[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 38 (Thursday, March 30, 2000)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E457]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




   NATIONAL ENDOWMENT FOR THE HUMANITIES HONORS PRINCETON UNIVERSITY 
                      HISTORIAN JAMES M. McPHERSON

                                 ______
                                 

                              HON. D. HOLT

                             of new jersey

                    in the house of representatives

                       Wednesday, March 29, 2000

  Mr. HOLT. Mr. Speaker, today I recognize Professor James M. 
McPherson, who last night delivered the Twenty-Ninth Annual Jefferson 
Lecture in the Humanities. Professor McPherson's career has combined 
scholarship and public service in a unique manner, and his selection as 
lecturer by the National Endowment of the Humanities was a well-earned 
and long overdue honor.
  Professor McPherson is the George Henry Davis `86 Professor of 
American History at Princeton University, where he has taught for over 
three decades. He has authored a dozen books, among them the Pultizer 
Prize-winning Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era (1988), which is 
widely credited with sparking America's renewed interest in this most 
crucial part of our shared history.
  Professor McPherson has not limited himself to academia, however. He 
has consistently shared his passion for the history of America with a 
wide and varied audience. He served as an advisor for the 1990 Ken 
Burns documentary ``The Civil War,'' which was watched and enjoyed by 
millions of Americans.
  Professor McPherson has also dedicated himself to the preservation of 
Civil War battlefields, serving on the boards of the Civil War Trust 
and the Association for the Preservation of Civil War Sites. He also 
served on the Civil War Sites Advisory Committee created by Congress in 
1991. Finally, he was the president of ``Protect Historic America,'' an 
organization which successfully opposed plans to construct a theme park 
near Manassas battlefield in Virginia.
  Professor McPherson's career has been the model of an engaged 
intellectual, one who can speak to both a scholarly and general 
audience, and who has fought to ensure that others have the opportunity 
to experience for themselves the places which have meant so much to 
him. Professor McPherson is a credit to Princeton University, to 
Central New Jersey, and to the nation, and I hope the House will join 
me in wishing him continued success.

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