Current Events > Trump Suggests Abraham Lincoln Should've Let the South Keep a Little Slavery

(+) Yeah! (+)

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/story/trump-suggests-abraham-lincoln-shouldve-let-the-south-keep-a-little-slavery

Just a little slavery, as a treat.

I mean, Lincoln only freed the slaves in the Confederate...

How far down/into the post/video(s) until the "meat and potatoes"???

I'm just drunk and I'm tryna to hear the actual quote here lol

Foppe posted...

I mean, Lincoln only freed the slaves in the Confederate...

Honestly this. Like we all want to stan Lincoln as this anti-racist hero but he was according to his Library a devout racist who literally only freed the slaves in the South because they were the backbone of the Southern economy and he had a war to win.

Topic title seems misleading. Person who wrote article is the one suggesting it based on stupid stuff Trump said

The South did get to keep a little slavery, though.

The thirteenth amendment specifically says slavery is okay if the state does it to prisoners.

Foppe posted...

I mean, Lincoln only freed the slaves in the Confederate...

Wait, what?

Are you saying the North got to keep theirs afterwards?

ROBANN_88 posted...

Wait, what?

Are you saying the North got to keep theirs afterwards?

The border states that remained loyal to the Union did, yes. The initial emancipation proclamation was only for the southern states that rebelled.

Lincoln didn't morally support slavery, but it wasn't high on his list of things to actively go after. He was against it expanding further across the country, and it wasn't until the southern states rebelled after his election win that he made the proclamation to weaken the confederate economy.

So how long did it take before it became a nationwide ban?

I don't get the logic. How is banning slavery gonna do squat if they are actively rebelling?

ROBANN_88 posted...

So how long did it take before it became a nationwide ban?

About 8 months later. But yeah, the big thing history glosses over is..

The south didn't split off because of the emancipation proclamation being made...the proclamation was made because the states split off.

Part of the need to have history be black and white (haha), with obvious good guys and bad guys, instead of digging into the more intricate details.

Sufferedphoenix posted...

I don't get the logic. How is banning slavery gonna do squat if they are actively rebelling?

It was a way to encourage the African-American population to join in the war on the Union side.

Didn't Delaware end slavery first 1901?

I'm all in favour of calling out Trump's bullshit, but that is not at all what he said and this is pretty slanty reporting.

He said Lincoln should have negotiated a settlement with the south rather than force a civil war; while that's an incredibly stupid statement, it's not the same thing as saying he should have let the south keep slavery. A negotiation could have been, "Hey, no more slaves, but we'll send you some grants/tax breaks so that you can get your economy in order. Deal?"

Trump's a dipshit and provides more than enough material to prove he's not fit for office; we don't need to resort to making shit up about him to make that case (the Republicans do enough of that as it is).

Senta posted...

It was a way to encourage the African-American population to join in the war on the Union side.

Other people here where saying to hurt their economy

ROBANN_88 posted...

Are you saying the North got to keep theirs afterwards?

Slavery was already illegal in the North and DC before the war. Recall that there was also an effort to balance free vs slave when creating new states.

darkknight109 posted...

I'm all in favour of calling out Trump's bullshit, but that is not at all what he said and this is pretty slanty reporting.

He said Lincoln should have negotiated a settlement with the south rather than force a civil war; while that's an incredibly stupid statement, it's not the same thing as saying he should have let the south keep slavery. A negotiation could have been, "Hey, no more slaves, but we'll send you some grants/tax breaks so that you can get your economy in order. Deal?"

Trump's a dipshit and provides more than enough material to prove he's not fit for office; we don't need to resort to making shit up about him to make that case (the Republicans do enough of that as it is).

Is it really unreasonable to conclude that the union would have been extremely unlikely to accept any "deal" that includes banning slavery?

Yes, the article is extrapolating a conclusion from Trump's stupid mouth saying stupid shit, but it doesn't seem an unreasonable conclusion.

DodogamaRayBrst posted...

