to be rankled at the suggestion of any association between them and their Straussian enemies. Once again, I’d suggest that you all read Mel Bradford (especially his “The Heresy of Equality"), Richard Gamble (on Babbitt and Lincoln), and Willmoore Kendall on how Lincoln’s concept of equality must inspire endless revolution at home and abroad.  This reading of the “facts” is no different from that of Jaffa or Berns.  (It’s interesting that both camps also agree that Lincoln was a centralizing federalist who eventually set America on the way to the New Deal.) In recent memory, I can’t think of other prominent paleos who have disputed this reading, though obviously they dispute other features of the Jaffaite portrait.  I doubt that debate over Abe as a global democrat is a “distant secondary concern,” in a time when GWB invokes Lincoln to support wars to end tyranny (recall the 2nd inaugural address of 2005?)

And speaking of Pat Buchanan, guess who associates Lincoln with GWB as a “wartime president” who invokes the cause of “global democracy”?
http://www.amconmag.com/2005_02_28/buchanan.html
If a paleo of Buchanan’s stature makes this association, is it any wonder that other paleos do as well?

My fellow contributors seem to be rankled at the suggestion of any association between them and their Straussian enemies.

Or, perhaps, they mean what they say.  As Daniel wrote:

That’s quite a claim, but it’s one that seems to be poorly supported.  Mr. Havers has since written another response to the critique of Thomas DiLorenzo, but besides DiLorenzo I don’t know of anyone who has made any argument even remotely similar to the one Mr. Havers imputes to paleoconservative critics of Lincoln.

Here are all of the references to Lincoln in the piece by Pat Buchanan:

By late 1863, Lincoln’s war to crush Southern secession was about whether “government of the people, by the people, for the people shall ... perish from the earth.” By 1917, the European war whose causes Wilson professed not to understand in 1916 had become “the war to end all wars” and to “make the world safe for democracy.”

Leaders alchemize wars begun over lesser interests into epochal struggles for universal principles because only thus can they justify demands for greater sacrifices in blood and treasure. But Bush has gone Wilson one better. He is not only going to make the world safe for democracy, he is going to make the world democratic. Where Lincoln abolished slavery in the South, Bush is going to abolish tyranny from the earth: “So it is the policy of the United States to seek and support the growth of democratic movements and institutions in every nation and culture, with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world.”

Does Dr. Havers mean to suggest that the first sentence is not literally true?  Did Lincoln not utter those lines at Gettysburg, or did he simply not mean them?  Buchanan does not go on to suggest that Mr. Lincoln’s War was the same as Mr. Wilson’s War or Mr. Bush’s War; he simply says that all three used similar appeals to abstract, universalist principles.

Does Dr. Havers deny that “government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth” is abstract and universalist?

As for the second paragraph, Buchanan not only draws a distinction between Mr. Lincoln’s War and Mr. Bush’s ("Where Lincoln abolished slavery in the South, Bush is going to abolish tyranny from the earth"), he even makes a distinction between Mr. Bush’s War and Mr. Wilson’s ("Bush has gone Wilson one better").

This isn’t an attempt to conflate the three men; it makes proper distinctions while discussing one thing that all three had in common: “Leaders alchemize wars begun over lesser interests into epochal struggles for universal principles because only thus can they justify demands for greater sacrifices in blood and treasure.”

That does not mean that Mr. Lincoln would have agreed with Mr. Wilson’s War, or even Mr. Wilson with Mr. Bush’s.

Of course, such elementary distinctions undoubtedly seem arbitrary when the point is making sure that we “control the Lincoln legacy.”

What Lincoln meant at Gettysburg does not translate into a program for global democracy!  (Are you now suggesting that this was Abe’s position after all? That’s quite a change in attitude.) Anyway, you omitted the first sentence in Buchanan’s article, which associates Abe and GWB as “wartime presidents” who invoke the cause of global democracy when it suits them.  And I commend Buchanan for distinguishing Lincoln’s aims and GWB’s, but this doesn’t change the fact that he still made an association between them on the cause of global democracy.

