Memorial Day...In Remembrance

Freedom isn't free, and today we remember those who have purchased our liberty with their blood and valor.

Executive Mansion, Washington, Nov. 21, 1864

Dear Madam,

I have been shown in the files of the War Department a statement of the Adjutant-General of Massachusetts, that you are the mother of five sons who have died gloriously on the field of battle.

I feel how weak and fruitless must be any words of mine which should attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss so overwhelming. But I cannot refrain from tendering to you the consolation that may be found in the thanks of the Republic they died to save.

I pray that our Heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement, and leave you only the cherished memory of the loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must be yours, to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of Freedom.

Yours, very sincerely and respectfully,

Abraham Lincoln

Comments

[Hanna]

Thank you for posting this. As with the Gettysburg Address, Lincoln was able to express his thoughts in short, concise sentences that did not need any speech writer nor spins. Just what he felt and he managed to convey these feeling to us, even today.

[Jubal]

You are so right, Hanna. he possessed an amazing, God-given talent in that regard. No American orator since has matched Lincoln in the ability to speak powerfully and eloquently with few words.

[Spanky]

"All war must be just the killing of strangers against whom you feel no personal animosity; strangers whom, in other circumstances, you would help if you found them in trouble, and who would help you if you needed it."
-- Mark Twain's "The Private History of the Campaign That Failed"

[Spanky]

"Freedom Isn't Free"

Particularly true when speaking of Halliburton.

[Chuck DeVore]

This post is in reply to Spanky. It is the gist of my remarks today at the American Legion event in Laguna Woods.

For Spanky and his friends: imagine this planet if the U.S. military never existed. Would slavery still be in the South? Would Nazi Germany rule Europe? Would Communist Russia hold sway over Eurasia?

Assemblyman Chuck DeVore at Laguna Woods, Monday, May 30, 2005:

In Southeast Pennsylvania, about 50 miles from Washington, there is a field beneath a hill. Upon that field, smaller than a major league baseball diamond and amongst the craggy rocks overlooking it, the Union of these United States was saved over the course of three hours. This happened on July 2, 1863. Abraham Lincoln dedicated a cemetery near this field on November 19, 1863.

On this modest field of battle more Americans were killed or mortally wounded in combat than anywhere else on earth. On the hot afternoon of July 2, 1863, possession of this field changed hands six times. And, while only armed with single action rifles, many of them muzzle loaders capable of less than rounds per minute, they killed each other more quickly than any of us can count out loud to 14,000, which is the number who fell there in the Peach Orchard and the Wheat Field, and on Little Round Top. The dead covered the ground in the last hour of the fight while men charged over the bodies of their fallen comrades and foes.

The stream in this field ran red for hours with the blood of patriots and is today known as Plum Creek because that was its color.

Let us remember those soldiers, North and South, who fought in this place with a sense of awe. Think of the cause for which most, and against which some, gave their lives. Think of the nobility of that cause, and the tragedy of the war that was necessary to sustain it.

The man who saved the Union, Abraham Lincoln, explained what happened in Southeast Pennsylvania 142 years ago far better than any of us can today when he stood at Gettysburg and said:

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.

[Spanky]

Chuck writes "imagine this planet if the U.S. military never existed."

For Chuck DeVore and his friends: Imagine this planet if people refused to kill and maim each other for revenge, pride, hatred, fear, etc. regardless of their nationality or where they live.

Seriously, Chuck...if you're going to dream, dream big.

[Jeff Flint]

It's almost ironic, reading the comments from "Spanky" next to the post from Lurk about elitists. Apparently to the Spanky's of the world, the only thing we DON'T need protection from is dictators, warlords, and terrorists whose mission it is to destroy us and freedom in the world.

[Spanky]

FLINT COMMUNICATIONS, LLC
1215 K STREET #980
SACRAMENTO, CA 95814

Sorry, Jeff...I have a rabid distrust of people who set up shop this close to the Capitol. No offense.

Wow, you know how to use the internet, impressive. Notice you didn't address my observation, however.