Is it really unreasonable to conclude that the union would have been extremely unlikely to accept any "deal" that includes banning slavery?

I'm assuming you mean the confederacy, not the union.

Anyways, no, which is why I said it was an incredibly stupid statement for him to make on the surface. Trump was doing his usual blather of, "I'm the greatest dealmaker in the history of the universe and everyone listens to me just because". This is the moron who insisted he could solve both the Middle East peace process and the North/South Korea conflict with his magical dealmaker skills, two conflicts that have been raging for over 70 years and which have flummoxed the best negotiators of several generations; expecting Trump to have a rational thought process when it comes to "making deals" is ascribing to him a level of intelligence and reasonableness that he plainly does not possess.

Hence why I say him saying that the union "should have negotiated with" the confederacy is not the same thing as him saying he would have let the south keep slavery.

Again, Trump's dumb enough as it is without people putting words in his mouth.

I suppose it is an outright lie to say he suggested such, but it still seems like the obvious outcome of what he did say.

Middle East conflict only a bit over 70 years. And here I just assumed the modern evolution of conflict dating back to the crusades.

darkknight109 posted...

He said Lincoln should have negotiated a settlement with the south rather than force a civil war; while that's an incredibly stupid statement, it's not the same thing as saying he should have let the south keep slavery. A negotiation could have been, "Hey, no more slaves, but we'll send you some grants/tax breaks so that you can get your economy in order. Deal?"

That claim is about as silly as what the OP claimed he said considering it was the very election of Lincoln that ended up being the final straw.

Senta posted...

It was a way to encourage the African-American population to join in the war on the Union side.

knowledge of the proclamation wes well know in Confederate slave populations who on the approach of the Federal Army often ran away and provided man power boosts (especially to the Union forces) and further chaos in the Southern economic war effort.

My crawl space was used to hide slaves during the Underground Railroad era.

FLAMING_EVIL_HOMER posted...

Topic title seems misleading. Person who wrote article is the one suggesting it based on stupid stuff Trump said

lolol

action52 posted...

The South did get to keep a little slavery, though.

The thirteenth amendment specifically says slavery is okay if the state does it to prisoners.

which is why Mississippi is easily the worst state out of 50

LeTigre posted...

Honestly this. Like we all want to stan Lincoln as this anti-racist hero but he was according to his Library a devout racist who literally only freed the slaves in the South because they were the backbone of the Southern economy and he had a war to win.

Never forget that Lincoln only abolished all slavery after the UK expressed interest in entering the war on the Confederacy's side due to the Trent Affair.

He did! Lincoln ran on no new slave states and not on ending slavery.

Wasn't Lincoln's election schtick saying the South could keep their slaves he just wasn't okay with expanding slavery into the Western territories?

darkknight109 posted...

I'm all in favour of calling out Trump's bullshit, but that is not at all what he said and this is pretty slanty reporting.

He said Lincoln should have negotiated a settlement with the south rather than force a civil war; while that's an incredibly stupid statement, it's not the same thing as saying he should have let the south keep slavery. A negotiation could have been, "Hey, no more slaves, but we'll send you some grants/tax breaks so that you can get your economy in order. Deal?"

That could not have been a negotiation. Even with Lincoln's increased wartime he did not have the authority to end slavery in states that remained in the union. That took a constitutional amendment. Lincoln ran on "no slavery in any US territory and no slavery in any new state." Coming to the table with the way more extreme position of ending slavery put paying them for the slaves is a terrible negotiation tactic. The majority of the South succeeded before his inauguration. The negotiation the south wanted to avoid a war was peaceful terms for the Confederacy to leave the Union, which obviously would have led to the continuation of slavery as the Confederate Constitution wrote in protections for slavery whereas the US constitution aimed to be silent on the issue.

bfslick50 posted...

That could not have been a negotiation.

reincarnator07 posted...

That claim is about as silly as what the OP claimed he said considering it was the very election of Lincoln that ended up being the final straw.

