Dear Editor,
As the people of Libya mourn the tragic deaths last week of peaceful protestors, and the nation continues . . .[restrict]to grapple with the uncertainty of nation building, the United States this week commemorates the 150th anniversary of President Abraham Lincoln’s historic Gettysburg Address, a remarkably short speech made at the dedication of a national cemetery for the Union soldiers who died at the Battle of Gettysburg some four months earlier.
This battle claimed almost 6,000 Union and Confederate soldiers and was considered a turning point in the American Civil War that had raged for 2 years already and would continue for another two, claiming upwards of 750,000 American lives. From its declaration of independence in 1776 to its ratification of a constitution some 12 years later in 1788, through the end of the American Civil War, the creation of the United States was a tumultuous, uncertain and fragile exercise. Many along the way predicted the result would ultimately be a “failed state,” descended into chaos, fractured into warring territories, with little common cause to hold it together after a brief unity against a common foe.
It was in this context that President Abraham Lincoln, beleaguered by the carnage of war, and surrounded by the cynicism of a nation divided and losing its ability to envision a just and peaceful future, spoke for just two minutes to remind those present that “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.”
On this day and in these difficult times, I hope that these words provide a reminder of what is at stake in Libya, and what can still be accomplished.
Sincerely,
Chuck Dittrich Executive Director
U.S.-Libya Business Association
1625 K Street, NW, Suite 200
Washington, DC 20006, USA
Tel: +1 (202) 464-2038
Fax: +1 (202) 452-8160
The full text of the Gettysburg Address, as engraved on the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC:
“Fourscore 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 battlefield 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 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. 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.”
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