ABRAHAM LINCOLN ~~ February 12, 1809 ~~ April 15, 1865

Photo:sonofthesouth.net/slavery/abraham-lincoln

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.

Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address ~ March 4, 1865

Naturalists John Muir & J. Horace MacFarland

Image::wikipedia.com

When I was a young child, my Dad’s study was in the parsonage at 216 State Street, a handsome four story Federal-style detached brick house (circa 1916) next door to the stone Gothic revival church just down the street in front of the State Capitol, a successful architectural pastiche with the general layout of the capitol in Washington, the staircase from the Paris Opera, and the dome of St. Peter’s in Rome (before the church turned the old parsonage into the church offices and bought a grand detached stone house uptown as the new parsonage).

Occasionally I visited Daddy in his study on the second floor at 216 State Street. I remember seeing Thanksgiving Day parades from the bay window. Other times we watched from the street by the green, where we used to have strawberry festivals – before they turned it into a double-sided car park.

This is reminiscent of the McFarland gardens at Polyclinic Hospital. It had been one of the premier rose gardens in the United States, with reflecting pools, arcades, and a handsome bronze fountain of the Three Graces, which Milton Hershey— of chocolate fame— had commissioned for his private garden. But Mrs. Hershey found the nudes offensive; so Mr. Hershey donated the fountain to the McFarland rose garden. J. Horace McFarland, a doctor and a founder of the American Rose Society, had created and endowed these gardens at his hospital.

The connection to the former green in front of Grace Church is almost a direct quote from an old Joni Mitchell song: “They paved paradise … put up a parking lot.” That’s exactly what they did to the rose garden. They turned it into a three-block parking lot. Dad did what he could to prevent it; but was unsuccessful. It broke his heart. I still have a jar of potpourri made from some of the last roses. Dad, however, was instrumental in preserving the Three Graces and placing them in the middle of Italian Lake, just a few blocks from the old rose gardens.

Previously he had recommended the new site above Italian Lake for the relocation of the Civil War obelisk commemorating “The Suppression of the Rebellion,” which had blocked traffic on Second Street in front of the Capitol and had been a genuine traffic hazard. Dad was able to suggest these changes because he had been a friend of the two mayors at the time. Both events occurred when I was in junior high school or at Mercersburg, in the early or mid sixties.

When Mother sold the house on North Second Street to move to a retirement community about thirty-five miles away, I took an extended leave from my job at Neiman-Marcus to assist her. (My parents had bought the house after the Hurricane Agnes Flood.) It was some of the most strenuous physical labor I’ve ever done.

While cleaning out the detached garage, I went through several boxes of assorted objects and papers from Miss Helen McFarland’s house. (Helen was the distinguished spinster daughter of J. Horace McFarland and had lived alone for many decades in her Victorian mansion, Breeze Hill, that had an uncanny similarity to the house in Psycho, though it was a much finer house. Helen McFarland was a close friend of my Dad’s and his great friend, Helen Heisey. The two of them worked together on a Decorator Showhouse at Breeze Hill after Miss McFarland’s death.)

A small Christmas card caught my attention. It had a sepia photo of the "Lone Cypress" at Carmel. I picked it up and read the note. It was from John Muir to his friend J. Horace McFarland and was dated 1914. I happened to know that John Muir died Christmas Eve 1914, and thought at first this must be one of the last things he wrote. But on closer examination, the card was notated “Rec’d 1/10/14” so it was from Christmas 1913. Even so, it’s a very special communication.

The card’s inscription reads:

“Dear Mr. McFarland,
Many warm thanks for the great work you have done and are doing for God’s beauty. Tho our long hard fight for Yosemite Park is lost, some compensating good must come from the aroused conscience of the whole country.Yours with love and admiration

John Muir”

I think the reference was to Hetch Hetchy Valley, which was dammed to provide a reservoir for San Francisco. Even today there is discussion about whether or not to restore the valley to its former natural state. I don’t think that will happen. We really need the water. But I’ve double framed the card, and consider it one of my most valued possessions.

