Event Info: |
Six award winning scholars will speak at the March 4, 2009, Lincoln Symposium at the Library of Congress. Their names and topics are as follows: 9:30 - 10:20 AM HAROLD HOLZER
Lincoln Comes to Washington: The Journey of a President-Elect
To commemorate the 148th anniversary of Lincoln’s first inaugural address,Mr. Holzer will discuss Lincoln’s train trip from Springfield to Washington, the preparation of his first inaugural address, the creation of his Cabinet, and the inaugural event (March 4, 1861). Harold Holzer, co-chairman of the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission and Senior Vice President for External Affairs at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, is author, co-author, or editor of thirty-three books on Lincoln and the political culture of the Civil War era. His most recent work is Lincoln President-Elect: Abraham Lincoln and the Great Secession Winter 1860–1861.
10:20 - 10:30 AM BREAK
10:30 - 11:20 AM JAMES M. McPHERSON
Abraham Lincoln as Commander in Chief
With virtually no military training or experience, President Abraham Lincoln found himself thrust into the role of commander in chief in a war that placed the nation’s survival in jeopardy. He learned on the job, established and articulated the nation’s war aims, mobilized a huge volunteer army, worked to evolve a successful military strategy, and held his political coalition together to a final victory that preserved the United States as one nation. James M. McPherson is the George Henry Davis ’86 Professor of American History Emeritus at Princeton University. Author of more than fifteen books on the era of the American Civil War and Reconstruction, he has won numerous prizes including the Pulitzer Prize in History (1989) for his book Battle Cry of Freedom and the Pritzker Award for Lifetime Achievement in Military Writing.
11:20 - 12:10 PM WILLIAM LEE MILLER
A New Birth of Freedom
In 1861 as Lincoln took office American slavery was a huge, entrenched, enormously powerful, fiercely defended, and, increasingly profitable institution. Lincoln faced not only the necessity to transform institutions— to end the monstrous injustice of slavery—but also to transform ideals—to bring a new understanding of the birthright of freedom in the mind and conscience of the nation. William Lee Miller, Scholar in Ethics and Institutions at the Miller Center of Public Affairs at the University of Virginia, is the author of two books about Lincoln, including President Lincoln: The Duty of a Statesman.
12:10 - 1:30 PM LUNCH
1:30 - 2:20 PM LUCAS E . MOREL
Lincoln on Race, Equality, and the Spirit of ’76
Freedom as we know it today was not the norm in Lincoln’s day. To understand how Lincoln approached the issue of racial equality requires an understanding of the longstanding prejudice of the time and what Lincoln considered to be the waning influence of the Spirit of ’76—the self-evident truths of the Declaration of Independence—upon the American people, especially those citizens of the free states. Lucas E. Morel is Associate Professor of Politics at Washington and Lee University and the Garwood Visiting Research Fellow at the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions at Princeton University. He is the author of Lincoln’s Sacred Effort: Defining Religion’s Role in American Self-Government.
2:20 - 2:30 PM BREAK
2:30 - 3:20 PM DOUGLAS L . WILSON
Words Fitly Spoken: Lincoln and Language
Lincoln’s lifelong interest in language, the defining aspects of that interest, and the ways in which his distinctive affinity for language affected Lincoln’s performance as president and the legacy for which he is honored worldwide. Douglas L. Wilson is the George Appleton Lawrence Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus at Knox College and co-director of the Lincoln Studies Center. He is author of Honor’s Voice: The Transformation of Abraham Lincoln and Lincoln’s Sword: The Presidency and the Power of Words.
3:20 - 4:10 pm ELIZABETH D. LEONARD
Ally on the Team of Rivals: Lincoln and His Point Man for Military Justice
Lincoln’s chief of the War Department’s Bureau of Military Justice, Judge Advocate General Joseph Holt, was a native of Kentucky and former slaveholder who, at great personal cost, chose to stand by Lincoln and the Union during the Civil War. Elizabeth D. Leonard is the John J. and Cornelia V. Gibson Professor of History, and the Director of Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, at Colby College in Waterville, Maine. She is the author of three books on the Civil War era, including her most recent Lincoln’s Avengers: Justice, Revenge, and Reunion After the Civil War.
Dr. James H. Billington, Librarian of Congress and John R. Sellers, Curator of With Malice Toward None: The Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Exhibition will introduce the speakers and kick-off the symposium. Learn more at, http://www.loc.gov/today/pr/2009/09-040.html To attend, please RSVP by e-mail specialevents@loc.gov. |
