Chapter 58: Abe’s First Inaugural Address Pleads for Saving the Sacred Union

March 1861

As Lincoln makes his leisurely 13 stop journey to Washington, he remains convinced that the South is bluffing, especially since the key state of Virginia has not yet declared itself. So he sees his task at the inaugural ceremony on March 4 as trying to convince both the South and North to save the Union. As always, his words are intended to reach the souls of his audience:

We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have
strained it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching
from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this
broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be,
by the better angels of our nature.