“A house divided....” — A speech delivered to a Republican Party that was not yet national, grand or old is relevant to an old party that isn't feeling grand and that is lost in the weeds on the local, state and federal level

Republicans need to look deep into themselves and into their history in order to find out —   Who they are  –  What they are all about  –  To understand the fix they’re in –  And to know how and why they got there  –  then  –  JUST BE REPUBLICANS !

Some call it the speech that changed the world. Abraham Lincoln’s “House Divided” was a very layered speech that used a recognizable scriptural and religious hook to achieve its poignancy — but, what should not be forgotten amid the historical significance heaped upon it, anachronistically,  the “House Divided” speech was a very political speech addressed directly to in-state Republican politicians.  Lincoln gave this speech to a state convention of a new Republican Party. The speech was considered by Lincoln’s closest friends and advisers to be too radical even for the relatively radical Republicans gathered in Springfield, Illinois for their 1858 state convention.  Once it had been delivered it was viewed as polarizing both inside and outside that convention, and many attribute Lincoln’s subsequent loss in his U.S. Senate race against Stephen Douglas as a reaction to the radicalism thought to be inherent in Lincoln’s “House Divided” speech.

Most would argue that the “House Divided” speech was just about chattel slavery in America  —  and it certainly is a discourse on that subject in tremendous detail.  However, it is clearly something else.

When one reads the ultimate paragraph of Lincoln’s “House Divided” speech, delivered to the Illinois Republican State Convention on June 16, 1858; it should be clear to any and all that Lincoln was exhorting a bunch of politicians in an upstart party to not give up the fight, but to build on their past successes which had been achieved “under the constant hot fire of a disciplined, proud, and pampered enemy.”

More important is his  peroration:

 “Did we brave all [that] to falter now?  Now, when that same enemy is wavering, dissevered, and belligerent? The result is not doubtful. We shall not fail-if we stand firm, we shall not fail. Wise counsels may accelerate, or mistakes delay it, but, sooner or later, the victory is sure to come.”

Lincoln was exhorting his party  —   “DON’T BE AFRAID TO  BE  REPUBLICANS  —  JUST BE REPUBLICANS AND YOU WILL WIN !”

The critical issues may have changed in the last hundred fifty or so years, but Lincoln’s exhortation still rings true.