In Our Time - The Gettysburg Address

Episode Date: May 26, 2016

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, ten sentences long, delivered at the dedication of the Soldiers' National Cemetery at Gettysburg after the Union forces had won an important battle with the Confederates. Opening with " Four score and seven years ago," it became one of the most influential statements of national purpose, asserting that America was "conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal" and "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." Among those inspired were Martin Luther King Jr whose "I have a dream" speech, delivered at the Lincoln Memorial 100 years later, echoed Lincoln's opening words.With Catherine Clinton Denman Chair of American History at the University of Texas and International Professor at Queen's University, BelfastSusan-Mary Grant Professor of American History at Newcastle UniversityAndTim Lockley Professor of American History at the University of WarwickProducer: Simon Tillotson.

Thank you for downloading this episode of In Our Time, for more details about In Our Time, and for our terms of use, please go to BBC.co.uk slash Radio 4. I hope you enjoy the programme. Hello, on the 19th of November 1863, President Abraham Lincoln spoke briefly at the dedication of the soldiers' National Cemetery at Gettysburg on the site of the bloodiest battle of the American Civil War. His Gettysburg address became one of the most famous and influential speeches in American history. It opens with the biblical four-score years and seven years ago

and closes barely two minutes and 272 words later with a resolution that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth. Its greatness wasn't immediately clear, while the Chicago Tribune said Lincoln's words would live among the annals of the war, the Times of London opined anything more dull and complex it would not be easy to produce. the times was wrong.

Its re-reputation grew and grew, and many Americans as children learnt it by heart. With me to discuss the Gettysburg Address are Catherine Clinton, Denman Chair of American History at the University of Texas, an international professor

at Queen's University of Belfast, Susan Mary Grant, Professor of American History at Newcastle University, and Tim Lockley, Professor of American History at the University of Warwick. Tim, why was America at war in 1861?

Well, Civil War is, essentially a war about slavery. And it's a war that has been a long time brewing. We can look back 30, 40 years with conflicts between southern states that generally owned slaves and their economy was entirely based around slavery, and to northern states, which had generally got rid of slavery by the middle of the 19th century. And so it's a war that is gradually growing, and it's a conflict that's gradually growing between north and south. But it all comes to a head with the election of Abraham Lincoln in 1860, because for the very first time, a president is elected purely or northern votes, northern electoral college votes.

None of the Southern states vote for Lincoln. And if you're a Southern state, then you think that, well, this is what's going to happen in the future. There's going to be northerners dominating the presidency from now on. And Southern states move very swiftly after the election before he's even inaugurated as president to leave the Union. South Carolina does so in December of 1860.

And Lincoln spends the very first months of his presidency. How did they do that? So you say they moved swiftly. What did they do? Well, they held secession conventions in their states, and they declared that they are no way. longer part of the United States. And South Carolina starts it. Other states follow. And Lincoln...

Such as. Can you just enumerate the states? Oh, well, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi. These are the sort of the first tranche of states. And then states like Virginia, North Carolina, do so slightly later. But the war starts in April 1861 with the South Carolina's attacking a federal fort in Charleston Harbor, which is Fort Sumter. And Lincoln tried hard not to go to war in 1861. He tried hard to have some kind of negotiation going on. And once the war starts, then he immediately summons volunteers to fight for the Union army

and determines to resolve the conflict by force. The Union, being the North. Yeah. How much support did he have at the start in the North itself? I think the attack on Fort Sumter is widely seen as sort of a treacherous attack by secessionist rebels. By the South. Yeah, on...

on Union territory. And I think he has a widespread support in popular opinion. And they think that, you know, this is going to be a short war. As often people do when they start wars, they think they're going to be over quickly. But they don't know, you know, what's going to happen in the future. And obviously, it doesn't pan out quite like that. There are internal opposition in the north to the war. There are southern sympathizers.

There are people who think that peace should be preserved at any price and there should be appeasement of the South. But certainly in the early years, they are the minority. They're not the majority. Is there also a tranche of opinion on the north that says, well, look, let them go their own way? There is that opinion, but I wouldn't have said it was the majority opinion. I think the majority opinion is that Lincoln's right

and that the war is necessary. You talked about the very beginning of your remarks. You talked about this being a war about slavery, but it was winkled in now, wasn't it? It didn't seem to start like that. Well, it doesn't start out as Lincoln saying... How was it about slavery? In what way was it about slavery?

Because slavery had been the root cause of the division between North and South, in that the southern states are slave states, and most of their antagonism towards the North is viewed on the fact that they think the North is going to control, limit, ultimately abolish slavery. Which Lincoln comes to the presidency saying, he's definitely not going to do that. He says, we're not going to abolish slavery.

