Transcripts For CSPAN3 The 20240704

Distinguished panel of americas leading lincoln scholars to discuss lincolns speeches and the american idea. Michael birmingham holds the chancellor naomi b lynn distinguished chair and lichen studies at the university of illinois springfield. Hes the author of several books on lincoln including and lincoln observed the inner world of Abraham Lincoln and the two volume american Abraham Lincoln a life as well as his new book, which hell be discussing tonight. The black mans president Abraham Lincoln African Americans and the pursuit of racial equality. Noah. Feldman is the Felix Frankfurter professor of law chair of the society of fellows and founding director of the Julis Rabinowitz Program on jewish and israeli law at harvard university. Hes the author of nine books including the three lives of James Madison genius partisan president and his latest book which will be tonight the broken constitution lincolns slavery and the refounding of america diana. Shall is professor of Political Science at loyola university, maryland and a nonresident senior fellow at the American Enterprise institute where she focuses on american political thought and history. She is the author of several books including what so proudly we hail the american soul and story speech and song and her new book is his greatest speeches how lincoln moved the nation welcome Michael Burlingame noah feldman and diana schaub. Michael berlin. Let us begin with you. Tell our friends why you argue in your new book that lincoln was the black mans president and you have you have several speeches of Frederick Douglass that you begin with including in 1865 eulogy on lincoln where he said no people at class of people in the country have a better. Reason for lamenting the death of lincoln then have the colored people. What is the significance of that . Speech . And why do you believe that lincoln was the black mans president . Well, thank you very much for your kind introduction and thank you for inviting me. I feel a little out of place because my book is focused the central theme im book is lets not focus on lincoln speeches and writings and policies in the light. Lets focus on lincolns interaction with black people both in springfield and in washington, but the title of the book comes from a eulogy that Frederick Douglass delivered on june 1st 1865 in cooper union the premiere site in the country to give up major speech. And it was covered widely in the new york press, but its been on accountably ignored by historians and anthologists of douglass speeches. And in this remarkable speech he says Abraham Lincoln was preeminently the white mans president the first to rise above the prejudices of his time and his country by inviting me Frederick Douglass to the white house to consult on public affairs. Lincoln was saying by that gesture that i am the president of the black people as well as the white and i mean to honor their rights as men and citizens. And its a striking contrast to the speech. That is very well. Known widely anthologized and commented on regularly and that is a speech he gave 11 years later. At the dedication of a statue the emancipation memorial in washington in which he said Abraham Lincoln was preeminently the white mans president. And i remember when i first encountered the speech in the douglas papers in manuscript. I was i was astounded i said surely i would have seen this speech in the five. I am addition of douglass speeches that the yale press published or the fourvolume study of philip phone or had anza which phone her and i went back to those sources and those speeches werent that speech wasnt included. Um, and so that got me thinking about lincoln and race in general. And then cape, missouri, very fine historian at Northwestern University published an article recently on the white house receptions and black peoples attendance at white house receptions and in my 2000 pageography. I had a little bit to say about that, but i thought cheaper saturday missed so much of the good information that she has unearthed and so i decided to plunge deeper into that subject and then that led me deeper and deeper into lincolns interaction with black people back in springfield and in washington and lots of people know about douglas lincolns interaction with Frederick Douglass because douglas described them in his autobiographies and some detail. Um, but but little has been done about lincolns interaction with other black people, and so thanks to the enormous utility of modern words searchable newspaper databases. I was able to take up a lot of new information. I got everything ive written needs to be updated. Thanks to these databases. And so and so what ive found is that both in springfield and in washington lincoln interacted with large number of black people all of whom commented on how respectful he was how kind and how generous and it wasnt just courtesy but it was also gestures an actions based on appeals that they made that indicates to my way of thinking that lincoln was an instinctive racial egalitarian. Fascinating. Thank you so much for that and thank you for calling our attention to the tremendous significance of digitized primary text which have indeed transformed Historical Research and our understanding of links of lincoln. No feldman, youve argued so powerfully in your book that the original constitution of 1787 was broken and as you put it in the New York Times lincoln fatally injured the constitution of 1787. He consciously and repeatedly violated core elements of the constitution and theyd been understood by nearly all americans of that time and through these act of destructions lincoln effectively broke the constitution of 1787 paving the way for something very different to replace this. Tell us more more about your thesis in the broken constitution. Thank you, jeff. Its an honor to be here with these distinguished scholars. I am a constitutions person rather than a lincoln person. So i came from the standpoint of the constitution itself and among those of us who work on the founding in 1787. Its for the most part there might be one or two exceptions commonly accepted that the constitution was a compromise document in which one of the central compromises was a compromise over slavery. And so we have the threefifths compromise famously. We have the guarantee that the International Slave trade would remain for at least 20 years, and we also have the fugitive slave clause