[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 41, Number 7 (Monday, February 21, 2005)]
[Pages 233-234]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks at the Performance of ``Lincoln Seen and Heard''

February 11, 2005

    Thank you for that wonderful performance. Laura and I welcome you 
all to the White House.
    I appreciate the members of my Cabinet who are here and former 
members of the Cabinet who are here. I thank Senator Bill Frist for 
joining us as well as Congressman Mel Watt. Thank you both for coming.
    I appreciate Michael Steele, the Lieutenant Governor of the great 
State of Maryland, for joining us. I want to thank Bruce Cole, the 
Chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities. I appreciate 
Brian Lamb joining us today, the president and CEO of C-SPAN.
    I thank the U.S. Lincoln Bicentennial Commission members and the 
Advisory Committee for joining us today. I appreciate all the Lincoln 
scholars and authors who are here.
    I particularly appreciate Sam Waterston and Lynn and Graham for 
joining us as well as Harold Holzer and Edith and Meg. Thank you all for 
coming.
    Sam and Harold have had a good many reviews since they first took 
``Lincoln Seen and Heard'' on the road. Perhaps the most enthusiastic 
review I heard came from two unimpeachable sources, Mother and Dad--
[laughter]--who told how much they enjoyed the performance when they saw 
it in Houston. Tonight we've had the special honor of listening to 
Lincoln's words being read in the very house where so many of them were 
written.
    Harold Holzer has written, coauthored, or edited 23 books on Lincoln 
and the Civil War. He cochairs the U.S. Lincoln Bicentennial Commission 
and in his spare time--[laughter]--works for one of Laura's favorite 
museums, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. He's an avid New 
York Yankee fan who had a miserable year last year. [Laughter] He has 
won many awards for his work, and his latest book is, ``Lincoln at 
Cooper Union.''
    This evening I can let you all in on a secret. Tomorrow it will be 
announced that Allen Guelzo, who is with us tonight, and Harold Holzer 
are this year's first and second place winners of the prestigious 
Lincoln Prize.
    Congratulations.
    Those of you who know Sam Waterston as ``Jack McCoy'' should know 
that America's most famous assistant district attorney has portrayed 
Abraham Lincoln on stage, on television, and so I'm told, even in 
ballet. [Laughter] He didn't dance. [Laughter] But he did narrate a 
special version of Aaron Copland's ``Lincoln Portrait'' while ballet 
dancers performed around him. [Laughter] Sam has said, ``If I have to be 
typecast, I'd like to be typecast as Abraham Lincoln.'' I like a guy who 
aims high. [Laughter]
    In his readings tonight, Sam noted that it was on this very day back 
in 1861 that Abraham Lincoln said goodbye to his home in Springfield, 
Illinois, never to return. Over the next 4 years, from this house, 
Lincoln would endure a bitter civil war that included terrible defeats 
as well as ringing victories; he'd sign the Emancipation Proclamation 
right upstairs; and he would live to see his hopes for peace and unity 
rewarded, before his life was taken at Ford's Theatre on Good Friday, 
1865.
    The Civil War was decided on the battlefield; the larger fight for 
America's soul was waged with Lincoln's words. In his own day, Lincoln 
set himself squarely against a culture that held that some human beings 
were not intended by their Maker for freedom. And as President, he acted 
in the conviction that holding the Union together was the only way to 
hold America true to the founding promise of freedom and equality for 
all. And that is why, in my judgment, he was America's greatest 
President.

[[Page 234]]

    We're familiar with the words of the Gettysburg Address and the 
Second Inaugural, so eloquently read by Sam. And this performance 
reminds us that Lincoln wrote his words to be spoken aloud--to persuade, 
to challenge, and to inspire. Abraham Lincoln was a master of the 
English language, but his true mother tongue was liberty.
    I hope that every American might have the experience we had here 
tonight, to hear Lincoln's words delivered with Lincoln's passion and to 
leave with a greater appreciation for what these words of freedom mean 
in our own time.
    Thank you all again. Please join us at the reception. And may God 
continue to bless our great land.

Note: The President spoke at 5:58 p.m. in the East Room at the White 
House. In his remarks, he referred to Sam Waterston, actor on NBC's 
television series ``Law & Order,'' his wife, Lynn Waterston, and their 
son Graham Waterston; Harold Holzer, cochair, Abraham Lincoln 
Bicentennial Commission, his wife, Edith Holzer, and their daughter Meg 
Holzer; and author Allen C. Guelzo. This item was not received in time 
for publication in the appropriate issue.