Bella Rivera

Humanities

12/14/17

A Purest and a Dictator Walk into a Bar

"Both parties deprecated war; but one of them would make war rather than let the nation

survive; and the other would accept war rather than let it perish. And the war came."-Abraham

Lincoln. Elected in 1860, the sixteenth President of the United States never shied from stating his

iconic anti-slavery opinions which made him despised by all the southern, democratic states. As

Honest Abe took the side of the union during the entirety of the Civil war, it seemed unlikely that

America would never have to again witness a president’s face off with “rebellious states”. That

is, until Donald Trump’s administration claimed the liberal state of California as the target of a

policy war following his election in 2016. Both presidents have used their power to bring justice

to states who have abused state laws and policies- at least, in the president’s eyes; one bringing

an end to legal slavery in America and another threatening to build a wall and actively deport

and displace oppressed immigrants. While their stances on human rights could not be more

durassically opposite, their strategy for achieving their goals offers mirror glimpses of eachother.

American’s everywhere have lived in hesitation, waiting for one to back down or realize that

when it comes to power and responsibility, the president has the right to veto both. Looking at all

the progress and setbacks America has claimed as its history within a one hundred and

fifty-seven year gap, have president’s patterned their decision making off of their presectors? Or

has the growing hunger for control only feast on the greedy rather than the pure: The difference
between true convictions and mere power-driven ego creating a Venn diagram between what

pure leaders and agenda driven dictators truly are.

By the time he was elected, Northern states praised Lincoln for his straight to the point,

stern yet warm speeches as well as the idea that slavery should be abolished nationwide, which

became his main driving point on the campaign trail. Looking to his supporters, his first

inaugural address was aimed at pleasing the people with an appeal to the “rebellious” red states

to end their autonomy and rejoin the nation. With seven said states already seceded, Lincoln

knew that only war or peace could bring together the nation and create a blank slate for his first

term in office. After the inevitable shots fired by the Northerners amidst the war at Fort Sumter,

Abraham spent the first stages of war using his power as president to combat protesters in

slavery states such as Maryland by suspending habeas corpus. This simply meant that without

right to a trial in court or need of probable cause to arrest them, all pedestrians protesting the

president were sent to jail, with Lincoln simply brushing off courts that claimed he “overstepped

his constitutional bounds”. As the war progressed, so did his limitations on media, press, and

civil liberties: even going as far to shut down newspapers that went against his own views that

were eventually taken over or intimidated into not publishing news throughout the war. As these

restrictions increased and spread, roughly 13,000 protesters were jailed under Lincoln's executive

suspension of the writ. Author Thomas DiLorenzo- whose best selling book brings light to

Lincoln’s true character, found in his own research that after the suspension, “Abraham Lincoln

issued an arrest warrant for Chief Justice Roger B. Taney after the eighty-four-year-old jurist

issued an opinion that only Congress, and not the president, can legally suspend the writ of

habeas corpus” pg. 157. By evidence alone it is clear that while Abraham was set on eliminating
the rebellion in any state that did not succeed to the union, he was also not about to let the

southern states continue to practice the state laws which were frowned upon by the north- even if

that meant threatening to take away human rights to civilians in the process.

By releasing a series of threats along with the increased tension following the state's

refusal to budge on their sanctuary state laws, Trump himself and his entire administration have

been in a heated relationship with the golden state ever since April when California, which holds

the sixth largest economy in the country, passed a “sanctuary state” bill through their senate in

response to the president’s promises to hold back on the jurisdictions of federal funds. As

Thomas Homan, the acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, puts it, “There's

no sanctuary from federal law enforcement”. Along with the state’s push back on deportation of

undocumented immigrants, the citizens of Sacramento have actively taken their stand and

protested the arrival of Donald Trump’s top immigration official; deepening the hostility

between the president’s entire administration with one of the most successful states. However,

the state of California has not been the only trouble for the White House. Months after the

protest, Trump took to Twitter to state, “With all of the Fake News coming out of NBC and the

