Senator Durbin gave the Gettysburg Address in the Senate today and he gave it well, with reverence and much as you have heard it before. I want to relate a true story that suggests a different way to give that important speech. Perhaps it will give you a different insight into what Lincoln was thinking on that day. I like the Idea that I know someone who met someone who heard Lincoln.
This true story seems appropriate today. We should all appreciate oral histories.
My father learned how to recite the Gettysburg Address from a Civil War Veteran and it is different than how most of you say it. Here is the story. (Dad is still alive and I heard Senator Durbin recite the Gettysburg Address today and invited him to call my dad so that he could hear the story directly)
Dad was a recent immigrant from Scotland living in New Jersey when he attended a July 4th parade in 1932. The parade included some Civil War Veterans (I confirmed this in Bayonne newspapers from the time). Dad was asked by one of those Veterans whether he knew that speech and of course like most school children of the time Dad could and did recite it (much as did Senator Durbin today). The Veteran claimed to have been at Gettysburg and insisted that Dad learn an important difference. Dad (and Durbin and almost every one) puts the emphasis on the prepositions:
"OF the people, FOR the people, BY the people"
The Veteran said that Lincoln had a rather high pitched voice and was easy to hear even in that setting. He insisted that Lincoln had an important difference in emphasis:
"of the PEOPLE, for the PEOPLE, by the PEOPLE"
I always look for how this portion of this speech is given. I do know that when Sam Waterston does his impression of Lincoln he does put the emphasis on "PEOPLE" but I do not know where he learned that way to give the speech.
Perhaps this is just a bit of trivia, but it always struck me as interesting and certainly that old Veteran felt that it was important to remember that the whole focus of Lincoln's speech was on people not prepositions.
Celebrate Lincoln.