Stanton and the Deification of “Father Abraham”

by Al Benson Jr.

Member, Board of Directors, Confederate Society of America

On December 4th Professor Thomas DiLorenzo, a noted Lincoln scholar, had some commentary published on http://www.lewrockwell.com about people comparing the popularity of Donald Trump with that of Abraham Lincoln. He noted an opinion poll that found that Trump was a better president than Lincoln was, according to 53% of the Republicans polled.

Professor DiLorenzo observed: “The Lincoln cult–especially the neocon/”Straussian” wing–must be tearing its collective hair out over this affront to their ‘Father Abraham’ (the official title bestowed upon the sixteenth president by the late Harry Jaffa and his fellow cultists). But, lo and behold, the news is even worse.”

Dr. DiLorenzo then went on to explain to us how really reviled and unpopular Lincoln was in his own day. He noted that: “Lincoln has the advantage of more than 150 years of deification through government propaganda, hundreds of false histories about him written by court historians like Jaffa, and the statist lapdog ‘popular culture’  with such propaganda films as Steven Spielberg’s ‘Lincoln.'” However, all this manufactured adoration has taken place since his demise and the deification of Lincoln has become a gigantic cottage industry that has made lots of money for those willing to  prostitute themselves telling us what a really grand fellow Mr. Lincoln was. Some who partake of this foolishness may actually believe the stuff they write. I am willing to wager that others, knowing the real truth, choose to ignore it because they have read the handwriting on the wall–and, for them, that handwriting consists of dollar signs.

In his article Professor DiLorenzo notes a book by a Larry Tagg, The Unpopular Mr. Lincoln: The Story of America’s Most Reviled President. He notes how even the Northern press had major problems with Lincoln. And well they should. He shut down all kinds of Northern newspapers that would not say to the public what he wanted said, and jailed their owners and editors, along with all manner of political prisoners.

Dr. DiLorenzo has a new book about Lincoln coming out next June, something to look forward to. He has already given us such books as The Real Lincoln and Lincoln Unmasked. Both well worth your reading time, and you are guaranteed to learn more about Lincoln than you will ever get out of your school “history” books, most of which are not real history to begin with.

Author Larry Tagg has noted of Lincoln that: “Lincoln was deeply reviled by many who knew him personally, and by hundreds of thousands who only knew of him.” In his day he was condemned as a “bloody tyrant, a dictator,” and a man who was “stretching the rules of the Constitution to allow arbitrary arrests, the suspension of habeas corpus, and the suppression of newspapers.” Tagg observed that there was actually “pervasive cheering and celebrating in the North when Lincoln was assassinated.” I sincerely doubt your “history” books mention any of this.

Professor DiLorenzo has observed, accurately, that “…all the typical American over the age of 35 knows about him is the few slogans that Americans  are all taught in grade school–that he supposedly ‘freed the slaves with a stroke of a pen’ and ‘saved the union,’ both of which are undeniably false. The under-35 population knows even less.”

I contended in an article awhile back that Lincoln was really our first Deep State president. The actions of Edwin Stanton immediately after Lincoln’s death seem to have verified what I said at that time.  Professor DiLorenzo stated that: “Immediately upon his death the Republican Party propaganda machine, led by Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, set about to turn this hated and reviled despot, who had launched an invasion of his own country that led to as many as 850,000 deaths according to the latest research, into a symbol of the ‘virtuous’ American state. He would become the murdered martyr who, like Jesus Christ (so they said at the time) died on Good Friday for the sins of his country, just as Jesus died for the sins of the world.”

And DiLorenzo also noted that “Pastors all over the North, who were part and parcel of the Republican Party machine, began comparing Lincoln to Jesus and Moses. Republican Party thugs  who had vandalized and destroyed Northern state printing presses and newspaper offices that supported the Democratic Party during the war bullied and brutalized those who dared to criticize “Father Abraham” in public. Tagg writes of how a Chicago man was shot and killed in a hotel lobby after saying ‘it served Lincoln right.’ There were dozens of eye witnesses but no arrest was made.” It just wasn’t nice to criticize “Father Abraham.” It could, literally, cost you your life!

DiLorenzo closes by noting that, if the real truth about Lincoln were known in our day, Trump would win any popularity contest with Lincoln “by at lease 99-1.” I can’t argue with his contention. He is right on the money. I still contend that Lincoln was our first Deep State president and that Stanton and others in the Republican Party of that day were Deep State operatives who used Lincoln as long as he was willing to  be used. When it came to a divergence of opinion within the Deep State between Lincoln and Stanton, then Stanton and the Republican Deep State exercised the ultimate solution to all such problems. But they made sure they deified their victim for future use.

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