For writing specific updates and material, please see my new author blog at https://www.historymystery.blog
Hope to see you there soon!
Monday, May 01, 2023
Friday, February 10, 2023
The School of Homer
Looking for a good vacation book? Dreaming about relaxing by the pool this summer already and want to dive into a mystery?
We humbly recommend The School of Homer by Alexander Marriott coming out February 23, 2023 from Vanguard Press and available where good books are sold!
Waterstones (UK)
Wednesday, October 07, 2020
Lincoln wanted the voters to pick Taney's replacement? Not so fast, Senator Harris
Tonight's Vice-Presidential Debate in Salt Lake City included a historical claim by Senator Kamala Harris of California:
"In 1864, one of the, I think political heroes, certainly the President, I assume you also, Mr. Vice President, is Abraham Lincoln. Abraham Lincoln was up for reelection and it was 27 days before the election. And a seat became open on the United States Supreme Court. Abraham Lincoln’s party was in charge, not only of the White House, but the Senate. But Honest Abe said, “It’s not the right thing to do. The American people deserve to make the decision about who will be the next president of the United States. And then that person can select who will serve for a lifetime on the highest court of our land.” And so Joe and I are very clear: the American people are voting right now and it should be their decision about who will serve on this most important body for a lifetime."
The facts?
On October 12, 1864 Chief Justice Roger B. Taney, author of the majority opinion in the infamous Dred Scott case and constant thorn in the side of Abraham Lincoln's administration of the Union war effort, died.
Abraham Lincoln did not nominate Salmon P. Chase (his Secretary of the Treasury) to the post until December 6, 1864 (he was confirmed the same day!), a month after his victorious reelection over Democrat George B. McClellan.
The circumstances seem to support Senator Harris's claim, superficially anyway. She alluded to Lincoln actually saying this was his rationale to someone in her "history lesson," but she did not attempt to quote honest Abe. It is well that she did not, as there was no such strategy at play here.
Why the delay then?
1a) There WAS an election--which Lincoln believed was essential to winning the Civil War. If he was defeated, the war was likely going to be lost--Union and emancipation would be in jeopardy.
1b) Lincoln was quite worried about what a nomination would do to HIS party--which had many factions, who each had a favorite for the Court.
2) Congress would not reconvene until December--so what was the rush? He would be President until March 1865 regardless of the election's outcome and the Senate would remain Republican, so he could afford to wait until the lame-duck session and keep the conservative and radical factions of his party focused on the election and the prize in Lincoln's hands. Doing so was dictated by political considerations (and, by extension--at least in Lincoln's mind--, strategic military considerations), but not as Senator Harris suggests.
There is no primary source evidence that suggests Lincoln decided to wait with any intention of allowing a President McClellan to appoint the new Chief Justice. None. At all.
But the most absurd thing about this fantasy is the idea that a lifelong partisan like Abraham Lincoln--and a man who had to suffer through four years of sanctimonious lecturing and posturing from Andrew Jackson's appointed Chief Justice (whom Lincoln had previously blamed, in part, for recklessly bringing about the events that led to the Civil War)--would ever allow a racist backsliding doughface Democrat like George B. McClellan to get within half an inch of filling that Supreme Court seat. Never.
To suggest such a thing (Senator Harris), or to allow it to go without negating and mocking it (Vice-President Pence) simply tells us that the people trying to remain/become the 48th/49th Vice-President of the United States know shamefully little about our 16th and, quite possibly, greatest President.
For more on this, please see Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life, Volume II (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008), 731-736.
"In 1864, one of the, I think political heroes, certainly the President, I assume you also, Mr. Vice President, is Abraham Lincoln. Abraham Lincoln was up for reelection and it was 27 days before the election. And a seat became open on the United States Supreme Court. Abraham Lincoln’s party was in charge, not only of the White House, but the Senate. But Honest Abe said, “It’s not the right thing to do. The American people deserve to make the decision about who will be the next president of the United States. And then that person can select who will serve for a lifetime on the highest court of our land.” And so Joe and I are very clear: the American people are voting right now and it should be their decision about who will serve on this most important body for a lifetime."
The facts?
On October 12, 1864 Chief Justice Roger B. Taney, author of the majority opinion in the infamous Dred Scott case and constant thorn in the side of Abraham Lincoln's administration of the Union war effort, died.
Abraham Lincoln did not nominate Salmon P. Chase (his Secretary of the Treasury) to the post until December 6, 1864 (he was confirmed the same day!), a month after his victorious reelection over Democrat George B. McClellan.
The circumstances seem to support Senator Harris's claim, superficially anyway. She alluded to Lincoln actually saying this was his rationale to someone in her "history lesson," but she did not attempt to quote honest Abe. It is well that she did not, as there was no such strategy at play here.
Why the delay then?
1a) There WAS an election--which Lincoln believed was essential to winning the Civil War. If he was defeated, the war was likely going to be lost--Union and emancipation would be in jeopardy.
1b) Lincoln was quite worried about what a nomination would do to HIS party--which had many factions, who each had a favorite for the Court.
2) Congress would not reconvene until December--so what was the rush? He would be President until March 1865 regardless of the election's outcome and the Senate would remain Republican, so he could afford to wait until the lame-duck session and keep the conservative and radical factions of his party focused on the election and the prize in Lincoln's hands. Doing so was dictated by political considerations (and, by extension--at least in Lincoln's mind--, strategic military considerations), but not as Senator Harris suggests.
