Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address Provides Hope Still to America

Yesterday my sister and I were talking about the future of our nation- it is a debate that we have often. She feels that America is now lost- that our culture, prosperity, and greatness has been squandered forever by Democratic corruption and excesses. I think that although the Democrats have delivered hard blows to America (especially lately), and weakened our culture, companies, and moral compass, we can still recover.

I point to Reagan as evidence- after the disastrous regime of Carter, Reagan put us on the path to 20 more years of continued economic success, moral revival, and judicial restraint. My sister also points to Reagan- that even the best Presidents now can only check the decline of our nation, and that for every Reagan, there is a Clinton and an Obama doing double damage.

It's a good argument to join, mostly because it we as a party and nation must cling still to hope- and not the phony kind of hope that comes from Obama's mouth, where he mouths empty promises and promises you the moon, but real hope, that kind of hope that springs from the soul and the mind and feels solid and real. You're not going to swoon and faint over this kind of hope, but your soul will be hardened for the long hard journey ahead.

But as we argued, I kept thinking back to Lincoln's second inaugural address, which I recently read on the wall of the Lincoln Memorial on my trip to Washington DC. I've already mentioned this before- see the post Deep Thoughts on DC Trip- LaHood, Palaces, Rainbows, Washington, and Lincoln for more. The part in particular that I kept coming back to was this:

Yet, if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondsman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said "the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether."

America is not perfect- we have sinned in the past. Sometimes the sins were understandable, other times we were forced to do so, and other times I am sure we sinned and I just don't know what they were, but it is true that our county has done wrong in the past. Perhaps Obama's win and the Democrats destruction of our country's economic, military, political, moral, and cultural might is the price we need to pay. Perhaps the election of Obama, fueled possibly in some small measure by guilt about many things, is the price we must now pay.

I don't know, but I do still think that right and reason will prevail over the wrong and insanity that the Democratic Party now espouses, I still feel that Republicans and conservatives will win elections once again and overturn all of the bad laws and judgements the Democrats are promoting, and I really hope that our nation can once again be that great shining city on a hill.