From: James Rogers (jamesr@best.com)
Date: Tue Jun 01 1999 - 00:56:01 MDT
At 03:37 PM 6/1/99 +0000, Damien Broderick wrote:
>At 09:57 PM 20/05/99 +0200, den Otter sig'd
>
>>"What I would most desire would be the separation of the white and black
>races."
>>(Spoken at Springfield, Illinois on July 17th, 1858; from Abraham Lincoln:
>Complete
>>Works, 1894, Vol. 1, page 273).
>
>I waited a while to see if a few people immediately and forthrightly
>expressed their revulsion at this kind of sly, evil trolling. I paused
>before doing so myself because I'm probably pegged by many here as some
>kind of censorious holier-than-thou meddler. Still, I have in mind the
>dictum about evil prevailing when good men and women do nothing...
Actually, I think you misread the intent of the quote. This particular
quote is often used as an ironic example of historical revisionism or
perhaps cultural license. American cultural mythology paints Abraham
Lincoln as a man whose great ambition was to end slavery and racism. In
fact, he had no particular interest in these issues and only freed the
slaves when it was to his political benefit. The only racism implied would
be that of Lincoln.
-James Rogers
jamesr@best.com
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