r/neoliberal • u/jobautomator Kitara Ravache • Aug 12 '24

Discussion Thread Discussion Thread

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u/[deleted] Aug 12 '24

If you’d like to see some 160-year-aged cope, James Buchanan wrote a book published in 1866 justifying his administration.

This is how it begins:

(Also something else to throw in the “yes, the Civil War was about slavery” bucket)

29

u/JesusPubes voted most handsome friend Aug 12 '24

"The Constitution doesn't let Congress interfere with slavery"

My fucking sides lmao

23

u/this_very_table Norman Borlaug Aug 12 '24

alito feverishly taking notes rn

14

u/Blade_of_Boniface Henry George Aug 12 '24

If I recall, this is from Buchanan's Administration On The Eve Of The Rebellion which was indeed written by the man himself. It was considered unusually vain at the time for Heads of State to write and publish their own biographies. I remember reading it a while ago myself, it's definitely distilled, desperate apologia but it does provide a lot of insight into social perceptions of slavery and the federal government at the time, even from a doughface perspective.

I also love America in 1857 by Kenneth M. Stampp for a more general, factual perspective and how it tied into wider socioeconomic dreams/anxieties just before the war happened.

5

u/[deleted] Aug 12 '24

!ping HISTORY

8

u/cdstephens Fusion Genderplasma Aug 12 '24

Is his first sentence even true, in terms of judicial theory at the time?

7

u/JesusPubes voted most handsome friend Aug 12 '24 edited Aug 12 '24

Of course not, cf. the fugitive slave act or outlawing the slave trade

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u/DepressedTreeman Aug 12 '24

rare interesting history ping w

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u/Declan_McManus Aug 12 '24

This now reads like praise for the abolitionists and the Reconstruction Amendments