Lincoln’s Best Speech: A Sesquicentennial

ThePublicDiscourse.com ^ | 3/4/2015 | Matthew S. Holland

[iowamark]

“With malice toward none; with charity for all…” It was a civic gesture as unexpected then as it is needed now.

One hundred and fifty years ago today, Abraham Lincoln stood on the eastern portico of the U.S. Capitol and delivered a few words—703, to be precise—at his Second Inaugural. The speech remains the most celebrated inaugural address in our history. Fredrick Douglass, not always an admirer of Lincoln, called it a “sacred effort.” Lincoln himself acknowledged it was filled with “lots of wisdom” and predicted it would “wear as well as—perhaps even better than—any thing I have produced.” From an otherwise self-deprecating man who had already authored the instantly classic Gettysburg Address, this is no small admission.

The morning Lincoln spoke, Washington, DC was awash in mud from several days of rain, and the skies remained grimly overcast. Yet, as Lincoln stepped forward to speak, a brilliant ray of sunshine burst through the clouds. Chief Justice Chase, among many others, saw it as “an auspicious omen of the dispersion of the clouds of war and the restoration of the clear sun light of prosperous peace.” There were good reasons for such an interpretation. With Robert E. Lee and his forces trapped near Richmond, Virginia, the downfall of the Confederacy’s capital city, largest army, and best general was imminent. The bloody, bitter ordeal of civil war finally appeared to be over, and everyone sensed it.

Despite these most confident circumstances, the war-weary Lincoln addressed his audience—many of whom were no doubt still grieving the loss of a son, a brother, a husband, or a friend—and gave no soothing prediction of the end of military action, no cathartic attack on Southern secessionists, no cheering vindication of his long-ridiculed leadership, and no promising plan for the future...

[central_va]

Acknowledges that the South wanted to negotiated peace but he refused to listen. Then again he was hell bent on teaching the South a lesson and wanted blood. He got it.

On the occasion corresponding to this four years ago all thoughts were anxiously directed to an impending civil war. All dreaded it, all sought to avert it. While the inaugural address was being delivered from this place, devoted altogether to saving the Union without war, insurgent agents were in the city seeking to destroy it without war—seeking to dissolve the Union and divide effects by negotiation. Both parties deprecated war, but one of them would make war rather than let the nation survive, and the other would accept war rather than let it perish, and the war came.

[Alas Babylon!]

Sess-kwee-sen-ten-ee-al?

[Alas Babylon!]

As a Southerner I’m glad the Union was preserved.

Two separate nations would have weakened us and showed the world that a nation dedicated to all men being equal was just a pipe dream.

Still, I humbly acknowledge and honor the bravery, dedication and devotion to duty of all and every Confederate soldier.

None of my “Piney Woods” people owned slaves nor supported slavery but were ardent in defending their country—meaning their State.

Had Lincoln lived, things would have been much better for the Southern people.

A deep, pervading sadness should affect us all to this day about those events...

[central_va]

Had Lincoln lived, things would have been much better for the Southern people.

If all earthly power were given to me [...] my first impulse would be to free all the slaves, and send them to Liberia,—to their own native land. But a moment’s reflection would convince me that whatever of high hope (as I think there is) there may be in this, in the long run, its sudden execution is impossible.[20][21]

Lincoln

[ml/nj]

Here's the report from the NYT. It's a bit at odds with your characterization and also with the text at your link which cites the report I reproduce below.

Start reading from "From Our Special Correspondent" in the left column. Be sure not to skip over:

The three plans, by one of which the conspirators expected to prevent the safe conveyance of Mr. Lincoln to Washington were these: 1) At some point this side of the Maryland, the train conveying the party was to be thrown from the track and precipitated down an embankment. ... 2) In case it was deemed best to allow the first plan to go by default, it was determined, by means of an infernal machine, to blow up the car in which Mr. Lincoln was to ride. ... 3) The favorite, and in all probability the only feasible plan was to surround the carriage in which Mr. Lincoln would ride from depot to depot in the City of Baltimore ...

Mrs. Lincoln did not seem in the best of spirits, partially because she did not wholly approve of the course taken, of which, indeed, she was not entirely cognisant, and partially because she felt anxious concerning the fate of her husband.

Mrs. Lincoln and her family reached the Baltimore Depot showed plainly what would have happened had Mr. Lincoln been of the party. ... They shouted -- "Trot him out," "Let's have him," "Come out, old Abe," We'll give you hell," You bloody Black Republicans," -- and other equally polite but more profane ejaculations. Some rude fellows entered the private apartment in which Mrs. Lincoln was sitting ... After a half an hour's experience of this sort of thing, Mrs. Lincoln and her son were taken to a carriage, which they entered without attracting much attention, and were driven to the house of the President of the road.

ML/NJ

[lee martell]

Thats a good phonetic layout of the word, although it’s still not a phrase that rolls off the tongue, such as Banana Republic.

[DoodleDawg]

Ah yes, because the local press of the day never, ever got anything wrong. I admit I depended on more current sources: Smithsonian Magazine, The True Mary Todd Lincoln; A Biography by Betty Boles Ellison (and didn't you say I should go to Mary Lincoln biographies?); Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin; The Baltimore Plot by Michael Kline; A. Lincoln by Ronald C. White. All of them detail how Lincoln traveled to D.C. without his family, and that they joined him the evening after he arrived. So I guess they didn't agree with your New York Times article. I wonder why?

[ml/nj]

That's not the "local press." That's the New York Times. The Times correspondent was THERE.

You can pretend all you want that people who referenced this report or ignored it entirely know better, but I just don't think that makes any sense.

