Click here for Full Issue of Fidelio Volume 11, Number 1-2, Winter-Spring 2002 while measures of the real economy sup- nomic analysts Marcia Merry Baker and Thus, EIR economist Richard Freeman porting that debt and money issuance, John Hoefle, applied actual U.S. eco- contributes to the report, an extraordi- decline slowly and then more sharply; nomic data from 1996-2001 to this nary 55-page review of “Why Roo- the trajectory of an economic break- heuristic, and found that LaRouche had sevelt’s Explosive 1933-45 Recovery down collapse. LaRouche emphasized been precisely right. This lies behind the Worked.” Freeman’s study takes F.D.R. that a collapse was at hand in such an Presidential candidate’s steely insistence, out of the false frame of “Keynesian eco- economic geometry, when the mone- during the 1999-2000 campaign, that nomics,” and locates him firmly, tary-supply curve started to grow so what was acclaimed by all others as the through family, education, principles, rapidly that it outstripped the growth of “New Economy boom” of the 1990’s— and actions, in Alexander Hamilton’s debt—to sustain which, the money sup- that “permanent prosperity”—would American System of political econo- ply was being increased! Weimar Ger- collapse during the year 2000. my—the principles Lyndon LaRouche many’s hyperinflationary breakdown of represents today. 1923 was a previous such occurrence. In Definitive Study of New Deal If Americans can overcome their des- 1999’s early stages of the Presidential Despite the qualitative difference of this perate desire to be lied to about the eco- campaign, LaRouche emphasized that economic breakdown, LaRouche assures nomic collapse by political leaders and this point was being reached in the that Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s “Gen- media in time, this report is ready to tell United States. eral Welfare” principles of a regulated them what to do. The econometric study, by EIR eco- national economy, will work again. —Paul Gallagher Defending Lincoln—And Discovering Him hose who slander Abraham Lin- reminded them that only five years ear- Tcoln these days—apologists for the lier, no one would have thought to say old slaveholders and the new “share- what Douglas and his ilk now holders”—have been patiently, thor- preached—that only whites were meant oughly debunked and dismantled by by the “all men are created equal” of William Lee Miller’s new book. America’s Declaration of Independence. Miller explores Lincoln’s life and Miller uses no rare texts, only sources work prior to his Presidency, to demon- available to all researchers. Thus, by strate his consistent fight against racial- contrast with his work, those who now ism. With good dry humor and an call Lincoln a racist, or tear words out of unobtrusive informal style, Miller shows context to claim he didn’t oppose slav- Lincoln’s very calculating steps to get ery, are proven to be utterly disrespect- the power he needed to advance society ful of truth. for all Americans. Lincoln’s True Identity Lincoln’s Virtues, Lincoln’s Virtues is a companion to An Ethical Biography Miller’s excellent Arguing About Slavery: But, although he deeply admires Lin- by William Lee Miller John Quincy Adams and the Great Battle coln, in an important sense Miller does New York, Alfred A. Knopf, 2002 in the United States Congress. Here we see not understand Lincoln’s identity. 515 pages, hardcover, $30.00 Lincoln exploding into action against This flaw appears jarringly: Miller the threat that slavery would spread and rebukes Lincoln for initiatives whose covers and invents the means to change destroy the nation, rather than die as an purpose and importance he simply does and improve his own labor. Cognition, institution confined to the Old South. not recognize. and resulting progress, mark mankind Miller shows Lincoln’s constant focus on From 1858 into 1860, Lincoln gave dif- as a unique species. slavery’s moral wrong; and his many- ferent versions of an address on “Discov- Miller’s contempt for this speech is a years-long hunting, perhaps even politi- eries and Inventions.” Miller scorns that serious blunder. It contains the core of cal “stalking,” of Illinois Senator speech, calling it a failure, and boring. Lincoln’s ideas on the race issue. In it, Stephen Douglas, whose Kansas- It was Lincoln’s own favorite speech, Lincoln shows scientifically man’s ele- Nebraska Act opened the gates to the on the score of repetition. He showed vated and dignified species-nature, and universal spread of slavery. the essential difference between man thus the nature of all men, equally. Douglas used race-baiting as his and all other living creatures: that while More deeply, this is Lincoln’s person- main debating weapon, while Lincoln beavers and ants work hard and effec- al identification with a very specific turn educated audiences to see their own tively, their labor is always the same as of mind—the humanist republican, a racist attitudes as a recent historical that of their grandparents. But man, Western tradition originating with Pla- degradation of popular opinion. Lincoln through creative problem-solving, dis- to’s Athens. 