Would Lincoln Survive Modern Politics?

As local politicians who won the election in 2019 have been sworn in and the dust over Manitou Arts Culture and Heritage vote has begun to settle and the mud has dried to dirt, life is pretty much returning to normal, up to a point. Now the biggest issue is the upcoming presidential election and the Impeachment debate for President Donald Trump. I have been following the recent Democratic debates on television and am amazed at how much in-fighting there is within the Democratic party as the debates get heated.

As mud flies from one end of the country to the other as politicians take to the air waves on a daily basis to trash their opponents, I reflect back on one of my favorite political and historical figures, Abraham Lincoln. I really admire Lincoln and what he did to keep everything together in the midst of what was, arguably, the most tumultuous time in our nation's history. Author Steve Berry in his book The Lincoln Myth, pointed out that, according to Utah Senator Thaddeus Rowan, “Lincoln fought the Civil War not to preserve an indivisible union. Instead he fought that war to create one, conning the nation that the union was somehow perpetual.” Berry sums it up to say that Lincoln actually created a union where one had not previously existed. That is something I had never considered before and he was correct in that statement. I admire Lincoln as one of my favorite presidents and he remains at the top of the list for many people when they list their favorite historical figures. I do wonder, though, if Lincoln would cut it in the political arena of the 21st Century.

Growing up in Washington, D.C., I always found inspiration at the feet of the Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall and always took time to reflect on the man and his legacy, reflected not only in the imposing statue of Lincoln in his chair designed by Chester French, but in the quotes from his speeches along the walls. The reflecting pool reflects the greatest image contributed to his legacy.

In the movie, "The American President," President Andrew Shepherd, played by Martin Sheen, said, "If there had been a TV in every living room sixty years ago, this country does not elect a man in a wheelchair." As true as that may be, Roosevelt won an unprecedented four terms as President of the United States. Seeing how the media treats candidates every four years and how politicians treat each other more often than that, how would we, as a nation, treat Abraham Lincoln today? Possible headlines: "One-Term Illinois Congressman and Failed Senate Candidate Runs for the White House." "Image Problems Beset Lincoln Campaign." "Is Abe Too Ugly To Be President?"

We are accustomed to thinking of our 16th president in Olympian terms - a stately figure in frock coat and a stovepipe hat, a frontier Demosthenes, fatherly and wise. I have been a fan of him for years and used to picture him this way myself. I have read many books about him throughout the years.

And yet, most firsthand accounts emphasize his homeliness. He had a piercing, high-pitched voice. Washington society thought him vulgar and scorned his cracker-barrel humor. One biographer says he was easily our most-hated president. That was before Trump, of course, who has now replaced Lincoln in that category. One influential newspaper of the day called him an "awful, woeful ass."

One member of his cabinet said, "he lacks will and purpose, and I greatly fear he has the power to command." Radical Republicans loathed him. Moderates mistrusted him. The Democrats viewed Lincoln as a would-be Caesar. Sounds a lot like the way Trump is viewed in our increasingly divided and polarized country.

The man who is consistently rated as one of our greatest presidents in surveys of historians was a dark-horse candidate in 1860. Republicans balked at re-nominating him four years later. Despite doing everything in his power to encourage soldiers to cast their ballots in the field (one observer said Lincoln would have personally collected their votes in a carpetbag if he could) he was re-elected with only 55 percent of the vote. It is odd that Lincoln is a liberal hero. He suspended the writ of Habeas Corpus, imprisoned dissidents, suppressed newspapers and threatened to arrest judges who used the writ to interfere with the draft. Devotion to civil liberties was not the primary concern of his administration. Many of the exact same things many modern day presidents have done during their terms.

Yet, Lincoln was the indispensable man for a crisis that almost cost us the republic. The Confederacy won most of the battles. After three bloody years, a nation of 20 million had failed to subdue a region of five million.

Agitation for a negotiated peace was rife. There were draft riots in Northern cities and a secessionist movement in the Midwest. England and France came close to intervening, as they themselves had pulled through and were recovering from their own civil wars and uprisings.

It was Lincoln's persistence and leadership that gave us a new birth of freedom. Following a speech that lasted over an hour at a ceremony - where he was not even the keynote speaker - in 272 words at the dedication of a small cemetery in the quiet eastern Pennsylvania mountain town of Gettysburg, he told the nation why its suffering was necessary and fortified it for the struggles ahead.

He had one overriding purpose: To save the Union. Although many historians, as mentioned above, disagree by stating that he ultimately created something that had not existed up to that time. Much as he detested slavery, he would have allowed the South to maintain its peculiar institution if it could be reconciled in this way. Lincoln believed that if slavery was excluded from the national territories it would die on its own.

But, he would not compromise on national unity. A New York merchant urged the president-elect to appease secessionists, saying it was up to Lincoln, "whether the grass should grow in the streets of our commercial cities."

Lincoln coolly replied that he preferred grass to grow in the fields, but would uphold the union, "let the grass grow where it may."

As a young man, Lincoln was somewhat of a skeptic. As the war progressed, he came to view the conflict as Divine punishment on both the North - for remaining passive about slavery in the first place - and the South - for allowing it to remain within their territory. "God wills this contest and wills that it should not end yet...He permits (the conflict) for some wise purpose of His own, unknown and mysterious to us."

When an old friend found him reading the Bible in the White House, he commented that, unlike Lincoln, he was still a skeptic. "You are wrong, Speed," the man of sorrows replied, "take all of this book on reason that you can and the balance on faith, and you will live and die a happier and a better man." Speed is a reference to his closest friend in Springfield, Joshua Fry Speed, a partner in the general store Lincoln owned. Later, Speed was a farmer and real estate investor in Kentucky and a one-term member of Kentucky House of Representatives, elected in 1848.

In 1864, Methodist Bishop Gilbert Haven declared it was the duty of Christians to "march to the ballot box...with the banners of the cross" and deposit their votes for the Great Emancipator. In those days, we were not so fastidious about separating politics and religion.

Our times are equally troubled. Not the smoke of war, but a moral darkness covers the land. Our casualties are scattered over the battlefields of the culture. Whether it is equal rights for blacks, women, Asians, Europeans, Native Americans, rich, poor, Democrat, Republican, or whatever else. We too, must decide if a nation so conceived and so dedicated can endure.

On Lincoln's death, Secretary of War Edwin Stanton proclaimed, "Now he belongs to the ages." He belongs to all of us who cherish the nation he so loved and dedicated his life and, ultimately, his last breath, to preserving. He also belongs to all of us who can draw inspiration from his example.