On January 27, 1838, Abraham Lincoln rose before the Young Men’s Lyceum in Springfield, Illinois, to make a speech. He took as his topic for that evening, “The Perpetuation of Our Political Institutions.”
Lincoln saw trouble coming, but not from a foreign power, as other countries feared. The destruction of the United States, he warned, could come only from within. “If destruction be our lot,” he said, “we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide.”
The trouble Lincoln perceived stemmed from the growing lawlessness in the country as men ignored the rule of law and acted on their passions, imposing their will on their neighbors through violence.
Lincoln reminded his audience that the torch of American democracy had been passed to them. The next generation must support democracy through “sober reason,” he said. He called for Americans to exercise “general intelligence, sound morality, and in particular, a reverence for the constitution and laws.” — Heather Cox — lincoln/speeches/lyceum
The most prescient speech in American history. Less then two centuries later a party, his own party, have eschewed those values and practice the exact opposite.
“If destruction be our lot,” he said, “we must ourselves be its author and finisher." The cons in their attacks on democracy and pursuit of authoritarian fascism are doing just that.
In 1796 Washington said, [political parties] “are likely, in the course of time and things, to become potent engines, by which cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the reins of government, destroying afterwards the very engines which have lifted them to unjust dominion.”
On January 27, 1838, Abraham Lincoln rose before the Young Men’s Lyceum in Springfield, Illinois, to make a speech. He took as his topic for that evening, “The Perpetuation of Our Political Institutions.”
Lincoln saw trouble coming, but not from a foreign power, as other countries feared. The destruction of the United States, he warned, could come only from within. “If destruction be our lot,” he said, “we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide.”
The trouble Lincoln perceived stemmed from the growing lawlessness in the country as men ignored the rule of law and acted on their passions, imposing their will on their neighbors through violence.
Lincoln reminded his audience that the torch of American democracy had been passed to them. The next generation must support democracy through “sober reason,” he said. He called for Americans to exercise “general intelligence, sound morality, and in particular, a reverence for the constitution and laws.” — Heather Cox — lincoln/speeches/lyceum
The most prescient speech in American history. Less then two centuries later a party, his own party, have eschewed those values and practice the exact opposite.
“If destruction be our lot,” he said, “we must ourselves be its author and finisher." The cons in their attacks on democracy and pursuit of authoritarian fascism are doing just that.
In 1796 Washington said, [political parties] “are likely, in the course of time and things, to become potent engines, by which cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the reins of government, destroying afterwards the very engines which have lifted them to unjust dominion.”