which effectively required the states that did not recognize slavery on their own to acknowledge and recognize slavery itself. So thats the setting. For the way the constitution functioned from that time up until the civil war. There were moments where the constitutional compromise seemed in your breaking but congress for the most part managed to reinscribe that compromise with new variations the missouri compromises the most famous example of this and lincoln actually very much supported that structure of constitutional compromise throughout his political career because were mentioning speeches of lincoln ill mention in this context is very briefly something which diana has written about very extensively lincolns address to the young mens lyceum in springfield in 1838. The only passage i want to mention from that in a speech where a lincoln was actively defending the constitution is lincolns statement there that we should be aware of people like alexander the great or like caesar or like napoleon who in their seeking of greatness would be willing to enslave free man or to free enslaved people. That is to say an act that would be extraordinary and outside the bounds of constitutional norms would be wrongful. Hes clearly against this and cause the constitution acid then existed legally mandated the continued existence of slavery in those states that chose to have slavery. So thats lincolns view. And once he becomes president he confronts the reality that there have been secessions by at that point seven states and he has to decide what to do about that. And of course thats secession is a fundamental breaking of the constitution and lincoln responded by himself breaking the constitution in i argue three ways, which ill just mention each very briefly. The first is sort of surprising. We dont necessarily think of it as breaking the constitution, but the decision to go to war unilaterally to obligate the seceding states to return to the union was not under contemporary constitutional norms an obvious authority or right of the presidency or even of the whole government the Buchanan Administration in an official opinion by the attorney general embraced by buchanan in his state of the Union Address had said that although secession was revolution. The president congress indeed no part of the federal government have the authority to force the states back into the union because nothing in the constitution explicitly authorized it and because of the principle of consent of the government and on this principle the southerners in those states had chosen to no longer give their consent to be governed and so it violated that principle of consent to coerce them back in lincoln unilaterally and then eventually with the support of Congress Took up arms to force them back in. The second braking was the suspension of habeas corpus, which is the right that says if the government grabs you up it has to appear in court. Give a reason put you on trial and if youre not convicted let you go and lincoln unilaterally suspended habeas corpus early in the war and kept that suspension in place even after the Supreme Court via the chief justice or at least the chief justice the Supreme Court ratchet roger tony issued an opinion saying that this was unconstitutional because only congress has the authority to suspend habeas and i would say that that is still the view of almost all constitutional scholars and the Supreme Court itself after the war also repudiated the idea that without a suspension by congress that martial law could be applied within the United States where no war was going on and lincoln did that he did extensively and he imprisoned somewhere between 15 and 40,000 people. Theres a lot of debate about how many over the course of the war without trial and without the opportunity to to appear in court. This was the largest suppression of free expression. In American History by a huge margin and last but not least and much more upliftingly lincoln also broke the constitution as he understood it when he issue the emancipation proclamation formally freeing enslaved people in areas that were under confederate control. Lincoln himself when the war began reiterated his commitment to the idea that slavery was constitutionally protected. So i think well probably talk a little bit tonight about his second inaugural address and the gettysburg address. Those are the two that you see when you go into the Lincoln Memorial on either side of the enshrined president and shrined as a god. Its after all the Lincoln Memorial is based on a an athenian temple. We never hear about the first inaugural address and thats because the first naugular dress opens with lincoln saying that he has needed the will nor the inclination nor the constitutional power to change slavery, which he says is protected by the constitution and lincoln over time shifted in his view and in my book i spent a lot of detail time trying to show that shift and he came to believe that it was somehow within his authority as president as commanderinchief in wartime. To break the guarantee of Property Rights break the fugitive slave clause which quite literally would have said that anyone who escaped would have to be returned to sl. And under the conditions of the war linking any emancipation proclamation said that people who escaped would not be returned and would in fact become permanently free. So those are thats a morally good breaking of the constitution in my view, but breaking nevertheless. Thank you so much for that wonderful summary of your book and for calling our attention to the first inaugural diana schaub. Im going to do something which may or may not work which is to try to screen share because its so wonderful to have the text in front of us. Did that work for the lyceum address . Think that everyone can see it unless anyone objects and you parse it you your project is so inspiring to really do close readings of the lyceum address and the gettysburg address and the second inaugural. Theres theres so much here and of course, we dont we cant parse the whole thing. But this theme that noah mentioned of the rule of law and also the conflict between reason and passion jumps out but there may be other aspects of it that you want to call our attention to so tell us about how we should read the lysium address. But yeah, maybe i can just for a minute just Say Something about the overall thesis of the book and then and then turn to the lyceum. So yeah the book of