Gettysburg Address

The Gettysburg Address is a dedication speech delivered by Abraham Lincoln, the 16th U.S. president, following the Battle of Gettysburg during the American Civil War. The speech has come to be viewed as one of the most famous, enduring, and historically significant speeches in American history. Lincoln delivered the speech on the afternoon of November 19, 1863, during a formal dedication of Soldiers' National Cemetery, now known as Gettysburg National Cemetery, on the grounds where the Battle of Gettysburg had been fought four and a half months earlier, between July 1 and July 3, 1863, in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. In the battle, Union army soldiers successfully repelled and defeated Confederate forces in what proved to be the Civil War's deadliest and most decisive battle, resulting in more than 50,000 Confederate and Union army casualties in a Union victory that altered the war's course in the Union's favor. The historical and enduring significance and fame of the Gettysburg Address is at least partly attributable to its brevity; it has only 271 words and was read in less than two minutes before approximately 15,000 people who had gathered to commemorate the sacrifice of the Union soldiers, over 3,000 of whom had been killed during the three-day battle. Lincoln began with a reference to the Declaration of Independence of 1776; "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." He said that the Civil War was "testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure". Lincoln then extolled the sacrifices of the thousands who had died in the Battle of Gettysburg in defense of those principles, and he argued that their sacrifice should elevate the nation's commitment...