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Lincoln's Changing Views as Seen Through his Writings
Diana Hardenstein
Leaders, Terror and Black Soldiers in the Civil Wa
Abraham Lincoln faced an extremely difficult job as the sixteenth president of the United States. Students will use speeches and writings by President Lincoln to examine the turmoil he experienced during this difficult time of the American Civil War.
Use the following website to access these documents:
http://showcase.netins.net/web/creative/lincoln/speeches/writings.htm
First Inaugural Address (March 4, 1861)
Emancipation Proclamation (January 1, 1863)
The Gettysburg Address (November 19, 1863)
Second Inaugural Address (March 4, 1865)
Ball of string or yarn
Sharp scissors
One 90 minute block
5
What significant shifts in President Lincoln's view regarding the cause of the Civil War are reflected in his writings?
On an overhead, project the titles of the documents that the students will be reading on one side, and the dates that they were written on the opposite side but list the dates out of order. Challenge students to put the correct dates with the documents.
First Inaugural Address (March 4, 1861)
Emancipation Proclamation (January 1, 1863)
The Gettysburg Address (November 19, 1863)
Second Inaugural Address (March 4, 1865)
To help students with historical context, remind them that the war began April 12, 1861, when Confederate forces attacked Fort Sumter, South Carolina, and that it ended on April 9, 1865, when General Robert E. Lee surrendered to Union General Ulysses S. Grant at the village of Appomattox Courthouse, Virginia. Other important dates may be accessed on-line at: ("Civil War Time-line") http://www.historyplace.com/civilwar/index.html.
Give students 10-15 minutes to review the time-line and note when the four documents were written. Have them highlight the dates and note what else was happening at that time.
Divide the class in to four groups. Give each group copies of one of the selected speeches. Allow time for reading the selections. (Use volunteers in the groups to read the speech to the group for those students who may need additional help)
Once students have read through their speech or writing, ask them to write a brief group essay that addresses the following.
- When did Lincoln make this speech or present this writing?
- Briefly summarize Lincoln's message.
- Describe the tone or language he used, giving at least one significant quote as an example.
- How do you think most Northerners and most Southerners responded to the speech or writing. Why?
- What reaction do you imagine Americans today would have to the speech or writing?
- How do you think this speech or writing affected the Civil War?
Give students an opportunity to share their essays. Then discuss their ideas and findings. Ask: What impact did the speeches and writings have on the Civil War? In what ways did the responses differ between the North and South? How do most Americans respond to Lincoln's words today?
Narrate the following information to students as they read their essays:
First Inaugural Address: Ten days prior to his first inaugural address, Lincoln stated, "Now, in my view of the present aspect of affairs, there is no need of bloodshed and war. There is no necessity for it. I am not in favor of such a course, and I may say in advance, there will be no blood shed unless it be forced upon the Government. The Government will not use force unless force is used against it." Lincoln did not want a civil war to break out over the issue of secession; he hoped that the south could be brought back into the Union through careful negotiations. He tried again to reach out to the South during his inaugural address. He promised that he had no intention of trying to abolish slavery in the states where it existed. The conclusion of his speech offers words of friendship.
Prior to the Emancipation Proclamation being issued, Congress passed a Confiscation Act, which enabled the freeing of slaves of those fighting the Union. The Union generals largely ignored this order, and Lincoln did little to enforce the law. According to Congress, the war was not being waged to overthrow or interfere with institutions of states, but rather to preserve the Union. An exchange of letters between Lincoln and the editor of the New York Times, Horace Greeley took place in August 1862. Greeley appealed to the practical need to win the war. "We must have scouts, guides, spies, cooks, teamsters, diggers and choppers from the blacks of the South, whether we allow them to fight for us or not.....I entreat you to render a hearty and unequivocal obedience to the law of the land." He also stated that he and others thought that Lincoln may have been influenced by politicians from the border Slave States.
Lincoln replied in a letter to Greeley and distinguished between his "personal wish" and his "official duty." The letter reiterates Lincoln's claim that the war was being waged over the South's secession, not over its slaves.
"I have not meant to leave any one in doubt......My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or destroy Slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing all the slaves, I would do it; and if I could do it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do that. What I do about Slavery and the colored race, I do because it helps to save this Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union.....I have here stated my purpose according to my view of official duty, and I intend no modification of my oft-expressed personal wish that all men, everywhere, could be free."
