Abraham Lincoln citations

Page 12

I will say, then, that I am not nor have ever been in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the black and white races, that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with White people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the White and black races which will ever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together, there must be the position of
Speeches and Writings, 1832-1858

IT IS RATHER FOR US TO BE HERE DEDICATED TO THE GREAT TASK REMAINING BEFORE US~THAT FROM THESE HONORED DEAD WE TAKE INCREASED DEVOTION TO THAT CAUSE FOR WHICH THEY GAVE THE LAST FULL MEASURE OF DEVOTION~THAT WE HERE HIGHLY RESOLVE THAT THESE DEAD SHALL NOT HAVE DIED IN VAIN~THAT THIS NATION UNDER GOD SHALL HAVE A NEW BIRTH OF FREEDOM~AND THAT GOVERNMENT OF THE PEOPLE BY THE PEOPLE FOR THE PEOPLE SHALL NOT PERISH FROM THE EARTH •
en
Adresse de Gettysburg : gouvernement du peuple, par le peuple, pour le peuple, 1863

Address Delivered in Candidacy for the State Legislature (9 March 1832)
1830s
Contexte: Upon the subject of education, not presuming to dictate any plan or system respecting it, I can only say that I view it as the most important subject which we as a people can be engaged in. That every man may receive at least a moderate education, and thereby be enabled to read the histories of his own and other countries, by which he may duly appreciate the value of our free institutions, appears to be an object of vital importance, even on this account alone, to say nothing of the advantages and satisfaction to be derived from all being able to read the Scriptures, and other works both of a religious and moral nature, for themselves.

The last sentence is from the 16 October 1854 Peoria speech, slightly paraphrased. No known contemporary source for the rest. It first appears, attributed to Lincoln, in US religious/inspirational journals in 1907-8, such as p123, Friends Intelligencer: a religious and family journal, Volume 65, Issue 8 (1908)
Misattributed

Source: 1860s, First State of the Union address (1861)
Contexte: Labor is prior to and independent of capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration. Capital has its rights, which are as worthy of protection as any other rights. Nor is it denied that there is, and probably always will be, a relation between labor and capital producing mutual benefits. The error is in assuming that the whole labor of community exists within that relation.

Claimed by atheist Franklin Steiner, on p. 144 of one of his books to have appeared in Manford's Magazine but he never gives a year of publication.
Misattributed

1850s, Speech at Peoria, Illinois (1854)
Contexte: The foregoing history may not be precisely accurate in every particular; but I am sure it is sufficiently so, for all the uses I shall attempt to make of it, and in it, we have before us, the chief material enabling us to correctly judge whether the repeal of the Missouri Compromise is right or wrong.
I think, and shall try to show, that it is wrong; wrong in its direct effect, letting slavery into Kansas and Nebraska — and wrong in its prospective principle, allowing it to spread to every other part of the wide world, where men can be found inclined to take it.
This declared indifference, but as I must think, covert real zeal for the spread of slavery, I can not but hate. I hate it because of the monstrous injustice of slavery itself. I hate it because it deprives our republican example of its just influence in the world — enables the enemies of free institutions, with plausibility, to taunt us as hypocrites — causes the real friends of freedom to doubt our sincerity, and especially because it forces so many really good men amongst ourselves into an open war with the very fundamental principles of civil liberty — criticising the Declaration of Independence, and insisting that there is no right principle of action but self-interest.

Variously attributed to Lincoln, Elbert Hubbard, Mark Twain, Benjamin Franklin and Socrates
Misattributed
Variante: It is better to be silent and be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt.

According to The Inner Life of Abraham Lincoln (1867) by F. B. Carpenter, Lincoln quoted this as having been said to him by a fellow-passenger in a stagecoach. See also "Washington during the War", Macmillan's Magazine 6:24 http://books.google.com/books?id=rB4AAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA24&dq=folks (May 1862)
Posthumous attributions
Variante: It's my experience that folks who have no vices have generally very few virtues.

Letter to Edwin Stanton (14 July 1864); published in Abraham Lincoln: A History (1890) by John Hay
1860s

1850s, Speech on the Dred Scott Decision (1857)

Statement first attributed in the New York Herald, (September 18, 1863) in response to allegations his most successful general drank too much; as quoted in Wit and Wisdom of the American Presidents: A Book of Quotations (2000) by Joslyn T. Pine, p. 26.
When some one charged Gen. Grant, in the President’s hearing, with drinking too much liquor, Mr. Lincoln, recalling Gen. Grant’s successes, said that if he could find out what brand of whisky Grant drank, he would send a barrel of it to all the other commanders.
The New York Times, October 30, 1863
Major Eckert asked Mr. Lincoln if the story of his interview with the complainant against General Grant was true. The story was: a growler called on the President and complained bitterly of General Grant’s drunkenness. The President inquired very solicitously, if the man could tell him where the General got his liquor. The man really was very sorry but couldn’t say where he did get it. The President replied that he would like very much to find out so he could get a quantity of it and send a barrel to all his Major Generals. Mr. Lincoln said he had heard the story before and it would be very good if he had said it, but he did not, and he supposed it was charged to him to give it currency. He then said the original of this story was in King George’s time. Bitter complaints were made to the King against his General Wolfe in which it was charged that he was mad. “Well,” said the King, “I wish he would bite some of my other Generals then.
Authenticity of quote first refuted in “The Military Telegraph During the Civil War in the United States” by William R. Plum, (1882).
Disputed

1860s, Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction (1863)

Speech in Springfield, Illinois https://cwcrossroads.wordpress.com/2011/01/18/race-and-slavery-north-and-south-some-logical-fallacies/#comment-47553 (17 July 1858)
1850s

1860s, Speech at Hartford (1860)

1860s, Last public address (1865)

p, 125
1850s, Autobiographical Sketch Written for Jesse W. Fell (1859)

1850s, Address before the Wisconsin State Agricultural Society (1859)

Remarks at Springfield, Illinois (20 November 1860) http://quod.lib.umich.edu/l/lincoln/lincoln4/1:214?rgn=div1;view=fulltext; published in The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln (1953) by Roy P. Basler, vol. 4, p. 142
1860s

Second Speech at Frederick, Maryland (4 October 1862)
1860s

1830s, The Lyceum Address (1838)