Tag: Abraham Lincoln

1865: Lincoln’s 2nd Inaugural

ESSENTIAL QUESTION:

How did Abraham Lincoln use language to convey his view of Reconstruction?

CONTEXT:

In 1864, the fourth year of the American Civil War, a presidential election was held in which incumbent Abraham Lincoln ran against General George McClellan, the campaign focusing on Lincoln’s war record. In late 1864 many believed Lincoln would lose this election, fearing that McClellan might negotiate with the Confederacy and end the war without emancipation. But when the electoral college votes were tallied, a series of Northern victories (including the fall of Atlanta) and the voting power of Union soldiers had given Lincoln a clear majority.

On March 4, 1865, 41 days before he would be assassinated, Abraham Lincoln delivered his second inaugural address, only 700 words and 20% the length of his first inaugural speech. He spoke from the North Portico of the Capitol Building, with its newly completed dome, and this inaugural address was the first in which African Americans were allowed to attend. Reflecting upon the four years of war, Lincoln outlined plans to heal the nation, and his words are engraved on the north interior wall of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC.

TEXT:

Fellow countrymen: at this second appearing to take the oath of the presidential office there is less occasion for an extended address than there was at the first. Then a statement somewhat in detail of a course to be pursued seemed fitting and proper. Now, at the expiration of four years during which public declarations have been constantly called forth on every point and phase of the great contest which still absorbs the attention and engrosses the energies of the nation little that is new could be presented. The progress of our arms, upon which all else chiefly depends is as well known to the public as to myself and it is I trust reasonably satisfactory and encouraging to all. With high hope for the future no prediction in regard to it is ventured.

“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.

“One eighth of the whole population were colored slaves not distributed generally over the union but localized in the southern part of it. These slaves constituted a peculiar and powerful interest. All knew that this interest was somehow the cause of the war. To strengthen perpetuate and extend this interest was the object for which the insurgents would rend the Union even by war while the government claimed no right to do more than to restrict the territorial enlargement of it. Neither party expected for the war the magnitude or the duration which it has already attained. Neither anticipated that the cause of the conflict might cease with or even before the conflict itself should cease. Each looked for an easier triumph and a result less fundamental and astounding. Both read the same Bible and pray to the same God and each invokes His aid against the other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God’s assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men’s faces but let us judge not that we be not judged. The prayers of both could not be answered ~ that of neither has been answered fully. The Almighty has His own purposes. “Woe unto the world because of offenses for it must needs be that offenses come but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh.” If we shall suppose that American slavery is one of those offenses which in the providence of God must needs come but which having continued through His appointed time He now wills to remove and that He gives to both North and South this terrible war as the woe due to those by whom the offense came shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living God always ascribe to Him. Fondly do we hope ~ fervently do we pray ~ that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondsman’s two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword as was said three thousand years ago so still it must be said ‘the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.’

“With malice toward none with charity for all with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right let us strive on to finish the work we are in to bind up the nation’s wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan ~ to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.”

INQUIRY:

  1. Why did Lincoln believe this inaugural address could be shorter that the one he delivered in 1861?
  2. When Lincoln said, “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,” how did he contrast the political aims of the North and South in 1861–to what political aims did he allude?
  3. How did Lincoln characterize the American Civil War? What did he see as its cause?
  4. Identify biblical allusions Lincoln made in this speech. What were the effects of these allusions?
  5. Identify examples of alliteration, repetition, and parallel structure, all of which are important especially in speeches. What purpose did they accomplish in this address?
  6. What was the tone of this address? Compare the tone to Lincoln’s first inaugural address, made in 1861. What might account for the differences?
  7. How did Lincoln view America’s future? Give examples.

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES:

https://www.nps.gov/linc/learn/historyculture/lincoln-second-inaugural.htm

https://www.loc.gov/resource/ppmsc.02928/

https://guides.loc.gov/presidential-election-1864

https://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/abrahamlincolnsecondinauguraladdress.htm

1861: Lincoln’s “Better Angels”

ESSENTIAL QUESTION

How did Abraham Lincoln use language to discourage Southern secession in his first inaugural address?

CONTEXT

Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) was the 16th President of the United States. Born in a log cabin on the Kentucky frontier, he was self-educated, studied to be a lawyer, and rose in politics, representing Illinois in Congress and eventually becoming a leader in the new Republican Party. National politics in the 1850s and early 1860s were contentious, belligerent, and antagonistic. A moderate Republican, Lincoln was elected president in 1860, even though he did not actively seek the nomination in the South and seven states had seceded from the Union by the time he delivered this inaugural at the US Capitol. Lincoln was assassinated in Washington, D.C., in April, 1865.

TEXT

…I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so…

…It follows from these views that no State upon its own mere motion can lawfully get out of the Union; that resolves and ordinances to that effect are legally void, and that acts of violence within any State or States against the authority of the United States are insurrectionary or revolutionary, according to circumstances….

…The Chief Magistrate derives all his authority from the people, and they have referred none upon him to fix terms for the separation of the States. The people themselves can do this if also they choose, but the Executive as such has nothing to do with it. His duty is to administer the present Government as it came to his hands and to transmit it unimpaired by him to his successor…

…In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow-countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war. The Government will not assail you. You can have no conflict without being yourselves the aggressors. You have no oath registered in heaven to destroy the Government, while I shall have the most solemn one to “preserve, protect, and defend it.”

I am loath to close. We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.

INQUIRY

  1. Why did Lincoln state he would not interfere with the institution of slavery?
  2. Explain Lincoln’s views on secession.
  3. How did Lincoln address Southern citizens?
  4. What was the tone of these excerpts from them 1st Inaugural? How do you know? How did the tone change?
  5. To whom did Lincoln give the responsibility for beginning the Civil War?
  6. What were the “mystic chords of memory”? Why did Lincoln use that metaphor?
  7. What did Lincoln mean in his closing by referring to the “better angels of our nature”?
  8. Lincoln won reelection in 1864, and much had happened in the four years since the 1st Inaugural. Secession had become a fact and after the Emancipation Proclamation the purpose of the Civil War focused on the eradication of slavery. In Lincoln’s 2nd inaugural address (March, 1865) he closed with the words, “With malice toward none with charity for all with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right let us strive on to finish the work we are in to bind up the nation’s wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan ~ to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.” What was the tone of those words? How did that tone differ from the tone of the 1st Inaugural text?

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES

https://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/lincoln1.asp

https://www.whitehouse.gov/about-the-white-house/presidents/abraham-lincoln/

https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/-with-malice-toward-none-lincoln-s-second-inaugural.htm