Under the Constitution, slavery is permitted. we do not have the right under the Constitution to abolish slavery. And so he's not an emancipationist when he comes to power. And that grows as time goes on. It definitely changes. Catherine Clinton, what impact did the Battle of Gettysburg have on public opinion? Well, by the Battle of Gettysburg, when Lee was invading the North at long last, it was quite a trial because everyone had gone to war thinking it'll be over in a month.

It'll be over quickly. Some of the southern politicians boasted that they would win. without a thimbleful of blood being spilled. So they were quite confident about their martial abilities. Two years later, you can imagine that massing armies, volunteers having to stay on, trying to keep troops in the field. And here was a great southern invasion of the north.

And Lee was respected on both sides of the war. So he's gone right up to Philadelphia. He's gone right up to Pennsylvania. Broken out of his safe territory and moved north. Yes. The Battle of Defensive, war was being fought mainly by the Confederacy. Why? Because it's much easier to fight off invaders rather than to try and take control and be aggressive. But in this little town of 1,500, 100,000 people

descended. So you had these soldiers coming in and all the followers and the chaos of it. And it was reported over three days in the American press. And certainly the slaughter was what people were so touched by, and the valiant core going forth, even though quite clearly Pickett's charge was something that many look at as a vainglorious effort in order to establish southern primacy, and yet those soldiers were mowed down in the field, and the bodies left behind left such an impression on the American public. So we've got Gettysburg, and Lee, who is a brilliant general, has driven north, perhaps mistakenly to test his strength. By confederacy, you mean the south, so you've got the south,

the slave owners, the confederacy all rolled into one. And this is an enormous battle around this little town, 175,000 troops are supposed to have taken part. It's by far the bloodiest battle in the whole American civil war. And we still haven't... Well, Antietam was the one day in American history when you did have more people die. Yeah, but this is the biggest battle, I've quoted from all your notes. So let me just go on. So I still haven't got, what was public opinion's view of this? This battle has happened. What did the American public think of it?

They thought it was a terrible slaughter. The concept of victory and loss, I think, was something added later. But at the time, it was viewed as a ghastly symbol of the troops coming together, the troops retreating, and yet was there a resolution? later, the overlay of winning and losing came, but with all battles during that period, it was a war of attrition. So I don't think that there was an overwhelming sense of victory in the North. As a matter of fact, the northern troops had to come back and face draft riots in New York City. So there was, instead, I think, a resignation to the battle continuing,

despite the fact that there had been this great contest. The Confederacy is trying to use its military superpowers to invade and yet repelled. So the public, both north and south, I think, saw it as part of a long string of continuing bloodletting north and south. Let's pick up the unrest to the north. So one of the reasons that Lincoln most unusually made a public appearance. He didn't like a public appearances. He even wrote to Congress instead of going there. He made a problem, was to steady, that was one of the imposes. Now, as a complicated man, and it's a very complicated 2272 words, but one of the reasons of going there was to steady the north.

Absolutely. It was important, I think, to establish his presence. And although Lincoln had pledged never to leave until this realignment of states could take place. Never to leave Washington. So it was quite unusual for him to go to Gettysburg. And no one actually, at the beginning, I think, anticipated that the young lawyer leading this campaign for the dedication of a cemetery would get the president to come there. He was not exactly an afterthought, but I think we'd be quite surprised in terms of the order. But Lincoln felt it was very important to go there because so many American sons had died,

so much slaughter had been endured, and he needed to get his message out. What was the purpose of this? Susan Mary Grant, so let's examine more the reasons that when Lincoln went there. And Catherine referred to Pickett Shards. The South put on a bravado efforts. grand gentleman who charges sort of slightly reminiscent upon two things that happened

at Waterloo. Never mind, there was a defeat there was massive, men in deaths. So Lincoln went just to develop it more, why did he decide to go? It's just a debt, not it's just, it is the dedication of a cemetery. So why did he decide to go?

I think as Catherine said, partly he wants to go to steady the north. But the Gettysburg Address is not something that is just directed at the north. It is actually also directed at the south. I mean, yes, he's at the dedication of a cemetery. At the time it was mainly union troops that were being interred in the ground. And the idea was that southern troops would be interred elsewhere or not interred.

That was a huge problem for Southerners, failing to remember they'd actually rebelled against the government. They got very upset when their fallen soldiers were not buried in northern cemeteries or at Gettysburg. So Lincoln wants to go and make this declaration. but I think he also sees it as an opportunity because this is a very difficult year and it's not just hindsight that tells us that. 1863 begins with the issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation officially.

Which is? In the 1st of January, 1863, the Emancipation Proclamation, he had announced it in September the previous year the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation. And what he basically said was, all slaves in states and rebellion against a government would henceforth be free.

