Abraham Lincoln’s second inaugural address is considered by many to be the best speech ever given by an American president, even greater than his Gettysburg Address.
At what Lincoln called ‘this second appearing to take the oath of the presidential office,’ he began with ‘Fellow countrymen,’ and concluded: ‘With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation’s wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.’
It is unfair to compare any inaugural address with Lincoln’s second because of its dramatic backdrop of a shattered country with more than 600,000 killed on its battlefields as a consequence of a devastating civil war, but one with the certain hope of an imminent victory by the Union. It was both a bleak but hopeful backdrop with which to work in 1865 as he messaged for the forces of freedom and the Union and also to the defeated and soon-to-be defeated enemy who were also soon to be reunited as countrymen.
President Trump will have a very challenging backdrop on Monday, but nothing like Lincoln’s. The four years just finished have been bleak in so many ways and the world has grown very dangerous for the United States, even more than it was in 1865. Our enemies are not our countrymen in arms, but the adversaries are more numerous and are not defeated.
Our citizens are deeply divided but moved in November decisively towards Trump. The ravaged region of Southern California is just the latest in a series of spectacular failures of government over the past four years. Although half the country is excited that another ‘morning in America’ is dawning, at least a third of the country dreads Trump’s return. Somehow, they have been poisoned in their perceptions by almost a decade of unending attacks on ’45-47.’
‘Trump Derangement Syndrome,’ like ‘Bush Derangement Syndrome’ before it, is a real thing. Trump’s combination of tough resilience and blunt and often ferocious attacks on those who attack him, as well as his candor in stating what he believes and thinks at any given moment on social media platforms like Truth Social and X or in any interview gives him an edginess quite unprecedented in the Oval Office. The incoming president faces unprecedented challenges though, and his bare-knuckled approach is, if not perfect for the moment, then close to it.
So, to whom should his remarks be addressed and for whom is his inaugural address intended?
First and foremost, I hope part of the president’s speech is directed at the enemies of our country abroad, specifically China, Russia, Iran and North Korea.
