Mrs. Welander and the GA

"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." -Abraham Lincoln


     In 7th or 8th grade English I had to memorize that line for Mrs. Welander and recite it in front of the class.  So did the rest of my class.  In fact, being the horrible task master that she was, she actually made us memorize another sentence or two.  (I know, you should all feel really, really bad for us.  We were severely put upon.  Later in the semester we had to memorize the (gasp) first two stanzas of Longfellow's "Paul Revere's Ride."  We were all sure we were going to die.)  I suppose I should acknowledge the effectiveness of her draconian measures, since I still remember the words I memorized clearly despite completing that assignment when I was only half as old as I am now.  (Seriously, we were awful, whiny, wussy brats.)
     Come to think of it, it seems as though Mrs. Welander taught me some of the most important skills I now use to accomplish my job.  For instance, I'm pretty sure I became a stickler for good grammar in her class(es).  I also left her class(es) with the beginning of an understanding of American literature.  I would be a horrible historian if I couldn't read critically, write well, or understand the impact of literature on culture.  
     I think about Mrs. Welander and memorizing the "Gettysburg Address" every time I read or hear it now, and I hear it a lot as a historian of 19th century America.  In fact, this semester I'm TAing for US history since 1865 again.  (Woohoo!)  The class is based around answering the question, "Has America lived up to the promises/standards of the GA?"  I  think this is the coolest idea ever.  I'm sure my students will be less enthusiastic, but just as Mrs. Welander insisted I etch Lincoln's words into my memory, I plan to insist that my students engage and think critically about the way Americans have interpreted the GA.  (I'm not going to hold recitation for 100 of them, though.  They're off the hook there.)  I'm sure they'll feel put upon, and many will write final essays full of poorly argued patriotic drivel instead of well-thought-out criticism.  Still, someone has to teach them about why Americans believe(d) what they believe(d) and claim(ed) what they claim(ed), and I think the GA is the perfect tool for getting at it all.

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.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate—we cannot consecrate—we cannot hallow—this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom— and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.