holding it here. Weve each got books out. We should show them is a close reading i believe in close and careful reading of three lincoln speeches first the lysine address the speech that he gave as a as a young man, and then the two most famous president ial addresses the gettysburg address and the second inaugural and actually what i what im struck by is how often lincoln anchored his speeches in dates in significant dates. So the lyceum address begins with the constitution and the date of 1787 the gettysburg address is everyone knows for score and seven years ago. It takes us to 1776 the declaration of independence. Thats what the gettysburg. Is just anchored in and then the second inaugural and i dont think this is maybe been noted enough, but it is actually anchored in 1619 if you do the math the reference to you know, 250 years of the slaves unrequited toil that takes you to 1615. Hes of course rounding the number off. So lincoln is aware of the origin date of slavery on the american continent. So i argue that lincoln really tells the story of america and helps us understand america through these three significant dates those two texts and the relationship between those texts and and slavery in the United States. So i think the second inaugural really deserves to be known as as the original and actually better 1619 project. So but to go to the the lyceum address the speech that he gives as a young man. I think its a remarkable address. Its diagnosis of the dangers that lincoln sees abroad in the land at the time and more general diagnosis of the problems. That democracy is always prone to so what lincolns notes is the growing prevalence of mob rule throughout the nation. So theres kind of breakdown of law and order and this breakdown is triggered. I mean hes not talking about looting and rioting hes talking about vigilante justice acts of vigilantes on so these vigilantes are driven by their passion for justice, but they are, you know running roughshod over the you know, due process and and rule of law. So lincoln highlights this danger, he gives this diagnosis and then he proposes a solution and his solution is reverence for the constitution and laws. So is recommendation is lawabidingness and not simply lawabidingness but a particular attitude in which one obeys the loss this attitude of reverence. So thats his diagnosis of the sort of the present danger, but the second half of the speech is not about the present danger, but about future dangers and this is where lincolns analysis of passion is really developed and here he goes back to a, you know, a famous distinction that the ancient political philosophers always use the distinction between the few and the many and so lincoln says what happens if a person of the founding type springs up after the founding, what is that person going to do what outlet for their vast ambition will be available and this is where he gives his against the alexanders the caesars and the napoleons those who wont be content to be you know, the the 44th the 41st or the 42nd or the 43rd president of the United States and i can tend to be a custodian in the house of the fathers and this ambition is presented as morally neutral if there are good avenues to pursue like the freeing of the slaves that might be done if the avenues of the good have already been been tried. They will set boldly forth enslaving free men. So theres this this problem of inordinate ambition, and then theres also a problem on the part of the many and that is these negative passions of human nature. Jealousy envy hatred revenge and lincoln says at the time of the founding those passions were able to be harnessed toward good ends. You could hate the hate the hate the fish and achieve liberty for yourself, but now and in the future those passions will be dangerous. So i mean his denunciation of passion is very strong, you know passion may have helped us but can do so no more in the future passion will be our enemy. I think it is significant to note though that lincoln always means by passion the negative passions. So for instance, he doesnt mean bonds of affection. He doesnt mean friendship. You can look at actually the you know, the first inaugural which also says passion is the problem think of that last paragraph, you know passion may have strained the bonds of affection, but we dont want it to you know to separate us. So his so his solution then for the for this future danger is reason so hes got a double diagnosis mob rule the present danger future danger this problem of the passions. And then a double solution the solution to the problem of mob rule is reverence for the constitutional laws the solution to these dangers ahead of inordinate ambition and runaway passion is is reason should probably stop there, but i try to explain how these two solutions could perhaps fit together. How can he recommend both reverence and reason . That was wonderful. Thank you so much for that and i so fascinating to read it closely with you and youve helped me understand how deep the classical influence was because these um vices of hate and adverse and envy are indeed the classical ones. He talks about the ruling passion, which was from cicero and aristotle. Its always negative and reason has to constrain it and then we see as you as you say that the ambition manifested by caesar and alexander are negative examples. So thank you for i wasnt sure whether the screen sharing would work but its just always learn so much when you read closely and thanks for inspiring us to do that. All right. Well, were now gonna for this next round use the gettysburg address as a jumping off point, but i dont want to constrain us to close reading but it is the anniversary in november of the address and it would be wonderful to hear of your thoughts on it. So as i call it up michael. How does the gettysburg address fit into your thesis that lincoln was the black mans president . And what do you want to tell us about the gettysburg address . Sorry, i think youre muted. Its been argued by some including a fine commentators that its striking that the gettysburg address doesnt say anything about slavery the word slave slavery doesnt appear, but it does seem clear to me that the new birth of freedom that lincoln refers to in the gettysburg address is a direct route illusion to emancipation and presumably beyond that of firstclass citizenship. So even though three address doesnt have a great deal to say about race and and the like