The Deification of Lincoln (and of the American State)

Via Billy

 

“The violence of the criticism aimed at Lincoln by the great men of his time on both sides of the Mason-Dixon line is startling.  The breadth and depth of the spectacular prejudice against him is often shocking for its cruelty, intensity, and unrelenting vigor.  The plain truth is that Mr. Lincoln was deeply reviled by many who knew him personally, and by hundreds of thousands who only knew of him.”
–Larry Tagg, The Unpopular Mr. Lincoln: America’s Most Reviled President

In his book, The Unpopular Mr. Lincoln, historian Larry Tagg, a native of Lincoln, Illinois, constructs a powerful case that Abraham Lincoln was by far the most hated and reviled of all American presidents, North and South, during his lifetime.  For example, in May of 1864 the New York Times labeled Lincoln “a perjurer, a usurper, a tyrant, a subverter of the Constitution, a destroyer of the liberties of this country, a reckless desperado, a heartless trifler . . .  there is no circle in Dante’s Inferno full enough of torment to expiate his iniquities.”

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