Do People Really Have to Say Something Before We Can Quote Them?

[UPDATED]

Here's something that's hilarious. Yesterday on the House floor, Rep. Don Young misquoted Abraham Lincoln, after this bogus Lincoln quote led off Frank Gaffney's column on Tuesday in The Washington Times: "Congressmen who willfully take actions during wartime that damage morale and undermine the military are saboteurs and should be arrested, exiled, or hanged."

FactCheck.org had the background of where the quote came from six months ago. J. Michael Waller wrote it in an article in Insight in 2003. According to FactCheck.org, here's the sentence that Waller used to lead off the article:

"Congressmen who willfully take action during wartime that damage morale and undermine the military are saboteurs, and should be arrested, exiled or hanged," that's what President Abraham Lincoln said during the War Between the States.

But it was all a big misunderstanding. Waller didn't mean to suggest that Lincoln actually said that. FactCheck.org allowed him to explain:

The supposed quote in question is not a quote at all, and I never intended it to be construed as one. It was my lead sentence in the article that a copy editor mistakenly turned into a quote by incorrectly inserting quotation marks.

Additionally, I filed my story with the lead sentence ending in the words "Civil War," which my southern editor switched to "War Between the States."

Oddly, you are the first to question me about this . I'm surprised it has been repeated as often as you say. My editors at the time didn't think it was necessary to run a correction in the following issue of the magazine, and to my knowledge we received no public comment.

What reasonable person would think that a statement followed by the phrase, "that's what President Abraham Lincoln said during the Civil War" was something that President Abraham Lincoln said during the Civil War?

Damn editors. They wreck everything.

Just for the record, FactCheck.org clarifies that, in this context or any other, Abraham Lincoln never called for Congressmen to be hanged. He can continue to hold his place in our hearts.

UPDATED--To remove the link to Gaffney's column, which, as far as I can tell, has been obliterated from The Washington Times Website.