Rome’s Responsibility for the Assassination of Abraham Lincoln
Contents
Rome’s Responsibility for the Assassination of Abraham Lincoln was authored by Thomas M. Harris and first published in 1897.
This page was copied from from http://www.antichristconspiracy.com and formatted into shorter pages with titles that are not in the original book. My intent is to make Thomas Harris’s book more accessible and more visible on the Internet.
“Thomas Maley Harris was a doctor who served in the Tenth West Virginia Volunteers during the Civil War. He rose to become a brigadier general, and was brevetted a major general. Harris was a member of the military commission which tried and convicted the Lincoln assassin conspirators. He later wrote the book ‘Assassination of Lincoln.'”
Introduction by the author
(Typed up by the webmaster. Source: https://archive.org/stream/romesresponsibil00harr#page/n11/mode/2up)
This little book is a book of facts. Every statement in it can be sustained by ample testimony.
It reveals a state of things that calls for the earnest and careful consideration of every true American citizen. It shows that we have a most wily and dangerous foe in our midst; that, in fact, we have taken a viper into our bosom, and have, by our genial and hospitable treatment of it, given it sufficient vital vigor to enable it to begin to use its sting.
That foe is the Roman Catholic Hierarchy.
Note–It is the governing power of the Roman Catholic Church; the Hierarchy, and not the church in the whole body of the membership that we arraign, and characterize as a foe. There are many of the individual members of the Roman Catholic Church amongst its laity in the United States that really love, and are loyal to our civil institutions.
These, however, are found almost exclusively amongst those who have been educated in our Public Schools; and so have caught the spirit of our institutions and have reached such an appreciation of their God-given rights of manhood as enables them to disregard the assumed authority of their priests over them in civil affairs. These, and these alone, amongst the laity of the Roman Catholic Church, are able to become true and loyal citizens of our Republic.
It is to prevent the multiplication of this class that the Hierarchy of the church uses all its power to keep the children of the church out of our Public schools. The Parochial school education is directed, and intended, to secure loyalty to the Hierarchy, and to prepare the minds of its children for disloyalty to any other power.
And so it comes to pass that but a comparatively very small moiety of its laity can be depended upon, in any test emergency, for loyalty to our government. But it is only the governing power of the Roman Catholic Church that we arraign. It alone is responsible for the attitude of its laity toward our institutions, and for the control of their conduct; and this Hierarchy is a deadly and implacable foe to our government. The reader of this little book will see that we have ample reasons for making this charge.
This being true, the great body of American freemen should be made to know the fact, and to realize its importance; that they may be prepared to meet, intelligently, the crisis that is upon us. But how shall they be put in possession of a full knowledge of the situation that confronts us? The Hierarchy has attained to such a position of power in this “land of the free” that it is able to control, to a great extent, all of the natural channels of information.
Wherever the Roman Catholic Church is strong it uses force to suppress freedom of speech, and this evidently at the instigation of the priesthood.
Patriotic lectures must make up their minds to be courageous enough to encounter the violence of the mob. This experience is, in this free country, and in this enlightened age, a thing of almost daily occurrence. It is the Roman Catholic Church alone that so educates its membership as to have them give this exhibition of their determination to suppress freedom of speech, whenever and wherever they have the power.
In suppressing freedom of the press the Hierarchy has been still more successful. By the skillful use of her almost boundless wealth, Rome has secured control of the public press, and can put before the American people just what she chooses, and can withhold from them whatever she chooses to suppress. Thus we find ourselves in such a situation today, that a book like this, cannot hope to be brought to public notice through this channel. Outside of the Patriotic press, there is scarcely a newspaper in the land that would dare to notice this little book, except to misrepresent, and condemn it. There is scarcely a bookseller or news dealer in the United States that would dare to expose it for sale, for fear of that exclusively Roman Catholic weapon, the “boycott.” How, then, shall it find its way to publicity? The information which it contains ought to be in the possession of every voter in the land; and of every American citizen; but how is it to gain the publicity that it ought to have? There is but one channel open to it; and this is found in the various Patriotic organizations that exist throughout the country.
