 The last photograph of President Lincoln, taken on the balcony at the White House, March 6, 1865. (Photo by Henry F. Warren) |
Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address, 1865 With the Union’s victory in the Civil War weeks away and Reconstruction plans already the source of raging debate, Lincoln’s second inaugural address looked back at the horror of the conflict but pledged to see it through to the bitter end, even as he hoped for a peaceful reconciliation. “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 250 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.” |
