Would Abraham Lincoln be a Democrat or a Republican ?

[kentuck]

If he were here today? Watching Barack Obama giving his speech before the Lincoln Monument today, one could not help but think of the Emancipation Proclamation and the fulfillment of the dream of Abraham Lincoln. As he looked upon the first African-American to be elected President, would he not have been proud? Would he have not admitted that this was the political Party to which he belonged -not the Republican Party? George W Bush lost nearly everything for his Party in the eight years of his tragic Presidency. Now it appears that he has lost Abraham Lincoln, also?

[Idealism]

1. Democrat for sure.

The GOP gave up all claims to "The Party of Lincoln" when they initiated the Southern Strategy, bringing overt racism into politics to levels unseen before.

Edit for numerous typos :(

[Critters2]

3. This is absolutely right. With the Southern Strategy, the GOP gave up all claims

on being "the Party of Lincoln".

[AZBlue]

2. No Republican today would be for emancipation.

Shows you just how far the GOP has fallen.

[FarCenter]

5. The Republicans would be for emancipation if it gave them power and money

You underestimate them.

[RoyGBiv]

9. This is exactly correct ...

And this is the reason a great number of Republicans in the 1850s/60s were anti-slavery.

The free-soilers, who formed a large core of the Republican party of the day, were by and large seething racists while at the same time being anti-slavery.

[Thothmes]

28. No Democrat today would support

military arrest and detention of state legislaters. No Democrat today would suspend Habas Corpus without congressional action. No Democrat today would conside allowing slavery to continue if the states that left the Union would return. Abraham Lincoln supported these measures.

[Lint Head]

4. History proves that he would be a Democrat.

That is what is taught in American History classes. The politcal planks, the entire ideology has flipped since the 1860's.
:dem:

[RoyGBiv]

6. Moderate Republican ...

Lincoln was a Clay Whig, i.e. The American System, which forms the core of the Republican pro-business stance.

[MaraJade]

7. Lincoln was actually

a Republican. They weren't always as bad or as nasty as they are now.

Another one of my favorite Presidents was a Republican--Dwight Eisenhower. It was Eisenhower who signed
Civil Rights Legislation in 1957, and it was Eisenhower who was so shocked by the nastiness in Little Rock
that he sent over 1000 Army Paratroopers to establish order there and he federalized the Arkansas National Guard
to guarantee the safety of black students at Central High.

Not all Republicans are bad. There are great people, people of integrity and conscience in BOTH parties.

This is what makes America GREAT!

[tkmorris]

14. Eisenhower is the last decent Republican I am aware of

And he became president over 50 years ago. That's not such a good record is it?

We all know Lincoln WAS a Republican. The point is, would he be one today? I rather doubt it myself.

[kentuck]

15. Last one that I remember also...

But I've read that Theordore Roosevelt was a pretty good Republican also. But he left the Republican Party and ran for the Bull Moose Party, is that not correct?

[tkmorris]

22. I'm pretty sure he created the Bull Moose Party

Teddy was supposedly pretty Liberal for a Republican, being a bit suspicious of big business and being a union supporter. IIRC he wanted to run in 1912 but Taft got the nomination, so he ran as a third party candidate (just checked, that is approximately correct). I also just saw a snippet saying that he was the first President to openly support universal health care. I did not know that one, interesting if true.

[AZ Criminal JD]

24. Where is your link that Teddy Roosevelt supported health care?

Or Unions?

[Lex]

8. GOP sold its soul to the racists for the 'Southern Strategy'. Lincoln would be a Dem.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_strategy

[Thothmes]

29. Those racists voted solid Democrat from the 1870 through

the 1960s. These were the Democrats that FDR relied upon to support his new deal. And they Did.

[Greyhound]

10. You're kidding, right? He would be in the party that none of us have heard of

or at least a Green.

Historically, and with only a couple of exceptions, the Democratic Party has been the party that defends the status quo... he doesn't fit in there.

The republik party of today represents nothing but theo-capitalistic authoritarians that only appeal to those afraid of losing the dominance they imagine but never had... he certainly doesn't fit there.

So he would have to be elsewhere, or more likely, would never get anywhere near public office, he is nobody from nowhere and didn't even go to a good school, c'mon.

[RoyGBiv]

11. Defends the Status Quo?

What?

Explain that comment, please.

[Greyhound]

30. Sure look at the history of the party and what they brought us.

I don't know how much detail you want to go through, but since about 1830 the Democratic Party has stood with money and power over the foundational principles of individual liberty and citizen's priority over concentrated power.

It was the proto-Democratic Party that advocated pushing the Native Americans out of their lands and stealing them. They favored the Mexican-American war. Lost the election of 1848 because the equivalent of the NewBlueThirdDCL faction favored slavery, split the party (forming what would become the republican Party in the process), and pushed through the Missouri Compromise and that of 1850. Oversaw and endorsed the disenfranchisement of the newly freed slaves, again favoring the parasite class over the "rabble".