103 © 2002 Schiller Institute, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part without permission strictly prohibited. The Fifteenth-century Golden give power to the people of the country. suddenly and mysteriously, after only Renaissance, reviving Plato, gave the Lincoln’s Renaissance passion for one month in office. Vice President John world the revolutionary idea of the improvement is his national mission. Tyler. a nominal Whig from Virginia, modern nation-state republic. This succeeded to the Presidency, betrayed Renaissance invention was finally real- Economic Development the Whig program, and vetoed the ized in a durable form in the American Miller vaguely defines the “ideological national bank. Tyler’s political sponsors Revolution; and Abraham Lincoln, reasons” for Lincoln’s politics: “his agree- would more and more openly attempt to reviving the American Founders’ ideals, ing with the Whig program of economic destroy the United States in the years to saw himself a colleague of these human- development; his sharing in the aspiring, come. ist fighters across the ages. improving, intellectualizing, even moral- Hints of this appear in the Miller izing element in Whig culture; and his Imperial Betrayal biography, but the author never pulls vibrating in tune with Whig nationalism Later, as a Congressman, Lincoln them together to get at the core of Lin- and devotion to the Union.” demanded evidence from President coln’s moral philosophy. But how do these elements make a James K. Polk that Mexico had really coherent philosophy? And who are its invaded the U.S. to start the Mexican Moral Philosophy opponents, the enemies of economic War; he embarrassed the lying President. For example, Mary Lincoln is quoted, development, improvement, intellect, Biographer Miller condemns Lincoln’s that while her husband was not a morality, nationalism, and the Union? 1848 Spot Resolutions, aimed at Polk, as “technical Christian,” “he was a reli- All American politics were defined by a nasty, personal, and unnecessary attack gious man always,” and he had a “kind the strategic-level fight between humanist against the dignity of the President. But of poetry in his nature.” Miller says nationalists such as Alexander Hamilton, there is rather direct evidence that Lin- Lincoln “liked and memorized and Henry Clay, John Quincy Adams, and coln knew what Miller has not really recited poems of Robert Burns that Lincoln, versus soulless, British Empire- attempted to understand. Miller quotes puncture the pretensions of religious aligned, anti-nationalist operatives such as from Lincoln’s Autobiographical sketch folk.” He uses these tidbits defending Aaron Burr, Martin van Buren, and (written 1860), on the issue of the Mexi- Lincoln from Fundamentalists’ August Belmont. There is no reference in can War: “[T]he act of sending an charges of irreligion; but Lincoln’s the Miller biography to the nationalist armed force among the Mexicans, was Christianity is a universe above those conceptions of Henry Clay, Lincoln’s unnecessary, inasmuch as Mexico was in gnostic hypocrites. mentor, and no mention of Mathew no way molesting, or menacing the U.S. Or, Miller quotes from the Discover- Carey or his son Henry C. Carey, whose or the people thereof; and that it was ies speech, on the invention of printing: economic writings defined Lincoln’s pro- unconstitutional, because the power of most “men . were utterly unconscious, gram throughout his career. levying war is vested in Congress, and that their conditions, or their minds So, Miller has no conception of what not in the President.” were capable of improvement. They not Lincoln meant in the speech of Dec. 26, Miller stops there, omitting the sen- only looked upon the educated few as 1839, attacking Democratic President tence ending the quoted paragraph (where superior beings; but they supposed van Buren and his faction as a “volcano Lincoln is speaking of himself in the themselves to be naturally incapable of of corruption,” who had destroyed the third person): “He thought the principal rising to equality. To immancipate [sic] Bank of the United States in order to motive for the act, was to divert public the mind from this false and under esti- turn over the nation’s credit and bank- attention from the surrender of ‘Fifty- mate of itself, is the great task which ing powers to private swindlers. He said four, Forty, or Fight’ to Great Britain, printing came into the world to per- the nation’s liberties were at stake, and on the Oregon boundary question.” form.” he would be willing to die rather than to This refers to the swindle by Polk— Miller says Lincoln himself must surrender to this corruption.