Lincoln, Abraham (1809–1865) Sixteenth president of the United States, who, it has been claimed, was influenced in his decision to free the slaves by Spiritualist experiences. Immediately after his election to the presidency, an article was published in the Cleveland Plaindealer based on statements of medium J. B. Conklin, who identified Lincoln as a sympathizer with Spiritualism. Conklin said Lincoln was the unknown individual who frequently attended his séances in New York, asked mental questions, and departed as unnoticed as he had arrived. When the article was shown to Lincoln, he reportedly did not contradict it but said: ‘‘The only falsehood in the statement is that the half of it has been told. This article does not begin to tell the wonderful things I have witnessed.’’ In a letter to Horace Greeley in August 1862, Lincoln stated: ‘‘My paramount object is to save the union, and not either to save or destroy slavery.’’ The antislavery proclamation was dated a month later, September 1862, and was issued in January 1863. The change in Lincoln’s attitude was at least in part brought about by the influences of Senator Thomas Richmond, by his experiences through the mediums J. B. Conklin, Mrs. Cranston Laurie, Mrs. Miller, Nettie Colburn (later known under her married name Henrietta Maynard), and by Dr. Farnsworth’s predictions. Senator Richmond, one of the leading businessmen of Chicago, had a controlling interest in the grain and shipping industries. While chairman of the committee on banks and corporations, he became a personal friend of Lincoln. In his book, God Dealing with Slavery (1870), Richmond reproduced the letters which, under psychic influence, he sent to the president. Col. S. P. Kase claimed in the Spiritual Scientist that ‘‘for four succeeding Sundays Mr. Conklin, the test medium, was a guest at the presidential mansion. The result of these interviews was the President’s proposition to his cabinet to issue the proclamation.’’ Col. Kase also narrated President Lincoln’s visit, in the company of his wife, in Mrs. Laurie’s house. Laurie was a wellknown medium. The colonel’s daughter, Mrs. Miller, produced strong physical phenomena. Colburn was another guest. She later became famous as an inspirational speaker, but then she was scarcely out of her teens. She passed into trance, approached the president with closed eyes, and addressed him for a full hour and a half. The sum total of her address was: ‘‘This civil war will never cease. The shout of victory will never ring through the North, till you issue a proclamation that shall set free the enslaved millions of your unhappy country.’’ In the same séance President Lincoln witnessed powerful physical manifestations. The piano on which the medium was playing rose four inches from the floor in spite of the efforts of Col. Kase, Judge Wattles, and the two soldiers who accompanied the president to weigh it down. In 1891 Colburn (then Mrs. Maynard) published the book Was Abraham Lincoln a Spiritualist? in which she described her very first meeting with President Lincoln. In 1862 in Washington, Mrs. Lincoln had a sitting with her and was so much impressed that she asked her to come and see the president. According to Maynard’s account in her book, she delivered a trance address in which the President: ‘‘was charged with the utmost solemnity and force of manner not to abate the terms of its [Emancipation Proclamation] issue and not to delay its enforcement as a law beyond the opening of the year; and he was assured that it was to be the crowning event of his administration and his life; and that while he was being counselled by strong parties to defer the enforcement of it, hoping to supplant it by other measures and to delay action, he must in no wise heed such counsel, but stand firm to his convictions and fearlessly perform the work and fulfill the mission for which he had been raised by an overruling Providence. Those present declared that they lost sight of the timid girl in the majesty of the utterance, the strength and force of the language, and the importance of that which was conveyed, and seemed to realise that some strong masculine spirit force was giving speech to almost divine commands. I shall never forget the scene around me when I regained consciousness. I was standing in front of Mr. Lincoln, and he was sitting back in his chair, with his arms folded upon his breast, looking intently at me. I stepped back, naturally confused at the situation—not remembering at once where I was; and glancing around the group where perfect silence reigned. It took me a moment to remember my whereabouts. A gentleman present then said in a low tone: ‘Mr. President, did you notice anything peculiar in the method of address?’ Mr. Lincoln raised himself, as if shaking off his spell. He glanced quickly at the full-length portrait of Daniel Webster that hung above the piano, and replied: ‘Yes, and it is very singular, very!’ with a marked emphasis.’’ On Mr. Some’s inquiry whether there had been any pressure brought to bear upon the president to defer the enforcement of the proclamation, Lincoln admitted, ‘‘It is taking all my nerve and strength to withstand such a pressure.’’
Posted on: Mon, 13 Oct 2014 19:00:41 +0000
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