Now, of course, it's a very, difficult document. It's more of what Martin Luther King later called a promissory note rather than any kind of legal document. It did not free the slaves because Lincoln did not believe he could free the slaves. But it was a statement that he was going to try and eradicate slavery. And the way he did that eventually was to push through an amendment to the Constitution, the 13th Amendment. But nevertheless, at the start of that year he'd made that declaration that this was going to happen. And people's response to it was a mixed in the north. I mean the south obviously was furious but in the north. We've heard mention of the draft riots. That was all mixed up together. People objected to the draft. They objected to the idea of fighting for African Americans. So Lincoln has that to deal with. It's also in 1863 the war was starting possibly to go the union's way. I'd been going very badly in 62. String of defeats, Fredericksburg, Chancellor'sville, famous defeats reported not just in the national press but the international press.

So in 63 there's a chance that things are going to start improving for the union. But I think there's also this opportunity I think and I think he was aware of it at Gettysburg, at the site of a cemetery, to say something that encapsulated what the union was fighting for and to make that statement to the nation, to the world and to try and change how people saw the war. Some people have said that the speech. included the notion that he was talking to all Americans in the South Annanod, but he was not burying all the Americans.

Can you just unwrap that? Well, it's quite difficult. The idea at Gettysburg was that the burial site was going to be something different. It was going to be sections buried by different states. Some states didn't want that. Massachusetts, for example, sent people to retrieve their dead. Southerners would not have wanted their dead to be buried with the Union dead at that. point, but increasingly it becomes

just one more thing that they complain about. You know, our dead are dishonoured. They are not being buried in this national cemetery. Because I think we have to remember before the Civil War, there was no federal space really outside Washington. There's the White House, but there is no federal space. You know there wasn't anywhere they could

bury them. Is that what you're saying? It's about burial. It's about somewhere that is owned by the federal government. Now, Gettysburg is not federal space either at this point. It's owned by the state of Pennsylvania. But it becomes federal space, and partly the way it becomes federal space, is because of Lincoln's address. And so the battlefields of the Civil War become almost sacred sites.

You know, what is stormy and J. Winter is called sites of memory, sites of mourning. But that is what the Civil War battlefields and cemeteries become partly through what Lincoln said at his book. Well, we know that he followed a two-hour speech by the then-greatest orator in America, Everett, which was commonplace of the time, and the man wasn't gassing on. That's what you did. You did these two-hour speeches. his lasted two minutes. Why did he make it so short?

He was never expected to make a long speech. But this is so short. It is short, but that was something he was prone to do. He would say something quite pithily. The actual Gettysburg address, I suppose, was Edward Everett. I mean, he was asked to give an address. As you say, this was normal for the time. He gave a very long address where he basically described a Battle of Gettysburg,

almost blow by blow. Lincoln was asked simply to make some dedicatory remarks. I think he saw this as an opportunity, but he's also very aware. This is a whole program of events. You know, they all meet at 9 o'clock, the ladies are there at 10. They have bands. They have prayers. They have Edward Everett's address. After that, I think Lincoln knew very well. He wasn't going to get away with something, you know, longer. So he wanted to encapsulate it. But I think also there was that poetic element to the Gettysburg Address that he does seek to encapsulate what the war was about in not as few words as possible, but certainly, you know, and as short and

and pithily away as he can to get the message across. Well, let's look at this speech then, Tim Lockley. It starts with the sentence, four score and seven years ago, our father's brought forth on this continent a new nation. What is he talking about and why does he start there? He's talking about the American Revolution, but specifically he's talking about... Not about the American Revolution.

Yeah, but he specifically is talking about the Declaration of Independence in 1776. And it's interesting that he references that ahead of the Constitution, which is 10 or so years later. Because the Declaration of Independence can widely be interpreted and seen as a much more radical document than the Constitution becomes. The Declaration of Independence sets out, you know, all men are created equal, all men have inalienable rights of life, liberty, the pursuits of happiness. The Constitution is a much more dry, legalistic document, which is really about how you actually manage to organize the states to function as a federal government. And it makes compromises with issues like slavery. And in order to keep the United States united, so it allows the states to have representation based on slavery.

It allows the states to reopen the transatlantic slave trade until 1808. These are issues that are in the Constitution. The Declaration of Independence is much more sort of raising these lofty ideals. And Lincoln is harking back to that original document saying our founding fathers, and bizarrely written by Thomas Jefferson, who of course was a slave owner, this is the sort of ideal we should be thinking back. And this is a continuity of what we're doing. And that's why you can in some respects interpret the Civil War as Act 2 of the American Revolution,

and that it's continuing and completing things that should really have been done 70 years ago, 807 years ago. And that's the link he's making. Catherine Clinton, and Lincoln says the New Nation of America, quote, was dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. And this is what we're part of the thing. Is he meaning including slaves with that sentence? Well, with greatness, he harks back, as Tim points out, to the Declaration of Independence.