I think I’ve provided a pretty good thumbnail sketch of what Bradford said and didn’t say about Lincoln, and what that meant. It may be clear to you that I’m wrong, Professor Havers, but you haven’t given us much of an argument to work with along these lines, except a rather insulting suggestion that we go back and read Bradford. I think I read him pretty well the first time, thanks.

It’s true that the Gettysburg Address is not a call to “global democracy” crusading, but that isn’t what Mr. Buchanan is saying in that passage.  As Scott says, he is saying that wars that begin for other reasons are turned into or become causes that invoke more abstract and universal goals.  For Lincoln, it was to save the “government of the people” from being destroyed in America (never mind that such a government was not in danger of being destroyed by his enemies, but rather by him), while for Wilson the war became a war for the sake of democracy abroad.  These are different visions, and I, for one, do not want to identify them with one another.  But they both show a preference for ideological objectives and an enthusiasm for “armed doctrine” that I hope we can all agree is deeply disturbing and dangerous.

I am skeptical about the claims regarding Kendall, but I admit I don’t know his work as well, but I definitely have read Bradford particularly with respect to his views on Lincoln, and I know that lumping him in with the argument Dr. Havers is making is not correct.

What Lincoln meant at Gettysburg does not translate into a program for global democracy!

I didn’t say that it did.  The only way you can interpret my words to meant that is if you believe that the only “abstract and universalist” principle is global democracy.

If you’re willing to admit that there can be other abstract and universalist principles, then you should be able to return to what I wrote and understand what I meant.

When Wilmore Kendall, Russell Kirk,, and Frank Meyers wrote for National Review, it was a dam good magazine. In my opinion Mr. Richert is winning this argument,but it is a good argument.

If one portrays Lincoln as an abstract universalist who believes in natural rights for all human beings (as both Jaffa and Bradford did, in their respective studies of Abe’s rhetoric), it is not a great leap to conclude that Lincoln was a global democrat.  (Of course, this conclusion is based on L’s rhetoric, not his actions, which do not reflect a commitment to global democracy.)

it is not a great leap to conclude that Lincoln was a global democrat.

So it is a leap, just not a great one?  Fine.  Now, show us where Bradford explicitly made the leap--and not where he implicitly made it through “silence.”

Then, once you’ve done that, come back and explain how Lincoln’s rhetoric was not abstract and universal; or, failing that, why we should not portray a man who used abstract and universalist rhetoric as an abstract universalist.

To Mr Richert:
I am not denying that Lincoln used abstract universalistic rhetoric, but that this rhetoric does not logically lead to a commitment to global democracy (this is now the 2nd time I have written this!)
In “The Heresy of Equality,” Bradford argues that Lincoln’s “gnostic” love of equality (using Voegelin’s idea of “gnostic") MUST lead to revolutions at home and abroad.

In “The Heresy of Equality,” Bradford argues that Lincoln’s “gnostic” love of equality (using Voegelin’s idea of “gnostic") MUST lead to revolutions at home and abroad.

Then you should have no trouble quoting the passage in which he says so.

The Southern States excercised their undelegated authority to freely leave the Union they freely joined. The Southern people decided to leave the Union and Lincoln and the North went to war to force the Southern States to remin.

Who was fightinng for “government of the people, by the people, for the people shall” again?

Sic Semper Tyrannis

Lincoln was a Whig. The Whigs in general (and Lincoln in particular) opposed expansion. The Democratic Party was pro-expansion, including its Southern wing, which hoped to open up new areas to spread slavery. Lincoln was a qualified egalitarian, disbelieving in social equality but believing that a man had the right to keep what the sweat of his brow earned (his opponents believed that only white men had such a right).

The Whigs were against expansion? Lincoln wanted the western lands to be “free” for white laborers only.

http://www.nps.gov/liho/debate4.htm

“I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been in favor of bringing about in anyway 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. I say upon this occasion I do not perceive that because the white man is to have the superior position the negro should be denied everything.”