PICKETT'S CHARGE ~ July 3, 1863

Image:en.allexperts.com

Pickett's Charge was an infantry assault ordered by Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee against Maj. Gen. George G. Meade's Union positions on Cemetery Ridge on July 3, 1863, the last day of the Battle of Gettysburg during the American Civil War. Its futility was predicted by the charge's commander, Lt. Gen. James Longstreet, and it was arguably an avoidable mistake from which the Southern war effort never fully recovered psychologically. The farthest point reached by the attack has been referred to as the high-water mark of the Confederacy.

The charge is named after Maj. Gen. George Pickett, one of three Confederate generals who led the assault under Longstreet.

After Confederate attacks on both Union flanks had failed the day and night before, Lee was determined to strike the Union center on the third day. On the night of July 2, General Meade correctly predicted at a council of war that Lee would try an attack on his lines in the center the following morning.

The infantry assault was preceded by a massive artillery bombardment that was meant to soften up the Union defense and silence its artillery, but it was largely ineffective. Approximately 12,500 men in nine infantry brigades advanced over open fields for three quarters of a mile under heavy Union artillery and rifle fire. Although some Confederates were able to breach the low stone wall that shielded many of the Union defenders, they could not maintain their hold and were repulsed with over 50% casualties, a decisive defeat that ended the three-day battle and Lee's campaign into Pennsylvania.

When asked, years afterward, why his charge at Gettysburg failed, General Pickett said: "I've always thought the Yankees had something to do with it."

Text:wikipedia.com

In 1963 when I was fourteen my family went to Gettysburg for the Centennial of the Battle. We stayed in our Apache aluminum-trailor-canvas-tent-camper on the farm of Mother's Mount Holyoke quasi-roommate (they had shared adjoining single rooms). One of the features of the brick farm house was a cannonball still lodged in the living room wall. Ethel Butterfield's husband was a math professor at Gettysburg College.

The night before we watched the reenactment of Pickett's charge, we attended a program at an outdoor amphitheater. The man sitting next to me looked vaguely familiar. He was obviously Southern and had a perpetual cigar in his mouth. Only later did I realize he was Alabama Governor George Wallace. Amazingly, I don't recall seeing substantial security. Of course this was four months before President Kennedy's assassination.. and nine years before Wallace himself was shot and paralyzed.

BATTLE OF GETTYSBURG ~ July 1-3, 1863

americanhistory.si.edu/documentsgallery/images/

The Battle of Gettysburg (July 1–3, 1863), fought in and around the town of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, as part of the Gettysburg Campaign, was the battle with the largest number of casualties in the American Civil War and is often described as the war's turning point. Union Maj. Gen. George Gordon Meade's Army of the Potomac defeated attacks by Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia, ending Lee's invasion of the North.

After his success at Chancellorsville in May 1863, Lee led his army through the Shenandoah Valley for his second invasion of the North, hoping to reach as far as Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, or even Philadelphia, and to influence Northern politicians to give up their prosecution of the war. Prodded by President Abraham Lincoln, Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker moved his army in pursuit, but was relieved just three days before the battle and replaced by Meade.

The two armies began to collide at Gettysburg on July 1, 1863, as Lee urgently concentrated his forces there. Low ridges to the northwest of town were defended initially by a Union cavalry division, which was soon reinforced with two corps of Union infantry. However, two large Confederate corps assaulted them from the northwest and north, collapsing the hastily developed Union lines, sending the defenders retreating through the streets of town to the hills just to the south.

On the second day of battle, most of both armies had assembled. The Union line was laid out in a defensive formation resembling a fishhook. Lee launched a heavy assault on the Union left flank, and fierce fighting raged at Little Round Top, the Wheatfield, Devil's Den, and the Peach Orchard. On the Union right, demonstrations escalated into full-scale assaults on Culp's Hill and Cemetery Hill. All across the battlefield, despite significant losses, the Union defenders held their lines.

