Lincoln and the coming of the Civil War

About this book

After 1854,when Lincoln reviewed his study of the slavery question, he was particulary acute in showing that the logic of the defenders of slavery was profoundly undemocratic, not only in reference to the Southern scene, but for human relations everywhere. The essence of his position was that the principle of exclusion has no inner check; that arbitrarilly barring one minority from the exercise of its rights can be both a precedent and a moral sanction for barring another, and that it creates a frame of mind from which no one can expect justice or security. "I am not a Know-nothing".-- Richard Hofstadler.