LINCOLN'S SECOND INAUGURAL ADDRESS
on April 3, 1865, the Confederates went out of Richmond. Lee his retreat blocked,
surrendered to Grant at Appomattox Court House on April 9, 1865. Lincoln said in his
Second Inaugural Address; " With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness
in the right, as Got gives us to see the right, let us strive to finish the work we are
engaged in. Let us strive to bind up the nation's wounds and care for him who has
borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan. Let us strive to do all which may
achieve and charish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations."
He was kind to the defeated Southern states, against the intention of radical
Republican leaders. In a proclamation of December 8, 1863, he had offered general
pardon to all except extreme secessionists if they would take an oath of allegiance.
The radicals in Congress, on the other hand, proposed to control reconstruction
themselves, leaving no room for the old planter aristocracy to regain political power.
Lincoln was against any kind of revenge, though he had no sympathy for the political
principle of theConfederacy. What concerned him was to bring about peace and harmony
between North and South. From the time of the Lincoln's nomination, however, fears of
his assassination were talked about among his friends. Threatening letters came to him
often.
one night he dreamed of a dead body surrounded by a guard of soldiers. " Who is
dead here?" he asked one of the soldiers. " The President," was the answer. " He was
killed by an assassin!" So loudly and piteously did they cry that he was awakened. on
the way back to Washington from City Point on April 5, 1865, he read aloud part of
Macbeth:
" Duncan is in his grave; After life's fitful fever he sleeps well;
Treason has done his worst; nor steel, nor poison, Malice domestic, foreign levy,
nothing can touch him further."