My home state of Pennsylvania has been spending quite a bit of time in the headlines these days. Both presidential candidates said early on in their campaigns that Pennsylvania was key to their election. This is not all that surprising. Pennsylvania’s official nickname is the “Keystone State”. For those not familiar with masonry, the keystone if the stone in the center of an arch that structurally ties it together. During the colonial period, Pennsylvania was not just the geographical center of the fledgling states, it was also at it’s heart politically and economically. Clearly the State retains this importance today.
Pennsylvania has always been center stage for this country’s fight for freedom and liberty. Just a few blocks from where Philadelphia’s election ballots are now being counted, 56 patriots from both the north and south, declared this nation independent from England in an overt act of treason. Shortly after securing freedom from England, many of these leaders returned to the same room to sign the Constitution. It is important to note that only 39 out of 56 delegates ratified this document that provided the foundation of this nation. Apparently, we have a history of division that started at birth.
Pennsylvania also has the unfortunate distinction of being witness to some of the bloodiest conflicts in our history. Our inability to resolve conflict resulted in over 51,000 casualties in the three-day Battle of Gettysburg and almost 23,000 casualties in a single day in the Battle of Antietam. This is a stark reminder of the dangers in leaving our internal divisions unresolved.
Politicians from both sides of the fence claim Abraham Lincoln as one of the greatest leaders in our young history. Lincoln, who prided himself on his personal integrity, understood the need to bring healing to the dismembered nation. For many of us, it has been a long time since childhood history lessons. Maybe time has faded the vivid words that once jumped off the page in their significance. Just in case, let me end today with Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address. These words are as relevant today as they were 150 years ago.
“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 battle-field 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.”
