Things Lincoln never said

[LincolnMan]

I've just arrived at my office. Someone has written on my wall dry erase board the following:
"Tact is the ability to describe others as they see themselves."
Abraham Lincoln

Doesn't sound like Lincoln to me but I'm not able to check on it here at work. Is it?

[RJNorton]

Bill, I just did a search of "The Collected Works" and drew a blank on this one. I've seen this quote on the Internet attributed to Lincoln but never with a source.

[LincolnMan]

Roger: meaning he probably didn't write or say it? What is your guess? Personally, i think not.

[RJNorton]

I sure agree with you, Bill. I cannot locate a source and feel it's not a legitimate Lincoln quote.

[Eva Elisabeth]

Off the top of my head I can't recall any Lincoln quote that is worded so much like an exact (scientifically determined) definition (XY=Z). Thus I'd rather go for "nay".

[LincolnMan]

For one thing, I don't think Lincoln ever used the word "tact."

[David Lockmiller]

(02-03-2014 08:49 AM)RJNorton Wrote:  Bill, I just did a search of "The Collected Works" and drew a blank on this one. I've seen this quote on the Internet attributed to Lincoln but never with a source.

By doing a Google search of the entire quotation, I found the following entry in the introduction to the book, "Recollected Words of Abraham Lincoln," edited by Don and Virginia Fehrenbacher:

“For more than a century, undocumented quotations have been attaching themselves to Lincoln and gaining currency through repetition. Many of them are undoubtedly spurious. There appears to be no credible evidence, for example, that he ever said: ‘Tact [is] the ability to describe others as they see themselves.’”

The Fehrenbacher’s added within the same paragraph: “In addition, there are many quotations vaguely linked to him by anonymous narrative, contemporary gossip, family tradition, and other tenuous connections. Such is the case, for instance, with his supposed greeting of Harriet Beecher Stowe as ‘the little woman who made this great war.’” Unfortunately, this quote is in the book by Emanuel Hertz, "Lincoln Talks, a Biography in Anecdote," without qualification as to authenticity.

[LincolnMan]

Thank you David for that great response.

[David Lockmiller]

(02-04-2014 11:14 AM)LincolnMan Wrote:  Thank you David for that great response.

Thank you, but how will you inform the unknown person who wrote on your wall dry erase board the spuriously-attributed quote?

I tried to inform the public that the NY Times Op-Ed "Lincoln's Surveillance State" was a hoax perpetrated on the NY Times and its readers. And, I was almost completely unsuccessful. My Lincoln-history based critique of Spielberg's "Lincoln" movie was another near-complete failure of mine.

From personal experience, I would have to say that this is the reason that an accurate study and statement of Lincoln's true words and actions is so important. For instance, Lincoln wrote: "I say 'try;' if we never try, we shall never succeed." Letter to General G. B. McClellan, October 13, 1862.

[LincolnMan]

David: that is a good question. I now have been informed who wrote it. I know she must be proud that she left that on the board for me. I know I will be "tactful" about it- I'm still pondering my response.

[RJNorton]

(02-04-2014 11:12 AM)David Lockmiller Wrote:  Such is the case, for instance, with his supposed greeting of Harriet Beecher Stowe as ‘the little woman who made this great war.’” Unfortunately, this quote is in the book by Emanuel Hertz, "Lincoln Talks, a Biography in Anecdote," without qualification as to authenticity.

Other than Stowe family lore I have never been able to find a source for this. Dr. Gerald J. Prokopowicz writes, "A popular story has Lincoln greeting the author of Uncle Tom's Cabin with 'So you're the little woman who wrote the book that started this great war!' but there's no written evidence that he said this. All that Stowe wrote to her husband was that she 'had a real funny interview with the President,' promising to tell him the details later."

[L Verge]

I have heard that Lincoln said that for most of my life. However, it just doesn't seem like Lincoln. When you stop and think, that quote is actually a put-down (or dissing as the younger generation would say) - a sarcastic slam in a way that lays the blame squarely on Mrs. Stowe's shoulders.

I just don't see Mr. Lincoln doing that to her face. Plus, he and everyone else knew that Uncle Tom's Cabin was just one log that went into the great fire.