We're having a battle. Can there even be a secession? Can there even be a rebellion? There can always be rebellions. But he is reminding all the Confederates who have said that they're trying to live up to their forefathers and have liberty, that liberty and equality were.

intention and therefore we are going to strike our balance by fighting for equality. But also they wanted the liberty to own slaves. The liberty to own slaves. So it was a great conundrum from the beginning, which is why the American Civil War is an extension, a continuation of the revolution. We also have to look at the fact that the language is very important. All politicians look back. And even though Jefferson was a slaveholder. Lincoln grew up in an age of oratory in an age of American politicians who gave a vision of what America would be. But America was on the shoals, and he was trying to guide us in the ship back to a new nation. And this rebirth was what he was preaching. In a way, I think he wasn't giving the, his oration was not a sermon,

but a prayer. And he was giving comfort. And his language shows that that he was trying to reach out. And that all men are created equal is a beautiful phrase that I think he was repeating and reminding. So the repetition and the language of the Gettysburg Address is something that draws us to it, which is why hundreds of scholars have debated the meaning of each paragraph of each word and sliced and diced this 272 word soliloquy. Susan Mary Grant, the next phrase, now we are engaged in a great civil war testing whether that nation or any nation so conceived and so dedicated

can long endure. Can you talk about that? Well, what Lincoln is saying here is he's reminding his audience that America is a political experiment. It is the first nation to break away from colonial rule. It finds this demographic. Democratic Republic. We have to bear in mind that at the time of the Civil War, America hasn't even had it centennial yet. So it is a young nation. So he is reminding them of what the nation was

intended to be. Because when America was founded, he's very aware international audiences, and that would include Britain. They look at America and they basically didn't exactly say, well, I'll give it five years. But they were waiting for it to fail. There was a huge degree of Schadenfreude lurking around the international political. scene about the United States. So he's reminding his audience that this is the crucial point that this civil war is about, as Catherine said, whether or not there actually can be such a thing as secession. And Lincoln's point was, no, there cannot. This is a rebellion, pure and simple. This is not a war between two nations. This is about whether one nation, having made the decision

to exist, can defeat its internal foes and endure. What point did you make about the secession in terms that, I'm wording this question wrongly, why did you say they couldn't leave the United States, the southern states? Because Lincoln, it all comes down to how one interprets the 10th Amendment and the Bill of Rights, which is about the power of the states relative to the power of the federal government. So 10th Amendment simply says that all powers that are not expressly given to the federal government or forbidden to them are given to the states. So Southerners interpret this to mean that they have the right to succeed

and they hark back again to the revolution. This is where that opening sentence is important. They say, we revolted against the mother country in 1776. We have the right to do so again. And Lincoln and the Republican said, no, you do not have the right to do this again. The revolution was a once and for all event. And there's no such things as a civil war.

I mean, it was called a war between the states. I mean, Lincoln uses the phrase civil war, but legally, he didn't believe it was a civil war. And that's what complicates the whole emancipation issue. He did not believe he had the right to deal with property in the South, to take southern property away, because he believed the Constitution still held. And so his idea was that it was a rebellion in the South,

but not a rebellion of the South. And that really influences everything that he does and doesn't do about the war. Can I just follow up on one thing? Didn't he say, or wasn't he, didn't he say that states can't secede? This is about the people. Only the people can go away. States can't go away.

Was this legal cleverness or was he saying something that was in the Constitution? No, he's trying to be sort of legally clever in that respect. His view was that the states cannot secede and that there could be no such thing as secession. And that's hugely important. And it does, it influences how people hear the address as well. It influences what they take away from it. some people here it's about emancipation it's about getting with a slavery

and others here know it's just about the union Tim, Tim, Tim Lockley One of the points is that Lincoln's trying to make is that the union predates the United States and it predates the states because the states were colonies and these states have never existed as independent entities like England and France and Holland or whatever in Europe

these are colonies that where the people come together and the union is created by the people and therefore it's only divisible by the people. Because it says, we the people in Congress assembled, that creates the Union, and it's not the States. Tim, I'll stay with you. He argues about the death of the Union, so it has an awful lot in this issue.

And it shouldn't have been in vain. He says, but they came to dedicate the cemetery. But in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men living and dead who struggled here have consecrated it. far above our poor power to add or detract.

So can you develop that? Yeah, I mean, obviously Gettysburg, as you said earlier on, is the biggest battle in terms of it overall in the war. It's got the highest number of casualties. There's 50,000 casualties, you know, including 8,000 dead, massive numbers injured. So by the middle, towards the end of 1863, there's well over 100,000 men have been killed on the Union side.

And so that's probably a million northern... who've lost family members, and nearly everybody in the north would have known somebody who'd lost family members. And so the impact is massive. And so there are coffins coming back. There are people being buried. So that erodes public support inevitably for war, just like it did in Vietnam in the 1970s. Coffins coming back erodes public support. And especially when the war's been going badly for the north, and they've been out-generalled by Lee for two years. So Gettysburg, Lincoln's trying to say partly that Gettysburg is a turning point. there's a long way to go, but Gettysburg is the Stalingrad of the Civil War and things will get better.

