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We should never make a saint of Abraham Lincoln. He was singularly responsible for engaging the nation in a war that inflicted more destruction and death than any in our history. And while he is credited with freeing America's slaves, he came to that position (as a matter of political expediency) late in his presidency, and to my knowledge never renounced his own racist statements such as the following:
"Our republican system was meant for a homogeneous people. As long as blacks continue to live with the whites they constitute a threat to the national life. Family life may also collapse and the increase of mixed breed bastards may some day challenge the supremacy of the white man." (1)
But in a time of increasingly divisive, destructive and deceit-filled rhetoric, it's helpful to reflect on some of the many positive statements by America's first Republican president, as follows:
“Do I not destroy my enemies when I make them my friends?”
“I am not bound to win, but I am bound to be true. I am not bound to succeed, but I am bound to live up to what light I have.”
"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 (2) get control, it will read 'all men are created equal, except negroes, and foreigners, and Catholics.' When it comes to this I should 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 money power preys on the nation in times of peace, and conspires against it in times of adversity. It is more despotic than monarchy, more insolent than autocracy, more selfish than bureaucracy. It denounces, as public enemies, all who question its methods or throw light upon its crimes."
"They are the two principles that have stood face to face from the beginning of time; and will ever continue to struggle. The one is the common right of humanity and the other the divine right of kings. It is the same principle in whatever shape it develops itself. It is the same spirit that says, 'You work and toil and earn bread, and I'll eat it.' No matter in what shape it comes, whether from the mouth of a king who seeks to bestride the people of his own nation and live by the fruit of their labor, or from one race of men as an apology for enslaving another race, it is the same tyrannical principle."
"My concern is not whether God is on our side; my greatest concern is to be on God's side.”
“Gentlemen, I depended on this witness to clear my client. He has lied. I ask that no attention be paid to his testimony. Let his words be stricken out. if my case fails. I do not wish to win in this way.”
"With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan—to do all which may achieve and cherish, a just and a lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations."
(1) One of numerous racist quotes by Lincoln.
(2) The American Party, popularly known as the "No-Nothing Party," was an anti-immigrant and anti-Catholic political movement.
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