A new Lincoln book, The Broken Constitution

[David Lockmiller]

(11-22-2021 01:32 PM)Rob Wick Wrote:  David,

I sold books for a living for over 20 years and not once have I ever told someone not to buy a book because I didn't like it. Not even the dreck that comes from Fox.

Best
Rob

Rob, it sounds to me like you were "biased" in favor of making a profit.

If I had been in your position, I would have "remaindered" Professor Feldman's book on President Abraham Lincoln and the U.S. Constitution from the very first day.

[Rob Wick]

Well David, since we don't live in a Socialist paradise, yes I am biased in favor of profits. After all, a Chevy salesperson wouldn't last too long trying to sell Ford's.

However, it's presumptuous of me to think that just because I don't like a book my view is the end all and be all and no other opinion matters. I am more knowledgeable than many, but that doesn't translate into omniscience. As Josiah Bartlett once said on the West Wing, absolutes generally end with a body count.

Best
Rob

[David Lockmiller]

I simply do not understand why the New York Times is recommending this book to its millions of readers and leaving it to them to parse out so little truth from so much fiction regarding President Lincoln and the U. S. Constitution.

[David Lockmiller]

(11-23-2021 09:40 AM)David Lockmiller Wrote:  I simply do not understand why the New York Times is recommending this book to its millions of readers and leaving it to them to parse out so little truth from so much fiction regarding President Lincoln and the U. S. Constitution.

As Shakespeare wrote: "There's something rotten in Denmark." (or, something like that) ["Hamlet." Act I, Scene 4.]

[Rob Wick]

(11-23-2021 09:40 AM)David Lockmiller Wrote:  I simply do not understand why the New York Times is recommending this book to its millions of readers and leaving it to them to parse out so little truth from so much fiction regarding President Lincoln and the U. S. Constitution.

Mainly because the New York Times is not a scolding nanny leading its readers by the hands to the promised land of Abraham Lincoln Truth. Most people who read the Times are quite capable of uncovering things by themselves.

Best
Rob

[David Lockmiller]

EDITORS' CHOICE - 8 New Books We Recommend This Week

"The New York Times Magazine’s ambitious and far-reaching 1619 Project has been turned into an even more ambitious and far-reaching book . . . ."

Gregory Cowles
Senior Editor, Books

THE 1619 PROJECT: A New Origin Story, edited by Nikole Hannah-Jones, Caitlin Roper, Ilena Silverman and Jake Silverstein. (One World, $38.) A revised and expanded version of a series of essays first published in The New York Times Magazine in 2019, this essential book delivers an account of America’s entanglement with slavery and its legacy, from the country’s colonial beginnings to today, that is cogent, meticulous and revelatory.

According to Dictionary.com, "cogent" means: "convincing or believable by virtue of forcible, clear, or incisive presentation; telling.

This is another controversial book recommended by the New York Times just in time for the 2021 Christmas shopping season.

[Rob Wick]

Wondered how long it was going to take you to drag that up again. I thought Adam Hochshild wrote a very balanced review.

Best
Rob

[David Lockmiller]

(11-26-2021 12:18 PM)Rob Wick Wrote:  Wondered how long it was going to take you to drag that up again. I thought Adam Hochshild wrote a very balanced review.

Best
Rob

Adam Hochshild wrote:

In a few ways “The 1619 Project” falls short. Hannah-Jones, for instance, still makes too much of Abraham Lincoln’s flirtation with the idea of colonization, or encouraging Black Americans to go to Africa. This surely felt insulting to Black citizens (although colonization had some Black backers), but it did not define him. On another point that earlier also drew scholarly criticism, she has made a few changes but basically remains insistent, claiming that “we might never have revolted against Britain if some of the founders had not . . . believed that independence was required in order to ensure that the institution [of slavery] would continue unmolested.” But this is untenable.

[David Lockmiller]

Lincoln vs. the Constitution? Not So Fast.
Nov. 21, 2021

To the Editor [of the New York Times]:
Re “Lincoln Broke the U.S. Constitution,” by Noah Feldman (Opinion guest essay, Nov. 8):

For the first time in more than 150 years, there’s serious debate about whether the Constitution is so deeply flawed as to require replacement. But Mr. Feldman gets it wrong: Lincoln did not break the Constitution.

“Contemporary observers … understood that the Emancipation Proclamation left the original Constitution in tatters,” Mr. Feldman writes. Admittedly, some thought the proclamation unconstitutional, but Lincoln had carefully crafted the proclamation so that it was within his power under the Constitution.

Mr. Feldman’s article leaves out a critical point. The Emancipation Proclamation did not free all enslaved people. It freed enslaved people only in territory controlled by the Confederacy. That made it a war measure sanctioned by the president’s power as commander in chief.

We venerate Lincoln today, so it is important to understand his vision. Working within the framework of the document written in 1787, he championed a vision of the Constitution based on equality and liberty.

William M. Treanor
Washington
The writer is the dean of Georgetown Law Center.