It might be a point to put in here, and I hope I've got you right from all your notes, that more soldiers were lost in the American Civil War than American soldiers were lost in World War I, World War II, Vietnam, Korea, Afghanistan and Iraq put together. Absolutely. It's well over 600,000, maybe as high as 800,000 to die. But that goes to the point that, although Lincoln might have been there to bury the Union dead, He was speaking to all Americans, to the people, that there were Confederate soldiers, there were Southerners who were dying in this war as well. And if you read the language, very specifically, the union is not particularly addressed.

It is the people going forward, what nation, what spirit will go forward. And the language you use is religious, basically, isn't it? Absolutely. And you tell us a bit about that. Well, certainly there's a lot about Lincoln's education. and being self-educated, that he only had... Inside the speech. Inside the speech, we do begin, of course,

with this marvelous four-score in seven years, and echoes back to his reading of the King James Bible, what sat on his desk along with Shakespeare's plays, and you look at Psalms 90, and you find that he begins, in other words, with a biblical echo for those people sitting in pews all across America, they would hear this language, and indeed it would in a way spiritually lift them.

Lincoln was not particularly known as a religious president. There are continuing debates about his religiosity, but certainly the spiritual nature of his language comes forward when he directly invokes biblical phrasing, biblical language. And we're talking about a state which is a country, a continent, which is massively religious in very different ways. ways there's a religious revival going on and he's using words like dedicate, consecrate, hello and devotion and so on throughout. Absolutely. And that this nation under God continues

to be something that people again... Even though we know at that time he wasn't a churchgoer, he wasn't a regular, can we just develop his, Susan Mary Graham, can we talk about his religion, his Lincoln religion at this time in 1863 as far as we know about it? I think as Catherine said, he is known for not really being religious. But increasingly as the war goes on, he uses religious language. And I think it's important for us to remember that it's not just America as a very religious country. I mean, this is a 19th century. And religion is a shorthand. Dickens was also a shorthand. So when you were talking to an audience, a national audience in the 19th century, you could make a biblical illusion, you could make a Dickensian illusion, and you could be

99.9% confident that your audience would get what you were saying. I mean, now you could maybe mention Game of Thrones and you'd get away with it, but anything else, you cannot be sure that people are going to hear you. So Lincoln is using this religious language, even though he's not very religious himself. And you really see it come out very strongly in the second inaugural, where it really reaches a peak of religious sentiment. But there's also the bigger context, too, is the cemetery at Gettysburg is coming at a time. There's been about 30 years of development of what's,

known as the rural or park cemetery movement, where again, it's not just Americans, it's happening in Britain as well, where the whole idea of death, the landscape, religion, rebirth, is, it's a Victorian cult of death and it's early stages, and by the time Lincoln gets to it,

it's almost fully fledged. So he's also using language that will resonate with people who are used to that, the idea of visiting cemeteries to be reminded of the hereafter, to take comfort from the brevity of life. So that's all. tied up with the religious aspects of the speech.

And also, as Tim pointed out, the number of coffins coming back to villages and towns and hamlets all over America. Absolutely. I mean... Catherine. I think Lincoln also sought religious counsel when he himself experienced the death of his children, certainly when his first child Eddie died. We know that he met with a local minister in Springfield.

We also know that the death of his son, Willie, in 1862, deeply affected him. and when he had to think about all the fathers and mothers losing their sons. And the night before the Gettysburg Address, Lincoln had been quite concerned about his son, Tad, who had been quite ill. Mary, Lincoln had begged him not to go to Gettysburg because there was an echo of his son falling ill, which reminded her of the death of their son Willie the year before. He received a telegram late at night saying his son was doing better, and actually the morning of the Gettysburg Address.

he did receive a telegram that his son was well. So I think he went on his journey to Gettysburg against the wishes of his family, worrying about his own child and his son was restored. But it could have brought him back to the echoes of trying to comfort those who were dealing with loss, who were dealing with grief, who were dealing with the terrible sadness. Do you want to come in? I just wanted to make a point about the sadness,

but also this idea of the coffins. I mean, there was the whole point about these national cemeteries was that most people could not afford to bring their dead back. And so it was a little like the First World War. There was this terrible tragedy for families that they could never afford to bring their loved ones home. Or if they could, they would never be able to look inside the coffin. They sealed them up because what was in there was not at all pretty.

And so it's that tragedy of not knowing where your relative fell. And that's what makes Gettysburg such a resonant sight for so many Americans at the time. Tim Locker, let's come to the closing phrase. Maybe this was the guarantee of the success of the address. Do you want to read it? We hear highly resolved that these dead... Do you want to go on?

That we hear 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 the government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth. Now that's a resonant ending.

