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Abraham Lincoln and the First-Person Plural: A Study in Language and Leadership

2011; Routledge; Volume: 12; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/14664658.2011.559748

1743-7903

Peter S. Field,

Education, Leadership, and Health Research

Abstract Abstract The 2009 bicentennial of Abraham Lincoln's birth brought forth an outpouring of fresh studies of the man and his times. The new scholarship largely affirmed the longstanding consensus about the sixteenth president and his greatness. His was an almost superhuman achievement in holding the Union together, emancipating the slaves, and ultimately leading the North to victory. This study offers a novel evaluation of one key element of Lincoln's leadership. It details how Lincoln frequently and surprisingly substituted "we" for "I" in his famous addresses, as no political leader had done before him, and explores how his preference for the plural over singular first-person pronoun enabled his political ascendency in the 1850s and sustained his presidency during the war. His syntax offers a linguistic window into understanding his timely, unique, and uniquely self-conscious, style of leadership. Although not exactly a man of letters, Lincoln proved to be a great leader in large measure because of his steadfast beliefs about a union and an inclusive vision of American nationhood so powerfully expressed in his exceptional use of the first-person plural. Keywords: LincolnleadershiprhetoricU.S. citizenshipnationalism Acknowledgements The author would like to thank Bradford Wilson, James McPherson, Matthew Pinsker, and Eric Foner for their comments on the article. Notes 1. Samuel R. Weed, "Hearing the Returns with Mr. Lincoln," New York Times Magazine, 14 February 1932. This line is also cited in Don E. Fehrenbacher and Fehrenbacher, Recollected Words of Abraham Lincoln, 460, and in Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln, 677. Weed's account is the fullest of election day in Springfield, although only composed in the 1880s and published many decades later. 2. Lincoln's words were cited by the Independent reporter and proprietor Henry C. Bowen, who quoted Lincoln after an interview "during the week of his inauguration" at the Soldier's Home in Washington, DC. See his "Recollection of Abraham Lincoln," in Ward, Abraham Lincoln, 31–2. 3. The technical term for using the "Royal we" for oneself is "nosism," as when Queen Victoria stated: "We are not amused." Mark Twain suggested with tongue in cheek that nosism be restricted to "kings, presidents, editors, and people with tapeworms." 4. Emerson, "Abraham Lincoln," Miscellanies. 5. Weed, "Hearing the Returns," 9. 6. Other first couples might grace the pages of American history including the intimates Martha and George Washington, the intellectuals Abigail and John Adams, and the elegant Jacqueline and John Kennedy. Yet none comes close to sparking the enduring, lurid curiosity as Mary and Abraham Lincoln. See Daniel Mark Epstein, The Lincolns, and Catherine Clinton, "Abraham Lincoln: The Family that Made Him, the Family He Made," in Foner, Our Lincoln. Contrast the portrayals of the Lincoln marriage in Clinton, Mrs. Lincoln and Burlingame, A Life. Two other recent works that weigh in on the Lincoln marriage are Emerson, The Madness of Mary Lincoln and Winkle, "The Middle-Class Marriage of Abraham and Mary Lincoln." 7. This is Herndon's famous line. Legend has it that the precocious teen-age Mary Todd had announced her intention to marry a future president, as indeed she would. Complementing her elemental drive were political instincts that in a later era might have inspired her own run for public office. 8. New York Times, February 19, 1861, 1. 9. Emerson, among others, called the romantic age "the age of the first person singular" in a journal entry from 1827. Historians follow Emerson in thinking of the age as obsessed with self: "self-reliance," self-improvement, self-interest, and more. See Howe, Making the American Self, and Masur, "Age of the First Person Singular." 