Evening Republican, Volume 22, Number 36, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 February 1919 — THOUGHTS OF NATION TURN TO MARTYRED PRESIDENT [ARTICLE]

THOUGHTS OF NATION TURN TO MARTYRED PRESIDENT

The following extracts on Abraham Lincoln, whose birth the nation is celebrating today, are taken from a eulogy on Mr. Lincoln which wias delivered by Senator H. E. Negley in phe Indiana State Senate, February -42, 19174-- -7T~ Mr. On February 12, 1809, in what was then Hardin county, in the state sos Kentucky, there came into being soul of so lowly origin as to challenge no attention even among the commonplace surroundings. But with the birth of Abnaham Lincoln the beacon light of'human freedom, lighted bv the Pilgrim Fathers, nourished and fed by the heroes of "the •Revolution, became again a living, active and vital energy set in force for the further uplift of the human race. We can safely assume that the aipbition to right the wrongs of others was the first predominant characteristic developed in (the young man Lincoln. When he stood as a i young flatboatman in the City, of New Orleans and watched the auc?aie <>f a negro woman, and as he turned away said to his compan-

ion: “If I ever get a chance to strike that_institution I will hit it with all the_force at my command, he was speaking with prophetic soundness far more forceful than even he at that time could anticipate. And Can it be said that the fire t’nen smouldering in the soul of that obscure backwoodsman was not then being nourished, and was not thereafter continuously nourished, by an all wise Deity watching with zealous eye the destinies of a growing nation? He came of a time which tried men’s souls, and brought out always the best, or the worst, that was m them. His manhood was developed in a period when statesmanship was a dignified honor and not a trade.

When the only known method of swaying the minds of others was bv earnest and honest argument, tand not by studied subterfuge and deception. It was only naturaT that in any community in which he might be found he should rise to prominent place, for his every thought was for cleaner, bigger and better things..than surrounded him; and the thought that they might be attained by the political tricks of the unscrupulous politician never found longment in his brain. . How often it is that we find, in after years, we have been entertaining a prince when we thought we were accommodating a pauper? How little did the good people of southern Indiana appreciate the fact that the obscure Lincoln family, then in its midst, contained among its -members one- destined -to be the savior of the nation in its greatest crisis following its creation? And without any realization of that fact the family came among us, bided awhile, and then pursued its way westward with the march of colonization, and our loss became the gain of our sister state Illinois. ” With his—election to the Presidency it must be conceded that he, more than any other, recognized the tremendous responsibility attached to the oath of office. A responsibility such as no other sumed in that position, and such as perhaps no other m ! an had ever assumed in taking upon himself the leadership of any nation in the history of the world. ’ He could forsee a division of his beloved country. A division founded largely upon sentiment, and he knew that men fought harder sentiment than for sovereignty. He. could forsee brother pitted, against brother, son against father, and friend against friend. He could for-

see a nation, bleeding at every pore, fighting on the one side for What it its inherited . ibr what ~it Relieved the dictates of human conscience demanded should be elimnn’ated from among our institutions. He could foresee that it must fall upon him to pilot through the horrors of a civil war the destiny of his country, when to fail in his undertaking ‘ meant probably the decline and ultimate" fall of the world s greatest republic. Could responsibility greater than this be conceived by the human mind? Would not a mind, supported by anything less than the guiding hand of a> divine. Providence, have broken under the rn. i n ? But he was not unmindful of the support which he must have froni the. common peopleJf he succeeded in maintaining a government, one for all and all for one. It was on February 11th, 1861, during a short’stop in* Indianapolis on his way to Washington to assume the Presidency, that he said in a public address made from a balcony front on Washington Street at the old Bates House: I

appeal to you to constantly bear in mind that not with politicians, not with Presidents, not with office-seek-ers, but with you is the question. Shall the Union and shall the liberties of this country be preserved to the latest generation?” And when the hand of an assassin struck down this great mind, this overpowering force for good, this benevolent character who was even then devising plans for the regeneration of the bleeding Souths with malice toward none and with charity for all, the thinking and the praying people of the Southland joined their tears with the patriots of the North, and the act of that assassin, intended to make possible and permanent the division of the North and South, inspired a rejuvenated spirit of brotherhood between the Blue and the Gray, and made even more certain than the great martyr could have hoped for, the eternal existence of the United States of America as a nation standing against the world, if need be, in the protection of human rights, and following one flag.