Today, on November 19th, Gettysburg Address of which he had made at the town of Gettysburg, only days after the famous Battle of Gettysburg during the American Civil War. The Battle, made between the forces of General Lee of the Confederates, and General Meade of the Union, thought at a time to be another Union defeat, resulted in a Union Victory, the first after a long string of defeats in the North and South. In a way, this battle was one that signified the turning of the tides for the Civil War. The Gettysburg Address, a speech that President Lincoln made on that day, although it was only 2 minutes long, was what made this day famous. The speech addressed the Civil war as an issue and stated that the actions, and the reasons, that the Union soldiers were fighting dying for, were justified in the Civil War, and that America was fighting for the freedom of the black Slaves in the South and for an end to slavery. In a way, it summarized the entire purpose of the Union in the American Civil war against the Confederates.

Here is a copy of that speech to read:

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.

Abraham Lincoln

November 19, 1863

This speech, though 150 years later, still rings true in the hearts of Americans who honor it and recognize its importance. Its message that the Americans fight for liberty, even for the liberty of others, still rings loud and proud today.