10. Aristotle, Rhetoric, ch. 2, 1395b. See also Kenneth Burke's updated terminology, particularly his use of "Consubstantiality," in A Rhetoric of Motives, 20–3. 11. See Fornieri, Abraham Lincoln's Political Faith, 6. 12. Compare for example the inaugural addresses of the previous fifteen presidents. Only Thomas Jefferson's 1801 oration is remotely comparable. The great speeches of Daniel Webster in his debates with Robert Y. Hayne and the great oration of Henry Clay and John Calhoun are redolent with singular pronouns, as is Edward Everett's Gettysburg peroration of November 1863 to which Lincoln so famously appended his brief "Address." Lincoln's exceptional use of "we" was noted by the reporter from the New York Tribune (November 25, 1863) who wrote that in contrast to the president, Edward Everett had said "I" multiple times in his speech. 13. David Donald wrote insightfully of "the essential passivity of his nature." See Donald's introduction to his Lincoln. 14. About representation as instruction see Lincoln's idol Henry Clay and his "On the Doctrine of Instruction" (speech before the United States Senate, January 14, 1839), The Life and Speeches of the Hon. Henry Clay, vol. 2, 350–4. 15. Daniel Walker Howe offers the most insightful reading of Lincoln as a typical Whig insofar as he combined a reverence for public opinion as the ultimate arbiter in politics with a paternalistic vision of the importance of self-improvement. See The Political Culture of the American Whigs, 263–98. 16. For a review of the recent literature on Lincoln and his leadership, see Field, "Our Character is Our Fate: Abraham Lincoln at 200." 17. A veritable cottage industry emerged last century about what Lincoln meant when he spoke of equal citizens and waxed eloquent over the Declaration. Harry Jaffa and M.E. Bradford spilled a great deal of ink debating the merits of invoking and acting upon the ideal of equality. See Deutsch and Fornieri, Lincoln's American Dream, 71–130. 18. The various jottings in Lincoln's hand of elements of the address "are evidence of a serious literary craftsman laboring to perfect an important work." Wilson, Lincoln's Sword, 225. 19. Or a Frederick Douglass. See Oakes, The Radical and the Republican, and Stauffer, Giants. 20. Sellars illustrates the philosophical turn from ideas and minds to the study of language this way: "all awareness of sorts, resemblances, facts, etc., in short all awareness of abstract entities – indeed, all awareness of particulars – is a linguistic affair." Wilfred Sellars, sec. 29, as quoted in Rorty's Introduction to Sellars, Empiricism and the Philosophy of Mind, 4. See also Solomon, "Ethical Theory," in Synoptic Vision. 21. This is a paraphrase of the last lines of the Cooper Union Address of 1860 in which Lincoln famously states "let us have faith that right makes might." 22. Sellars also notes that speaking of "we-intentions" closes the logical gap between what most people should do to make a society moral and what one person should do. The inconsistency in the notion that "stealing is wrong, but I can steal without damaging society just so long as the vast majority of others do not" becomes incoherent. "There is no logical place for a compromise between benevolence and self-love," writes Sellars, "where 'benevolence' is understood as the consciousness of oneself and one's fellow men as we." See his Science and Metaphysics, 215–18 and passim, as well as in "Imperatives, Intentions, and the Logic of 'Ought.'" 23. Sellars, "Imperatives, Intentions, and the Logic of 'Ought,'" 210. Other studies of "we-intentions" include Tuomela and Miller, "We-Intentions," and Tuomela, "We Will Do It: An Analysis of Group-Intentions." 24. For the classic Enlightened discussion of the relation of sympathy to morality, see Adam Smith's 1759 The Theory of Moral Sentiments, in which Smith eloquently relates ethical behaviour to something in between ethical rationalism and animal self-interest. My interpretation of Lincoln's language owes much to Smith. 25. Rorty, Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity, 192. 