There is no primary source evidence that suggests Lincoln decided to wait with any intention of allowing a President McClellan to appoint the new Chief Justice. None. At all.
But the most absurd thing about this fantasy is the idea that a lifelong partisan like Abraham Lincoln--and a man who had to suffer through four years of sanctimonious lecturing and posturing from Andrew Jackson's appointed Chief Justice (whom Lincoln had previously blamed, in part, for recklessly bringing about the events that led to the Civil War)--would ever allow a racist backsliding doughface Democrat like George B. McClellan to get within half an inch of filling that Supreme Court seat. Never.
To suggest such a thing (Senator Harris), or to allow it to go without negating and mocking it (Vice-President Pence) simply tells us that the people trying to remain/become the 48th/49th Vice-President of the United States know shamefully little about our 16th and, quite possibly, greatest President.
For more on this, please see Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life, Volume II (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008), 731-736.
Wednesday, September 23, 2020
On August 13, 2020 - I compiled a chart (below) to compare the United States to six roughly contiguous European countries with a combined roughly equivalent population to the United States to see if COVID-19 was impacting apples and almost apples about the same regardless of the supposedly far different government responses. I relied on the Johns Hopkins University COVID-19 Tracking Database for this--the Global Map feature.
I have been updating the numbers regularly ever since. I have started to notice something quite peculiar, though, over the last five weeks. While the JHU data for Europe has reflected the recent spikes in cases in Europe reported in the press, the data on deaths has not only remained unrealistically and improbably stagnant, it is actually moving in the retrograde. Below are the updated figures as of 7:00 PM on September 23, 2020.
These six European countries, despite discovering about 900k additional COVID-19 cases, have not only managed to avoid any mortality from them, but have actually managed to resurrect previously dead COVID-19 patients! This might make the novel corona virus not only one of the least fatal illnesses in the history of mankind, but curiously the guarantor of immortality if you happen to die from it in one of six European countries.
Given the rate of infections/deaths in the United States in early August, we would be justified in expecting 208,222 deaths at this point in September. As you can see, the rate of deaths per infection has come down slightly. But it is not way off the expectation from the August data point. By contrast, the 6 Euro countries' rate of infections/deaths would lead one to believe they would be around 253,106 deaths by now with their massive uptick in detected cases. Now, it is one thing to be below that frightening number due to younger people being more likely to test positive, getting better at detecting asymptomatic cases, getting better at treating cases, etc.--but to have the number of deaths actually go down??
Seriously though, the parallels to the suppression of accurate data during the so-called Spanish flu are hard to ignore here. I hope I am wrong.
Thursday, August 17, 2017
What President Trump should have (and easily could have) said on Saturday, August 12, 2017
"We were scheduled to have a meeting today about the status of Veterans in our country, and the new bi-partisan bill supporting their ability to seek the best medical care available in our country, but events have superseded the schedule. Today we stand with the people of Charlottesville, Virginia who simply want to live in peace and make decisions for themselves without being harassed by reprehensible outsiders. The United States, which the most illustrious of my predecessors beautifully wrote in 1790, "gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance" and will never be the home or domain of vile collectivist ideologies that we have spilled blood and treasure to eradicate at home and abroad--be they racist, fascist, communist, or religious.
"All who commit criminal acts will be punished to the fullest extent of the laws of the State of Virginia and the United States--I have already called Governor McAuliffe and the Attorney General and have been assured that they are doing everything legally permissible to bring anyone responsible for violating the laws of Virginia or the laws of the United States to justice. I would like to extend my personal thoughts and condolences to all those who have been injured or killed as the result of the disturbances this day.
"Our rights to disagree with one another, to speak freely, passionately, and openly--and assemble and protest and demonstrate--are sacred and inviolable. Just as sacred and inviolable are our rights to life and liberty and to not be physically assaulted by others. There is no tension or contradiction between legitimate rights, and there is no tension here. Saying vile things is unpopular but undeniably one's right to do. Doing vile things that violate the rights of others will never be permissible or tolerated while the Constitution of the United States still lives or while I am still the President of the United States.
"God bless the people of Charlottesville, those who have been hurt and injured, and those who have lost loved ones--and god bless the United States of America."
A republican
"All who commit criminal acts will be punished to the fullest extent of the laws of the State of Virginia and the United States--I have already called Governor McAuliffe and the Attorney General and have been assured that they are doing everything legally permissible to bring anyone responsible for violating the laws of Virginia or the laws of the United States to justice. I would like to extend my personal thoughts and condolences to all those who have been injured or killed as the result of the disturbances this day.
"Our rights to disagree with one another, to speak freely, passionately, and openly--and assemble and protest and demonstrate--are sacred and inviolable. Just as sacred and inviolable are our rights to life and liberty and to not be physically assaulted by others. There is no tension or contradiction between legitimate rights, and there is no tension here. Saying vile things is unpopular but undeniably one's right to do. Doing vile things that violate the rights of others will never be permissible or tolerated while the Constitution of the United States still lives or while I am still the President of the United States.
"God bless the people of Charlottesville, those who have been hurt and injured, and those who have lost loved ones--and god bless the United States of America."
A republican
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