Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Kaitlin Spear
On March 4th, 1861, President Abraham Lincoln gave his first Inaugural Address after
being sworn in. By the end of the previous year, many southern states had officially seceded
from the Union and just preceding Lincolns Inauguration, The Confederate States of America
were formed (1996). In writing his speech, it was imperative that Lincoln got his point across
without making it sound as though the United States was crumbling due to the actions of the
southern states, A.K.A: slavery and secession. With the help of various documents such as
Andrew Jacksons Nullification Proclamation and the Constitution, he was very strategic in
composing his speech; he knew over half of the country did not want him elected in the first
place. Yet due to the Electoral College, here he was (2010). Lincoln provides valid logical
arguments in order to tell the people what his plan of action was as opposed to appealing to their
emotions or his own credibility. Lincoln chose to use Aristotles artistic proof, logos, to establish
the fact that secession from the Union was not possible and appease both the North and the South
under his unwanted administration.
One section of Lincolns address where his use of logos is prevalent occurs when he
refers to secession as a form of anarchy. In section 25.1, he states, Plainly, the central idea of
secession, is the essence of anarchy. A majority, held in restraint by constitutional checks and
limitations, and always changing easily, with deliberate changes of popular opinions and
sentiments, is the only true sovereign of a free people. Whoever rejects it, does, of necessity, fly
to anarchy or to despotism. Lincoln explains that secession is one method in which the people
choose to protest the national government that will lead to anarchy, if not considered anarchy in
and of its self (Zarefsky, 2012). By establishing that secession, by definition, can be considered a