You guys are missing my point. Again, as I mentioned, Trump's statement was really dumb. I'm not arguing that it wasn't. Dude either thinks there was a deal to be had there (there wasn't) or that everyone else is dumb enough to believe him when he says there was.

No, there was never going to be a negotiated settlement between the south and the north. Anyone who has even a cursory understanding of the history and politics at play at the time understands that. My point is that Trump is probably not in that group. He's not exactly "well-read" (and is a fucking moron to boot).

So him saying he thinks Lincoln could have negotiated a peaceful resolution isn't (necessarily) the same as him saying he thinks the south should have gotten to keep slavery in some form, since he's not specifying what terms he thinks this imaginary magic deal would have. Maybe he's thinking that if the north agreed to pay the south enough money, they'd be willing to give up slavery. Yes, in the real-world a deal like that wouldn't work for several reasons, but Trump's dumb enough that he very well could think that it would (or, just as likely, he's talking out his ass to try and paint himself as a legendary peacemaking dealmaker who could have stopped the civil war had he been alive for it).

ROBANN_88 posted...

So how long did it take before it became a nationwide ban?

From google

Mississippi officially abolished slavery on February 7, 2013, when the state ratified the 13th Amendment to the US Constitution. However, Mississippi had previously voted to ratify the amendment in 1995, but failed to notify the U.S. Archivist, making the ratification unofficial

ooger posted...

lolol

I don't know what's funny. Nowhere in link i found shows Trump actually said even anything about keeping slavery until author of the article assumes thats what he is saying. Then TC puts that authors claim as if Trump actually said it.

If i tried to use this topic and tried to convince Trumpers that he said Lincoln should've let the south keep slaver, the first thing they would say is fake news and he never said anything about it.

Alot of racist icels get off to the idea of minorities (especially women of color) being 2nd class citizens again so they can torture and rape them without consequences.

A 2nd Trump presidency will be a living nightmare for women of color. Like legit Slasher film esque.

LeTigre posted...

Honestly this. Like we all want to stan Lincoln as this anti-racist hero but he was according to his Library a devout racist who literally only freed the slaves in the South because they were the backbone of the Southern economy and he had a war to win.

This is a complete misunderstanding of history

BB_mofo posted...

Never forget that Lincoln only abolished all slavery after the UK expressed interest in entering the war on the Confederacy's side due to the Trent Affair.

This is false.

bfslick50 posted...

He did! Lincoln ran on no new slave states and not on ending slavery.

Unknown5uspect posted...

Wasn't Lincoln's election schtick saying the South could keep their slaves he just wasn't okay with expanding slavery into the Western territories?

This is true. Because being openly abolitionist would make him unelectable.

But he was always open that he wanted slaves everywhere to be free and begged states to set them free. He was just aware of the political reality that his allies like Thaddeus Stevens were not.

The thing is "No new slaves and no expanding slavery" meant slavery had a shelf life and the confederates knew that. They wanted to keep slavery around.

The idea that Lincoln was not anti-slavery is a lost cause myth and just demonstrates being too lazy to look at history. It was Lincoln's open oppoisition to slavery that caused the succession crisis after decades of kicking the can down the road in the first place.

FLAMING_EVIL_HOMER posted...

I don't know what's funny. Nowhere in link i found shows Trump actually said even anything about keeping slavery until author of the article assumes thats what he is saying. Then TC puts that authors claim as if Trump actually said it.

If i tried to use this topic and tried to convince Trumpers that he said Lincoln should've let the south keep slaver, the first thing they would say is fake news and he never said anything about it.

Like you said, it is based on what Trump said.

Sorry bud, the GOP is full of awful, conspiratorial, white nationalist weirdo's.

His mind is stuck on the concept of a deal for the sake of a deal.

UnfairRepresent posted...

This is a complete misunderstanding of history

This is false.

This is true. Because being openly abolitionist would make him unelectable.

But he was always open that he wanted slaves everywhere to be free and begged states to set them free. He was just aware of the political reality that his allies like Thaddeus Stevens were not.