but the the implication of a new birth of freedom does seem to herald not just the complete emancipation extended not just to the Confederate States but to throughout the country which happens with the 13th amendment but also by implication the 14th amendment and a 15th amendment establishing civil rights for blacks and then Voting Rights. Um is implicit in that notion of a new birth of freedom. And lincolns support for black Voting Rights for example, which wasnt articulated publicly until his last public address, which of course he didnt know was going to be his last public address on april 11th. 1865. In which you call for the first time for black Voting Rights at least limited black Voting Rights. That is to say those who had served in the armed forces and those who were very intelligent by which we assume he meant literate. Um, and now he had privately recommended that to the governor of louisiana, which was the model in lincolns mind for reconstruction. What can the north expect the south to do to rehabilitate itself politically after the war . And so in louisiana, it worked very hard to get Something Like black civil rights were Voting Rights included working behind the scenes and then he writes a letter upon having been visited by two black gentlemen from new orleans bearing a petition signed by a roughly a thousand men in new orleans who said look we are literate. We are property owners. We are taxpayers and we would like the right to vote. And lincoln tells him well under our constitution the eligibility requirements for voting are established by states and by the federal government, so im very sympathetic, but you really have to get this constitutional convention, which is about to meet in, louisiana to agree to do that. And so he says that to these gentlemen, but then he takes a step further. He writes a letter to the governor. Newly elected governor, louisiana saying i suggest that in the new constitution that is going to be drawn on you include Voting Rights at least for the veterans of the union army and the very intelligent. And the fact that lincoln then as part of this new birth of freedom publicly announces that two days after robert e, lee surrenders. Uh is as a noteworthy because it means hes shifting away from or other moderate position on on reconstruction to a much more radical position and Frederick Douglass said that i was in that audience that day on on april 11th, 1865, and i was disappointed in the scope of the recommendation for black Voting Rights because it was so limited just to the veterans of the armed and the very intelligent. But we should have recognized and many my abolitionist friends were also disappointed, but we should have recognized that that was an extremely important speech because Abraham Lincoln learned his statesmanship in the school of rail splitting and to split a rail you take a wedge and you insert the thin edge of the wedge into the log and then you drive it home with a big hammer a mall and we should have known that once Abraham Lincoln inserted the thin edge of the wedge publicly that you could count him to drive home the thick edge of the wedge, but there was one gentleman in the audience who did appreciate it significance and that was wilkes booth and he said that means nword citizenship. Thats the last species ever going to give by god. Im on a running through and three days later murdered lincoln not because he issue the emancipation proclamation, which is here in my time and not because he supported the 15th and 13th amendment, but because he called for black Voting Rights and therefore, i think its appropriate for us in the 21st century to regard lincoln as a martyr to black civil rights as much as Martin Luther king or midgar evers or any of those people who were murdered in the 1960s as they championed the civil rights revolution of that time. Thank you very much indeed for that. Noah feldman you write that the use of biblical language and imagery in the gettysburg address marked a great change for lincoln whos a nonreligious rationalist and he could now describe the aims of the war at the union and the constitution in new moralized terms. Tell us new about and and you very provocatively argued that the idea of new birth and both the teaching of rebirth in christ. Tell us about that fascinating reading of the gettysburg address and what else you want our friends to learn about the gettysburg address and you can also introduce any other speeches that you think are important to support the help us understand the thesis of your of your book. Next job. Well, let me start by saying that. Plenty people have looked at the gettysburg address and seen classical greek overtones. And those are unquestionably there gary wills famously drew attention very actively to this but the speeches also suffused with biblical language and a biblical idea of morality and its the beginning in my view of lincoln articulating his own moral vision of the entire history of the United States and in the second inaugural address, which maybe will come to in our next round of conversation. Hes most explicit about doing that. But in my view hes starting to do that in the gettysburg address and you know, the the three score and seven is selfconsciously biblicizing. Its biblical and to americans in the 19th century almost all of whom were protestants biblical language meant general morality 19th century americans believed that morality was derivative of the bible. They were as i say heavily protestant and protestants thought that you should read the bible and through the bible you would get access directly to morality. Lincoln could not interpret the history of the United States in these moral terms or the constitution these moral terms so long as the constitution enshrine slavery, which he knew to be a moral wrong. So up until the emancipation proclamation he was committed to the constitution under the rule of law principles that anna was talking about but that meant he was committed to a compromise that included a compromise with immorality and that put him in a contradictory situation. After emancipation he was now able to describe the constitution as fundamentally moral. So when he said that the concept that the that our country was not only conceived in liberty but dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. He could not have said that about the constitution until he broke the constitution because the constitution wasnt dedicated to their proposition