What makes a President, a leader, an office holder, great?
By the time President Abraham Lincoln stood up to give his
second inaugural address on a blustery and rainy Monday the 4th of March, in 1865, the
Union, what was left of the United States of America, an experiment in
democracy less than ninety years old--the country lay in tatters. Torn asunder
from coast to coast, from North to South, between slavery abolitionists and
slavery proponents. Violent partisanship and anger marked the political and
civic dialogues of the day.
In less than a month Lincoln
would be dead, the victim of assassination. In five weeks, the Civil War would
finally end, but not before claiming the lives 618,222 soldiers on both sides,
two percent of the nation's population. Imagine 6.5 million war deaths in 2019
and the scale of that cataclysm is clear. And although Lincoln had won a second term, the vote, of
course, did not include any of the secessionist southern states. His election
opponents, the Democratic Party had called for an immediate peace while Lincoln insisted the war
must waged until the unconditional and complete surrender of the enemy.
So on that day Lincoln
might have been "right", even justified, to condemn the Confederacy
in his speech. Vilify them as traitors and turncoats, seditionists to the last
man. Lincoln could have used the speech to outline his plan for a harsh Reconstruction,
describe how he would now punish these fellow citizens, mete out sharp justice
on all those who had started the war, dared to found a new "nation"
on the continent.
What makes a President, a Senator or Congressperson, truly
great, the right person for the right time in history?
Listen.
Lincoln, in just seven
hundred words, the second shortest inaugural address ever--the man from Illinois known
affectionately as "honest Abe" and "Father Abraham": the
President chose to lay down his sword, unclench his fist, set aside self
interest and party, and instead offered a powerful vision for peace and
reconciliation. He did so first, by reminding
the country that each side imagined itself in the right. "Both read the
same Bible and pray to the same God, and each invokes His aid against the
other....[then] let us not judge that we be not judged. The prayers of both
could not be answered."
What makes a President, a legislator, truly great, one who
serves the common and highest good, not for personal gain or power, but instead
as a servant of the people?
Instead of humiliating the South, Lincoln knew that peace would only be
realized if both sides approached the other with sincere humility and honest
confession before the God each claimed as their own. No one escaped the guilt
and responsibility for the insanity of warfare. All had blood on their hands. For
civic fractures to be repaired, for a nation to be reunited, for opponents to
work together again, Lincoln
knew the only path to true justice and shalom was mercy. Was forgiveness. Was grace. Was love.
As he concluded on that long ago day, "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
nation's 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 a just and
lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations."
On this Presidents Day weekend, we are right to ask as
nation, as a people sorely divided by party and partisanship and self-righteous
surety, we are still right to ask. What makes a President, a leader, any
candidate for high office, great?
The question still matters, 154 years after one of our greatest
Presidents gave the answer and reminded America what true greatness could
be and still is. Thank you President Lincoln. God help us all to never, ever forget
you and your wise, wise words and great leadership.
Happy birthday.
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