Mr. Lincoln’s Speech, Fourth Debate with Stephen A. Douglas at Charleston, Illinois,” September 18, 1858

douglassarchives.org/linc_a89.htm

“Mr. Jefferson did not mean to say, nor do I, that the power of emancipation is in the Federal Government. He spoke of Virginia; and, as to the power of emancipation, I speak of the slaveholding States only. The Federal Government, however, as we insist, has the power of restraining the extension of the institution — the power to insure that a slave insurrection shall never occur on any American soil which is now free from slavery. ”

Abraham Lincoln, “Cooper Institute Address,” 27 February 1860

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corwin_amendment
http://www.geocities.com/ghostamendment

The Corwin amendment

uS House of Representatives, 28 February 1861
uS Senate, Adopted Adopted March 2, 1861

No amendment shall be made to the Constitution which will authorize or give to Congress the power to abolish or interfere, within any State, with the domestic institutions thereof, including that of persons held to labor or service by the laws of said State.

http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/presiden/inaug/lincoln1.htm

I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so.

I understand a proposed amendment to the Constitution–which amendment, however, I have not seen–has passed Congress, to the effect that the Federal Government shall never interfere with the domestic institutions of the States, including that of persons held to service. To avoid misconstruction of what I have said, I depart from my purpose not to speak of particular amendments so far as to say that, holding such a provision to now be implied constitutional law, I have no objection to its being made express and irrevocable.

First Inaugural Address of Abraham Lincoln, Monday, March 4, 1861

http://www.classicallibrary.org/lincoln/greeley.htm

“My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union. I shall do less whenever I shall believe what I am doing hurts the cause, and I shall do more whenever I shall believe doing more will help the cause.”

Lincoln’s Letter to Horace Greeley, Executive Mansion, Washington, August 22, 1862

http://www.geocities.com/presidentialspeeches/1862.htm

“I cannot make it better known than it already is that I strongly favor colonization.”

Abraham Lincoln’, 2nd Annual Message, December 1,1862, Washington, DC

Americans please ignore the opinions of Canadian fools.

I think we are splitting hairs on this one.  To me Lincoln is the president who to paraphrase Gandalf in the movie version Fellowship of the ring, ....when did Saruman the wise abandon reason for madness?  It cannot be argued whatever the intent of Lincoln, and who can truly know this?, the result for our society has been an abandonment of reason for universalist abstracts.  Even to the point of waging a war of aggresion killing in excess of 500,000 Americans to enforce those abstracts.  This madness has become the norm in our upside down world where both progressives and conservatives support this thinking.  The ironic thing is we condemn foreign leaders for doing the exact thing Lincoln did even though they do it on a much smaller scale.

Dear Jaime: Lincoln was for white settlement after the lands had been acquired. Lincoln got himself in political hot water by opposing the Mexican War that led to the Mexican Cession. He and others feared it was an attempt by the “Slave Power” to spread slavery. He was only partially correct - the slave states would have been pleased to extend slavery to the Cession territories but Pres. Polk preferred to buy them from Mexico. Unfortunately, the Mexicans had no intention of selling and were intent on recovering Texas by force.

Lincoln was the personification of the Whigs under the new Party. Then no different than today: opposition to intervention abroad depends on which Party is in power and who is not.

No self-respecting Whig would have wanted all those Spanish speaking Catholics.

Scott, thank you for your excellent, reasoned retort to Mr. Havers’s position, which I have found wanting, and yet, hadn’t taken the opportunity to express what you have expressed so well.  You and Daniel have done a terrific job of placing Mr. Havers’s position under proper scrutiny. Needless to say, I find your position far more compelling, and our “hermeneutic” much more convincing. Regards, Michael -

sorry - that should have been “your” hermeneutic…

Mr Richert and I agree on one thing: neos often want to “control” history.  The irony is that many of the paleos on this site engage in the same practice by drawing “straight lines” in-between whole decades and even centuries of historical change. I just read a blogger who is convinced that Cromwell set the stage for GWB’s war on terror, ignoring the fact that GWB is a Jacobin global democrat.  There are self-styled “neo-pagans” who blame all of western Christianity for the excesses of the 20th century.  And, as you know, Lincoln can be a scapegoat for a variety of policies today.  All these attempts are about as fallacious as the postwar attempts in W. Germany to convince Germans that Bismarck led directly to Hitler.  I am not denying that history matters or that there is continuity:  certainly the Versailles Treaty led to WW 2.  But if paleos truly respect historical thinking, they have to fill in the details, not simply make simplistic cause-and-effect assertions.  (By the way, I am not directing this to anybody in particular.)

