Text of Gettysburg Address

Text of Gettysburg Address

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 can not dedicate, we can not consecrate, we can not 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.

Shortly after Everett's well-received remarks, Lincoln spoke for only a few minutes. With a "few appropriate remarks", he was able to summarize the war in just ten sentences.

Despite the historical significance of Lincoln's speech, modern scholars disagree as to its exact wording, and contemporary transcriptions published in newspaper accounts of the event and even handwritten copies by Lincoln himself differ in their wording, punctuation, and structure. Of these versions, the Bliss version, written well after the speech as a favor for a friend, is viewed by many as the standard text. Its text differs, however, from the written versions prepared by Lincoln before and after his speech. It is the only version to which Lincoln affixed his signature, and the last he is known to have written.

If all men are created equal, how come there are so many morons in the world? ;)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Slicker

If all men are created equal, how come there are so many morons in the world? ;)

---

Agreed! But i have an answer: If there were no morons, who would cook our fries at McDonald's? :D

I wrote this in a time that some are claiming for revolution ( that will lead to a civil war). It was another time when men of peace had to go to war and defend the principles of the American Revolution.

All the world is steaming for a civil war between 2 different visions for our future. I hope that good sense come to the minds of men before we start killing each other.

I really hope we can find a solution before we come to that. No war is worst or more bloody than a civil war. How it would be a civil war on a world with Atomic weapons?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Duke of Buckingham

I wrote this in a time that some are claiming for revolution ( that will lead to a civil war). It was another time when men of peace had to go to war and defend the principles of the American Revolution.

All the world is steaming for a civil war between 2 different visions for our future. I hope that good sense come to the minds of men before we start killing each other.

I really hope we can find a solution before we come to that. No war is worst or more bloody than a civil war. How it would be a civil war on a world with Atomic weapons?

---

Palastine and Isreal? The only think that wouldkeep them from going nuclear is that they are so close to each other that the nuclear fallout would also hurt the one that sent the bomb.

I would say Syria is a good example of a civil war. It is easiest to speak from the outside the monstrosities that men from both sides are doing to each other one thing very different is to be the woman raped or the innocent man killed or the children that saw is parents being killed in front of him.

The situation in Palestine and Israel is very different, in there there is two opposite visions of what is fair and no one wants to take the first step to solve the problem. It is not denying the basic trues that men will come to a solution.

In a war, any war, is men against men killing each other and every men are victims of older solutions anchored on prejudice and politics that have nothing to do with our real world. We need to find a way very soon and very quickly before it is to late.

I made a video about it, it was one of the first and maybe it is not very well done but it has a message on it, I think.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0P11jqmQzo

Civil war?

Siria? No, that is a rebellion vs a dictator. Freedom fighters or terrorists, the term will be decided by the victors.

Israel/Palestinians? No, those are two different people fighting for survival that have no common anything, other than land.

Civil war, at least as it means to the USA, is a common people fighting over ideas. States rights some say, human rights others say. Politics/power are at the root, I think we can all agree.

CIVIL WARS

James Fearon, a scholar of civil wars at Stanford University, defines a civil war as "a violent conflict within a country fought by organized groups that aim to take power at the center or in a region, or to change government policies". Ann Hironaka further specifies that one side of a civil war is the state. The intensity at which a civil disturbance becomes a civil war is contested by academics. Some political scientists define a civil war as having more than 1000 casualties, while others further specify that at least 100 must come from each side. The Correlates of War, a dataset widely used by scholars of conflict, classifies civil wars as having over 1000 war-related casualties per year of conflict. This rate is a small fraction of the millions killed in the Second Sudanese Civil War and Cambodian Civil War, for example, but excludes several highly publicized conflicts, such as The Troubles of Northern Ireland and the struggle of the African National Congress in Apartheid-era South Africa.

Based on the 1000 casualties per year criterion, there were 213 civil wars from 1816 to 1997, 104 of which occurred from 1944 to 1997. If one uses the less-stringent 1000 casualties total criterion, there were over 90 civil wars between 1945 and 2007, with 20 ongoing civil wars as of 2007.

The Geneva Conventions do not specifically define the term "civil war", nevertheless they do outline the responsibilities of parties in "armed conflict not of an international character". This includes civil wars, however no specific definition of civil war is provided in the text of the Conventions.

Nevertheless the International Committee of the Red Cross has sought to provide some clarification through its commentaries on the Geneva Conventions, noting that the Conventions are "so general, so vague, that many of the delegations feared that it might be taken to cover any act committed by force of arms". Accordingly the commentaries provide for different 'conditions' on which the application of the Geneva Convention would depend, the commentary however points out that these should not be interpreted as rigid conditions. The conditions listed by the ICRC in its commentary are as follows:

(1) That the Party in revolt against the de jure Government possesses an organized military force, an authority responsible for its acts, acting within a determinate territory and having the means of respecting and ensuring respect for the Convention.

(2) That the legal Government is obliged to have recourse to the regular military forces against insurgents organized as military and in possession of a part of the national territory.

(3) (a) That the de jure Government has recognized the insurgents as belligerents; or (b) That it has claimed for itself the rights of a belligerent; or (c) That it has accorded the insurgents recognition as belligerents for the purposes only of the present Convention; or (d) That the dispute has been admitted to the agenda of the Security Council or the General Assembly of the United Nations as being a threat to international peace, a breach of the peace, or an act of aggression.

(4) (a) That the insurgents have an organization purporting to have the characteristics of a State. (b) That the insurgent civil authority exercises de facto authority over the population within a determinate portion of the national territory. (c) That the armed forces act under the direction of an organized authority and are prepared to observe the ordinary laws of war. (d) That the insurgent civil authority agrees to be bound by the provisions of the Convention.