Maggie Thatcher and Abraham Lincoln

[Liz Rosenthal]

The quotation that Thatcher and Reagan mistakenly attributed to Lincoln is still being attributed to Lincoln by those who believe that government intervention in the economy is a bad thing. I'm talking about the modern-day Republican Party and its allies. I can see why Thatcher and Reagan would have liked the quote. It expresses a laissez-faire view of government's relationship to the economy and the individual well-being of a nation's citizens. Reagan succeeded in completely changing the discourse with regard to government's role, basically blaming it for all the nation's ills. Ever since, Democrats have been on the defensive regarding the good that government can do; even President Obama hasn't been able to, or perhaps hasn't wanted to, totally reverse course (witness: the lack of a public option in the health care law, a stimulous plan dominated by tax cuts, feeble re-regulation of Wall Street). I suppose that Thatcher had a similar affect on British political discourse. And attributing the quote to Lincoln seems to lend it a meritoriousness it wouldn't otherwise have, given that he is almost universally regarded as American's greatest president, as well as its most principled, and the perfect exemplar of America's ability to produce great individuals who came from nothing.

The problem with linking Lincoln (no rhyme intended ) to this sort of statement is that very little about Lincoln's record could be explained by pointing to it as his working philosophy. He was a leader of the Whig Party prior to the establishment of the Republican Party. The Whigs, unlike the then-Democrats, were in favor of government support of what today would be called public works (canals, bridges, railroads), which were essential to economic development. The Whigs supported a national bank and a state bank. They supported public schools. They supported high tariffs to favor domestic products.

When the Republican Party was formed, while it did attract many disaffected, anti-slavery Democrats, it was dominated by former Whigs, and formed for one purpose only - to arrest the spread of slavery to the territories. It was not formed to shrink the size of government, or to keep government out of the economy. As America's first Republican President, Lincoln expanded the role of government in a wide range of areas: railroads, homesteading, national currency, taxation, agriculture, higher education. He signed into law a Freedmen's Bureau to assist newly-freed slaves in entering society unshackled. While Lincoln's domestic policies couldn't be equated to the New Deal, they were far from the sort of economic laissez-faire belief system espoused by Thatcher and Reagan.