Networks, at what point is it appropriate to challenge their License? Bad for country!”. His stand

off with the media came after a CNN story which covered the president’s plan to increase

nuclear budgets. “Fake news”, a term coined by Trump himself, is used as a way to draw

negative attention when the published stories that highlight critical coverage of Trump’s

administration go against his own views. With unfavorable stories published about Trump’s

presidency, he has made it clear that he does not take them lightly and has even threatened to

shut down NBC and other huge networks. However, the war on California does not stop there,
with the state’s new laws slated to go into effect as of January first. These include tightened gun

restrictions, raised minimum wage, and most notably, the California Values Act : “a law which

restricts superior authorities from having to cooperate with and work alongside federal

immigration agents, as well as setting new regulations on said agents entering schools, churches,

hospitals or courthouses in order to detain undocumented immigrants”, says The New York

Times.

As media has always played a role in America’s conversation on civil rights, both

Abraham Lincoln and Donald Trump have played into the power that comes along with the

highest authority. At the beginning of his presidency, Donald compared himself to Lincoln,

claiming at his inauguration that he was inspired through the former president’s words. When

Lincoln's own arbitrary arrests policy came into effect, his main goal and true intentions were to

put a stop to the south’s unwillingness to cooperate as well as their protests that were not in the

favor of the president. Looking at present day, Trump’s administration is not too far behind, as

Donald’s intentions to stifle those who would speak out against him escalates. Much like

Lincoln's own administration, as protests against capturing of undocumented immigrants

continue to take place, they do not seem to affect his supporters’ view on the president on a large

scale. Comparing Lincoln's wartime behavior in the White House to the political movement

Trump has started since he took office, their goal to suppress the media that goes against what

they stand for is nothing new to the American people. Under Lincoln's terms, over three hundred

newspapers were shut down- mostly consisting of Democratic views or sympathies. While

Abraham used the idea of freedom as the base of what he stood for, that did not stop him from

taking extreme precautions against slave states. While Lincoln sided with the northern states,
Trump’s strategy has been to target liberal states, all while feeling the support from the southern

states who back his ideology. Both had the most supporters from the states whose politics held

the majority of the country at the time, giving permission to both men to carry out their goals.

While their situations fall on the opposite ends of the spectrum, both presidents have used their

superior power to wipe out press with opposing ideas as well as the oppression of peaceful

protesters and rallies that do not go along with their own agenda. As Thomas J. Dilorenzo notes

in his book ​Lincoln Unmasked,​ “Any newspaper deemed by Lincoln to be ‘guilty of being in

opposition to the war’ was shut down and, in many cases, its printing presses destroyed. Not only

that, but editors and owners of opposition newspapers were routinely imprisoned in military

prisons without any due process”-pg 235.

While both leaders took the opportunity at hand to build their own power, there lies both

distinct moral and ethical differences between their actions during their time in office. Infamous

for his proposal to build a two thousand and twenty six mile wall along the border of the United

States and Mexico, Trump’s intentions for the highly debated project has always been to keep

undocumented minorities out of the country. Even with Abraham and Donald gaining a mass

following on the campaign trail from their highly publicized promises, one difference that keeps

the two candidates distinct has been the reasoning behind their actions. Lincoln’s strong and

direct precautions against the south were in order to secure that the democratic politics of the

region did not interfere with his plans to create equal opportunity for enslaved African

Americans and begin a new wave of freedom as well as a shift in the American economy. With

that said, Trump’s own hopes from the future entail the displacement of hardworking Americans

whose jobs allow the economy as a whole to function smoothly: allowing field workers and
working class jobs to keep agricultural and unwanted jobs afloat across the country. One plan

allows America to prosper as a whole, since the North’s economy relied heavily on factories as

well as industrialism, while the other allows employment gaps after immigrants are displaced

with no one to fill their jobs. While Lincoln looked out for the American people in times of

change, even if that meant having to use his status as president, Trump’s plan to build a wall only

hurts the economy, claiming in his immigration speech, “we have to listen to the concerns that

working people, our forgotten working people, have over the record pace of immigration and its

impact on their jobs, wages, housing, schools, tax bills and general living conditions”.