26. Aristotle made a similar claim 25 centuries ago when critiquing Plato's communal arrangements as described in Book V of Republic. "Each of the citizens," wrote Aristotle, "comes to have a thousand sons, though not as an individual, but each is in a similar fashion the son of any of them; hence all will slight them in similar fashion." See The Politics, Book II, 1262a1, 57. 27. A good "postmodern bourgeois liberal," as he calls himself, Rorty also worries about characterizing anyone as "other." Ameliorating his concerns is a belief that Americans tend to be highly reflective; they worry about being the kind of people who are ethnocentric. 28. Rorty notes that irony plays an important part in our development of solidarity, as we come to understand what he calls our "final vocabularies" as subject to revision and doubt. 29. Lincoln's greatness and his use of language are more intertwined than any other American president or political leader. Jefferson's lofty ideals as expressed in the Declaration are too intellectual for a politician and were written decades before he became chief executive. Another gifted writer-president, Woodrow Wilson was just too professorial in his tone and his greatness as a writer stems from his tenure in academia prior to the presidency. Theodore Roosevelt approaches Lincoln in the union of his literary persona and leadership style. Although Roosevelt authored more books than any other American president, neither his "talk softly but carry a big stick" nor any other lines move us they way Lincoln's poetics do to this day. On Lincoln as the Twain of American politics, see Kaplan, Lincoln, ch. 5 in particular. 30. Building on twentieth-century linguistic analysis, moral philosophers have insinuated a new chapter into the history of ethics by exploring what they call "we-intentions," by translating ethical imperatives into statements of the first-person plural. In attempting to give an account of the logical structure of moral judgments – terms like "right," "good," and "ought" – and how they connect to behavior, or in Lincoln's terms, what gives right its might, philosophers like Wilfred Sellars have sought to rephrase "ought-judgments" into statements of intention. Such translation provides a key tool for assimilating Lincoln's "we's" to the broader ethical implications of his statesmanship. See Sellars, Science and Metaphysics, 215–18 and passim, as well as in "Imperatives, Intentions, and the Logic of 'Ought,'" 201–16. 31. Lincoln, "Speech at Peoria," 251. 32. See the debates in Lincoln, Collected Works, vol. 3. 33. Rorty, Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity, 192. 34. Lincoln, "Letter to Galloway," 35. 35. Lincoln, "House Divided Speech," 462. 36. For a penetrating view sizing up American nationalism and the sectional conflict, see Grant, North Over South, esp. ch. 6. 37. Holzer, Lincoln at Cooper Union is subtitled "The Speech that made Abraham Lincoln President." 38. Holzer, Lincoln at Cooper Union is subtitled "The Speech that made Abraham Lincoln President." 39. Holzer, Lincoln at Cooper Union is subtitled "The Speech that made Abraham Lincoln President." 40. Cincinnati Enquirer, September 18, 1859. 41. Holzer, Cooper Union, 145. 42. The Address in theory was to be non-political, or at least non-partisan, as Seward and Greeley were supposed to be New York Republicans' preferred candidates for the nomination. 43. Lincoln, "Speech at Cincinnati, Ohio," 454. 44. David Potter speaks to this blindness in Lincoln and his Party in the Secession Crisis. 45. Lincoln, "Address at Cooper Institute, New York City," 550. 46. A striking comparison can be made with Henry David Thoreau and his "Essay on Civil Disobedience," which addresses a similar topic with different conclusions. 47. Lincoln, "Address at Cooper Institute, New York City," 547. 48. The fanatical abolitionism of John Brown Lincoln feared every bit as much as the lynch mobs and anti-abolition gangs that he had decried in his first public address at the Springfield Lyceum in 1838. 49. Lincoln, "House Divided Speech," 462. 