Libertarians and Tea Partiers flunk their Civil War era homework

Well, okay, my claim is a bit overblown, but the TPers and the Libertarians do have the common Young American weakness of shoddy research.  I'll give three quick examples here:

Libertarians often claim that President Abraham Lincoln was the real father of big government during his time in office, because the size of government and taxes expanded during those years.  Now, let me think.  There was something unique about Abraham Lincoln's Presidency.  Hey, I remember...

HE WAS PRESIDENT DURING A CIVIL WAR!!

This means, for those who can connect two dots, that the precedents Honest Abe set are valid IN TIME OF CIVIL WAR!  (The government post-bellum was back down to its pre-war size only seven years after the shooting stopped.  Ask your favorite small-government Lincoln basher is they knew that.)

Libertarians also love to claim that Abraham Lincoln violated the Constitution by suspending the Writ of Habeus Corpus in 1861.  I haven't the time for an extended treatment of the issue, so I'll give you the bullet points version:

The Constitution dictates that the Writ will not be suspended EXCEPT IN CASE OF REBELLION.  As Professor Harry Jaffa points out, if an attempt to separate 11 states from the Union by force of arms isn't rebellion, what would be?

Congress was in recess when Lincoln found it necessary to suspend the writ.  He called the Congress back early in a special session, and then asked them to rule up-or-down on his actions during the crisis, including his action of suspension of the Writ.  They approved.

A-ha, say the libertarians and neo-Confederates, but the states had reserved the right of secession from the Union when they ratified the Constitution!  They were exercising their legal right!

Wrong again.  Claremont Institute Fellow Thomas Kranawitter reviewed the records of the various ratification conventions in every state, including the ratification statements, the proposed amendments (sucessful and failed), and the records of the debates, and he made a startling (to some) discovery.

Not one state reserved a right of secession in their ratification statement.  Not even one.  In fact, only one convention, Delaware's, even proposed an amendment reserving that fancied right.  It was defeated.

You have to do your homework, people.