Defending your cause

The editorial "Statesman Savimbi?," Oct. 9, includes a fact injurious to the truth. The Southern rejection of the United States election of 1860 did not cause "violent resistance."

Abraham Lincoln's policies of rejecting the South and his pledge to destroy it drove people in the South, in accordance with the Constitution, to legally separate from the federal government. The South defended itself against the actions of Mr. Lincoln.

Please do not blame people for defending themselves. This is similar to blaming the violence of World War II on the Polish and the Jews. E. Dabney Howe, Rossmoor, Calif.

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