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Making
things happen - with integrity. A weekly CyberMemo designed to keep you on task. Monday April 29, 2002 Volume IV Number 17 |
FOCUS - United We Stand
Dr. Ron Rietveld was a teenager when he stumbled across an old discarded photograph of a man in a coffin. The quality and condition of the aging picture was poor; grainy and dog-eared. He found it in an old castaway chest.
The discovery was made in the nineteen fifties, nearly a hundred years after an event that is universally recognized as a watershed moment in American history. The man who gave leadership to the nation during the most trying four years in the life of the nation was brutally murdered while attending an evening stage performance at Ford’s Theatre in Washington DC. Using a hand pistol, from close range, John Wilkes Booth fired a gun into the President’s head, shortly after the orchestra played during intermission “Hail to the Chief.”
A nation grieved. Weary of a devastating war, so many young soldiers gone, so much property destroyed, Abraham Lincoln had by then emerged as a towering leader. His speeches brought purpose and complex ideas into clear focus. His manner represented the best of the young country’s aspirations. His words carried the weight of moral authority. Even in defeat, most of the embattled Confederacy recognized the powerful place Lincoln would occupy for all time in the history books.
Ronny Rietveld, knowing the little photograph might have some historic significance, sought out knowledgeable advisors. Before long, it was confirmed. This was the last existing photograph of the fallen President, making it a bona-fide historical artifact. It made the young researcher something of a national celebrity. When LIFE Magazine ran the story, Ron Rietveld, butch cut and freckled grin was featured as its discoverer. Because he was a reader and an aspiring historian, college scholarship offers arrived.
Today, Dr. Rietveld is winding up a distinguished career at the university as a professor of American History and a nationally known Lincoln scholar. Before long, he will retire as a long time favorite of students and faculty alike. His Lincolnesque chin whiskers, now turning white, are reminiscent of the man who provided a lifetime of curiosity, lively lectures, position papers, and in an era of political correctness and historical revisionism, Dr. Rietveld stood firm on the documents.
The State of Illinois is just now completing the construction of a Library in Lincoln’s honor. For well over a century, Springfield has boasted the accomplishments of her favorite son. Thirteen Presidential libraries bear the name of former Presidents, each housing the documents and memorabilia, providing perspective and insight into their terms of office. Even Jefferson Davis, the elected President of the Confederacy during the Civil War has one. But until now, Abraham Lincoln had no library. The dedication and opening day are scheduled for November 18 this year.
Dr. Rietveld will be among the distinguished guests commemorating the life of an American icon.
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By 1858, Lincoln’s career lacked luster. His law partnership, Lincoln and Herndon, flourished in the Capitol of Illinois. But Springfield, a relatively small town, was a long way from Chicago. He dabbled in politics, but his attempts to serve in both the Congress and the United States Senate left him in defeat. He was a country lawyer, and while he represented some larger corporations in some major courtroom contests, most of the bread and butter work of the firm involved minor local disputes. Lincoln was easily distracted. He loved to read. Ideas and words and story-telling were his staple. His lanky frame and aw-shucks demeanor made him easily recognizable, and likable, too.
His wife, Mary, always had greater aspirations for him that he had for himself. It was a Congressman named Stephen Douglas, a contemporary, a fellow attorney/politician who sparked a flame in Abraham Lincoln that was not extinguished until Booth took deliberate and malicious aim that night in the Ford’s theater.
Where Lincoln was as thin as the rails he split as a boy, Douglas was paunchy. Lincoln’s vests hung loose under his coat. Douglas’ vests stretched at the buttons, pulling at the threads. Lincoln’s long and narrow face was nearly gaunt, thin. Douglas’ face was round and full and cheeky. Nearly twelve inches difference in height, the two men standing side by side were a study in contrast. Douglas, the indulgent politician, boisterous, bold, daring, defender of moneyed interest, gestured wildly, a booming voice filling auditoriums with high sounding phrases, appealing to the baser nature of his broad audiences. Lincoln, studied, deliberate, relied on the force of logic, the persuasive power of the careful argument illustrated by folksy storytelling, and ultimately, the triumph of the true and the right. The two men, running for US Senate in 1958, appeared in public debate. And with each successive contest, Abraham Lincoln grew in his conviction that the defenders of slavery, including Douglas, were desperately wrong.