Every member of every one of these various organizations should make it a matter of conscientious duty to interest himself in its circulation. (Webmaster: I have! How about you?)
Every Patriotic lecturer should be prepared to furnish it to any with whom he may come in contact who may desire, or can be prevailed upon to read it. Its price puts it within reach of all; and it should be circulated by the millions throughout the length and breath of the land. The suggestions which I have indulged in at its close area intended to be tentative rather than arbitrary.
They, of course, express my own conclusions in regard to what will be found necessary to break, for good and all, the power of the Hierarchy, yet, I do not desire to be dictatorial. I simply invite for them a careful, unbiased, consideration. It will be for the American people in the exercise of their collective wisdom to determine upon the best course of action. Something must be done; and they will have to determine as to the best method of doing that something.
May God, in His infinite mercy, give us wisdom and courage to do the right and necessary thing; and to face and overcome the foe. As it is only the claim of the Hierarchy of sovereign, civil dominion for its head that we oppose and resist; so, it is only in our civil action, in the discharge of our duties of citizenship, that we can successfully resist this monstrous claim.
It is Rome in politics that we are called upon to fight. With the religion of the Roman Hierarchy we have nothing to do in this field of contention. We accord to every man the right to choose his religion for himself; and be answerable only to his God.
DEDICATION
To the memory of our Martyred President, Abraham Lincoln; to all who love the Flag of our country; to all lovers of Liberty and haters of Despotism; to all who are loyal to the Constitution and Government of the United States of America; and who value the rights and the protection which these secure to us; liberty of conscience, freedom of thought and investigation, freedom of speech and the press, within the limitations of the law; the complete separation of Church and State, as distinct and separate organizations; each being independent of the other in its own proper sphere of action, yet not so as to separate religion from the State; civil government being an ordinance of God, and to be administered under His authority, in accordance with the great moral requirements of the Decalogue; to the friends of popular education at the expense of the State; and to all who hope to subserve the highest interests of mankind, and to attain to the true ideals of human existence on earth through the maintenance of these Protestant ideas and institutions, this book is respectfully and fraternally dedicated by its author.
T.M. HARRIS, Harrisville, WV
ROME’S RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE ASSASSINATION OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN
The Anti-Catholic agitation that is now so rife in the United States, marks a crisis in our history. Hundreds of intelligent, patriotic, conscientious men are earnestly, laboriously, and courageously devoting themselves to this agitation.
Newspapers have sprung up all over the country to give warning of danger, and to arouse the spirit of American patriotism.
Societies are being organized all over the land to protect and defend American institutions against the aggressions and encroachments of a Foreign political power that has gotten a lodgment in this land of Liberty, and that is evidently bent on the destruction of our free institutions, and substituting for them the Papal despotism; a despotism that lords it over the minds, the consciences, and the actions of its subjects; and thus renders them incapable of loyalty to any other government.
What does it all mean? It is evident that a crisis is even now upon us; a crisis in which the world-old contest between freedom and despotism is to be definitely and finally settled. This is an old fight. The cause of liberty seemed to have achieved the victory when our forefathers achieved their independence through a successful revolution and founded our government on the principles for the first time formally announced in our Declaration of Independence; securing to our people the natural rights of man; freedom of the mind and conscience, freedom of worship, and freedom of speech and of action, and protection in the exercise of these rights.
Here, in the wilds of a newly discovered world, was established a well considered, well understood, and truly democratic government; a government “of the people, by the people, and for the people.” The tree of liberty was here planted in a fertile soil, and a congenial clime, and has become a well-rooted, vigorous and fruitful tree, of goodly stature. Its branches overshadow the land, and its fruit is pleasant to the taste. The question now is, shall it be plucked up by the roots, and burned in the fire?
To this question more than twelve million of American freemen, for themselves, their wives, and their children, and in behalf of humanity, return, in the most emphatic manner the answer: “Never!” and stand ready, if need be, to seal that answer with their blood. The fruit of the tree of liberty is so sweet to the taste, so refreshing and so invigorating that we are ready to say with Patrick Henry, “Give me liberty, or give me death.”