because the constitution enshrined slavery once emancipation was established fact by lincoln, he could reconceptualize the country in these terms and this is where the new birth of freedom part comes in and ive talked to this about this with peter bogrove i think is in the audience who was one of the earlier readers of my book. New birth is very resonant phrase for 19th century American Protestant christians. All of whom i think would have recognized immediately the idea of new birth in christ. Now, im not arguing here that lincoln was making a consciously christian argument what im saying is he was drawing upon the Common Thread of protestant moral thought which was derivative of christian ideas to express a new idea and the idea here was that just as the Old Testament had been superseded by Christian Liberty in the new testament. So the new birth of freedom would supersede the slavery present in the original constitution so that the country would then be reborn and he plays out this idea more fully in the second inaugural address as a moral country one that therefore could be improper fulfillment of the ideals of morality that were present in the original declaration of independence on lincolns reading but were not present in the constitution. So that i think is the explanation for why lincoln was able to use this kind of religious language both in the gettysburg address and ultimately in the second inaugural its because he was freed up to do so by emancipation which ended the immoral qualities of the constitutional compromise and opened the possibility of a moral accounting and of course, that was very appropriate at a funeral what was after all in a way a commemorative funeral oration for people who had died and eventually in the second inaugural lincoln would give specific sacral meaning to the deaths of the people who had died fighting in the civil war. Thank you very much for that diana shop. Im not even gonna call to gettysburg address up because its short and we almost all right by heart. What what what . What should we about the gettysburg address . Um, yeah, i just want to maybe begin by just to saying that i agree with noah about the presence of the biblical language in the gettysburg address, and of course even more so in the second inaugural, but i dont think thats new. In fact, i think thats present in his rhetoric from the beginning. I mean, you see it at the very end of the lyceum address where he quotes from the bible the gates of hell shall not prevail against it it draws a connection between the only greater institution the church and the United States you see in the dred scott speech where he actually puts the United States in the position of pharaoh and the in and the enslaved blacks in the position of the enslaved hebrews. You see it in the house divided speech that that itself is a biblical phrase house divided against itself cannot stand so i think thats always been been present in in his rhetoric. Maybe just a word about the rel. Ship between lincolns thinking about the constitution and the declaration so i argued that the lyceum addresses anchored in the constitution and i think that lincoln is a dedicated constitutionalist and unlike noah. I believe he remains a dedicated constitutionalist nonetheless. Its true that as the crisis over the house divided develops lincolns attention in the speeches in the 1850s. Shifts from the constitution to the declaration of independence. Its actually begins in 1852 with the eulogy to henry clay. He begins that speech by saying on the 4th of july 1776 and in every one of the great speeches that he delivers throughout the 1850s he recurs to the declaration. I think the reason that he has to do that in other words the reason that his textual horizon shifts is because americans in the 1850s are beginning to repudiate the selfevident truths of the declaration. Theyre doing this in an outright manner in people like calhoun and his followers who have taken to calling the selfevident truth selfevident lies and theyre doing it in other ways more insidiously folks like Steven Douglas and roger bit thani, so i think as those repudiators of the principle of liberty for all become stronger lincoln has to demonstrate their error and so throughout the 1850s. He appeals to the declaration in speech after speech and not just appeals to it but gives explications of the declaration what what properly understood it does mean so its only by reading the declaration that the challenge posed by slavery and slaverys extension can be met and i think that his decade of reflection on meaning of the of the declaration really reaches its culmination in the gettysburg address and really that 30word sentence with which he begins the gettysburg address and its quite remarkable that post gettysburg, uh, lincoln does not again recur to the declaration. Its as if his thought about it had achieved its final form and thats the thats the statement that he wants that he wants to remain and then he wants all americans to memorize maybe just one other point about the new birth of freedom. I agree that it makes sense to read the new birth of freedom as a reference to emancipation and the steps that will follow emancipation, but i i also sort of believe that that perhaps the more fundamental meaning of the new birth of freedom. Is that if the union is victorious then the heretical suggestion of secession and that argument that was made for secession will be refuted and that that refutation itself constitutes a new birth of freedom. In other words that thats whats necessary to return to the the original meaning of the founding charters. So i i dont know that thats the usual way of reading it. But i think it fits with what lincoln says about the meaning of the war in other places where he says the real meaning of the war is so that americans will have the proper understanding of the relationship between ballots and bullets once you agree to be bound by ballots. You dont get to have recourse back to bullets that that these its basically a lesson in democratic theory. Thank you very much for that. Well, our last text is the second inaugural. Im going to give myself the great pleasure, which i get to do as moderator of reading the famous last sentence, which we all do know and then ask each of you to give us your thoughts on the speech. Here we go 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 nations 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 adjust