November 19.
1863. At the consecretation of a cemetary on the site of the famous battle, Abraham Lincoln gives the Gettysburg Address. The "address" was really supposed to be that given by Massachusetts Congressman and famous orator, Edward Everett, who spoke for over two hours. Shortly thereafter, President Lincoln got up and gave a two minute address. The precise wording of the address is in dispute -- as there are multiple drafts floating around, and some newspaper accounts are at odds with the drafts. The most commonly accepted version is the only one that Lincoln signed.
Quote:
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Originally Posted by Abraham Lincoln
Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on 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 a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that 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, we can not hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor 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 which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. 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 that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
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After the speech, there was muted, delayed clapping, apparently in part at the surprise over its brevity. Lincoln himself was said to be unimpressed with his speech, saying (at least according to legend), "that speech won't scour", referring to a plow implement that doesn't do a good job of accomplishing its purpose. The Democratic Chicago Times wrote of the speech
Quote:
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Originally Posted by Chicago Times
The cheek of every American must tingle with shame as he reads the silly, flat and dishwatery utterances of the man who has to be pointed out to intelligent foreigners as the President of the United States.
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Everett himself was the more farsighted of the reviewers, sending a letter to Lincoln the next day stating that " should be glad if I could flatter myself that I came as near to the central idea of the occasion, in two hours, as you did in two minutes." Lincoln replied that he was glad to hear that the speech was not a "total failure."
1930. Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow commit their first robbery.
1942. The USSR launches Operation Uranus, counterattacks around Stalingrad that will turn the tide of the battle in its favor.
1969. Pete Conrad and Alan Bean land on the Moon, becoming the third and fourth humans to do so, though they do not
quite earn the fame of their predecessors.
1998. The House begins impeachment proceedings against Bill Clinton.