The thing is "No new slaves and no expanding slavery" meant slavery had a shelf life and the confederates knew that. They wanted to keep slavery around.

The idea that Lincoln was not anti-slavery is a lost cause myth and just demonstrates being too lazy to look at history. It was Lincoln's open oppoisition to slavery that caused the succession crisis after decades of kicking the can down the road in the first place.

A fine post.

Yes yes CE, I'm as surprised as the rest of you, but credit where it's due.

UnfairRepresent posted...

But he was always open that he wanted slaves everywhere to be free and begged states to set them free. He was just aware of the political reality that his allies like Thaddeus Stevens were not.

The thing is "No new slaves and no expanding slavery" meant slavery had a shelf life and the confederates knew that. They wanted to keep slavery around.

The idea that Lincoln was not anti-slavery is a lost cause myth and just demonstrates being too lazy to look at history. It was Lincoln's open oppoisition to slavery that caused the succession crisis after decades of kicking the can down the road in the first place.

It took a constitutional amendment to ban slavery. Constitutional amendments require 3/4 of states to ratify to go in effect. You couldnt then still cant today get that accomplished without a southern state.

Whether Lincoln wanted to ban slavery or not is irrelevant. He didnt have the power to do that before reconstructed southern governments signed on.

ooger posted...

Like you said, it is based on what Trump said.

"Based on" is doing a lot of work in this sentence. This is sort of like saying that Vance's claim that people are eating cats and dogs is "based on" actual events.

Trump says that Lincoln should have made a deal with the south to avert the war. That's a really dumb take, but it's from the guy who thought he could just buy Greenland, so that's kind of par for the course. Nowhere does he say or imply that deal would involve the south getting to keep slaves - that's entirely something the author of the article chose to extrapolate from what Trump actually said, with somewhat flimsy logic.

This is like when nimrods on the right try and twist statements like, "There should be reasonable gun safety laws" into "Them Demon-rats want to ban guns!" (or, for that matter, when they try and whitewash Trump's *actual* awful statements into something reasonable by saying, "What he REALLY meant was..."). It's a bad look from them; let's not adopt it, yeah?

Everyone is so fixated on his opinion of Lincoln nobody noticed that Trump thinks Reagan was president when he was little.

darkknight109 posted...

I'm all in favour of calling out Trump's bullshit, but that is not at all what he said and this is pretty slanty reporting.

He said Lincoln should have negotiated a settlement with the south rather than force a civil war; while that's an incredibly stupid statement, it's not the same thing as saying he should have let the south keep slavery. A negotiation could have been, "Hey, no more slaves, but we'll send you some grants/tax breaks so that you can get your economy in order. Deal?"

Trump's a dipshit and provides more than enough material to prove he's not fit for office; we don't need to resort to making shit up about him to make that case (the Republicans do enough of that as it is).

There is no way the rebels would have let children born be free.

darkknight109 posted...

You guys are missing my point. Again, as I mentioned, Trump's statement was really dumb. I'm not arguing that it wasn't. Dude either thinks there was a deal to be had there (there wasn't) or that everyone else is dumb enough to believe him when he says there was.

No, there was never going to be a negotiated settlement between the south and the north. Anyone who has even a cursory understanding of the history and politics at play at the time understands that. My point is that Trump is probably not in that group. He's not exactly "well-read" (and is a fucking moron to boot).

So him saying he thinks Lincoln could have negotiated a peaceful resolution isn't (necessarily) the same as him saying he thinks the south should have gotten to keep slavery in some form, since he's not specifying what terms he thinks this imaginary magic deal would have. Maybe he's thinking that if the north agreed to pay the south enough money, they'd be willing to give up slavery. Yes, in the real-world a deal like that wouldn't work for several reasons, but Trump's dumb enough that he very well could think that it would (or, just as likely, he's talking out his ass to try and paint himself as a legendary peacemaking dealmaker who could have stopped the civil war had he been alive for it).

