The Bixby Letter

[ELCore]

(04-01-2013 08:47 AM)RJNorton Wrote:  Here is Bullard's interpretation:

What did John Hay mean when he went on record with the statement that "the letter of Mr. Lincoln to Mrs. Bixby is genuine?" A letter is "genuine" when it is not spurious, not counterfeit, when it is written by the person whose name it bears.

Since the central theme of Bullard's book was that Lincoln was the letter's author, this definition comes as no surprise.

No surprise, at all. Bullard's definition is, quite conveniently, too narrow. I suppose, though, that we need more context for Hay's remark. Do we have that?