PathosWhile Lincoln had the stature (dude was tall) and gravitas that comes with being president, he was hardly the main attraction of the ceremony. He was there to give some short remarks followin...

What's so remarkable about this speech is how little fanfare it received. In the age of Twitter and 24-hour media cycles, it's easy to become oversaturated with information and "hot takes" on every...

Although the Gettysburg Address goes by the basic naming convention of location + type of speech = TITLE, its very plainness speaks to how important the contents were. It was a speech with no hype...

Lincoln would've made a pretty great D.J. Before the devastating bass drop at the end of the address, he got the crowd riled up with a recap of their current situation. First, he hooked 'em with "f...

Lincoln pretty much guaranteed the speech would be a hit with his final line. It sounds like something Aragorn said in The Lord of the Rings, if The Lord of the Rings had way more bureaucratic lang...

(2) Sea LevelThough there are some tricky words here—"consecrate," "hallow," and "score" (why not just say "20"?)—the text is straightforward. Basically, Honest Abe was saying, "Don't let these...

In-Text ReferencesHistorical and Political ReferencesWashington, Adams, Jefferson, etc.—a.k.a., the Founding Fathers (1)The Declaration of Independence (1)The Constitution (1)The Bill of Rights (...

The phrase "government of the people, by the people, for the people" was actually first used in the 14th century, predating the printing press, the United States, and Betty White. (Source) So many...