The Gettysburg Address
One hundred and fifty one years ago today (or six score and eleven years ago depending on who's counting), Abraham Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address. The occasion was the dedication of the Soldier's National Cemetery in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania - the dead of that great battle being laid to their final rest. In his speech, Lincoln called upon the principles set down in the Declaration of Independence and invoked the wartime sacrifice of so many brave souls in order redefine the American Civil War as a transformational struggle to save not only the Union, but the very institution of representative democracy. These are his words,