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Historical research essays about abraham lincoln
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Abraham Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address
As I read the lines carefully of Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address, I wonder how a man who is elected for his second term as president with over 54% of the popular vote, and in turn, compose such an eloquent address can be assassinated little more than a month later. In reading other commentaries concerning this address it seems to me that everyone concurs that this address is one of the finest speeches ever written by a president. Lincoln wrote other memorable speeches such as his first inaugural address, and the Gettysburg Address, which are of equally high caliber, however, his second inaugural address is considered a favorite by most critics. Even the surrounding circumstances at the time of the address are unique. There was weeks of wet weather that had caused Pennsylvania Avenue to become a sea of mud and standing water. When the thousands of spectators came to witness the address they had to stand in thick mud at the Capitol grounds. Then the most amazing thing happened . . . as Lincoln started to deliver the address, the clouds parted and a sunburst broke forth. Even the president commented in surprise about it after the address was over.
One commentary was written that said the following: "Abraham Lincoln delivered his second inaugural address, which was his favorite of all his speeches, on March 4, 1865, at the start of his second term as President of the United States. At a time when victory over the secessionists in the American Civil War was within sight and slavery had been effectively ended, Lincoln did not speak of triumph, but of loss, guilt and sin. Some see this speech as a defense of his pragmatic approach to Reconstruction, in which he sought to avoid harsh tre...
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... may speedily pass away." He wishes the war to be fought and won as quickly as possible.
I believe this speech was successful in its intention. The rhetoric was clear and understandable, and it expressed Lincoln's values to the audience which approved greatly. He really had to sell himself and his ideas to the audience especially since the end of the war was at hand and he wanted to avoid harsh treatment of the south and encourage help with reconstruction which was controversial. I, personally, revere this speech as one of the best orations given by a United States president.
Works Cited List
Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lincoln's_second_inaugural_address ; last modified 12:20, 15 Nov 2004.
http://students.luther.edu/~campra02/Rhetoric%202nd%20Inaugural.htm
http://www.loc.gov/rr/program/bib/ourdocs/Lincoln2nd.html#External
Lincoln’s Famous Address written by Roselynn Marquez talks about how Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address was only 270 words, and it followed a two hour introduction by Edward Everett. Being short was not the only memorable point that the speech had. “Another was the simplicity of its language. As historian Allen Guelzo notes, ‘the address relies on crisp, plain vocabulary.’ He points out that most of the words are only one-syllable. Doris Kearns Goodwin concludes, ‘Lincoln had translated the story of his country...into words and ideas accessible to every American.’ By making his ideas easy to grasp, Lincoln gave them directness and power” (Marquez). The Gettysburg Address to this day is known as a unforgettable expression inscribing the war that took on in the country. In summarization, Abraham Lincoln is known widely for the Address he made in Gettysburg after the battle that took place
Disapproval, the Confederacy, and slavery were amongst the many crises Abraham Lincoln faced when addressing his First Inaugural speech (Lincoln, First Inaugural, p.37). Above all, Lincoln’s speech was stepping on the boundaries of the southern slave states. Once states began to secede, new territories formed and the disapproval of Lincoln grew. Despite Lincoln’s attempts of unifying the antislavery and confederate views, many whites refused to follow his untraditional beliefs. Lincoln encountered hostile and admirable emotions from the people of the Union and the Confederacy. However, despite his representation of the Union, not everyone agreed with his views.
Lincoln secondarily accused slavery for chaos in the United States. He concluded that there needed to be a “political religion” emphasizing laws in the US, including citizenship. Lincoln’s speech was one of the earliest speeches of its time to be published. The Lyceum Address was published in the Sangamon Journal. The speech helped to establish Lincoln’s reputation as an orator.
On March 4th, 1865, the Civil War was drawing to an end and Abraham Lincoln gave his Second Inaugural Address to become the President of the United States for the second time. At this point it was clear that the North was to win the war. Instead of boasting and bragging about his victory, Lincoln took a different route in his speech. He focused instead on putting the war behind the nation and reunifying the country. In this famous speech, he used various forms of rhetoric and literary devices to achieve this goal. He first employs the use of God to appeal to the pathos in the people of the North and South. The overall tone of the speech is also one of unification rather than that of celebration. Going with this is his word choice or diction; he continuously addresses the country as one instead of two split parts. These literary devices are crucial to the success of his core purpose of speech.
It was a goal of President Abraham Lincoln’s for Reconstruction to be a very smooth and successful period of time. “With malice toward none, with charity to all,” Lincoln said in his second inauguration speech. He was referring to not only the conflict between black men and white men, but also the hard feelings between the north and south. The southern states had entered the Civil War with such confidence and dreams of independence that many were now humiliated at the idea of having to receive aid from the federal government. President Lincoln’s assassination also put in the country in further turmoil.
In his second Inaugural Address, delivered on March 4, 1865, Lincoln addressed the need to reconstruct the South and rebuild the Union: “With malice toward none; with charity for all.”