[David Lockmiller]

(02-05-2014 08:32 AM)RJNorton Wrote:  

(02-04-2014 11:12 AM)David Lockmiller Wrote:  Such is the case, for instance, with his supposed greeting of Harriet Beecher Stowe as ‘the little woman who made this great war.’” Unfortunately, this quote is in the book by Emanuel Hertz, "Lincoln Talks, a Biography in Anecdote," without qualification as to authenticity.

Other than Stowe family lore I have never been able to find a source for this. Dr. Gerald J. Prokopowicz writes, "A popular story has Lincoln greeting the author of Uncle Tom's Cabin with 'So you're the little woman who wrote the book that started this great war!' but there's no written evidence that he said this. All that Stowe wrote to her husband was that she 'had a real funny interview with the President,' promising to tell him the details later."

I am inclined to believe that Lincoln made the greeting in this manner to Harriet Beecher Stowe. I believe that it was Lincoln's humerous way of stating that he knew already who Harriet Beecher Stowe was. As Roger writes in his post: "All that Stowe wrote to her husband was that she 'had a real funny interview with the President,' promising to tell him the details later." If true, all the rest of Harriet Beecher Stowe's interview with President Abraham Lincoln that day (its humor and sagacity) has been lost to history.

The phrasing of Lincoln in this instance sounds somewhat similar to Lincoln's statement that the Brady photograph taken at the time of his Cooper Union speech and the speech itself made him President. The Lincoln-Douglas debates, Lincoln's "House Divided" speech, Lincoln's speech critical of the Taney Supreme Court majority opinion in the Dred Scott case are among several other contributing factors to his election.

It is hard to imagine that a series of magazine articles published in 1850 to 1852 and cumulatively published as the book "Uncle Tom's Cabin" in 1852 could be considered by either of these two intelligent people as the direct cause of the American Civil War almost a decade later. No doubt, it was important to the process of change in public opinion in the North on the subject of slavery.

A NY Times book review published in 2011 entitled "The Impact of ‘Uncle Tom’s Cabin,’" states the following information:

[The book being reviewed is “Mightier Than the Sword,” by David S. Reynolds]

The novel began to germinate in Stowe’s mind while she was living in Cincinnati in the 1830s and ’40s, where she met fugitive slaves who had escaped through or from Kentucky, and where, as Reynolds puts it, “she loved spending time in the kitchen with servants like the African-¬American Zillah.” In the spring of 1850, having moved to Maine, where she followed the Congressional debates over a proposed new law that would deny fugitive slaves basic rights while imposing new penalties on anyone harboring them, she wrote to a magazine editor that “the time is come when even a woman or a child who can speak a word for freedom and humanity is bound to speak.” The result was a series of fictional sketches of slaves under physical or psychological assault.

When the magazine pieces were gathered and published in 1852 as “Uncle Tom’s Cabin, the first print run was 5,000. Within a year, the book had sold 300,000 copies in America, and over a million in Britain.

If ever there was a publishing event to prove the principle that timing is everything, “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” was it. On both sides of the sectional divide the timber was dry — and Stowe struck the igniting spark. In the North, Frederick Douglass rejoiced that she had “baptized with holy fire myriads who before cared nothing for the bleeding slave.” In the South, her indictment of slavery through the odious figure of Legree was likened to a “malignant” attack on the institution of marriage, as if she had chosen a wife-beater to represent “the normal condition of the relation” between loving spouses.

A decade after the book appeared, Abraham Lincoln is said to have received Stowe at the White House with the greeting, “Is this the little woman who made this great war?” No one knows if Lincoln really said that, and as the historian David Potter once put it, “history cannot evaluate with precision the influence of a novel upon public opinion.”

[RJNorton]

David, thank you very much for all of your input. In the past I have tried to find independent corroboration that Mrs. Stowe actually visited the White House. Yes, I realize nearly every Lincoln biography includes mention of her visit, and it seems "a given." But I still have wondered about it.

What surprises me is that there is no mention of it in Lincoln Day By Day.

The web page here says, "According to biographer Joan Hedrick, Stowe was accompanied on her
2 December 1862 visit to the White House by her sister Isabella Beecher Hooker and her daughter Hattie. Although Joan Hedrick does not report the famous quote in her biography–presumably it is not mentioned in Hattie’s contemporaneous letter to her twin sister Eliza or in Harriet’s letter to her husband Calvin–she emphasizes their reports on the joviality of the occasion."

In Lincoln Day By Day, December 2, 1862, was not a particularly busy day for Lincoln, and there is no mention of Harriet Beecher Stowe visiting the White House. Abraham Lincoln, himself, made no known record of the encounter.

