Journal #32 Abraham Lincoln: Better Late Than Never!

QUOTE:

“Fondly do we hope - fervently do we pray - that this mighty scourge of war my speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue, until all the wealth piled by the bond-man’s two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash, shall be paid by another drawn with the sword” (Lincoln 1636).


SUMMARY:

Lincoln seems to be saying that the Civil War was necessary to pay back God for all of the innocent lives that were so horribly destroyed by slavery.


RESPONSE:

After reading Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address, I feel much better about the man Lincoln becomes. He may have started out indifferent to the issue of slavery, but by this quote in his speech, Lincoln even understands how many people were wrongly enslaved, treated horribly, and beaten. I know it took him a little time to fully change his view of slavery, but better late than never! I also love how he isn’t saying that only the South should have been punished. It seems to me that Lincoln is saying that the North was also punished for letting slavery continue for so long.

It’s so funny how reading this speech makes me SO glad that the North won the Civil War, well maybe not funny, but it makes me realize that there could have been a different outcome! If the South won, Lincoln said every state would have had to become a slave state! I’m not really sure how that would have ever worked; just because so many Africans were already living free in the North. I also think that the people in the North would have felt really horrible if they had to capture all of the free African Americans as slaves.

Maybe Lincoln didn't really mean it when he said, “It will become all one thing, or all the other” (Lincoln 1629). Because if he meant that the whole North would have had to change to slave states as well if the South won the Civil War, I really don’t think that would have worked. I think that would have been a lot harder to change, because so many people were so passionate against slavery.