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Secretary
Seward, who drafted the Thanksgiving proclamation for Lincoln.
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n 1863, in the midst of a terrible civil
war which had already taken hundreds of thousands of lives, President
Lincoln issued a thanksgiving message. Drafted by Secretary Seward, the
document became the model for many similar presidential messages over
the century and a half that followed; for this was the original observance
of Thanksgiving Day on the last Thursday of November.
This year, as in most years, bad news has dominated the airwaves. Not
least was the suffering (and sometimes shameful behavior) that accompanied
the hurricane season's great storms. Rather than dwell on the negative,
however, we need to pause once again to follow the example of Lincoln
and his cabinet, remembering the blessings which God has heaped upon us.
By the President of the United States of America. A Proclamation.
The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the
blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which
are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from
which they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary
a nature, that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart
which is habitually insensible to the ever watchful providence of Almighty
God. In the midst of a civil war of unequaled magnitude and severity,
which has sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite and to provoke
their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has
been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony
has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict; while
that theatre has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies
of the Union. Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields
of peaceful industry to the national defence, have not arrested the plough,
the shuttle or the ship; the axe has enlarged the borders of our settlements,
and the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have
yielded even more abundantly than heretofore.
Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the waste that has
been made in the camp, the siege and the battle-field; and the country,
rejoicing in the consiousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted
to expect continuance of years with large increase of freedom. No human
counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things.
They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with
us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed
to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully
acknowledged as with one heart and one voice by the whole American People.
I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United
States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in
foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November
next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who
dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up
the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings,
they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and
disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows,
orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which
we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of
the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as
soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment
of peace, harmony, tranquillity and Union.
In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the Seal
of the United States to be affixed.
Done at the City of Washington, this Third day of October, in the year
of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the Independence
of the Unites States the Eighty-eighth.
By the President: Abraham Lincoln
William H. Seward,
Secretary of State
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