Emancipation Proclamation: When Lincoln issued the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation, it was a military move. It gave the South four months to stop rebelling. It threatened to emancipate the slaves if the fighting continued, and promised to leave slavery untouched in states that came over to the North. When the Emancipation Proclamation was issued January 1, 1863, it declared slaves free in those areas still fighting against the Union, and listed those states specifically. It said nothing about slaves behind Union lines. The Emancipation Proclamation changed the purpose of the Civil War. As he had stated in his famous "House Divided" speech of 1858, his country could not permanently stand half slave and half free; it would eventually become all one or all the other. The Emancipation Proclamation announced the policy to allow blacks to enlist in the Union army and fight to end slavery. African American troops began to enlist in the Union army.
Evidence of his changing attitude towards the new African American troops is evident in an executive order that was delivered by Lincoln on July 30, 1863. Reports of mistreatment of the new recruits disturbed him and he issued an order of retaliation concerning the capture of soldiers on the battlefield. Lincoln informs the South that if its commanders executed any captured Union soldier, black or white, he would order a captured Confederate soldier executed in return. If any captured Union soldier were sent into slavery, "a rebel soldier shall be placed at hard labor on the public works and continued at such labor until the other shall be released and receive the treatment due a prisoner of war. This order reveals Lincoln's evolving attitude on race. He asserts the fundamental equality of all citizens, including soldiers.
Lincoln wrote a letter on August 26, 1863 to James C. Conkling in which he asserts again the importance and value of the African American soldiers. He justifies the necessity of the Emancipation Proclamation, and uses sound reasoning to spell out exactly why the soldiers are needed to help save the Union. He says:
"I thought that in your struggle for the Union, to whatever extent the negroes should cease helping the enemy, to that extent it weakened the enemy in his resistance to you. Do you think differently? I thought that whatever negroes can be got to do as soldiers, leaves just so much less for white soldiers to do, in saving the Union. Does it appear otherwise to you? But negroes, like other people, act upon motives. Why should they do any thing for us, if we will do nothing for them? If they stake their lives for us, they must be prompted by the strongest motive - even the promise of freedom. And the promise being made, must be kept."
Gettysburg Address: Lincoln concludes the Gettysburg address with his hope that this American government "of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth" He never used the word slave or slavery, nor did he speak specifically of racial inequalities. Yet Lincoln clearly informs the people of the meaning of the war. It was a war about equality, a war that would determine whether every American would have equal opportunity to pursue happiness. It was an extension of the Emancipation Proclamation. After he had freed some of the slaves, changing the purpose of the war, he saw the struggle as a fundamental testing of the Declaration of Independence's assertion that "all men are created equal".
Second Inaugural Address: Lincoln took his second oath of office on March 4, 1865. He took the opportunity as he did at the Gettysburg dedication to explain the meaning and purpose of the war that had been going on for the last four years. It was a much shorter speech than the first inaugural address where he had pleaded with the South to rejoin the Union and avoid a civil war. He reminded his audience of the situation earlier:
‘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 tan 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......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."
It is clear here that Lincoln identifies slavery, not secession, as the essential cause of the war. Secession and the war were the effects of the debate over slavery - the cause of the war. He concludes his address with words of healing:
" 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 a lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations."
His second inaugural address provides further explanation and justification for the Emancipation Proclamation. In his view, as long as slave owners continued to demand labor without pay from their slaves, god would continue to require that blood be shed on the battlefield Lincoln realized that he couldn't stop the bloodshed without ending the sin of slavery. He had grasped the war's meaning.
Web of Appreciation
Using a ball of string, construct a web of appreciation. Hand onto the end of the string and toss the ball to someone else in the group. State something you appreciate about Lincoln or the documents that were reviewed. The receiving person does the same until everyone in the group has become part of the web. The resulting web symbolizes the connectedness of the writings, their importance from one to the other, and how history continues to weave a larger and larger web.
Use a pair of sharp scissors to eventually cut the connecting string, symbolizing that Lincoln's ideas were part of a web that was once connected and can become so again. Cutting the string can be a very poignant moment, a sad but realistic commentary of changing times.
Carry over discussions could include exploring the history of Civil Rights in the country dating back to this era. Compare/contrast Lincoln and Dr. Martin Luther King. How would a conversation go between these two men..............?
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