...after the Civil War, Frederick Douglass continued to think highly of Lincoln and his great speech. It was hard to believe that before the Civil War, the two men disagreed and fought over the greatest and most awful sin committed, slavery. But they found a way to form the friendship that would last throughout history. It was his famous quote that really brought attention. He had said of the sixteenth president, “His greatest mission was to accomplish two things: first, to save his country from dismemberment and ruin; and, second, to free his country from the great crime of slavery . . . . taking him for all in all, measuring the tremendous magnitude of the work before him, considering the necessary means to ends, and surveying the end from the beginning, infinite wisdom has seldom sent any man into the world better fitted for his mission than Abraham Lincoln.”
In 1981, former president Ronald Reagan was inaugurated into office and just a couple days ago current president Donald Trump was inaugurated into office. When a president is inaugurated into house, they generally give an inaugural speech about what they will and can do for America. In Ronald Reagan’s inaugural address, he shares his thoughts about America and plans to come. Using different literary devices Ronald Reagan characterizes America as a broken country but, by using hard work and effort, America can truly be great.
He had just beaten out George B. McClellan for president. McClellan wanted the country split into two- one slave-holding and one free. However, the country had chosen Lincoln, they wanted the country to stay together. People wanted too much of Lincoln. He would have enemies no matter what choice he made. So now, instead of staying passive like he did in his first Inaugural Address, he took a stand in his second. He told the country that God sent the slaves to them early in this country, but now He wanted them gone. The war was a punishment from God for all slaveholders. Lincoln made this a rallying cry for all northerners, telling them that they would fight “until every drop of blood drawn with the lash, shall be paid by another drawn with the sword.” This war would be bloody, but if they could only keep fighting a little more, there would be success at the
On November 19th, about seven score and twelve years ago, President Abraham Lincoln gave a monumental speech known as the Gettysburg Address. Lincoln’s address was comprised of two-hundred and seventy-two words which were separated by ten forms of various punctuation and lasted a mere two minutes. However, although short, the speech was particularly concise, and is still resonating in the classrooms of High School and College campuses. In fact, Edward Everett also gave a speech that day over the same subject, and he is quoted saying, “I should be glad, if I could flatter myself that I came as near to the central idea of the occasion, in two hours, as you did in two minutes.”
Four and a half months after the Union defeated the Confederacy at the Battle of Gettysburg, Abraham Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address on November 19, 1863. He gave the Union soldiers a new perspective on the war and a reason to fight in the Civil War. Before the address, the Civil War was based on states’ rights. Lincoln’s speech has the essence of America and the ideals that were instilled in the Declaration of Independence by the Founders. The sixteenth president of the United States was capable of using his speech to turn a war on states’ rights to a war on slavery and upholding the principles that America was founded upon. By turning the Civil War into a war about slavery he effortlessly ensured that no foreign country would recognize the South as an independent nation, ensuring Union success in the war. In his speech, Lincoln used the rhetorical devices of juxtaposition, repetition, and parallelism, to touch the hearts of its listeners.
By the time of his speech South Carolina, Mississippi, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Louisiana and Texas had already seceded from the Union. In his speech Lincoln had three main points: “to hold, occupy, and possess the property and places belonging to the government,” secession was impossible because the Union was unbreakable, and that any use of arms against the United States would be met with force but he would never be first to attack (Grafton 80). Lincoln aspired to increase his support in the North without alienating the South where most disliked him in fear of the end of slavery. In his speech however, Lincoln made it clear that his intention was not to interfere with slavery quoting “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” (Grafton 81). In hope to make amends with the South Lincoln closed by saying “We are not enemies, but friends. 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” (Grafton 81). Although meant to unify the North and South, this address had a larger impact on another
If Lincoln had it his way, Reconstruction would have been short, sweet and to the point but the country was not allowing that. I do not know how he expected such a thing considering the South was still acting rebellious and racism was dominant all over the country. There would be no agreements without strong laws being made and enforced by the government. Now, many northerners wanted the South to be punished and completely reformed of
On November 19, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln delivered ‘’The Gettysburg Address’’. Abraham Lincoln’s purpose in ‘’The Gettysburg Address’’ was to persuade listeners to finish what those who fought for died for by treating everyone else equally. ‘’The Gettysburg Address’’ is the most compelling speech due to its use of rhetorical
As both of the speech and the audience's emotion reach the climax, Lincoln already succeed in winning the resonance from the audience on his argument. If Lincoln just plainly address his argument of continue fighting the war without any emotion changes in his audience, the audience would not be effected so fully by his speech. Lincoln ''played'' with his audience's emotion in order to make the audience mentally agree and support Lincoln's argument from within. Despite weather the aggressive emotion was on a whim or not, Lincoln did success, at least at that moment, arguing that the Civil War is still worth fighting by controlling the audience's emotion.