On the third day of battle, July 3, fighting resumed on Culp's Hill, and cavalry battles raged to the east and south, but the main event was a dramatic infantry assault by 12,500 Confederates against the center of the Union line on Cemetery Ridge. Pickett's Charge was repulsed by Union rifle and artillery fire, at great losses to the Confederate army.

Lee led his army on a torturous retreat back to Virginia. Between 46,000 and 51,000 Americans were casualties in the three-day battle. That November, President Lincoln used the dedication ceremony for the Gettysburg National Cemetery to honor the fallen and redefine the purpose of the war in his historic Gettysburg Address.

text:wikipedia.com

YOSEMITE VALLEY ~ June 30, 1864

iPhone photo:Rob Bell May 2008

President Abraham Lincoln signed a bill on June 30, 1864 granting Yosemite Valley and the Mariposa Grove of Giant Sequoias to the State of California "for public use, resort and recreation," the two tracts "shall be inalienable for all time". This was the first time in history that a federal government had set aside scenic lands simply to protect them and to allow for their enjoyment by all people.

Yosemite Valley (pronounced /joʊˈsɛmɨtiː/ yoh-SEM-it-ee) is a glacial valley in the western Sierra Nevada mountains of California, carved out by the Merced River. The valley is about 8 miles (13 km) long and up to 8,000 feet (2,400 m) deep, surrounded by high granite summits such as Half Dome, El Capitan, and Cloud's Rest, and densely forested with pines. Tenaya, Illilouette and Bridalveil Creeks join in the valley, and flow out of the valley's mouth as the Merced River, which eventually flows to the Pacific Ocean. The valley is renowned for its natural beauty, and is widely regarded as the centerpiece of Yosemite National Park, attracting visitors from all parts of the globe.

The Valley is the point of entry into the park for the majority of visitors, and a bustling hub of activity during "tourist season", with an array of visitor facilities clustered in the middle. There are both hiking trail loops that stay within the valley and trailheads that lead to higher elevations—all of which afford glimpses of the park's many scenic wonders.

Text:wikipedia.com

Image::wikipedia.com

Below is a reposting from December 3, 2008:

When I was a young child, my Dad’s study was in the parsonage at 216 State Street, a handsome four story Federal-style detached brick house (circa 1916) next door to the stone Gothic revival church just down the street in front of the State Capitol, a successful architectural pastiche with the general layout of the capitol in Washington, the staircase from the Paris Opera, and the dome of St. Peter’s in Rome (before the church turned the old parsonage into the church offices and bought a grand detached stone house uptown as the new parsonage).

Occasionally I visited Daddy in his study on the second floor at 216 State Street. I remember seeing Thanksgiving Day parades from the bay window. Other times we watched from the street by the green, where we used to have strawberry festivals – before they turned it into a double-sided car park.

This is reminiscent of the McFarland gardens at Polyclinic Hospital. It had been one of the premier rose gardens in the United States, with reflecting pools, arcades, and a handsome bronze fountain of the Three Graces, which Milton Hershey— of chocolate fame— had commissioned for his private garden. But Mrs. Hershey found the nudes offensive; so Mr. Hershey donated the fountain to the McFarland rose garden. J. Horace McFarland, a doctor and a founder of the American Rose Society, had created and endowed these gardens at his hospital.

The connection to the former green in front of Grace Church is almost a direct quote from an old Joni Mitchell song: “They paved paradise … put up a parking lot.” That’s exactly what they did to the rose garden. They turned it into a three-block parking lot. Dad did what he could to prevent it; but was unsuccessful. It broke his heart. I still have a jar of potpourri made from some of the last roses. Dad, however, was instrumental in preserving the Three Graces and placing them in the middle of Italian Lake, just a few blocks from the old rose gardens.

Previously he had recommended the new site above Italian Lake for the relocation of the Civil War obelisk commemorating “The Suppression of the Rebellion,” which had blocked traffic on Second Street in front of the Capitol and had been a genuine traffic hazard. Dad was able to suggest these changes because he had been a friend of the two mayors at the time. Both events occurred when I was in junior high school or at Mercersburg, in the early or mid sixties.