To Evan:
My suggestion that some contributors re-read Bradford was not directed towards you.

Dear Jaime: The anti-Catholic party in 1850s America was the American ("Know Nothing") Party. Lincoln was highly critical of the Know Nothings. He was also friendly to immigrants (even Catholics!). His law partner Billy herndon remarked that Lincoln even liked the Irish, whom he (Herndon) couldn’t stand.
“I am not a Know-Nothing. That is certain. How could I be? How can any one who abhors the oppression of negroes, be in favor of degrading classes of white people? Our progress in degeneracy appears to me to be pretty rapid. As a nation, we began by declaring that “all men are created equal.” We now practically read it “all men are created equal, except Negroes.” When the Know-Nothings get control, it will read “all men are created equal, except Negroes and foreigners and Catholics.” When it comes to this, I shall prefer emigrating to some country where they make no pretense of loving liberty - to Russia, for instance, where despotism can be taken pure and without the base alloy of hypocrisy.” The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln edited by Roy P. Basler, Volume II, “Letter to Joshua F. Speed” (August 24, 1855), p. 323.

But if paleos truly respect historical thinking, they have to fill in the details, not simply make simplistic cause-and-effect assertions.

Indeed.  Which is why some of us asked you to fill in the details by providing quotations from paleos who were representative of the trend that you were criticizing.

And now for that long-awaited Bradford passage!  Originally, I was mistaken in referring to his essay “The Heresy of Equality” (Modern Age, Winter 1976) to support my view that Bradford saw Lincoln as a global democrat (following Jaffa).  It is near the end of his paper “Dividing The House:  The Gnosticism of Lincoln’s Political Rhetoric” (Modern Age, Winter 1979, p. 21) that Bradford writes the following pregnant comments about L’s legacy: “In its train it has left us, as a nation, with a series of almost insoluble problems in our social, economic, and political policy, to say nothing of our foreign affairs: with a series of promises impossible to keep.” I interpret his reference to “promises impossible” in “foreign affairs” to mean that Lincoln made utopian commitments to universalize American liberty and equality (and thus democracy) which cannot be met.  Yes, this is an interpretation, but not an overreaching one.  Otherwise, what else could Bradford have meant?

Dr. Havers, I don’t know whether to laugh or cry.  You based your whole argument in “The Limits of Lincoln-Bashing” on how paleos view Lincoln on one sentence that you admit has to be interpreted to support your argument?

Thanks for the reference.  I’ll dig up the article and reread it.

To Mr Richert (for the umpteenth time):
I had suggested other references (Kendall, Gamble) but these were dismissed as not true “paleos” (no control issues here, are there?). I focused on Bradford now because everyone agreed that he was a paleo. I never based my argument solely on Bradford (remember DiLorenzo?) As for dismissing this one sentence of Bradford, I suspect you have no choice but to dismiss it because you have no way of explaining Bradford’s comment except on my terms!  I never claimed that Bradford wrote extensively on Abe’s foreign policy; I only claimed that he agreed with Jaffa on what this policy amounted to.

As for dismissing this one sentence of Bradford

Dr. Havers, I haven’t dismissed it; what part of “I’ll dig up the article and reread it” don’t you understand?

I never claimed that Bradford wrote extensively on Abe’s foreign policy; I only claimed that he agreed with Jaffa on what this policy amounted to.

No, you wrote:

If one portrays Lincoln as an abstract universalist who believes in natural rights for all human beings (as both Jaffa and Bradford did, in their respective studies of Abe’s rhetoric), it is not a great leap to conclude that Lincoln was a global democrat.

Bradford somehow manages to do all of that in one sentence?  Furthermore, you wrote:

In “The Heresy of Equality,” Bradford argues that Lincoln’s “gnostic” love of equality (using Voegelin’s idea of “gnostic") MUST lead to revolutions at home and abroad.

You now tell us that you were mistaken about the essay this appeared in, but then you quote one sentence that doesn’t mention revolutions, either at home or abroad.

