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GETTYSBURG, Pa. -- Abraham Lincoln photos are rare -- especially those from the day of the Gettysburg Address. For years, only one such photo was thought to exist, but now that may not be the case.
Well it certainly looks like a picture of a very tall man with beard and a tall stovepipe hat so it could be as these details are unusual. It is quite an exciting discovery but why did it take so long for them to notice that ?
This seems like a good place to discuss President Lincoln. The thread about USA Today's rankings notes (buildings_and_bridges) that Lincoln's reputation has taken a hit lately, and the online poll rates Lincoln as the 5th Worst President.
This is not what I learned in school; for example, Wikipedia ranks Lincoln as the Best President.
I think that Lincoln's reputation is being sullied today by the same types of people who attacked him back then with slurs like: "shambling ape" and "Honest Ape" (Chimpy?).
In other words, it's George Bush's fault.
Why would people do this? Because of actions Lincoln took to preserve the Union, like this:
Lincoln arrested, denied Habeus Corpus, tried by military tribunal, and then exiled anti-war 'Peace Democrat' Clement Vallandingham to the South. Vallandingham was a (former) Congressman from Ohio who said 'King Lincoln' should be removed from office. He wrote the "peace plank" of the 1864 Democratic Party platform declaring the War a failure and demanding an immediate end to the War.
This seems like a good place to discuss President Lincoln. The thread about USA Today's rankings notes (buildings_and_bridges) that Lincoln's reputation has taken a hit lately, and the online poll rates Lincoln as the 5th Worst President.
This is not what I learned in school; for example, Wikipedia ranks Lincoln as the Best President.
I think that Lincoln's reputation is being sullied today by the same types of people who attacked him back then with slurs like: "shambling ape" and "Honest Ape" (Chimpy?).
In other words, it's George Bush's fault.
Why would people do this? Because of actions Lincoln took to preserve the Union, like this:
Lincoln arrested, denied Habeus Corpus, tried by military tribunal, and then exiled anti-war 'Peace Democrat' Clement Vallandingham to the South. Vallandingham was a (former) Congressman from Ohio who said 'King Lincoln' should be removed from office. He wrote the "peace plank" of the 1864 Democratic Party platform declaring the War a failure and demanding an immediate end to the War.
If you do a search of "Lincoln worst President" you actually find very few comments to that effect. You get a number of hits, but most of them don't actually say that Lincoln was the worst President, but rather are web pages claiming that Bush is, and the Lincoln refence is elsewhere on the webpage. I did find a couple though that did specifically make the claim that Lincoln was the worst President (admittedly I didn't look at every hit, but I did look at quite a few). Of the ones that I saw making the claim that Lincoln was the worst President, only 2 really stand out as "real" articles - the rest seem to be generally opinion posts on message boards.
Here's the 2 "real" articles I found:
This one by a conservative writer, claims Lincoln was the 2nd worst President:
And this one (that's for the "Southern Party of Georgia" - prominantly features the "stars and bars" in it's title (so no surprise they dislike Licoln):
There are probably others out there, but I really didn't find much criticising Lincoln.
Where is the original post you mention? I'd be interesting in taking a look at it. Have to say that I find hard to believe that many folks would rate Lincoln poorly.
LordBalfor - good to see you. I was shocked myself to see Pres. Lincoln ranked 5th Worst, but it's an online poll so no big deal. Note that your ERS article actually lists Pres. Andrew Johnson as 2nd worst.
For example, FoxNews' Judge Napolitano's book 'The Constitution in Exile' discusses some of Pres. Lincoln's abuses of power (saw him on C-SPAN talking about it - BTW Napolitano incorrectly identified Vallandingham as a Republican).
LordBalfor - good to see you. I was shocked myself to see Pres. Lincoln ranked 5th Worst, but it's an online poll so no big deal. Note that your ERS article actually lists Pres. Andrew Johnson as 2nd worst.
For example, FoxNews' Judge Napolitano's book 'The Constitution in Exile' discusses some of Pres. Lincoln's abuses of power (saw him on C-SPAN talking about it - BTW Napolitano incorrectly identified Vallandingham as a Republican).
LordBalfor - you're looking at the USA Today historian's rankings; scroll down to 'Now It's Your Turn' then 'View Results Without Voting'. Lincoln still #5 worst.
LordBalfor - you're looking at the USA Today historian's rankings; scroll down to 'Now It's Your Turn' then 'View Results Without Voting'. Lincoln still #5 worst.
Ah, OK, I see it now.
I tried to vote just as an experiment to see what percentage a single vote against an unselected President (Grover Cleveland) achieved. After my vote it still showed him at 0%. So, I don't know if:
A) It is no longer accepting votes
B) The number of participants is so large that my single vote made no statistical difference
C) The website is honked up.
In any event, like you I really have difficulty believing that even 14% of Americans have such a low rating of Lincoln. Something is just not right with this. Either that or there are a lot more of the "The South Will Rise Again" type folks out there than I expect (that would be a scary thought).
The historian polls are what actually matters. Open internet polls are of the "One Moron, One vote" variety.
If you put Hitler and Dick Cheney on the list of choices....they'd probably be getting tons of votes as "worst US president" (I wish I were joking)
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