Secession

TEXT:  Lincoln, First Inaugural (1861)

• Lincoln wrote most of his 1861 inaugural address though he had key editorial assistance from Secretary of State William Seward, especially with the poetic closing

CONTEXT:  Secession Crisis

• Lincoln delivered the address on March 4, 1861 after seven (0ut of fifteen) slave states had seceded (or left) from the union
• Lincoln was the nation’s first Republican president; he was a 52-year-old attorney from Springfield, Illinois
• As a young boy in Indiana, Lincoln attended informal frontier or “blab” schools for only about a year in total.  He learned to read and write mostly on his own.

SUBTEXT:  Lincoln’s Union

• For detailed analysis of Lincoln’s subtext and understandig how he defined “union” see:  Lincoln’s Secession Crisis and Ours

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METHODS CENTER:  AI Tools and Traps

• Understand the difference between artificial intelligence and fake intelligence
• Remember a headline mantra they liked to use during the Civil War:  “Important, if True”