The Real Reason Lincoln Was Hated Before He Ended Slavery | Presidents Series | Glenn Beck

Abraham Lincoln was a little-known, failed one-term congressman who secured the presidential nomination after 50 rounds of voting. His unpopularity was so extreme that he faced a credible assassination threat in Baltimore on his way to Washington D.C. for his inauguration. He had to sneak into the capital disguised, realizing the depth of the Union's and his own peril.

He was voted in on the 50th round of voting at the convention. On the way to office in Baltimore, there was a threat on his life. He took his hat off, put a shawl on, and acted like an old man to get into Washington on another train.

Glenn Beck developed a proprietary AI system, distinct from general models like ChatGPT, by feeding it a vast collection of founding documents from 1610 to 1830. This AI is 'walled off' to prevent external influence and hallucination, allowing it to provide insights directly from the original texts of the founders, without knowledge of modern concepts or figures.

We put all of that into a database. It's all proprietary. This is not ChatGPT. We fenced it off so it cannot pull from anywhere else. It can't hallucinate. It doesn't know anything past 1820.

Lincoln endured a traumatic childhood with an abusive, alcoholic father who beat his wife and children. After his mother's death, his father abandoned him and his sister for nearly a year, forcing Lincoln to hunt and survive. His life changed when his father returned with a new wife, who taught Lincoln to read the scriptures and instilled in him the values he later credited for everything he became.

His father was nasty, drunk, one of these kind of Christians that would beat Christ into you. His mother dies, his father just leaves. Then dad walks in one day and pushes a woman towards him and says, 'This is your new mother.' She taught him how to read, she taught him the scripture. He later said, 'Everything I am, I owe to my mother.'

Prior to Gettysburg, the Union had lost almost every major battle. Lincoln, not yet a committed Christian, was deeply moved by the horrific aftermath of the battle, where bodies were still being stacked months later. This experience drove him to his knees, leading to a full surrender to God and a commitment to divine will, which was reflected in his subsequent speeches and a national call for 'humiliation, prayer, and fasting.'

We had lost every battle but one up until this point. He shows up like three or four months later and they're still stacking bodies like cordwood. He hadn't surrendered to God until Gettysburg. After Gettysburg, he gets on his knees and he's begging God, 'Whatever you want. Tell me what you want. I'll do whatever you want.' He calls for a national day of prayer and fasting. We win every battle but one after the proclamation.

As a young congressman, Lincoln was not an abolitionist leader, but his perspective on slavery was significantly shaped by John Quincy Adams. Adams, the only former president to serve in the House, actively fought against slavery and saw Lincoln as a potential successor in this cause, 'downloading' his knowledge and strategies to him.

John Quincy Adams sees this young kid and he's looking for a successor. He has been fighting against slavery forever. He sees Abraham Lincoln and he realizes, 'I think this is the guy that can do it.' So he downloads everything that he has done. Abe is not necessarily a guy who is marching or leading with abolition.

For Abraham Lincoln, especially at the beginning of his presidency, the paramount concern was preserving the Union, not immediately abolishing slavery. He believed that a divided nation would be vulnerable to foreign powers like France and England, who were considering backing the Confederacy for trade benefits. The Emancipation Proclamation was partly a strategic move to prevent foreign intervention.

He was more concerned about saving the republic than anything else. It really for Abraham Lincoln at least at the beginning it was about keep the union together. One of the reasons why the Emancipation Proclamation happens is to stop France and I think England from endorsing the South. We had to keep this together if we were going to be one. Otherwise, we would be divided up and eaten by foreign powers.

Lincoln's presidency was marked by actions that many consider constitutional violations, primarily due to the exigencies of the Civil War. He suspended habeas corpus and initiated a naval blockade without Congressional approval, believing these measures were necessary to preserve the republic. This led to him being labeled a 'tyrant' by some, particularly in the South.

You can look at him and say he violated the Constitution at least three times, all on the same thing. Writ of habeas corpus and actually sending the blockade down. Most people agree that it's Congress that has the right to do that. He holds them and he holds them without trial. He believed that we have to preserve the republic.

John Wilkes Booth, a fervent Confederate sympathizer, was enraged by Lincoln's post-Civil War call for national reconciliation, encapsulated in his 'malice toward none, with charity for all' speech. Booth believed Lincoln's conciliatory approach would prevent the South from rising again and sought to destabilize the Union by assassinating the president, hoping to reignite the conflict.

He had just given his speech with malice toward none. When he hears 'with charity toward all, malice toward none,' he loses his mind. He's like, 'I got to kill him.' Abraham Lincoln is saying, 'Look, we are all one family. We've got to come together.' He's for reconciliation. Booth knows he's out of his mind crazy that the South submitted. He says, 'I've got to rile up the North to be able to get them so angry they'll just go back into war.'

During the chaos of Lincoln's assassination at Ford's Theater, the lead actress of the play, seeing an opportunity for fame, changed into a new white dress with green flowers. She then insisted on holding the dying president's head, allowing his blood to stain her dress. She subsequently toured, wearing the blood-stained dress and recounting the event, effectively turning herself into a 'Florence Nightingale' figure.

The woman who was the lead actress in the play that night, she sees an opportunity. She goes downstairs, she changes into a white dress. She comes up to the door of the box and says, 'I just must hold him.' They lift him up, put his head so he bleeds all over her dress. She does it because she knows she's going to make herself into the Florence Nightingale of this night. She goes on tour wearing the dress telling how what happened.

A freed slave seamstress, who had bought her own freedom and moved to Washington D.C., became a close friend and confidante to Abraham and Mary Todd Lincoln. She was the only person the Lincolns fully trusted in the city. On the night of Lincoln's assassination, she was in the White House, making Mary Todd Lincoln's black mourning dress, a poignant symbol of her connection to the president who ended slavery.

The woman who made all of his clothes and his wife's clothes, she was a freed slave that freed herself and bought her freedom and moved to Washington DC. They hit it off and became friends. She was a black woman and the only one that Abraham Lincoln and his wife trusted. She's in the White House and she's making the black dress so Mary Todd Lincoln can wear it the next morning.