When Mother sold the house on North Second Street to move to a retirement community about thirty-five miles away, I took an extended leave from my job at Neiman-Marcus to assist her. (My parents had bought the house after the Hurricane Agnes Flood.) It was some of the most strenuous physical labor I’ve ever done.

While cleaning out the detached garage, I went through several boxes of assorted objects and papers from Miss Helen McFarland’s house. (Helen was the distinguished spinster daughter of J. Horace McFarland and had lived alone for many decades in her Victorian mansion, Breeze Hill, that had an uncanny similarity to the house in Psycho, though it was a much finer house. Helen McFarland was a close friend of my Dad’s and his great friend, Helen Heisey. The two of them worked together on a Decorator Showhouse at Breeze Hill after Miss McFarland’s death.)

A small Christmas card caught my attention. It had a sepia photo of the "Lone Cypress" at Carmel. I picked it up and read the note. It was from John Muir to his friend J. Horace McFarland and was dated 1914. I happened to know that John Muir died Christmas Eve 1914, and thought at first this must be one of the last things he wrote. But on closer examination, the card was notated “Rec’d 1/10/14” so it was from Christmas 1913. Even so, it’s a very special communication.

The card’s inscription reads:

“Dear Mr. McFarland,
Many warm thanks for the great work you have done and are doing for God’s beauty. Tho our long hard fight for Yosemite Park is lost, some compensating good must come from the aroused conscience of the whole country.Yours with love and admiration

John Muir”

I think the reference was to Hetch Hetchy Valley, which was dammed to provide a reservoir for San Francisco. Even today there is discussion about whether or not to restore the valley to its former natural state. I don’t think that will happen. We really need the water. But I’ve double framed the card, and consider it one of my most valued possessions.

John Wilkes Booth Shot & Burned ~ 1865

Photo: courtesy of wikipedia.com

ABRAHAM LINCOLN ~ February 12, 1809 ~ April 15, 1865

image.examiner.com/images/blog/wysiwyg/image/lincoln_portrait.jpg

The assassination of Abraham Lincoln, one of the last major events in the American Civil War, took place on Good Friday, April 14, 1865, when President Abraham Lincoln was shot while attending a performance of Our American Cousin at Ford's Theater with his wife and two guests.

Contrary to the information Booth read in the newspaper, General and Mrs. Grant had declined the invitation to see the play with the Lincolns, as Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Grant did not like each other. Several other people were invited to join them, until finally Major Henry Rathbone and his fiancée Clara Harris (daughter of New York Senator Ira Harris) accepted the invitation.

"What will Miss Harris think of my hanging on to you so?" The president replied, "She won't think anything about it". Those were the last words ever spoken by Abraham Lincoln. It was about 10:15 p.m.

The box was supposed to be guarded by a policeman named John Frederick Parker who, by all accounts, was a curious choice for a bodyguard. During the intermission, Parker went to a nearby tavern with Lincoln's footman and coachman. It is unclear whether he ever returned to the theatre, but he was certainly not at his post when Booth entered the box.

Booth knew the play, and waited for the right moment, one where actor Harry Hawk would be onstage as "cousin Asa", where there would be laughter to muffle the sound of a gunshot, when Hawk said to the insufferable Mrs Mountchessington, "Don't know the manners of good society, eh? Well, I guess I know enough to turn you inside out, old gal; you sockdologizing old man-trap!" Booth raced forward and shot the president in the back of the head. Lincoln slumped over in his rocking chair, unconscious. Mary reached out and caught him, then screamed.

Rathbone jumped from his seat and tried to prevent Booth from escaping, but Booth stabbed the Major violently in the arm with a knife. Rathbone quickly recovered and tried to grab Booth as he was preparing to jump from the sill of the box. Booth again stabbed at Rathbone, and then attempted to vault over the rail and down to the stage. His riding spur caught on the Treasury flag decorating the box, Booth jumped on the stage and landed awkwardly on his left foot, fracturing his left fibula just above the ankle. He raised himself up and, holding a knife over his head, yelled, "Sic semper tyrannis!" the Latin Virginia state motto, meaning "Thus always to tyrants."