and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations. Michael brillian, what should we know about the second inaugural . Well, the final paragraph of course is the one that people know best but Frederick Douglass in that remarkable speech that i mentioned earlier the eulogy of june 1st 1865 says that the more remarkable paragraph is the one that immediately precedes it. In which lincoln starts off by quoting jesus . Uh well into the world because of offenses for it must be that offenses come. But well into that man by whom the offense cometh. And he goes on to say if we shall suppose that american slavery is one of those offenses which in the providence of god must needs come. And having passed through his appointed time. He now wills to remove and that he gives to both north and south is terrible war as the woe do unto them by whom the offense came. Shall we discern there and any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in the living . God have ever ascribed. Ive always ascribed to him. Finally do we hope fervently, do we pray that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. But if god wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bonds 250 years of unrequited toil shall be sunk and until all the blood drawn by the lash shall be paid by another drawn by the sword. So it must be said as was said 3000 years ago the judgments of the lord are true and righteous altogether. And Frederick Douglass said this is a truly remarkable notion and that this reveals the depth of lincolns commitment to Racial Justice and racial equality. That to say in in on an occasion like like the on second or another address of a president something to the effect that god has punished white people for enslaved black people. And the war has gone on so long because the scales have to be balanced there have been 250 years of unrequited toil and a lot of a lot of income was generated by that and it has to be amount of an amount of White Property equal to the back wages that were denied to slaves has to be destroyed. And then the notion that that for all the blood because its we have to remember that this war was incredibly bloody. That the total number of deaths of was roughly 750,000 on a population base. Thats one tenth of the population base. This is so imagine if we lost seven and a half million men in the war against terror. Its just the scope of the blanchard was was extraordinary. And for for just for Frederick Douglas to say well lincoln bridge to say that impressed Frederick Douglass very profoundly as well. It might and it wouldnt have sounded out a place in the in the mouth of a presbyterian minister say reflecting on on the nations ordeal of the war. But for a president to say that is truly extraordinary and i think that douglas is understanding of that and how how radical it was and how deep it was and how how much it reflected his sense of justice and his compassion for blacks i think is truly remarkable and therefore that that paragraph deserves to be more carefully scrutinized than the more famous final that immediately follows it thank you for calling our attention to it and thank you for reading it. Noah feldman the second inaugural. I strongly agree with michael and his emphasis on that paragraph. I would say that that paragraph amounts to what we would call the political theology of the United States and a political theology is the use of religious ideas distinctively religious ideas to explain political events and to give them meaning and i think what lincoln is doing here is offering a version. I wouldnt call it secularizing because god is in it but a version of the political theology of the United States thats heavily dependent on protestant christian ideas about liberation from sin. So in this picture slavery is the original sin that lincoln describes which is an offense, but its inevitable offense. Its something that had to happen much as original sin is seen in early protestant theology as an inevitable reality. That was nevertheless fundamentally evil and sinful and the only thing that can cleanse original sin is the sacrifice of christ. Through his blood and here the blood of the civil war dead is used by lincoln as a substitute for christs blood. Its passionate in the sense and the technical sense that its christs passion or suffering that forgives original sin, and thats whats going on here the blood of the civil war dead who are themselves martyrs is being used theologically to cleanse the United States of the original sin of slavery. And what emerges from this is a new world where it is possible to view the entire picture as in some sense righteous in the eyes of god because it is a judgment because there has been sin and the sin has been purged and its also true i think as michael mentioned earlier that because lincoln himself was subsequently assassinated he came to function in our political theology a political theology that he devised as a martyr of the process. Of emancipation and liberation and then because of the failure of reconstruction and the imposition of segregation and disenfranchisement of black people. It was necessary for the Civil Rights Movement to come around and bring about a further redemption of the constitutional guarantee of freedom and here it was Martin Luther king jr. Who played that central role . Its not an accident that his most famous speech took place in front of the Lincoln Memorial and then he too was assassinated becoming a further martyr of this political theology of the constitution in which a price is being paid a price of blood and sacrifice is being paid to try to cleanse us of the sins of slavery and of racism. So that is a political theology that i think is still with us and deepened and made even more powerful by the Civil Rights Movement and by Martin Luther kings own martyrdom and sacrifice. Thats why we have a Martin Luther king day today as well. Its part of our official or unofficial both official and unofficial. American theology now i just want to add to that there might be some listeners who feel troubled by the idea that our political theology is so derivative of christian stories and ideology after all we do have an establishment clause in our constitution and our free exercise clause and lots of us would like to believe that we have a separation of church and state although not everybody agrees that thats the way performinated. I happen to think. That is a good way to formulate it. I think the key point