Saturday, December 06, 2014

Abe Lincoln or Jefferson Davis: Who Liked Black People More?


Who was a bigger racist? Abe Lincoln or Jefferson Davis? Abe Lincoln wasn't shy about his hatred about black people. Here's a quote from Lincoln in the Fourth Debate with Stephen A. Douglas at Charleston, Illinois, September 18, 1858:
“I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been in favor of bringing about in anyway the social and political equality of the white and black races – that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any other man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race. I say upon this occasion I do not perceive that because the white man is to have the superior position the negro should be denied everything.”
After all, the Emancipation Proclamation didn't free the slaves:
Since Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation as a military measure, it didn’t apply to border slave states like Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri, all of which had remained loyal to the Union. Lincoln also exempted selected areas of the Confederacy that had already come under Union control in hopes of gaining the loyalty of whites in those states. In practice, then, the Emancipation Proclamation didn’t immediately free a single slave, as the only places it applied were places where the federal government had no control—the Southern states currently fighting against the Union.
Recent research from British archives suggests Lincoln wanted blacks out of America. Here's a University of Missouri Press book on the subject.
Did Jefferson Davis hate black people? Ask Jim Limber? Was Jim Limber adopted by Jefferson Davis or did he just live in his house?