Other accounts state that he also uttered "The South is avenged!" He then ran across the stage, and went out the door onto the horse he had waiting outside. Some of the men in the audience chased after him, but failed to catch him. Booth struck "Peanuts" Burroughs in the forehead with the handle of his knife, leaped onto the horse, kicked Burroughs in the face with his good leg, and rode away. He headed toward the Navy Yard Bridge to meet up with Herold and Powell.

Mary Lincoln's and Clara Harris' screams and Rathbone's cries of "Stop that man!" caused the audience to understand that this was not part of the show, and pandemonium broke out in Ford's Theatre. Dr. Charles Leale, a young Army surgeon on liberty for the night and attending the play, made his way through the crowd to the door at the rear of the Presidential box. It would not open. Finally Rathbone saw a notch carved in the door and a wooden brace jammed there to hold the door shut. Booth had carved the notch there earlier in the day and noiselessly put the brace up against the door after entering the box to kill Lincoln. Rathbone shouted to Leale, who stepped back from the door, allowing Rathbone to remove the brace and open the door.

Leale entered the box to find Rathbone bleeding profusely from a deep gash that ran the length of his upper left arm. Nonetheless, he passed Rathbone by and stepped forward to find Lincoln slumped forward in his chair, held up by Mary, who was sobbing. Lincoln had no pulse and Leale believed him to be dead. Leale lowered the President to the floor. A second doctor in the audience, Dr. Charles Sabin Taft, was lifted bodily from the stage over the railing and into the box. Taft and Leale cut away Lincoln's blood-stained collar and opened his shirt, and Leale, feeling around by hand, discovered the bullet hole in the back of the head by the left ear. Leale removed a clot of blood in the wound and Lincoln's breathing improved. Still, Leale knew it made no difference: "His wound is mortal. It is impossible for him to recover."

Leale, Taft, and another doctor from the audience, Dr. Albert King, quickly consulted and decided that while the President must be moved, a bumpy carriage ride across town to the White House was out of the question. After briefly considering Peter Taltavull's Star Saloon next door, they chose to carry Lincoln across the street and find a house. The three doctors and some soldiers who had been in the audience carried the President out the front entrance of Ford's. Across the street, a man was holding a lantern and calling "Bring him in here! Bring him in here!" The man was Henry Safford, a boarder at William Petersen's boarding house opposite Ford's. The men carried Lincoln into the boarding house and into the first-floor bedroom, where they laid him diagonally on the bed because he was too tall to lie straight.

A vigil began at the Petersen House. The three physicians already in attendance were joined by Surgeon General of the United States Army Dr. Joseph K. Barnes, Dr. Charles Henry Crane, Dr. Anderson Ruffin Abbott, and Dr. Robert K. Stone. Crane was a Major and Barnes' assistant. Stone was Lincoln's personal physician. Robert Lincoln, who had stayed home, arrived at the Petersen House after being told of the shooting at about midnight. Tad Lincoln, who had attended Grover's Theater to see Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp, was not allowed to go to the Peterson House. Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles and United States Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton came and took charge of the scene. Mary Lincoln was so unhinged by the experience of the assassination that Stanton ordered her out of the room by shouting, "Take that woman out of here and do not let her in here again!"

While Mary Lincoln sobbed in the front parlor, Stanton set up shop in the rear parlor, effectively running the United States government for several hours, sending and receiving telegrams, taking reports from witnesses, and issuing orders for the pursuit of Booth. Nothing more could be done for President Lincoln. At 7:22 a.m. on April 15, 1865, Abraham Lincoln died. He was 56 years old. Mary Lincoln was not present at the time of his death.

The crowd around the bed knelt for a prayer, and when they were finished, Stanton said "Now he belongs to the ages". There is some disagreement among historians as to Stanton's words after Lincoln died. All agree that he began "Now he belongs to the..." with some stating he said "ages" while others believe he said "angels".