The Lincoln mythology, the Lincoln legacy, is based on four short years of Presidential history. He was the youngest man to date ever to take the oath of office. In 1858, as the debates rolled though small towns in the agrarian State of Illinois, Lincoln could not have known the overwhelming responsibility that would fall on his shoulders just two years hence. Had he won the election to the Senate, he may well have not have been considered a Presidential candidate. In the wake of the defeat of 1858, he seemed relieved to know that the personal pursuit of public office was over, and the time for private practice returned.
At that moment, the nation was embroiled in a fearsome debate over state’s rights. As territories lined up and applied for Statehood, the federal government, the courts, the President himself, were all in turmoil. The nation split down the middle. The North, opposed to slavery, objected to extending the right of the new territories to allow slave ownership. The South, argued for the new State’s right to make a decision independent of federal control. Regional battles raged, some of them violent, shootings and street skirmishes, anger and resentment boiled up as the Union elected a new President in the 1860 campaign.
Lincoln’s rise to national prominence was meteoric. But when he and Mary took up residence in the White House, after a steam train processional from his home town of Springfield that en route galvanized the Northern states in enthusiastic support, he was thrust into a national crisis that escalated into a brutal conflict between the North and the South.
The debates with his nemesis, the Honorable Stephen Douglas, sharpened his mind. Readied his wit. Gave him the firm conviction – “United, we stand. Divided, we fall.”
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This weekend the newly weds from Colorado came to California to meet the West Coast segment of the family.
Matt and Ann seemed fresh at the end of week one of their five week long honeymoon. Matt took Ann on a tour of his childhood haunts in California from his first twelve years. Today, she met her new extended family face to face. They embraced her as one of their own, which, as of last Saturday, she is. There were hugs and tears and prayers and well wishers all, in an open house featuring a slide show with dramatic sound track and photographs from childhood to courtship, and an abbreviated video tape of the Colorado ceremony.
In attendance, a long time family friend, nearing retirement, there to bring a blessing on a family he and his wife watched grow up from the early days. Mom, the matriarch of the clan, looked across the room, most of her twenty three grandchildren in attendance. Her seven children, too, all there with their spouses. Matt, the third of those grandchildren to marry, sat before them all, holding his bride’s hand, with all the excitement of a young man in love, and Ann, looking at him adoringly, and then at the crowd, disguising well whatever anxiety she must have felt.
I introduced our special guests. “When I was in the second grade,” I explained to them all, “we were hardly committed to spiritual things. But us kids went to a Vacation Bible School in our little town that summer. Mom and dad were curious, delivered us to the church. And then on the final night, Mom attended a parent-student rally.”
“The preacher was a youth pastor and Christian education director. He spoke directly to young families in the neighborhood, and challenged each to take a stand, and commit their lives to the Lord and His service.”
“Mom went home and told Dad, ‘It’s time for us to be the kind of family God wants us to be.’ Not long afterward, Dad agreed.”
That commitment set the course for our family, a direction that has remained in place for nearly fifty years since. That preacher was in attendance, and I asked him to lead us in a prayer of dedication and affirmation and support for these two newlyweds. It was a prayer of blessing, shared from a tender heart.
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It’s Monday morning. You are a leader.
When you were young, perhaps you made a discovery, too. Like Dr. Rietveld, it set you on a path that to this day as been a cornerstone to your life. At the time, it didn’t seem that significant. But today, you realize its enormous impact.
And as you’ve grown, you’ve had your share of conflict. In the crucible of struggle, you’ve developed. Your skills have sharpened. You are capable of so much more because of the turmoil. Lincoln had no idea that those debates would prepare him to lead our nation through the most difficult of circumstances. Your conflicts, too, they’ve shaped your character. You draw regularly on the lessons you learned in the heat of battle.
Some of us have only just begun. Others of us are just now hitting our stride.
As our family embraced in celebration of a new milestone on a wedding day this past week, let’s remember.
United, we stand.
© Copyright Kenneth E. Kemp 2002
LeaderFOCUS is brought to you by Good Stewardship Associates
Special Thanks for Design by my good friend David Belcher, owner of Rhino Media Group and creator of WisdomGram
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