Last Full Measure of Devotion

It’s Memorial Day, and I want to add my tribute to those who paid the “last full measure of devotion.” Mostly I’ll be sharing tributes others have offered that I think are beautiful.

Let’s start with words from Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address:

…that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.—Abraham Lincoln, Gettysburg Address

These words from Lincoln show up at the end of the three-minute video below, Hillsdale College’s Memorial Day tribute from 2016, which includes Ronald Reagan offering tribute, plus the song “Mansions of the Lord.”

Here are some of Reagan's words:

We are a nation under God, and I believe God intended for us to be free. We must realize that nor arsenal or no weapon in the arsenals of the world is so formidable as the will and moral courage of free men and women.

The price for this freedom at times has been high. But we have never been unwilling to pay that price.

Those that say that we’re in a time when there are no heroes, they just don’t know where to look.

President Reagan had a knack for saying the right thing. Here’s another tribute using his words. It comes from Champion Forest Baptist Church, which is in Northwest Houston, from 2014, which includes these words from Pres. Reagan:

The imagination plays a trick. We see these soldiers in our mind as old and wise. We see them as something like the Founding Fathers—grave and gray-haired. But most of them were boys when they died. And they gave up two lives: the one they were living, and the one they would have lived…. They gave up everything for our country, for us. We owe them a debt we can never repay. All we can do is remember them, and what they did, and why they had to be brave for us.

One more. This links to a tweet from 2015 in which Chris Pratt is teaching his son the Pledge of Allegiance. It should make you smile.  

Monuments and Memorials, Part II

I’m traveloguing last week’s trip to Washington, DC, going by way of the great people worth revering. Monday was on Thomas Jefferson. Today we honor Abraham Lincoln. I expect there will be at least two more parts to come.

We had a few minutes before our tour trolley arrived Monday morning, so we quickly walked through the Ford Theater—yes, that Ford Theater—which was just across the street from our starting place. They have memorialized the box in which President Lincoln was assassinated, and have a more general museum downstairs as well.

President Lincoln's box at the Ford Theater

 

There was a section of the museum on the various generals of the Civil War, which was interesting. And there was a fair amount on the Lincoln family in the White House. Other than what George Washington went through that winter at Valley Forge, well before his presidency, I don’t know if a US president ever went through a more stressful and precarious time than Lincoln did during his presidency. It is hard to imagine what would have happened without his resolute leadership in getting disagreeing sides to come together. Such circumstances with our current president would have meant total dissolution. God blessed us with Lincoln at that time. Praying that God has prepared such a person for our immediate future. (I wrote about Lincoln, in relation to "Ultimate Right and Wrong," September 14, 2011.)

The Lincoln Memorial is built to look something like a Greek Parthenon.

Lincoln Memorial, approaching from the left side

 

This larger-than-life statue sits looking out.

 

The way the monuments are set up, the Lincoln memorial is at one end. There is the reflecting pond straight ahead of him, toward the Washington Monument, with the White House beyond, and the Capitol building at the far end. There’s a word for such a view—the aspect. It is stunning, the symmetry and beauty of this aspect, referred to as the Washington Mall. It says civilization in every tree and stone in the arrangement.

View from the Lincoln Memorial

 

Lincoln was both brilliant and brief in words. The walls to his left and right have immortalized in stone his Gettysburg Address—which daughter Social Sphere and I memorized as part of her homeschooling—and also his Second Inaugural Address. These are words worth immortalizing, along with a man worth remembering through the ages.

The Gettysburg Address, at the Lincoln Memorial

 

Lincoln's 2nd Inaugural Address, at the Lincoln Memorial

 

 

They Don't Make Them Like They Used To

It’s President’s Day, the combined celebration of the birthdays of Abraham Lincoln (February 12) and George Washington (February 22). Back when I was in grade school, we didn’t get either day off; we spent them in school, learning about those men on their birthday. Even without a day off in their honor, I grew to love and honor them.