Essentially, Donald’s attack on the states does not better the people, and instead targets

differences in the country as well as the dividing morales seen throughout the states. Rather than

approach his proposal for the border wall in a professional manner, he instead chooses to claim

opposing states as dangerous and a destruction to his ill thought plan.

Despite proving their differences and similarities through the way they both chose to

handle the country, Abraham Lincoln and Donald Trump have held their position of power and

different moral levels, their terms in office spanning between a one hundred and fifty-four year

difference. Today, Americans everywhere learn in school of the Honest Abe; the man who freed

the slaves, rather than the real politician whose goals for the country paralleled his agenda for the

economy as well as his own agenda for his time in office. Fast forward to 2018 and the President

of the United States has yet again created hostile tension within the country, putting power

before peace and his own greedy intentions before the people. Whether or not the two men are

more different than similar, what is not up for debate is the tension and strain within the country

during both presidencies: civilians standing up for what the believe in and in return being met
with backlash from the population whose political views dominates all states. Looking at the

accomplishments from both Lincoln and Trump, the question of what makes a good leader still

remains, the measures taken in times of stress over evaluated by historians, thereby shifting the

history fed to children. With all said and done, What stands strong in the leadership of both

Abraham Lincoln and Donald Trump is their ability to make themselves heard and listened to,

taking what’s at stake and twisting it to their own advantage. With all eyes watching as leaders

have to make executive decisions under immense pressure from the public all while having to

hold their actions to what is constitutional, perhaps it is the least well behaved presidents that

make the most impact on their country, for better or for worse.
 Works Cited

1)DiLorenzo, Thomas J. Lincoln unmasked: what you're not supposed to know about dishonest

Abe. Three Rivers Press, 2006.

2) Romm, Joe. “Trump compares himself to Lincoln. But Lincoln warned us about demagogues

like him.” ThinkProgress, Think Progress, 9 Jan. 2017,

thinkprogress.org/abraham-lincolns-warning-about-american-demagogues-like-trump-a5ba8a576

5f6/.

3) Williams, The Honorable Frank. “Abraham Lincoln and Civil Liberties in Wartime.” The

Heritage Foundation, 5 May 2004,

www.heritage.org/defense/report/abraham-lincoln-and-civil-liberties-wartime.

4) Neely, Jr. Mark E. “The Lincoln Administration and Arbitrary Arrests: A Reconsideration.”

Papers of the Abraham Lincoln Association, Michigan Publishing, University of Michigan

Library, 1 Jan. 1983,

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www.cnn.com/2018/01/05/politics/is-the-white-house-declaring-a-policy-war-on-california/inde

x.html.

7) Steinmetz, Katy. “Donald Trump vs. California: 7 Ways the State Is Resisting.” Time, Time, 6

Apr. 2017, time.com/4725971/california-resisting-trump-administration/.

8) Hamblin, Abby. “Here's why some think Trump has 'declared war on California'.”

Sandiegouniontribune.com, San Diego Union Tribune, 5 Jan. 2018,

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9) Kopan, Tal. “Trump asks for $33B for border; $18B for wall.” CNN, Cable News Network, 6

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10) Clark Mindock New York. “Donald Trump threatens to shut down NBC and other TV news

networks that criticise him.” The Independent, Independent Digital News and Media, 11 Oct.
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11) Arango, Tim. “In Clash Between California and Trump, It’s One America Versus Another.”

The New York Times, The New York Times, 7 Jan. 2018,

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12) “The Civil War.” HistoryNet, www.historynet.com/civil-war.

13) “10 Facts: Abraham Lincoln.” Civil War Trust, Civil War Trust,

www.civilwar.org/learn/articles/10-facts-abraham-lincoln.