Reported in the Liberator, July 7, 1865, pg. 4 is the Address on the Assassination of Abraham Lincoln, Delivered at the request of the Rhode Island Union League, in the City Hall, Providence, June 1, 1865. Some of those words and phrases from that address:
Abraham Lincoln was, perhaps, the most remarkable product of American democracy (but not in a party sense), which has been presented to the world. It is a long stride from the position of a humble rail-splitter to that of President of the United States — from commanding a flat-boat to being elected head of a mighty republic. Yet he succeeded in raising himself from one to the other by a straight-forward course of conduct; by the vigor and sagacity of his mind; by an unselfish and ever-active patriotism; and by a combination of admirable qualities for professional life and civil administration. His simplicity of character no elevation could alter, no popularity inflate … No amount of training could have changed his plainness of speech or address. He was emphatically no respecter of persons, yet neither lacking in courtesy nor rude in manners. In the “White House” he was as simple in intercourse and easy of access to all comers, high or low, rich or poor, white or black, as at his own residence in Sprignfield.
There is doubt …. the “collective judgment of the country and of Europe is favorably recorded as to his wisdom and statesmanship, and the excllence of his administration … culminating, in a comparatively brief period, in crushing the most formidable rebellion recorded in the pages of history, giving liberty to millions held in brutal servitude, and placing the American republic, in all that is trly great and glorious, at the head of the nations .
Peace be to the ashes and honor to the memory of Abraham Lincoln, the martyred President of the United States! He has died that his country might live. From the lowest obscurity he has risen to sublime alititude in the service of Freedom and Humanity. All nations and people shall do homage to his virtue and applaud his crowning deeds.
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