So today will be a quote day, just rereading some of their passed on wisdom. (I put in citations when I had them.) 

George Washington

George Washington portrait by
Gilbert Stuart, at Williamstown

"The preservation of the sacred fire of liberty, and the destiny of the republican model of government, are justly considered as deeply, perhaps as finally, staked on the experiment entrusted to the hands of the American People."—George Washington, after taking oath of office, April 30, 1789 

"Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, Religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of Patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great Pillars of human happiness—these firmest props of the duties of Men and citizens."—George Washington, Farewell Address, September 19, 1796 

“And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.”—George Washington, Farewell Address, September 19, 1796 

"To be prepared for war is one of the most effectual means of preserving peace."—George Washington, First State of the Union Address, January 8, 1790 

“The habits of thinking in a free Country should inspire caution in those entrusted with its administration, to confine themselves within their respective Constitutional spheres; avoiding in the exercise of the Powers of one department to encroach upon another.”—George Washington, Farewell Address, September 19, 1796 

“Reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.”—James D. Richardson, A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the President, 1789–1897, U.S. Congress, 1899, vol. 1, p. 220 

"It is in our own experience that the most sincere neutrality is not a sufficient guard against the depredation of nations at war. To secure respect to a neutral flag requires a naval force, organized and ready to vindicate it from insult or aggression. This may even prevent the necessity of going to war, by discouraging belligerent powers from committing such violations of the rights of the neutral party as may, first or last, leave no other option."—George Washington, Eighth Annual Address to Congress, December 7, 1796 

George Washington Praying at Valley Forge
painting by Arnold Friberg

"I have often expressed my sentiments that every man, conducting himself as a good citizen, and being accountable to God alone for his religious opinions, ought to be protected in worshipping the Deity according to the dictates of his own conscience."—George Washington, Letter to the United Baptist Churches in Virginia, May 10, 1789 

"The Constitution recommended by the federal convention [of 1787]...approache[s] nearer to perfection than any government hitherto instituted among men."—George Washington—to Sir Edward Newenham, George Washington Himself, by John C. Fitzpatrick 

"We have abundant reason to rejoice that in this land the light of truth and reason has triumphed over the power of bigotry and superstition, and that every person may here worship God according to the dictates of his own heart. In this enlightened age and in this land of equal liberty, it is our boast that a man's religious tenets will not forfeit the protection of the laws, nor deprive him of the right of attaining and holding the highest offices that are known in the United States."—George Washington, letter to the members of the New Church in Baltimore, January 27, 1793 

“If the freedom of speech is taken away then dumb and silent we may be led,

like sheep to the slaughter.”—George Washington

 

So many favorite quotes come from Washington’s Farewell Address, you might like to read it in full, here.

Abraham Lincoln, 1863 daguerreotype

Abraham Lincoln

(Responding to a question about which side God was on during the Civil War) “I am not at all concerned about that, for I know that the Lord is always on the side of the right. But it is my constant anxiety and prayer that I and this nation should be on the Lord’s side.”—Abraham Lincoln, Abraham Lincoln’s Stories and Speeches, ed. J. B. McClure, Chicago: Rhodes and McClure Publishing Co., 1896, pp. 185–86. 

“No oppressed, people will fight, and endure, as our fathers did, without the promise of something better, than a mere change of masters.”—Abraham Lincoln, Fragment on the Constitution and the Union, c. January 1861 

“The people of these United States are the rightful masters of both Congresses and the Courts, not to overthrow the Constitution but to overthrow the men who would pervert the Constitution.”—Abraham Lincoln, speech at Cincinnati, Ohio, September 17, 1859, in The Papers and Writings of Abraham Lincoln, Volume 5, Constitutional Edition, ed. Arthur Brooks Lapsley 

“America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.—Abraham Lincoln is attributed with this quote, but it may be that his actual words were these: “If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide.”—Abraham Lincoln, speech “The Perpetuation of Our Political Institutions” 