to recognize is that when it comes to them making of narratives narratives are made including National Narratives by the people who are living in the country at the time according to their own moral instincts and judgments and at the time that lincoln was speaking the United States was descriptively and practically a christian country. There were very few. They were very few muslims and it was still at the time also overwhelming their protestant country now, we are a country of much greater religious diversity and as a consequence, weve secularized these ideas so much so that we cant even quite recall or realize the christian origins of this kind of political theology or that we might traveled by it and my view is that we shouldnt be troubled by it and i should say cards on the table and jewish and was raised jewish and im still very committed to jewish tradition. But as an american, im not troubled by the idea that this political theology of lincolns spoke in the moral language that most americans of the time held and that that moral language was in a sense christian. I dont think that makes it any less capable of being honored any less capable of being respected or any less capable of being embraced by americans today because were capable of updating and changing our beliefs and of keeping our narratives and making them more inclusive over time and we have to believe that because if we didnt believe that we would have to think not with lincoln but unlike lincoln that because of the racism and slavery that existed in our origins. Were doomed forever as a country to be just that same group of people and i dont think we are so june were capable of change. Were capable of expansion. Were capable of improvement. We dont always do it. We dont always do it right and we dont always go forward. I think king said that the you know the arc of the universe tends towards justice. We want that to be true, but its not always in a straight line. So we do make mistakes and we do sometimes go backwards, but were capable of Going Forward and i think that enables us to be more expensive and more open. Thank you very much indeed for that close reading diana showed the last word on the second inaugural is to you. Yeah, i think its great that we read aloud both the fourth paragraph and a substantial part of the third paragraph and i think really the question of the speech is whats the relationship between that third paragraph and the fourth paragraph. His aim is obviously to get to the fourth paragraph to to make that call to act with malice toward non and with charity for all and to set the task ahead. So i i think that the theological interpretation makes possible it opens up the space for human charity. I dont think id actually call it a political theology i think is real theology with a political purpose, but i think its also important to note that the theological interpretation of the meaning of the civil war is not presented as a certainty. It is presented by lincoln as a supposition if we shall suppose that and if god wills so it is a supposition or a hypothesis and i think that is part of what protects it from being some kind of crossing of the line between between church and state or religion and politics. It also prevents it from being used for sort of purposes of fanaticism. Its clear actually that the theological interpretation is intended to induce humility on the part of human beings, and i think that the message in that third paragraph is very specifically targeted to three different audiences lincoln is trying to avert the danger of northern arrogance northern persecution of the south after the war, you know blaming them as the traders who started the war. Even though they were the traders who started the war of that kind of blame wont be helpful after the war. Also. Hes trying to address the problem of southern recalcitrants and i think by calling it american slavery not southern slavery, not african slavery, but american slavery by all americans all white americans at least being willing to share in that blame. He hopes to do what he can to induce the south to to admit the fault. And then i think that last sentence of the third paragraph the one that Frederick Douglass always quoted whenever he referred to lincoln. I think this is true in every reference after the war where douglas Frederick Douglas made reference to lincoln. He always quoted that divine reparations sentence. The one about the 200 years of unrequited toil and every drop of blood drawn with the lash being. Paid by another drone with the sword i think in a way that is what is offered to to africanamericans. It is an admission of the nations guilt. Its an acknowledgment that god was all along on the side of the slave. And its a kind of vision of divine reparations and the fact that Frederick Douglass so latched on to that passage i think is in isnt indication that he understood what what lincoln was doing there with that with that line. Think thank you very much indeed for that and thanks to all of you for this parsing of these. Centrally important speeches. Its so meaningful to learn with all three of you. We have just seven minutes left or only Constitution Center will lose to end on time, but i think thats enough time for one question to each of you and some very brief closing thoughts. So Michael Brougham bonnie zedek asks, how did lincoln react to the Seneca Falls Convention in 1848 into Voting Rights for black women as well as white women was either friend of black woman as well as black men. And what final thoughts would you like like to share with our friends . Well, we have no. Direct illusion and anything that Lincoln Center wrote about the seneca fallscon convention, but he was ive argued in my book a kind of protofeminist that he was opposed to the sexual double standard of a husband violated the marriage fails of the wife had every right to do so he does. It does in one of his speeches in running for the reelection to this state Legislature Say that he believed that all folks who pay taxes should be our serving the militia should be able to vote not excluding females and sometimes people sneered that said, well no females paid taxes in those days, but widows certainly did so he also refused to gossip about women. He was famous all the men were forever telling stories about the lack of virtue of this woman or that for a movie the other one lincoln. To have anything to do with that he also as president was very reluctant