(Washington, DC) – The latest accusations of wiretapping by the White House against former President Barack Obama should come as no surprise to those who have been around our nation’s capital for very long. It is a well-documented fact that as far back as President Abraham Lincoln, wire tapping has been prevelent. Lincoln was the first President to make use of wiretapping, and it was integral to his political strategy during the American Civil War. It is estimated that there were thousands of skilled wiretappers employed by the White House and the Union Army during Lincoln’s presidency.

The U.S. War Department was the first to oversee official White House wiretapping, starting in March of 1862. All communications, secret or otherwise, were captured by the war department in their building near the White House. Most involved in communications with the White House were wholly unaware of the existence or location of this office and its wiretappers. The location for collections changed several times over the course of the Lincoln presidency, in order to better collect conversations, and also to provide a more private venue for the President to consider any action he might take based on the captured communications. It was in this office that Lincoln first intercepted the infamous Nasby Papers.

From Lincoln on, Presidents have continually made use of wiretapping. In 1942, President Franklin Roosevelt revolutionized his wiretapping efforts by creating the clandestine White House Signal Detatchment (WHSD). The WHSD allowed the President to be aware not only of communications taking place in the White House, but also at remote locations of his choosing. Even those who were aware of these efforts didn’t appear to be concerned. By this time, wiretapping had taken on a whole new meaning.

We live a wholly different time that did Presidents Lincoln and Roosevelt, and wiretapping is no longer seen as a profitable activity. Our laws, technology and mores have changed, such that traditional wiretapping can no longer thrive in today’s environment.

This makes the accusations of wiretapping that President Trump has made against former President Obama both obvious, and absurd at the same time. Though wiretapping is still practiced by ham radio enthusiasts who are fluent with Morse Code, and the U.S. Military still trains its officers in More Code wiretapping, all of this has become a thing of the past. Today, we are more likely to use voice communication via telephones than to bother with the cumbersome tapping of Morse Code via telegraph. Former President Obama has demonstrated that he is too savvy and efficient to resort to communicating via dots and dashes when voice communications are so readily available.