50. Ken Burns significantly chose Sam Waterston to be the voice of the sixteenth president in his documentary series on the Civil War, thus reinforcing the misconception. Similarly, novelist E.L. Doctorow has it wrong when he has his Dr Sartorius overhear Lincoln's baritone voice from the adjoining room in The March. See also Burlingame, Life, vol. 1, 585. 51. Lincoln, "Fragment on Proslavery Ideology," 205; see also the Second Inaugural where Lincoln suggests that it "may seem strange that any man should dare ask a just God's assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men's faces." 52. Lincoln did not win the case. Quoted in Holzer, Lincoln at Cooper Union, 174. 53. Lincoln, "Speech at Peoria," 256. 54. Burlingame, Life, vol. 1, 154. 55. Quoted in ibid., vol. 1, 517. 56. Lincoln, "Fourth Debate with Douglas, at Charleston," 145–6. 57. Lincoln, "Speech at Springfield," 410. 58. Speech of Stephen Douglas in New Orleans, December 6, 1858. 59. Cox, Lincoln and Black Freedom, 21. 60. Phillips in the Liberator XXX, 99 (June 22, 1860). 61. Lincoln, "Protest in Illinois Legislature on Slavery," 75 62. Lincoln, "Letter of Joshua Speed," 321. 63. Thus Jefferson and Clay could, and did, remain political heroes for Lincoln. 64. Lincoln, "Speech at Peoria, 276. 65. Lincoln, "Speech at Peoria, 276. 66. Lincoln, "Letter to A.G. Hodges," 282. 67. Ford, Writings of John Quincy Adams, vol. 7, 71. 68. See Guelzo, Abraham Lincoln, 314. 69. Lincoln, "Temperance Address," 275. 70. The gauntlet Lincoln had thrown down before the reformers was not lost on his audience, who Herndon claimed "were open in their expression of displeasure." Herndon and Weik, Herndon's Lincoln, 206. 71. Reprinted in National Anti-slavery Standard, October 8, 1864. 72. Frederick Douglass, "Oration in Memory of Abraham Lincoln" (1876 at the dedication to a freedmen's monument in Washington, DC). 73. Lincoln, "Speech at Chicago," 501. 74. Lincoln, "Fragments: Notes for Speech," 399. 75. Oakes, "Natural Rights, Citizenship Rights, States' Rights, and Black Rights: Another Look at Lincoln and Race," in Foner, Our Lincoln, 109–10. 76. Douglas vilified Lincoln for slanting his arguments towards different audiences during the 1858 debates. 77. Joshua Giddings while in the House of Representatives and William Seward while campaigning for Taylor in New England in 1848. 78. I thank Eric Foner for sharing his manuscript of The Fiery Trial with me and for his many discussions on the subject of Lincoln and race. 79. Lincoln, "Speech at Columbus, Ohio," 425. 80. Lincoln, "Speech at Columbus, Ohio," 403, for example. 81. At Peoria, Lincoln called slavery a "GREAT evil" and the destruction the democratic experiment that was the United States a "GREATER one." Lincoln, "Speech at Peoria," 271. 82. Lincoln, "Letter to James N. Brown," 329. 83. Lincoln, "Speech at Peoria," 256. 84. See Oakes, "Lincoln and Race," in Foner, Our Lincoln, 131, and Fredrickson, Big Enough to be Inconsistent. 85. Quoted in Fehrenbacher and Fehrenbacher, Recollected Words, 144–5. 86. Eric Foner offers a fine treatment of this topic in his "Lincoln and Colonization," in Foner, Our Lincoln, 135–66. 87. Quoted in Fehrenbacher and Fehrenbacher, Recollected Words, 144. 88. See Wilson, Lincoln's Sword, 209–12. 89. Americans had not witnessed a Second Inaugural in more than 30 years, since 4 March 1833. 90. Not all agree on this point; certainly M.E. Bradford reads Lincoln's prose as anything but self-effacing. Lincoln need not mention himself, says Bradford, because he has become one with the deity. From God's mouth to Lincoln's ears. 91. Lincoln, "Second Inaugural Address," 333. 92. Gabor Borritt makes a similar observation about Lincoln's magnanimity in his The Gettysburg Gospel: The Lincoln Speech that Nobody Knows. 93. The religious tone of Lincoln's remarks has drawn considerable interest from scholars. M.E. Bradford called Lincoln "a dangerous man" in large measure because Lincoln joined others in reaching for a foolish Gnosticism. See "Dividing the House: The Gnosticism of Lincoln's Political Rhetoric," 20–1. 94. David Donald wrote insightfully of "the essential passivity of his nature." See Donald's introduction to his Lincoln.