Summary – Katula and Donald
In Katula’s essay “The Gettysburg Address as the Centerpiece of American Racial Discourse,” the author argues that Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address was the turning point at which America’s destiny was turned to the search for racial equality. The work itself is largely an opinion piece, only working from speculation of the Address itself in the context of history (citing other importance civil rights events like the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Brown v. Board of Education and more) to paint the Address as something that inspired all these other cultural advances. As a professor of African-American studies, Katula is primarily concerned with the pursuit of equality throughout American history, making his perspective quite interesting. Katula paints Lincoln as a prescient figure who understood that equality was paramount, but knew that he could not push these advances all at once. By using the language of the Address to only tout ‘economic’ equality, Lincoln is said to frame the civil rights struggle into a manageable perspective given the still-racist times they were working in. Katula believes the Gettysburg Address is an incredibly important speech in steering America’s goals toward the ends of racial equality – while it took awhile, and many other figures had to help along the way, Lincoln is where it all starts.
Works Cited
Katula, Richard A. “The Gettysburg Address as the Centerpiece of American Racial Discourse.”
The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education 28 (Summer 200): 110-111.
In Donald’s assessment of the Gettysburg Address in his book on Lincoln, he discusses the creation of the Address in its historical context. Faced with the significance of the Civil War, Lincoln realized that there was a “need for a broad statement” on the subject of the war and what it was for – people needed to understand, on both sides, why the Union was fighting the seceding Confederacy (p. 460). Donald writes this as a Lincoln historian more than anything, and so the general attitude revolves around how this would affect Lincoln as a man. In effect, Lincoln chose to make the Gettysburg Address a mission statement for the Civil War, and for the importance of equality. The article mostly goes over the days leading up to the Address, the day to day conversations and interactions he had with people, and the reactions people had after the fact towards the Address. The legacy of the speech itself, and the reactions its contemporaries had towards it, are the main concern. Donald makes copious use of other sources and scholarship, both primary and secondary sources, to create this historically accurate portrayal of the creation and reaction toward the Gettysburg Address. Donald believes the significance of the speech lies in Lincoln’s intent for it, and the mindset he had when writing and speaking it – the details of the clothes he wore on the day, the people who were there with him, the intonation he used while writing the speech, etc. Donald paints Lincoln as a festive yet resolute man, someone who wanted to inform the nation of what they were fighting for, and who might have been troubled by the immediate backlash the speech received for being short and perceived as shallow.
Works Cited
Donald, David Herbert. Lincoln. New York: Random House, 1995. Print.