ML/NJ

[jjotto]

Just to be clear, the New York Times was a local paper during Lincoln’s time. The New York Tribune (Horace Greeley) was the big dog then.

[DoodleDawg]

That's not the "local press." That's the New York Times. The Times correspondent was THERE.

And yet source after source repeat that Mrs. Lincoln was in Harrisburg and came down later in the day. I guess they're all lying.

[ml/nj]

A "local paper" would be one published in Baltimore. The NYT had their correspondent on the train with Lincoln. They were supportive of and trusted by Lincoln. If the Tribune reported on this incident (which you said never happened!) I am not aware of it.

I apologize for the poor quality of the image previously posted. I believe this one will be clearer.

ML/NJ

[DoodleDawg]

From your article:

"The scene at Harrisburgh(sic) the next morning was refreshing. The information had been given under an injuction of secrecy to the TIMES and one other journal; at half past ten or eleven o'clock, of the night which Mr. Lincoln left the city.

And later in the story:

"On the special train which left Harrisburgh(sic) promptly at nine in the morning, were all who had originally compsed the presidential party, with the exception of Mr. Lincoln, his immediate friend, COL. LAMON, who accompanied him on the night ride, and N.B. JUDD, who preferred to take the early morning route to Baltimore via Philadelphia."

So your own New York by God Times correspondent make it clear that Lincoln was not on the train when Mrs. Lincoln left, was, in fact, in Washington, and this information was known.

[ml/nj]

I guess you just have difficulty with the English language.

No. He wasn't on the train which left Harrisburg, because he abandoned it the night before ("at half past ten or eleven o'clock"). That "special train" was the one that was thought might be attacked.

Mr. Lincoln left the train Thursday night. Mrs. Lincoln left Harrisburg on Friday morning and arrived in Baltimore midday Friday. She " she felt anxious concerning the fate of her husband," because he wouldn't arrive in Washington until Saturday morning. He was NOT in Washington when Mrs. Lincoln left Harrisburg.

I guess you also don't think "Honest Abe" stood up Mary Todd on their first appointed wedding date either. Edgar Lee Masters writes in Lincoln, The Man:

The wedding was finally fixed to take place on January 1, 1841, at the Edwards mansion, and great preparations were made for the event. The rooms were decorated, the cakes baked. By the time the hour arrived Mary Todd was dressed in her bridal gown and veil, with flowers in her hair, waiting for Lincoln. But he did not come. An hour slipped by, and messengers were sent forth into the town to find him. They returned with word that he could not be found. Finally Mary Todd gave up and went weeping to her room. The guests departed. The lights in the mansion were blown out, and all was in darkness.

They got married on November 4, 1842.

What a swell guy!

ML/NJ

[DoodleDawg]

I guess you just have difficulty with the English language.

Or else I'm not reading things into it that aren't there, as you seem determined to do. He wasn't on the train which left Harrisburg, because he abandoned it the night before ("at half past ten or eleven o'clock"). That "special train" was the one that was thought might be attacked.

We hadn't really "abandoned" anything since he had arrived in Harrisburg a day or two before. He came on one train, he left on another. He stayed in a hotel in the interim.

That "special train" was the one that was thought might be attacked.

By the time the train Mrs. Lincoln was left Harrisburg Lincoln had been in Washington for some time, having also been seen in Baltimore. By the time the train reached any rebellious area of Maryland it was common knowledge that Lincoln himself wasn't on it. So I fail to see where Mrs. Lincoln was in any danger. Unless you think the rebel mob would have deliberately targeted her since they couldn't get to her husband?

She " she felt anxious concerning the fate of her husband," because he wouldn't arrive in Washington until Saturday morning. He was NOT in Washington when Mrs. Lincoln left Harrisburg.

Actually yes he was. He arrived in Washington at 6 AM and had telegraphed word of his safe arrival back to Pennsylvania. Mrs. Lincoln didn't leave till 9 AM. Your own newspaper clipping makes that clear, as does dozens of accounts of the trip made by historians.

I guess you also don't think "Honest Abe" stood up Mary Todd on their first appointed wedding date either.

When it comes to bad things about Lincoln, nothing you believe would surprise me.

[BillyBoy]

>> ...except the hundreds of thousands of innocents his generals had just killed in the South. As a proportion of the population today, it’s millions. A speech can’t take away these blunders. No other nation required a war to end slavery. <<

Tell that the confederates who STARTED the war to PRESERVE slavery.

[BillyBoy]

>> Then again he was hell bent on teaching the South a lesson and wanted blood. He got it. <<

Wow, even Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee would disagree with you on that one. They started repeatedly that Lincoln had conciliatory policies towards the south, and were alarmed when they learned he had been assassinated.

Things would have been quite different if a Radical Republican had been in the white house who wanted to punish the south and completely rebuild them from the ground up.

I respect the original confederates a lot more than their modern day neo-confederate counterparts. At least they were honest about Lincoln and the motivation for the war.

[central_va]

Did you read Lincolns own words, I put them in the post. Did you just skip over that?

[ml/nj]

Maybe this will help you with the timeline? It's from page one of the 25Feb1861 NYT.

Pay attention to the datelines.

ML/NJ

[DoodleDawg]

Doesn’t help. First one is dated 8 AM. It says Lincoln is in Washington and Mrs. Lincoln leaves Harrisburg at 9. Second one says Lincoln arrived in Baltimore at 8 AM. Historians agree that Lincoln arrived at Washington about 6 AM. And in none of the accounts does it say anything about abandoning Mrs. Lincoln and family.

[ml/nj]

I give up. You're hopeless.

Let others weigh in if they wish to.

ML/NJ