“What is conservatism? Is it not preference for the old and tried, over the

  new and untried?”—Abraham Lincoln, quoted by Russell Kirk, The Essence of Conservatism

 

"I have been driven to my knees many times by the overwhelming conviction that I had no place else to go. My own wisdom and that of all about me seemed insufficient for that day."—Abraham Lincoln, according to journalist Noah Brooks 

“This, and this only (will satisfy the South): cease to call slavery wrong, and join them in calling it right…. Holding, as they do, that slavery is morally right, and socially elevating, they cannot cease to demand a full national recognition of it, as a legal right, and a social blessing…. Let us be diverted by none of these sophistical contrivances….such as groping for some middle ground between the right and the wrong….”—Abraham Lincoln, Speech at New Haven, Connecticut, March 6, 1860 

“If slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong,”  Lincoln statement on March 26, 1864, to former Senator Archibald Dixon, Governor Thomas E. Bramlette, and Albert G. Hodges, editor of the Frankfort, KY, Commonwealth, later put in writing per Hodges’ request. See more here.  

In honor of the sesquicentennial of Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, I wrote about that speech, and included it in full, here.

Part of being conservative is caretaking what we have. I hope we will, with care, preserve the words and ideas of these two great men.

 

 

Sesquicentennial Speech

Yesterday marked 150 years since Abraham Lincoln gave his famous Gettysburg Address.

There was an error in that speech: “The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here.” There are very few speeches more noted and remembered. We could probably name The Sermon on the Mount as more memorable—more memorized, more quoted, more honored. But it’s hard to come up with another. Moments of many other speeches are notable:

photo of Lincoln at Gettysburg

“Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.”—Ronald Reagan

“Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country.”—John F. Kennedy

“Never give in–never, never, never, never, in nothing great or small, large or petty, never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force; never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.”—Winston Churchill

Among modern (since the inception of the United States) speeches by political persons, it may be that Abraham Lincoln’s short speech is unsurpassed.

Because it is blessedly short, it is possible for school children to memorize it—and even to learn the meaning of all the words. Back when I was in school, I memorized the first paragraph, which has always stuck with me. I was tougher as a teacher in our homeschool, where I not only persuaded daughter Social Sphere to memorize the whole thing, but to present it at a gathering of her peers. (I memorized it along with her, which only seemed fair.)

There are several versions of the speech, handwritten by Lincoln, to different people who received them. There are the first draft, the Nicolay copy (his personal secretary); and the second draft, the Hay copy (a White House assistant), but handed over prior to the speech. The other three were all written on request afterward: the Everett copy (the other speaker at Gettysburg, whose unmemorable speech went on for a couple of hours, causing even more notice of the brevity of Lincoln); the Bancroft copy (intended to be reprinted as a fundraiser for soldiers); and the Bliss copy (replacing the Bancroft copy, which had been written on both sides, which prevented lithographic reproduction). The Bliss copy is the most “standard”—the most quoted. It is the one written in stone at the Lincoln Memorial.

Gettysburg Address, Bliss copy as two pages

There are tiny differences from one to another. Without recording devices, it’s difficult to determine exactly which words Lincoln spoke. But the ones he signed and gave as definitive, after the speech, all contain the words “under God.”

Controversy in the news of the day referred to a documentary done by Ken Burns, which included each of the living US presidents reciting Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address. All were given the Bliss copy, the standard version. They were able to read it during the recordings. But our current president chose to edit Lincoln and omit the “under God” phrase. Why? I don’t know. An error? A reading of a different version instead? Without mindreading, it’s hard to know. But it’s unfortunate that this president uses such a moment to give even more evidence of his opposition to the culture of civilization.

It is nevertheless my hope, along with Lincoln, that what we face now will not be an end to this freedom experiment: “that this nation shall have a new birth of freedom; and that this government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

If you didn’t take a moment yesterday (or even if you did), take this opportunity to reread Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address.

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate--we can not consecrate—we can not hallow—this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.