How did he put that together? and why is under God there at that time when he isn't particularly religious? I think that ties in with what Susan Mary and Catherine have said about Lincoln's growing religiosity. And under God, interestingly enough, is not in the earliest drafts we have of the Gettysburg Address. And it seems to be something that he added probably while he was speaking because the newspaper reports of his speech say he said it. So the fact that it's not in the drafts that are in his hand and the fact that it appears in the later drafts that he wrote and in the press reports,

suggest that he actually said those words. What about the government of the people, by the people, for the people? Yeah, and that's a really resonant phrase, and it's a phrase that sticks in the memory, obviously, for us, but it's also, in the future, going forward, people constantly attribute that to Lincoln, and Lincoln created this great...

Lincoln borrowed that phrase from other people, and people had used it before. The famous Italian Republican, Matsini, had used exactly the same phrase, and there's lots of Europeans who had used it before, so he's not creating it Ab initio. Shaker used phrase as well. other people before that. It's how you use it

when you use it and what impact. Well, absolutely. And his is memorable and it's memorable partly because of what happens to Lincoln himself and the fact that he dies, first president to be assassinated. That also elevates his speech in people's memory.

And he raises so many issues of democracy and the fact that the government should be representative and that it should be beholden to the people and responsive to them. that's really what people, you know, remember.

Catherine, did any parts of this speech become a battle cry for the Union for the North? When Tom Paine wrote, this is a time to try men's souls, then they went into battle with that phrase. Washington read Tom Paine's work out to them, and they went saying that, writing that, and going to the Great Battle on that river where they beat the German mercenaries. Were any of these phrases picked up by those in the war? I would like to say that for the people, by the people, and certainly many of the ideas that we are fighting for all of our people, and we are fighting as a nation, we are struggling to survive.

But the idea that it was such an incantation in the soldier's mind, I'm afraid, for example, was a Spielbergian notion that an African-American soldier would be repeating these addresses. At the same time, we do know that it does sing, it does resonate. it did it force people to rethink what this battle was about? Yes, when it finally was spread throughout the people. And it wasn't in a union prayer. It was a union cry. And it was something I think that, that again, reading in, as Susan Mary pointed out, with the emancipation, it brought the people rather than citizens.

It brought a nation rather than a divided nation into the fore. Susan, Mary, can I come to you on one thing? it isn't true, is it, that America was the only country working towards democracy. So he's obviously saying it to stir people's hearts, right? But it's also, I think,

underneath that, there's a serious idea of American exceptionalism. Yes, I mean, obviously you're right, that this is the age of nationalities. I mean, Italy and Germany, they're trying to pull together as nations. So America's just...

It's only in its own way is this country? Yes, indeed. indeed, but I'll steer away from that one. The idea of American exceptionalism, I mean, larger it is rhetorical for Lincoln. He's trying to say, you know, your specials is a nation worth fighting for. The idea of American exceptionalism is a bit of an academic.

Chestnut, in some respects, because all too often, particularly in the 70s and 80s in the aftermath of the Vietnam War, it was seen to be almost hubristic, that this was about America being special and being not just different but better. I think the idea of them being exceptional. I would have thought, fair enough. I mean, they'd set off almost Abinissio just two or three hundred years ago.

They'd become this great power, the great manufacturing power. And apart to try everything else, I think to think of themselves as exceptional, is not hubrisic then, it might be in Vietnam. That's another one. I don't talk about that. But I'm talking about what we're talking about, civil war. Yeah, I mean, I think civil war, period, this idea of America being exceptional was had widespread currency. I mean, not least because many of the leaders,

of the Union as well. They had come from Europe. They had come after the revolutions of 1848. They saw America as this last best hope of Earth. They saw it as an opportunity for a new kind of life. And you have all these regiments, these immigrant regiments, and they are fighting for a better future. They see their future as being tied up with the Union cause. So that's the way that they interpret America as being exceptional for them. Usually during civil wars, people avoid the country. But America had an in-migration. And again, it wasn't just the immigrants who'd come and fled there, seeing that this democracy might be something

they could realize their dreams, bring them back to Europe. But they continued to come there, even during the war. You had the growth, the expansion, as we know, war is very, very strongly associated with industrial growth. It wasn't any exception in the United States at that time. And so this created this amazing exceptionalism. Yeah, but it is true that a participatory democracy was at its furthest extent in America,

in comparison to anywhere else in the world. And that Britain was making moves towards democracy with the Great Reformites in the 1830s. But this address is actually used to push through the second Great Reform Act which widens the franchise considerably more in Britain in 1867. So Britain is making moves towards democracy,

but in the US, most adult males can vote. And that's not true anywhere else in the world at this time, even though Britain is making moves towards it. And the French do as well when Lou and Napoleon is thrown out in 1860s. 70 and the French Republic is restored. The French move towards democracy as well, but the Americans are certainly the world leaders in that. In a small abolitionist movement grew and grew and felt that the Civil War was in some way their victory, just having it declared and pushing. And of course,

women's role in that, and their declaration of their intention to get citizenship rights and voting was also a part of their contribution to the Civil War cause. And I think that made it, in some ways, again, hate to say it, but an exceptionally interesting. I should hate to say it if it's accurate enough. Susan Grant, when did the Gettysburg address achieve in the enormous resonance

it now has? It had a lot of resonance at the time. I mean, obviously some people didn't like it, some of the press, I mean, the democratic press. When they were talking about that time, people would refer more to Washington and around that and Washington. Washington was more referred to than Lincoln.

