"2. That no one of you will do any thing which, in his own judgment, will tend to hinder the increase, or favor the decrease, or lessen the efficiency of the army and navy, while engaged in the effort to suppress that rebellion; and, "3. That each of you will, in his sphere, do all he can to have the officers, and soldiers, and seamen of the army and navy, while engaged in the effort to suppress the rebellion, paid, fed, clad, and otherwise well provided and supported. "And with the further understanding that, upon receiving this letter, with the names thus indorsed, I will cause them to be published, which publication shall be, within itself, a revocation of the order in relation to Mr. Vallandigham." It may seem strange that to men making any pretensions whatever to patriotism—to men not avowedly enemies of their country and in league with the rebels-propositions like the above could involve any questionable alternative; and yet had they indorsed these propositions, they would have condemned their own partisan principles. If they refused, they made it obvious to all men that not only the banished convict, but they themselves were disloyal men. They pre SPEECH AT GETTYSBURG. 153 ferred the latter horn of the dilemma, refused to indorse the propositions, and left their confrere under the military sentence of banishment to rebeldom. The battle of Gettysburg, on the first three days of July, 1863, is regarded as approaching nearer to the honor of a "decisive battle" than any other of the war. Thenceforward the rebellion steadily retrograded till it was crushed out. The victory was hung in the balance, and was only won by the most stubborn and heroic efforts on the part of the Union forces. Had it gone against them, our country would have been in a different position from that which she now occupies. The people, grateful to the thousands of brave and patriotic dead who fell there, purchased the field for a national cemetery. Mr. Lincoln was invited to attend the ceremonies of dedication. He there delivered the following brief address: "Four-score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on the great battle-field of that war. We are met to dedicate a portion of it as the final resting-place of those who here gave their lives that the nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. "But in a larger sense, we can not dedicate, we can not consecrate this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it far above our power to add or detract. The world will little note nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us, the living, rather to be dedicated here to the unfinished work that they have thus far so nobly carried on. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us; that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to the cause for which they here gave the last full measure of devotion; that we here highly resolve that the dead shall not have died. in vain; that the nation shall, under God, have a new birth to freedom, and that the Government of the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the earth." That "the world will little note nor long re "TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN." 155 member" what Lincoln said there, was a mistaken prophecy. It will be read and admired so long as Gettysburg is remembered as a battlefield of freedom. The Union National Convention which met in Baltimore in June, 1864, nominated Mr. Lincoln for reëlection without a dissenting voice; and yet such was the apparent national discontent with the management of affairs, and such the apparent weariness and impatience of the people under the crushing burdens of the war, that the success of the Unionists at the election was for a time regarded as very doubtful. The opposition were clamorous for compromise, concession to the rebels, abrogation of the Proclamation of Emancipation-in short, for "peace at any price:" and the noisiness of these timeservers made them appear to be much more numerous and formidable than they really were. To foster this spirit and to furnish them electioneering capital, the rebel government sent emissaries to Canada, who announced themselves peace commissioners, authorized to propose terms for the cessation of hostilities. Lincoln declined to hold any official intercourse with them, but published the following proclamation "EXECUTIVE MANSION, "TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN: } "Any proposition which embraces the restoration of peace, the integrity of the whole Union, and the abandonment of slavery, and which comes by and with an authority that can control the armies now at war against the United States, will be received and considered by the Executive Government of the United States, and will be met by liberal terms on other substantial and collateral points, and the bearer or bearers thereof shall have safe conduct both ways. "ABRAHAM LINCOLN." This was regarded by many of the Union party to be a great political blunder, and one which might result in the triumph of the "peaceat-any-price party," and in that view greatly to be deplored. Lincoln's reply was that, "If I go down, I will go down, like the Cumberland, with my colors flying." He meant to stand by justice and principle, sink or swim, and he did it. Another great "blunder" was perpetrated by the President-candidate soon after. Sherman was beating Johnson back step by step upon Atlanta, and Grant fixing his grip firmly upon Richmond, but the terms of enlistment of many |