to execute any sign the execution orders for any soldiers who had been condemned to death by a courtmartial except if they had been guilty of rape and then he showed no hesitation in doing that. Signing that and then then he took vigilanti action actually as this opponent of vigilanteism actually acted as a vigilante in punishing a wifebeater a fellow in and springfield had been beating his wife lincoln and his friends told him to stop it. He didnt stop it so they went and the whole amount and gave his wife a belt and said lay into it. So i think lincoln was was by temperament a fairminded man who sympathized with the notions of feminism and then as for black women during the war the question arose whether the widows of black soldiers the women who had been in effect wives of soldiers should get a pension even if they hadnt been formally married and lincoln said yes. Yes, they should be given so so he sympathized with black women in that particular context. So i think that in general he was sympathetic to the ideas and ideals that were enunciated at, seneca falls. Thank you very much. Indeed for that. No feldman several questions about the constitutional arguments against secession and whether or not lincoln was correct to argued that it was unconstitutional and your closing thoughts as well. Thank you. You know. The articles that confederation said that the union was perpetual. The constitution did not say that the union was perpetual. But it did say that it would be more perfect and perfect in the technical sense. Not in the contemporary sense the way president obama like to use it, but perfect in the sense of complete. So the argument on lincoln side, is that if the articles in confederation made the union perpetual and if the constitution made them more perfect than it must have been just as perpetual or even more perpetual and therefore there was no way out. I think probably the most honest and sophisticated answer is to say that in any Political Union that doesnt include an explicit provision for withdrawal if some group of People Choose to withdraw and others think they shouldnt withdraw. Its very hard to give a objective answer as to whether theyre permitted or not. But the effect of it is revolutionary and remember to the framers generation there was nothing wrong with being revolutionary and this was also true for americans of lincolns generation a revolution was just something that people did and in fact lincoln when he was in his one term of congress. Gave a speech he was actually speaking about the mexicanamerican war and he was referring to the texan revolution and he embraced the idea that any group of people no matter where they were had a fundamental right to as he put it revolutionized. So i think the best way to think about it is that it was a revolutionary act and that people of the time debated whether it was a legitimate and just revolution or an illegitimate revolution. From lincolns perspective as the person who was actually running the country. He didnt think he had the option of accepting this as a just or legitimate revolution and the way he described it was to say that congress could decide that if it wanted to but he on his own did not have the authority to say that it was just he felt he needed to execute the laws and the laws were not being executed in those states and therefore he felt that it was his obligation based on the oath registered in heaven as he put it in his first inaugural to go out and do what it took to enforce those laws. So i think those who want to argue that secession was somehow legitimate can argue that it was legitimate in that it was an act of revolution that was anticipated by the political the political theory of the declaration those on the other side who want to insist that it was definitively not legitimate also something to rely on. And thats why there was a war, you know, thats why we fought a war over this. That leaves the question of whether the outcome of the war. It tells you that one side was right or wrong. Thats the might makes right theory of history it may or may not be true descriptively. Its probably not true morally and normatively. I guess my concluding thought on all of this is that its amazing to me how much we as Americans Still care about these questions and i think this is why we have a national Constitution Center. Its why we struggle to try to get constitutional questions right today. Its because these issues are central to who we are as a people and thats the best thing you can say about our constitution gives us a mechanism for arguing about who we are that is better than fighting and although we did fight on one occasion. We ought not to do so in the future and i think the work of the national Constitution Center is to contribute to our not fighting each other. Thank you for those kind words and thank you for contributing so well to that inspiring mission, which i know we all share a danish chob. The last word is to you our friend colin tebow says some of lincolns speeches are famous for being very short. Was that intentional and does that impact as rhetorical intentions and constitutional ideas your thought on his shortness as we close this wonderful program. If yes, and i think i dont have much time left to answer this so i will try to be as brief as link. And yes, he acquires this gift for brevity and you see it, especially in the gettysburg and the second inaugural. I think its very deliberate on his part and part of it, especially in the gettysburg address. I think is that he hoped it would be memorized by americans. So my suggestion is that we all commit both the gettysburg address and the second inaugural to memory. What a wonderful challenge and friends. Lets lets take up the hannah shows challenge and if you succeed in memorizing, lets say either the gettysburg address for the second inaugural then right to me at constitution j. Rosen Constitution Center. Org and let me know and ill send you a congratulations and well let diana and noah and michael know about it, and i know theyll be as please design that this deep civil rigorous and learn at discussion will have inspired you to commit these sacred words to memory michael berlin noah feldman and diana shobe for constitutional conversation in the highest possible tradition of thank you so much and thank you friends for joining us. Look forward to seeing you all again soon. And thanks for joining us on. C span. American history tv well, it was at