“We write today in reconsideration of “The Gettysburg Address,” delivered by then-President Abraham Lincoln in the midst of the greatest conflict seen on American soil. Our predecessors, perhaps under the influence of partisanship, or of strong drink, as was common in the profession at the time, called President Lincoln’s words “silly remarks,” deserving “a veil of oblivion,” apparently believing it an indifferent and altogether ordinary message, unremarkable in eloquence and uninspiring in its brevity.
In the fullness of time, we have come to a different conclusion.” Harrisburg Patriot & Union newspaper retracting its contemporaneous panning of Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address
Good for them. It only took 150 years to own up to it.
(ht Tony Munter)