As I understand it, it was later, much later that the Gettysburg address itself became a big thing in American life. Well, as I say, it is a big thing. The press reported, and there's a lot of commentary about how marvelous it is. I mean, a lot of people do understand what Lincoln has done. It doesn't really, I suppose, becomes hugely resonant in the 20th century, but that's to do with the growth of the media, I suppose, much more.

And it becomes hugely resonant when the Lincoln Memorial is erected and finally finished. And the address is, you know, carved in stone at the centre of Washington. And then it acquires a much broader resonance for the civil rights movement. because obviously the words apply people like Martin Luther King give famous speech in 1960 on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial and so it starts to take on a different kind of resonance in the 20th century as encapsulating the American ideal that the nation has yet to live up to in the way that Tim said the revolution and the Declaration of Independence

had been an ideal that the Civil War generation felt it hadn't lived up to. And he becomes transcendent. because Reagan quotes him, Clinton quotes him, Barack Obama's inauguration is to do a Lincoln, even swearing his oath on the Bible on which Lincoln swore his oath. Yeah, I mean, it is incredible. There's a whole industry of what would Lincoln have done, what would Lincoln have said. That's that whole industry of that. That's what you've answered.

I think it was the Lincoln centenary of his birth, though, in 1909, when we see he overtakes Washington. Washington, of course, is the first president, is the one. who created the nation, who is magisterial and much revered. But we look in media in this early period, we look at memorials, and we see that memorials to Lincoln begin to grow. And of course, as Susan Mary says, the Lincoln Memorial doesn't put the emancipation proclamation on the walls, but it puts the Gettysburg address. Yeah, and the interesting thing, and this is where the length of the speech becomes

really important, is that there are associated press reporters at the site. They telegraph the text of the speech all over the use. US. And so the next day, newspapers print it in its entirety because it's short. They don't print Everett's speech because it's two hours long. They print Lincoln's address because it's a column. And then it's picked up by newspapers all over the US and then it's picked up internationally and even the London Times prints the address. And so he captures people's imagination because he does it succinctly. Briefly, Susan May, how is it playing into a current American political culture? To current American political culture, I think America is still dealing with these issues. It's

still grappling with these issues, which it grappled with from the very beginning. I mean, Declaration of Independence is all men are created equal, but they were slaveholders when they wrote that. The Civil War ostensibly has dealt with slavery. The 13th Amendment has abolished slavery, but what it has left is a legacy of racial division. And that is where a speech like the Gettysburg address still has resonance because the nation is still trying to live up to its own mission statement, its own ideal. And it's hugely resonant today, almost unfortunate. Catherine, finally. Well, and evolutions of these ideas are so important.

So we look at the Civil War centenary, and we see it was a great battle in the 1960s. Why? Because America was grappling with the second American Civil War and the Civil Rights Movement, that these very values of equality, which Lincoln espoused in the Gettysburg Address, the prayer that he hoped for America would survive and indeed did become his legacy, that we look at him now as someone who was perhaps the first. first civil rights martyr as he gave his final speech saying that he could see voting for African-American soldiers. And this was a form of equality that evolved over the course of the war.

He was a politician evolving. And I think his evolution is what makes him so prescient and so wonderful for us. Thanks to Catherine Clinton's, Mary Grant and Tim Lockley. Next week we were talking about Margaret Kemp and the English mystics in the early 15th century. Until then, you can always follow us on Twitter at BBC In Our Time. Thanks for listening. And the In Our Time podcast gets some extra time now with a few minutes of bonus material from Melvin and his guests. What do you think we should have talked about? Well, I'm surprised we didn't talk about the Lincoln, the Great Emancipator. Yes, I suppose.

The complications of emancipation, I think, is something that most audiences and students struggle with. And I think Gettysburg itself, as well as role, is military role. In fact, it's tied in with fall of Vicksburg the day after. how it becomes this kind of transformative moment. But I think it's emancipation that really gives people the hardest time. Yeah, because it wasn't. We prodded it.