To SR:
First of all, Bradford does write extensively about Lincoln’s natural rights ideology (back to “The Heresy of Equality"), whose arguments are consistent with the statement that I quoted. 
Second, when Bradford associates gnosticism (radical immanentism) with “promises” impossible to keep, it is not a leap to assume that he sees Abe as a revolutionary in every sphere, unless one is a complete literalist devoid of hermeneutical sense.  But yes, I am sorry that I referred to the wrong article originally (my memory conflated the two Modern Age essays); I hope that didn’t offend you too much.

@Stan

Your cheap, cretinous and xenophobic remark is not appreciated in what has hitherto been an adult discussion.  If you have a valid argument which you want to discuss with Dr. Havers (who, incidentally, probably knows more about your country than you do) then please, by all means, contribute.  If not,kindly refrain from these adolescent outbursts of resentement.

I hope that didn’t offend you too much.

Of course not; not only am I generally thick-skinned, I also don’t take philosophical and historical debates as personal attacks.  Perhaps if others felt the same way, we could maintain a more civil tone.

First of all, Bradford does write extensively about Lincoln’s natural rights ideology (back to “The Heresy of Equality"), whose arguments are consistent with the statement that I quoted.

Ah, good!  Perhaps then you could provide us with a quotation from “The Heresy of Equality” that expands upon the one sentence you offered from the other essay?  One that, perhaps, requires no interpretation?

Just to clarify: I mean, of course, a quotation in which Bradford declares that Lincoln is a booster of global democracy, not simply that Lincoln employed abstract, universalist rhetoric (which point you’ve already conceded, above).

To SR:
Why do you dislike interpretation? (Is this too Straussian?) Anyway, the “Heresy” paper is consistent with the “Gnosticism” quote.  I wrote “consistent,” not “identical.” What I mean is that in both papers MB emphasized the revolutionary nature of Abe and his legacy. On p. 75 of “Heresy,” Bradford writes that this legacy will inspire people “to push against the given and providential frame of things.” This very Voegelinian phrase suggests revolution.  In the Heresy paper, MB was totally concerned with the effects of equality on the founding.  In “Gnosticism” he refers to the revolutionary effects of Lincoln on foreign affairs.  Again, one can spy the connection between MB’s critique of equality and his fear that L sought to universalize it around the world, with promises impossible to keep.

I don’t think I conceded anything.  Just because MB never used the term “global democracy” doesn’t mean that he meant something else when he referred to promises impossible to keep in foreign affairs.  Once again, what else could he have meant?  You still haven’t offered your hermeneutic.

You wrote:

I don’t think I conceded anything.

In response to my remark:

not simply that Lincoln employed abstract, universalist rhetoric (which point you’ve already conceded, above).

In which I was referring to this remark of yours:

I am not denying that Lincoln used abstract universalistic rhetoric

Not to anything you wrote about Mel Bradford.

As for me “still” not having offered my “hermeneutic,” I am afraid that you are correct: In the brief period since you wrote this, I haven’t gone home, retrieved the issue of Modern Age from my library, reread the article, thought it through, and commented.  Sorry to disappoint.

Turns out that ISI has the article in PDF form on their website: <http://www.mmisi.org/ma/23_01/bradford.pdf>.  Here’s the quotation Dr. Havers offered in context:

But the final Lincoln is the worst. For by him the real is defined in terms of what is yet to come, and the meaning of the present lies only in its pointing thither. This posture, when linked to one of the regnant abstractions of modern politics, can have no other result than a totalitarian order. In its train it has left us, as a nation, with a series of almost insoluble problems in our social, economic, and political policy, to say nothing of our foreign affairs: with a series of promises impossible to keep.

Without reproducing everything that Bradford wrote in the article, the “final Lincoln” that he mentions is the Lincoln who employed “the technique of sorting out or discerning the providences after the fact.” As Bradford writes, “In the months preceding the Emancipation Proclamation, and again at the very end of the War Between the States, Lincoln’s faith that he was able to perform this prophetic, teleological task took hold of his mind.”

That’s why Bradford says that, for the “final Lincoln,” “the real is defined in terms of what is yet to come, and the meaning of the present lies only in its pointing thither.” In the next sentence, Bradford uses the phrase “This posture” to refer to this teleological view, and, in the sentence that Dr. Havers quoted, the pronoun it ("its train,” “it has left us") refers back to the subject of the previous sentence ("This posture").

