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Belatedly, for Juneteenth

Belatedly, for Juneteenth

Last updated on: June 20, 2026 at 7:40 pm by Dan Peterson

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Belatedly, for Juneteenth 2026-06-20T19:40:03-06:00 Dan Peterson

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An iconic anti-slavery medallion created by Josiah Wedgwood in 1787. (Wikimedia Commons public domain image)

I’ve been under the weather and I’ve been recovering from my dermatologist’s most recent brutality — I don’t suppose that my continual whining has gone completely unnoticed — and I’ve been under some pressing deadlines. I cite such things as an excuse for my having failed to mention Juneteenth, which was yesterday. I’m happy that it has become a recognized holiday; it certainly merits the designation and the recognition. So I won’t let it pass here unremarked, even if I’m late in marking it.

And the way that has occurred to me to take note of it here ihas been to re-read Abraham Lincoln’s great Second Inaugural Address, which he delivered on Saturday, 4 March 1865. It begin in a rather ordinary manner but, by the middle of its short text, Abraham Lincoln’s peerless presidential eloquence takes command, giving us some of the most memorable language in all of American history. It is fully appropriate to the seriousness of the conflict at that time and to the majesty of the cause.

Inside the Lincoln Memorial in Washington DC

(Wikimedia Commons public domain image)

Reading it again (or, perhaps, for the very first time) will be well worth the few minutes that doing so will require — and, if you don’t do it until the Sabbath day, entirely fitting for Sunday reading. As is the “Battle Hymn of the Republic, with the text of which I will follow Mr. Lincoln’s speech. I also share the legendary rendition of it by the Tabernacle Choir.

Fellow-Countrymen:

At this second appearing to take the oath of the Presidential office there is less occasion for an extended address than there was at the first. Then a statement somewhat in detail of a course to be pursued seemed fitting and proper. Now, at the expiration of four years, during which public declarations have been constantly called forth on every point and phase of the great contest which still absorbs the attention and engrosses the energies of the nation, little that is new could be presented. The progress of our arms, upon which all else chiefly depends, is as well known to the public as to myself, and it is, I trust, reasonably satisfactory and encouraging to all. With high hope for the future, no prediction in regard to it is ventured.

On the occasion corresponding to this four years ago all thoughts were anxiously directed to an impending civil war. All dreaded it, all sought to avert it. While the inaugural address was being delivered from this place, devoted altogether to saving the Union without war, insurgent agents were in the city seeking to destroy it without war–seeking to dissolve the Union and divide effects by negotiation. Both parties deprecated war, but one of them would make war rather than let the nation survive, and the other would accept war rather than let it perish, and the war came.

One-eighth of the whole population were colored slaves, not distributed generally over the Union, but localized in the southern part of it. These slaves constituted a peculiar and powerful interest. All knew that this interest was somehow the cause of the war. To strengthen, perpetuate, and extend this interest was the object for which the insurgents would rend the Union even by war, while the Government claimed no right to do more than to restrict the territorial enlargement of it. Neither party expected for the war the magnitude or the duration which it has already attained. Neither anticipated that the cause of the conflict might cease with or even before the conflict itself should cease. Each looked for an easier triumph, and a result less fundamental and astounding. Both read the same Bible and pray to the same God, and each invokes His aid against the other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God’s assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men’s faces, but let us judge not, that we be not judged. The prayers of both could not be answered. That of neither has been answered fully. The Almighty has His own purposes. “Woe unto the world because of offenses; for it must needs be that offenses come, but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh.” If we shall suppose that American slavery is one of those offenses which, in the providence of God, must needs come, but which, having continued through His appointed time, He now wills to remove, and that He gives to both North and South this terrible war as the woe due to those by whom the offense came, shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living God always ascribe to Him? Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. 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.”

With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation’s wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.

Robert E. Lee surrenders to Ulysses S. Grant on Appomattox Courthouse on 9 April 1865
(Wikimedia Commons public domain image)

Please take a few minutes to listen to the Tabernacle Choir’s famous version of the “Battle Hymn.”

1 Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord;
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored;
He hath loosed the fateful lightning of this terrible swift sword;
His truth is marching on.

Refrain:
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
His truth is marching on.

2 I have seen Him in the watch-fires of a hundred circling camps;
They have builded Him an altar in the evening dews and damps;
I can read the righteous sentence by the dim and flaring lamps;
His day is marching on. [Refrain]

3 He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat;
He is sifting out the hearts of men before His judgment seat;
O be swift, my soul, to answer Him; be jubilant, my feet!
Our God is marching on. [Refrain]

4 In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea,
With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me;
As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free,
while God is marching on. [Refrain]

Slavery is the darkest blot on the history and heritage of the United States of America. I hereby resolve to pay its end more attention next year on Juneteenth, which should be a holiday not only for Black people but for all Americans.

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