...a simple-minded soldier boy who deserts," Lincoln asked, "while I must not touch a hair of a wiley agitator who induces him to desert? This is none the...less injurious when effected by getting a father, a brother, or friend, into a public meeting, and there working upon his feelings, till he is persuaded...

...reprinted in Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, v. 6, p. 264. Rutgers University Press (1953, 1990). Must I shoot a simple-minded soldier boy who deserts,...hair of a wily agitator who induces him to desert? Letter to Erastus Corning and Others, [June 12], 1863, reprinted in Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln,...

...from the army, and to leave the rebellion without an adequate military force to suppress rt. . . . Must I shoot a simple-minded soldier boy who deserts,...hair of a wily agitator who induces him to desert? I can no more be persuaded that the government can constitutionally take no strong measures in time...

...one of the leading Southern sympathizers in the Union, Clement L. Vallandigham, the president asked: "Must I shoot a simple-minded soldier boy who deserts,...touch a hair of a wily agitator who induces him to desert?"58 As usual, there was corruption in the quartermaster corps. Lincoln got involved, although...

...Vallandigham as an agitator. "Must I shoot a simple-minded soldier boy who deserts, [Lincoln asked Corning] while I must not touch a hair of a wily agitator who induces him to desert?"26 Even the friendly press found it difficult to be carried along by Lincoln's argument in...

...York, Democrats," 12 June 1863, Abraham Lincoln, defending his suppression of the press, despaired, "Must I shoot a simple-minded soldier boy who deserts,...hair of a wily agitator who induces him to desert?" Quoted in The Living Lincoln, ed. Paul M. Angle and Earl Schenck Miers (New York: Barnes & Noble, 1992),...

...the women to howl about me." 33 "Must I shoot a simple-minded soldier boy who deserts," he protested, "while I must not touch a hair of a wily agitator who induced him to desert?' The longer the war lasted, the more entrenched became his resolution against...

...armies cannot be maintained unless desertions shall be punished by the severe penalty of death. . . . Must I shoot a simple-minded soldier boy who deserts,...touch a hair of a wily agitator who induces him to desert?"98 It was a powerful point. But, judging by Vallandigham's case, it included antiwar political...

...war effort whose arrest had prompted the Albany resolutions, Lincoln stated his often-quoted epigram: "Must I shoot a simple-minded soldier boy who deserts, while I must not touch a hair of a wilcy agitator who induces him to desert?" The popularity of this statement has, it seems to me, distracted...

...not be maintained unless desertion shall be punished by the severe penalty of death." Then he asked: "Must I shoot a simpleminded soldier boy who deserts, while I must not touch a hair of a wiley agitator who induces him to desert? ... I think that in such a case, to silence the agitator,...