Text:wikipedia.com

THANKSGIVING DAY

Phot0:theunquietlibrary.files.wordpress.com/2007/11/thanksgiving

The fourth Thursday in November is the official national celebration of Thanksgiving in the United States. It hasn’t always been official, nor on the fourth Thursday.

In elementary school we learned that the first Thanksgiving was celebrated by the Pilgrims in Massachusetts in 1621. But seven years ago, when Dennis and I went to Virginia to visit Williamsburg, Monticello, and the hunt race at Madison’s Montpelier, we also visited some Charles River plantations, including Berkeley Plantation, which claims that honor. At this site in December 1619, a group of British settlers led by captain John Woodlief knelt in humble prayer and pledged “Thanksgiving” to God for their healthy arrival after a long voyage across the Atlantic.

Throughout the first century of the republic there were a number of Presidential Thanksgiving Proclamations, but not necessarily on a regular basis. The first was issued by George Washington on October 3, 1789.

Then in the midst of the horrors of the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln on October 3, 1863 proclaimed a day of Thanksgiving to be observed on the last Thursday of November “as a day of Thanksgiving and praise.” It was almost as if things were so bad, that it was necessary to look beyond the bloodshed to discern some greater purpose.

At the beginning of Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s presidency, Thanksgiving was not a fixed holiday and it was up to the President to issue a Thanksgiving Proclamation to announce what date the holiday would fall on. Most states followed Lincoln’s precedent and observed the last Thursday of November. But in 1939 there were two days celebrated a week apart. As a reaction to the Great Depression, Roosevelt decided to declare the third Thursday of November as a day of Thanksgiving. That was to give retailers an extra week of shopping before Christmas. (Of course today the Christmas shopping season starts almost before Halloween!) Most states, however, in 1939 continued to observe that last Thursday; so there were two Thanksgivings that year. (And World War II in Europe was already near the end of its third month.)

Franklin Roosevelt observed Thanksgiving on the second to last Thursday of November for two more years, but the amount of public outrage prompted Congress to pass a law on December 26, 1941, ensuring that all Americans would celebrate a unified Thanksgiving on the fourth Thursday of November every year, and that’s the way it’s been ever since. I don’t know how my grandfather Bob Rich voted, but he probably was in favor of it. Note that the vote was after Pearl Harbor, so the psychology may have been a little like Lincoln’s during the Civil War.

####

A few other countries have National Days of Thanksgiving. After observing several different dates, the Canadian Parliament on January 31, 1957 proclaimed “A day of General Thanksgiving to Almighty God for the bountiful harvest with which Canada has been blessed… to be observed on the 2nd Monday in October.”

Great Britain likewise has a “Harvest Festival” Day of Thanksgiving held every year in the month of September, on a Sunday nearing the harvest moon. I attended such a Harvest Festival Thanksgiving service at Lincoln Cathedral in 1988. The preacher that day was Neville Chamberlain’s grandson, or great-nephew, I don't remember which.

(The week before I had seen a BBC revisionist documentary on Neville Chamberlain, which put a somewhat different perspective on his blame for, and contribution to the outcome of WWII. After being burned by Hitler’s occupation of all Czechoslovakia in violation of the Munich accord, Chamberlain ordered the building of the Spitfires, which eventually won the Battle of Britain. Had war started in 1938, the Germans would have had clear air superiority. Reality is frequently more nuanced than popular perceptions. Counter-factual history, though fascinating, guarantees absolutely nothing.)

[For the record, I prefer the British pronunciation of the word 'THANKS-giving'. To me it seems closer to the meaning.]

Anyway, have a Happy and thank-full Thanksgiving!

elements of text courtesy wikipedia.com

UNCLE TOM'S CABIN ~ 1851

Harriet Beecher Stowe's anti-slavery serial, Uncle Tom's Cabin or, Life Among the Lowly started a ten-month run in the National Era abolitionist newspaper on June 5, 1851.

