Tom DiLorenzo on Abraham Lincoln, US Authoritarianism and Manipulated History
Thomas DiLorenzo: As a libertarian, I saw it as my duty to spread the truth about what a horrific tyrant Lincoln was, with his illegal suspension of Habeas Corpus and the imprisonment of tens of thousands of political dissenters in the North; his shutting down of over 300 opposition newspapers; his deportation of the leader of the congressional opposition, Democratic Congressman Clement Vallandigham of Ohio; and his purposeful waging of total war on civilians. He destroyed the voluntary union of the founding fathers and destroyed the system of federalism that was the hallmark of the original constitution by using military force to "prove" that nullification and secession were illegal. Might makes right. Unlike England, Spain, France, Denmark, Holland, Sweden, and other countries that ended slavery peacefully in the nineteenth century, Lincoln used the slaves as political pawns in a war that both he and the U.S. Congress declared to the world in 1861 was being waged for one reason only: to "save the union." But as I said, he really destroyed the voluntary union of the founders.
The issue that threatened the union was slavery. So i think "saving the union" and slavery go hand in hand. I agree that Lincoln violated individual liberties, but I'm not sure how else slavery would have been abolished. It was much more deeply established in the US South than in Europe. Without war, slavery might have persisted for decades, into the 20th century.
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