Lincoln And the Republican Party of Freedom

Joe Sobran has a review of a new book on Abraham Lincoln.We did a small post on it recently.Sobran says:

Lincoln suspended habeas corpus on his own authority; the first Republican Congress obligingly passed an act authorizing the confiscation of private property used in aid of the “rebellion.” Since the Republicans regarded any failure to support his war as pro-Confederate “treason,” this meant, in practice, the seizure and destruction of printing presses of hundreds of Democratic newspapers. More than 10,000 dissenters were also arbitrarily arrested, without warrants or specified charges, and held without trial.
This reign of terror wasn’t conducted by government agents alone. Much of the dirty work was done by mobs and rioters, who knew they too could act with impunity, even enjoying Lincoln’s tacit approval. Though he never openly endorsed mob violence, he did nothing about it and never condemned it.

They certainly have standards for great Presidents over at the American Historical Association.