Another Real Gettysburg Address, 50 Years On

From the Gettysburg Times, buried on page seven on November 19th, 1963:

The following address, “100 Years After Lincoln's Gettysburg Address” by E. Washington Rhodes, editor-publisher of the Philadelphia Tribune and president of the National Newspaper Publishers Association, was delivered at exercises in the Gettysburg National Cemetery Tuesday afternoon:

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PD / Abbie Rowe

“I consider it a great privilege to have been invited as a representative of the American Negro people to participate in an occasion of such national, historic importance, at this time of racial tension and unrest. This, then, is an historic moment of high honor and high drama, which will be forever cherished by the American Negro people, as they march with heads erect to the goal of full and complete equality of citizenship rights.

“One hundred years after the Battle of Gettysburg, 100 years after the Gettysburg Address, the anguished expectations and hopes of Abraham Lincoln for a united nation remain unrealized, unfulfilled in American life. The present, grave Civil Rights struggle attest to this melancholy, tragic fact.

Great Statesman

“The 'March On Washington' on August 28, 1963, ended at the Lincoln Memorial – at the knees of Lincoln – at the knees of a magnificent stone image. Today, as we evoke the living, breathing presence of Abraham Lincoln here at Gettysburg, we and the entire nation should become acutely aware of his great, compassionate heart sustained by a statesmanship unparalleled in his day. By nature, by instinct, Lincoln understood statesmanship, and became not only one of America's greatest statesmen, but also one of the world's greatest statesmen and is so recognized throughout the world today.

“It has been said that 'statesmanship is characterized by wisdom, breadth of vision or regards for the general welfare rather than partisan interest.' May God grant to us in unstinting measure both the determination and the will to substitute statesmanship for racial antipathies – statesmanship for political expediency and frivolity – statesmanship for educational, social and economic inequities – statesmanship for fragmented views of life – statesmanship for sectional hatreds – statesmanship for walls of hostile silence. Such positive, affirmative, imperative action alone can satisfy the great compassionate heart of Abraham Lincoln 100 years after the Gettysburg Address.

“House Divided”

"Abraham Lincoln prior to his election as President, quoting from Holy Writ, declared with the wisdom of the ages that 'A house divided against itself cannot stand.' He continued: 'I believe this government cannot permanently endure half slave and half free.'

“With all the vigor at my command and the great esteem which I have for my beloved country, I am respectfully urging my fellowmen to take note that this is as true today as it was centuries ago – a house divided against itself cannot stand.

“Second – class citizenship with all of its attendant evils must end. Unless men of substance and creative minds take positive action, move forward with alertness and stout hearts to remove this injustice, I fear that government of the people, by the people and for the people, will soon be endangered beyond repair.”

Rhodes visiting Kennedy's Oval Office in 1962.
PD / Abbie Rowe. White House Photographs. John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston

Two More Proclamations for a Special New Years Eve

From the pages of William Lloyd Garrison's Liberator published in those first few elated moments of 1863:

Proclamation by Gen. Saxton.

A Happy New Year's Greeting to the Colored People
in the Department of the South.

In accordance, as I believe, with the will of our Heavenly Father, and by direction of your great and good friend, whose name you are all familiar with, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, and Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy, on the 1st day of January, 1863, you will be declared "for ever free."

When in the course of human events there comes a day which is destined to be an everlasting beacon-light, marking a joyful era in the progress of a nation and the hopes of a people, it seems to be fitting the occasion that it should not pass unnoticed by those whose hopes it comes to brighten and to bless. Such a day to you is January 1, 1863.

I therefore call upon all the colored people in this Department to assemble on that day at the Headquarters of the 1st Regiment of South Carolina Volunteers, there to hear the President's Proclamation read, and to indulge in such other manifestations of joy as may be called forth by the occasion. It is your duty to carry this good news to your brethren who are still in slavery. Let all your voices, like merry bells, join loud and clear in the grand chorus of liberty — "We are free," "We are free," — until, listening, you shall hear its echoes coming back from every cabin in the land — "We are free," "We are free."

R. SAXTON,
Brig. Gen. and Military Governor.

The New York Times reported that three thousand men, women and children turned out to let those merry bells ring, to shout those sainted words.

And men, women and children gathered again a century later, in the symbolic shadow of that, "great and good friend." And once again echoes were sounded from the throats of a people still traveling a long and winding path:

Let freedom ring from the snowcapped Rockies of Colorado!

Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California!

But not only that; let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia!

Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee!

Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi. From every mountainside, let freedom ring.

And when this happens, when we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, "Free at last! free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at last!"

Will it ring still? Can you hear the merry bells still? Strain your heart and listen.

Happy New Year, 1863. Happy New Year, 1963. Happy New Year, 2013. It's going to be a bumpy ride.