You all prodded it two or three times, and you summarized it very carefully about what he wanted and what he didn't want. I was thinking and going further down that route, but I think I thought it would have ended up, we would have had to miss other stuff out that was important to talk about. And he was a contradictory,

and when we were discussing the nationalism and when we were discussing the possibility of secession, while Lincoln, in his own thought process, was contradictory because there was a blockade. How could you have a blockade if it wasn't indeed a... Oh, and it's an adult to law in its finance. No, so he played the role of, you know, he's someone, of course, who we celebrate his words, we talk about his words, and yet in the final, in the early decades of the 21st century, people were debating whether he suppressed the press, and he went in and he suspended

habeas corpus. And he wasn't afraid to use executive power, which is something that Barack Obama has been criticized a lot for. Because he didn't necessarily want to work with Congress. He wanted to get stuff done. And if that meant short-circuiting some of the normal rules, then he was a war president, and he said, I'm commander-in-chief, and this gives me the right to do that. But the words of the Gettysburg Address are also so very much a part of the memory culture and the culture, not just of Lincoln, of an earlier era, and the greatness. and that all Americans of my age group in the post-60 group had memorized it as a child in the South and in the North. That's something quite amazing.

It became a creed. But what I find is also interesting about it is that you can adapt the speech to different circumstances. I mean, it's possible to read that, in my view, you tell me I'm wrong, and think that he is talking to all Americans, not just enough. And also to feel that the soldiers of the Americans are they being buried there in some way, metaphorically perhaps that they're still on the field. I think it's also people at the time, it was a speech that was capable of being read

in two very different ways because abolitionists and people who really wanted immediate emancipation and for immediate equality, what they heard was the words equal and they thought this is brilliant, this is encapsulating everything that we thought for and this is going to be about emancipation. And people who didn't want emancipation

who were quite racist and didn't really want rights for African-Americans, they could focus on this government of the people and by the people and say this is not about emancipation, this is entirely about democratic government and whether it can last. But not just less but improve and evolve so that it will be a new birth of freedom. We have been talking about the nation surviving,

but actually this war, baptized in blood, allows us. It's this way to spiritual freedom to move to all to utopia. One of your American colleagues said this was the hinge of the war this battle. Hinge of fate is about it. But the hinge of fate, but not what's gave America's destiny. But the hinge of fate is a retrospective projection backwards.

Just as I would argue that although, as Susan Mary and Tima pointed out, it had widespread application. The true application of the text as a doctrine really, I think, does come in the 20th century. And as you point out, putting it on the Lincoln Memorial is the legacy, that he did allow us to survive to be more down. democratic, more democratic. Maybe we aren't going to just be the democracy that our forefathers wanted because we were reborn during this and it's that new rebirth. That's the

spiritual elements of it. Oh yeah. That I think is really interesting. You could do a risk on the whole thing being basically, the word prior of whoever introduced it you to. I mean, just makes complete sense, doesn't it? Oh, totally isn't it? The wording, the pausing and I would love to, they can't know.

I'd love to hurt him deliver it. And when you go to that Lincoln Memorial as frequently movie characters do from Jimmy Stewart to Reese Witherspoon and they read the words on the wall. It has an echo and I often find it, you know, it was really difficult imagining

I hadn't heard Lincoln's voice but now we have Daniel Day Lewis and I feel I can hear his voice. But it's also clear that he spoke it quite slowly the press reports talk about him talking really slowly and also the press reports that include all the notations for applause suggest that it would have taken in quite a long time to read it because several points that it says long burst of applause,

extended applause, and so it would have taken quite a long time. And remember his audience, he's mainly soldiers. You say it was warmly received. It was mixed. Some people... Yeah, I mean, it was political divide, wasn't it? The Republicans said, this is a gem.

The Democrats said, this is, wishy-washy rubbish. Yeah, and this is where the focus on, the nation and the democratic government becomes so important, because, you know, the democratic critics would say, this is all about emancipation, and, you know, they were running up,

they ran in 1864, a vicious campaign. It was horrible, horrible racist, even by the standards of the time, racist campaign. Who did? The Democrats in 1864. Against Lincoln. But his own party had problems. The Pennsylvania people.

I'm interested. What was the basic, what was the phrasing? What was the attack in this campaign? The attack, well, for the Democrats, there wasn't a particular phrase. I mean, they had the union as the constitution as it was and the Negroes where they were. Miscegenation.

the language came in that particular election campaign. So there was all this idea that if you vote Lincoln again, your daughters would be marrying black men, the cartoons were very overt about it. It was just horrible, really, really unpleasant. But, you know, Lincoln could say, well, this is not about emancipation. You know, don't be afraid of this. This is about government, and so it becomes a kind of soothing thing. But it was pretty.

The slander of old ape was used at the time. And we find it even among some of the New York Republicans being very, derisory towards him, but also he was someone at the time who was putting forward something so radical at the time. He shifted, I think, from a moderate, but he was a politician.

He was known as moving in and out. And Thaddea Stevens, who became the most radical of Republicans, refused to go to his own home state. Let the dead bury the dead. Let the dead bury the dead. Amazing. I thought it was terrific. I'd be interested, well,

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