Harriet Beecher Stowe (June 14, 1811 – July 1, 1896) was an American abolitionist and author. Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852) depicted life for African-Americans under slavery; it reached millions as a novel and play, and became influential in the U.S. and Britain and made the political issues of the 1850s regarding slavery tangible to millions, energizing anti-slavery forces in the American North, while provoking widespread anger in the South. Upon meeting Stowe, Abraham Lincoln allegedly remarked, "So this is the little lady who started this great war!" .

Photo & text:wikipedia.com

WHAT EXPERIENCE REALLY MATTERS?

President Kennedy addressing the nation October 22, 1962

The election is less than two weeks away! It surely looks as though Senator Barack Obama is going to win a landslide victory –with significant coattails. That is, of course, unless the “Bradley Effect” is still alive after more than twenty years… and unless Republican charges against Obama begin to stick.

The most potent charge against Senator Obama is his perceived lack of experience— particularly executive experience— since he has been only a Senator… and for less than a full term. By that standard, however, what executive experience does Senator McCain have?

If Senators don’t gain any executive experience, what’s the difference between four years or more than two decades? Perhaps that perception is one reason the last Senator to be elected was John F. Kennedy in 1960; and he was one of only two, I believe, to be elected directly from the Senate in the history of the Republic. So by that standard, the only so-called qualified candidate among the four major contenders is Governor Sarah Palin. God, help us!!! Clearly, other experience matters. And perhaps, even more important are temperment and judgment.

George Will recently wrote that experience can be gained, but temperment is fairly constant or something to that effect. His conclusion was that Obama’s temperment is steadier than McCain’s.

Former Secretary of State, retired General Colin Powell's eloquent endorsement last Sunday on Meet the Press gave additional validity and gravitas to Obama's candidacy. "Experience is helpful, but it is judgment that matters."

President Clinton has said that nobody has the experience to be President before gaining office, and I think that is probably true.

What about Abraham Lincoln? Besides being un-photogenic, and reportedly having a high, squeaky voice, Lincoln had had only a few terms in the Illinois legislature and a single term in the U.S. House of Representatives— more than a decade before— when he had opposed the War with Mexico. By today’s standards, he would never be considered a serious presidential contender.

Although he was roundly criticized by all sides last summer, I think retired General Wesley Clark made a valid point. To paraphrase VP Dick Cheney (in reference to energy conservation) holding up well under enemy captivity may be a sign of “personal virtue” and perhaps of patriotism and distinguished valor; but –by itself— it does not necessarily demonstrate any executive or military decision-making capability.

Temperament and judgment are sometimes true conservative values: that is, careful, deliberative, non-reflexive action. (I contend that many so-called conservatives today are really radical-reactionaries. If so-called conservatives can denigrate the positive definition of liberalism, then it’s only fair to describe so-called conservatism by what it actually is and does.)

In the Cuban Missile Crisis forty-six years ago in October 1962, * both President John F. Kennedy and Premier Nikita Khrushchev demonstrated true conservatism by ignoring the demands of their respective generals to start offensive action. Perhaps it was just luck and not good judgment – but how lucky we all were!! Maybe both Kennedy and Khrushchev were like General Dietrich von Cholitz, the “Butcher of Sebastopol” hand-picked by Hitler to destroy Paris when given the order. He didn’t. Evidently he didn’t want to go down in history as the man who destroyed Paris. Similarly, Kennedy and Khrushchev perhaps didn’t want to go down in history (providing there was any history left to write) as the men who destroyed civilization.

I contend that Senator Barack Obama— more so than Senator John McCain— has demonstrated the careful, steady temperament and judgment needed to deal with future world crises. I think the world would be a much safer place with a President Obama in the White House.

####

* I recall how ominous events seemed to be in October 1962. I was thirteen. My Dad returned home early from a business trip to be with the family and listen to President Kennedy address the nation on October 22, 1962. There really was a palpable fear that this might be the end of civilization as we knew it.