So it is “This posture” (the teleological view) that “has left us, as a nation, with a series of almost insoluble problems in our social, economic, and political policy, to say nothing of our foreign affairs: with a series of promises impossible to keep.”

Does that mean that Lincoln delivered all of those “promises” that are “impossible to keep”?  In other words, does the mention of “promises impossible to keep” after “foreign affairs” mean that Bradford is saying that Lincoln was a proponent of global democracy?

No.  Bradford attributes to Lincoln simply a “posture” (the “teleological view") that, “when linked to one of the regnant abstractions of modern politics, can have no other result than a totalitarian order.” Such “regnant abstractions of modern democracy” might well include “global democracy.”

But that takes us to the crux of the matter: Who does the linking?  Bradford, contra Havers, in not suggesting that Lincoln himself is directly responsible for each item in the “series of almost insoluble problems in our social, economic, and political policy, to say nothing of our foreign affairs.” Rather, he is saying that those who, following Lincoln, adopt “This posture” have created these problems.

Does this posture, when linked to that regnant abstraction of modern politics known as global democracy, cause “almost insoluble problems in . . . foreign affairs”?  Certainly.  One need only recognize that George W. Bush has adopted a similar posture regarding the “War on Terror” and the war in Iraq to recognize the truth of this statement.

Does that mean that Abraham Lincoln was a “global democrat”?  No.  But now, having examined the quotation in context, we can see that Bradford is making no such claim.

Searching for middle ground on which the non-iconoclast might stand . . .

I’m not at all convinced by Havers’ portrayal of Bradford as simply accepting Jaffa’s grid. He appears to be overreaching, as Mr. Richert complains, to stretch the value of an otherwise valid point--that even paleos might more intelligently contest the ground on which Lincoln stands. Still, I think it’s worth considering whether Bradford makes Lincoln into too much of a revolutionary, or DiLorenzo into too much of a dictator. To that extent I appreciate Havers’ remarks. Otherwise, I’m probably not alone among those who have hung on this long in thinking that this skirmish has lost whatever charm it might once have had.

To SR:
I doubt in the extreme that Bradford thought that the users of Lincoln’s legacy and image were more culpable than Lincoln himself for modern excesses (that is my view).  Remember:  MB calls AL a “gnostic”, not just his followers.  That is perfectly clear from his work.  He blames AL for setting up a “political religion” which promises all manner of things, domestic and foreign.  Sorry, SR, but paleos pick and choose their history just as much as neos. And once again, you still haven’t explained what “foreign affairs” refer to in this passage, if not egalitarian democracy-building.

And once again, you still haven’t explained what “foreign affairs” refer to in this passage, if not egalitarian democracy-building.

I didn’t say that it didn’t refer to global democracy; in fact, I explicitly stated that it might.  Instead, I pointed out that the line, taken in context, does not mean what you said it means: that Bradford believes that Lincoln is a global democrat.  Rather, Lincoln’s “posture” (which is indeed his legacy to American politics) combined with the “regnant abstractions of modern democracy” ("regnant" meaning reigning--i.e., at the time Bradford is writing) has led to “almost insoluble problems,” including in “foreign affairs.”

Bradford’s argument is perfectly clear.

I have to agree with Evan, however.  This discussion is no longer particularly fruitful (if it ever was), and your demeanor has made it far from pleasant.  So I’ll let you have the last word.

Make it a good one, please.

As one who has “been there and done that,” Mr. Richert, your tone is none the best either.  Rather
smug, in fact.

Good night and good luck.

First, Lincoln did not have any Constitutional mandate to “save the Union”.  Because it does not exist, this mandate was invented in Lincoln’s mind due to the extreme pressure from the Northern Industrialists to not lose Southern wealth.  At that point in time, there was more wealth in the Southern states than in the Northern states, and this is what constantly supported 75% to 90% of the U.S. Treasury income.  Secondly, we know that Lincoln had either bi-polar disorder or perhaps, manic-depressive syndrome.  Either of these would have influenced his perceptions of reality and ALL events in which he was involved, distorting all of them to some degree in his mind. Thus, Lincoln always was outside a pure picture of understanding of reality, and his decisions were made from this perspective.