The thing is, everything we know about how Donnie operates, it's very easy for one to infer that he would give in to some sort of partial "slavery" as part of his deal.

FLAMING_EVIL_HOMER posted...

I don't know what's funny. Nowhere in link i found shows Trump actually said even anything about keeping slavery until author of the article assumes thats what he is saying. Then TC puts that authors claim as if Trump actually said it.

If i tried to use this topic and tried to convince Trumpers that he said Lincoln should've let the south keep slaver, the first thing they would say is fake news and he never said anything about it.

That's your first mistake. It doesn't matter what he says. He literally COULD have said it, asked if he really meant it, and then doubled down and said he 100% meant they could keep slaves and they would just weasel around what he said.

CobraGT posted...

There is no way the rebels would have let children born be free.

See Post 31.

Heineken14 posted...

The thing is, everything we know about how Donnie operates, it's very easy for one to infer that he would give in to some sort of partial "slavery" as part of his deal.

Trump's storied history of being a racist shithead notwithstanding, that inference is still just that: an inference. It's not what he said, and I would argue that nothing he said in the speech being referred to hinted or suggested that would be the case.

This, again, is why I find articles like the one in the OP so irritating. Trump has a long, long, LONG history of making unambiguously racist statements; you don't need to even try hard to find them. We don't need to make shit up that he didn't say, or lean on "Well, maybe he meant THIS" (when talking about a hypothetical situation regarding a conflict that happened over 150 years ago) inferences, especially when doing so makes the case of Donald Trump being a racist look a lot weaker than it actually is - you can just cite one of the numerous, very clearly racist things he said (anything from saying "You wouldn't want to live with them either" regarding the accusations he and his father were illegally turning away black prospective buyers from his properties all the way up to accusing Haitians of eating people's pets) and have a much stronger case.

If I was a politically uninformed person and someone tried to cite this article as proof that Donald Trump was racist, it would make me a lot less likely to take that claim seriously.

darkknight109 posted...

CobraGT posted...
There is no way the rebels would have let children born be free.
See Post 31.

Read my post. cause I reread yours and you show no awareness of the relevance of children being born free.

darkknight109 posted...

Trump says that Lincoln should have made a deal with the south to avert the war. That's a really dumb take, but it's from the guy who thought he could just buy Greenland, so that's kind of par for the course. Nowhere does he say or imply that deal would involve the south getting to keep slaves - that's entirely something the author of the article chose to extrapolate from what Trump actually said, with somewhat flimsy logic.

The states rights view of the civil war that conservatives love to use is that states had a right to leave the union regardless of reason. The negotiation would be peaceful terms for the south to secede from the union. If they formed their own country it wouldve been the confederacy that protected slavery. Slavery continuing is not some wild conjecture but the only conclusion from his position.

darkknight109 posted...

See Post 31.

Trump's storied history of being a racist shithead notwithstanding, that inference is still just that: an inference. It's not what he said, and I would argue that nothing he said in the speech being referred to hinted or suggested that would be the case.

This, again, is why I find articles like the one in the OP so irritating. Trump has a long, long, LONG history of making unambiguously racist statements; you don't need to even try hard to find them. We don't need to make shit up that he didn't say, or lean on "Well, maybe he meant THIS" (when talking about a hypothetical situation regarding a conflict that happened over 150 years ago) inferences, especially when doing so makes the case of Donald Trump being a racist look a lot weaker than it actually is - you can just cite one of the numerous, very clearly racist things he said (anything from saying "You wouldn't want to live with them either" regarding the accusations he and his father were illegally turning away black prospective buyers from his properties all the way up to accusing Haitians of eating people's pets) and have a much stronger case.

If I was a politically uninformed person and someone tried to cite this article as proof that Donald Trump was racist, it would make me a lot less likely to take that claim seriously.

I disagree, but not to the extent to carry on further.

Sounds like a centrist take, to me

Side A: "Slavery is bad!"
Side B: "Slavery is good!"
Centrist: "Now now, surely just a little slavery is okay"