Apparently the famous quote did not appear in print until 1896.

From what I can tell we just have to trust the Stowe family members that the meeting and famous quote actually happened. But I am somewhat surprised that are no accounts from Lincoln, White House personnel, or contemporary newspapers that the visit took place.

Apparently, in later years, three Stowe family members wrote accounts of the meeting, but their accounts differ substantially.

[David Lockmiller]

(02-06-2014 03:27 PM)RJNorton Wrote:  In the past I have tried to find independent corroboration that Mrs. Stowe actually visited the White House. Yes, I realize nearly every Lincoln biography includes mention of her visit, and it seems "a given." But I still have wondered about it. What surprises me is that there is no mention of it in Lincoln Day By Day.

The web page here says, "According to biographer Joan Hedrick, Stowe was accompanied on her 2 December 1862 visit to the White House by her sister Isabella Beecher Hooker and her daughter Hattie. Although Joan Hedrick does not report the famous quote in her biography–presumably it is not mentioned in Hattie’s contemporaneous letter to her twin sister Eliza or in Harriet’s letter to her husband Calvin–she emphasizes their reports on the joviality of the occasion."

In Lincoln Day By Day, December 2, 1862, was not a particularly busy day for Lincoln, and there is no mention of Harriet Beecher Stowe visiting the White House. Abraham Lincoln, himself, made no known record of the encounter.

Apparently the famous quote did not appear in print until 1896.

From what I can tell we just have to trust the Stowe family members that the meeting and famous quote actually happened. But I am somewhat surprised that are no accounts from Lincoln, White House personnel, or contemporary newspapers that the visit took place.

Apparently, in later years, three Stowe family members wrote accounts of the meeting, but their accounts differ substantially.

It appears that the main reason of so little record of the event is the sneaky way the Stowe clan arranged the meeting. It appears the plan that worked involved Harriet arranging in New York to be invited by Mary Lincoln for tea when she came to Washington. Then, with the assistance of Senator Wilson, the three Stowe family members "ambushed" President Lincoln in his office after hours for about one half hour.

The narrative of Isabella is in a book entitled Visits With Lincoln: Abolitionists Meet The President at the White House, by Barbara A. White.

To accompany her to Washington, Harriet chose two relatives, Hattie, one of her twin daughters, and her forty-nine-year-old brother Henry Ward Beecher. Henry, slightly younger than Harriet, was the closest of her eleven siblings. . . . Harriet’s success with Uncle Tom’s Cabin and Henry’s with his ministry at Plymouth Church in Brooklyn had made them the wealthiest and most famous of their siblings. . . . Harriet thought Henry’s presence in Washington would be helpful to her and was disappointed when he begged off because of work. She next turned to her stepsister, Isabella Beecher Hooker. Isabella, eleven years younger than Harriet, was also bombarding Lincoln with letters. She wanted to meet him . . . .

In the middle of November 1862 Harriet, Hattie, and Isabella met in New York. They stayed in Brooklyn with Henry, who had good news. The President had written, assuring him that he would stand by the proclamation. But did the Republican losses in the November elections mean he would change his mind? Harriet and Isabella decided to adhere to their original plans, and Harriet called on Mary Lincoln, who was in the city (i.e., New York), and succeeded in getting an invitation to the White House. (Pages 43-44)

Another memorable day was December 1, when President Lincoln read the Emancipation Proclamation on the opening day of Congress. Isabella was sitting in the gallery with Harriet and concluded, “Yes I think 25 years hence I shall mention this fact with some exultation.” Clearly, however, the sisters were more impressed by the “magnificent” and “imposing” Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner, who came over to speak with Harriet, than they were by the President.

Mrs. Lincoln kept her promise to invite Harriet and her party to tea, and on the evening of December 2 Harriet, Hattie, and Isabella went to the White House. They were first to see Mr. Lincoln and were accompanied by Henry Wilson of Massachusetts . . . . The pavilion entrance was really fine under the brilliant lamps & all looked well enough till we mounted to the President’s private room or office – here Mr. Wilson stuck his head in the door & out again. (Page 47)

There's more to be typed of this account, but there is no specific reference to the introduction between President Abraham Lincoln and Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of Uncle Tom's Cabin. I am afraid that we have reached a dead end on our discovery quest of the exact words used in this introduction.