The theft of land through "imminent domain" for the railroads, the Bourbon Democrats, laissez-faire capitalism, and on and on. It can even be reasonably argued that FDR, more than fixing the economy, preserved the system that inherently favors the parasite class.

I'm not saying that we totally suck and have never done any good, but the Party has consistently backed the people and systems that prevent us from realizing our potential.

[lurky]

12. He was a liberal.

He was not as enlightened as the "Radical Republicans", but his views were considered liberal by the standards of the day. (pretty poor standards, I know, but still...)

[kentuck]

13. From some quotes of his about capitalism and corporations...

I might have mistaken him for a Socialist...

[leftstreet]

16. LOL I was just going to post that he'd probably be a Socialist

Certainly by today's standards.

[Shiver]

27. Have you read the "Southern Victory" series

by Harry Turtledove? Eleven book alternate history where the south wins the civil war (due to the Confederacy recovering Lee's Special Order 191 - which meant there was no Battle of Antietam, and the south was able to win it's independence with the support of England and France.)

Abraham Lincoln is never assassinated, and spends the rest of his life traveling the country, giving speeches on worker's rights, Karl Marx, socialism, etc. He tries to get the Republican party to adopt the ideas, but the refuse; Abe leaves the Republicans (who never have another President, and essentially become regional Midwestern) and goes on to form the Socialist party. The two political parties are thus, the (conservative) Democrats, and the Socialist - the Whigs rule the South, until the Freedom Party (Nazis) take over.

It's a really good series, if you ask me. Abe himself is a central character in the first book, How Few Remain (which also stars Frederick Douglas, Samuel Clemens, and George Armstrong Custer) while the other ten books take place during the world wars, fought mainly between the North and the South.

[tritsofme]

17. Its an invalid question.

Would Thomas Jefferson ever support such a huge central government?

Of course not.

You just really can't make such comparisons with hundreds of years of separation.

[JackRiddler]

18. You realize you're talking about the most successful third-party leader in US history?!

So if you're going to talk about impossible hypotheticals, you should acknowledge that there are more than two possibilities, no?

[kentuck]

19. Yeah... I think he would be a Democratic Socialist...

He and Bernie would be great friends... Of course, that is just my opinion. :-)

[JackRiddler]

20. Sorry, no opinions allowed...

When you're thinking about Abraham Lincoln with beard and stovepipe hat traveling through time or rising from the dead and running for office today, then you are required to stick to the FACTS, okay?

;)

[kentuck]

21. No. He wouldn't be wearing a stovepipe hat...

He would be wearing a Kentucky baseball cap and would be a big basketball fan. Hmmmm...Come to think of it....never mind.

The "facts", huh??

[JackRiddler]

23. Yes, the FACTS.

They're all that matters when dealing with laughably impossible scenarios that cannot possibly make sense, no?

For example, it is an objective fact, established by science, that Lincoln would fight alongside Captain Kirk.

[Sanctified]

25. A republican, the emancipation proclamation was purely political and only applied to States

that were trying to secede from the Union.

[comtec]

26. Yes, he was hardly for equal rights...

This has been posted before, but it bears repeating.
We all have this image of "honest Abe" fighting to stop bigotry and free the slaves, to move them on the road towards equality!

bull

shit


I'm sorry, I really am, and for his DAY he WAS a "flaming liberal", but he was hardly what people want to equate him with.

While he might agree to be talked into understanding and accepting our modern anti-discrimination laws (which has a way to go towards gays, sadly) he would have been horrified by Obama, I'm sorry to say.

He had said openly he did not believe African Americans (mind you that's a very new term) were "equal" to 'whites'.

The reason he emancipated the slaves was to piss off the south. It was a show of power.

He would have gladly kept slavery a south-only thing to this day if it had not been for other issues.
He would have danced on the rights of human beings NOT to be slaves if it would have kept the union together and prevented the war.

actually... thankfully, it didn't work. The south succeeded, and the very beginning of civil rights began with that forced issue abolition.

Perhaps he would have considered an early form of equal rights had he not been assassinated. Who knows.

Point being he was a flawed man by modern terms, like all great men, however he was VERY forward thinking for his time.
We need to accept his deep flaws, and understand them in the context we find them.
Yes he was a great man, who did great things. his plan of paying a war pension to ALL soldiers of BOTH sides was a brilliant way to make peace with the south.
His tactical decision to free the slaves was brilliant because it brought us that one necessary step closer to "...all men are created equal by their creator..." being true.

He did great things, some for the right reason, some for teh wrong, but great none the less. THAT is how he should be remembered... honestly.