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Barry Schwartz, a sociologist who has examined America's
cultural memory, states that in the 1930s and 1940s, the memory of Abraham Lincoln was practically
sacred and provided the nation with "a moral symbol inspiring and guiding American life." During the
Great Depression, he says, Lincoln served "as a means for seeing the world's disappointments, for making its sufferings not so much explicable as meaningful."
Franklin D. Roosevelt, preparing America for
World War II, used the words of the
American Civil War-era president to clarify the threat posed by
Nazi Germany and the
Empire of Japan. Americans asked, "What would Lincoln do?"[2] However, he also finds that since World War II, Lincoln's symbolic power has lost
relevance, and this "fading
hero is symptomatic of fading confidence in national greatness."[3] He suggested that
postmodernism and
multiculturalism have diluted greatness as a concept.[citation needed]
While Lincoln remains in the very top tier of the
historical rankings of presidents of the United States, all of the presidents have slipped in historical prestige in the public's mind. Schwartz said that the reason is what he calls the "acids of equality": as the
culture of the United States became more
diverse,
egalitarian, and multicultural, it also suffered a "deterioration and coarsening of traditional symbols and practices."[4]
The oldest continuously operating association in the United States honoring Lincoln is the Lincoln Association of Jersey City in
Jersey City, New Jersey, which was formed in 1865 shortly after
Lincoln's assassination. The association has held a banquet in Jersey City every year on Lincoln's birthday, February 12. The association has been addressed by a number of people of national importance, including political figures, military veterans, educators and civil rights leaders. The association celebrated its 150th anniversary on February 12, 2015, which included the laying of a wreath at the entrance to Jersey City's Lincoln Park. The association's annual dinner featured speaker
Todd Brewster, author of Lincoln's Gamble, about the struggle to create the
Emancipation Proclamation.[6]
Memorials
The memorials include the name of the
capital of Nebraska (1867). The first public monument to Abraham Lincoln, after his death, was a statue erected in front of the
District of Columbia City Hall in 1868, three years after
his assassination.[7]
In 1876, on the anniversary of his death, a memorial, paid for by emancipated citizens to honor the Great Emancipator, the
Freedmen's Memorial was dedicated in
Lincoln Park, Washington, D.C. Present for the dedication were President
Ulysses S. Grant, cabinet members, and representatives of both the Supreme Court and Congress.
Frederick Douglass gave the dedication speech.[8]
The first national memorial to Abraham Lincoln was the historic
Lincoln Highway, the first road for the automobile across the United States of America, which was dedicated in 1913, predating the 1921 dedication of the
Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., by nine years.
On the night of November 7, 1876, a group of counterfeiters entered Lincoln's tomb with the intent of absconding with his mortal remains and holding them for ransom in order to secure the release of their leader, Benjamin Boyd, an imprisoned engraver of counterfeit currency plates. The group entered his tomb, but had only succeeded in partially dislodging its marble lid before a US Secret Service agent who had infiltrated their number alerted law enforcement authorities. Although several escaped, most served a one-year prison term. For much of the next decade (c. 1876 – 1887), Lincoln's tomb was mobile, to avoid further unwanted disinterment.[20]
Statue burning
On August 16, 2017, a bust of
Abraham Lincoln in a park in
West Englewood, Chicago was spray-painted black and later covered in tar and set on fire.[21][22][23]
The bust restoration was finished in 2018, it was then moved to the Chicago Public Library.[24]
To date, more than 50 nations around the world have issued postage bearing his image.[27]
Lincoln was one of five people to be depicted on United States paper currency (federal issue) during their lifetime (along with
Salmon P. Chase,
Francis E. Spinner,
Spencer M. Clark, and
Winfield Scott). He has been featured on several denominations ($1, $5, $10, $20, $100, and $500) across different issues (e.g., Demand Notes, Legal Tender, Gold Certificates, Silver Certificates, etc.) since the first federally issued U.S. Bank Note in 1861.[28] In addition to the modern
United States five-dollar bill, currency honoring the president includes the
Lincoln cent, which represents the first regularly circulating U.S. coin to feature an actual person's image.[29]
Lincoln's image on the five-dollar bill was used by
Salvador Dalí to help commemorate the
U.S. Bicentennial with his creation of "Gala looking at the Mediterranean Sea which at a distance of 20 meters is transformed into the portrait of Abraham Lincoln (Homage to
Rothko)" and
Lincoln in Dalivision, the earlier of which was displayed at
The Guggenheim in New York during the 1976 Bicentennial.[30]
International
The first statue of Lincoln outside the United States was erected in
Edinburgh,
Scotland in 1893. The work of
George Edwin Bissell, it stands on a memorial to Scots immigrants who enlisted with the Union during the Civil War, the only memorial to the war erected outside the United States. A second statue by
George Grey Barnard was erected in
Manchester,
England in 1919. Nowadays situated in
Lincoln Square west of
Manchester Town Hall, the statue commemorates the impact the
American Civil War had on the cotton cloth-producing region of
Manchester and
Lancashire.[31] A large statue of
Lincoln standing by Saint Gaudens was unveiled near
Westminster Abbey in
London, on July 28, 1920, in an elaborate ceremony. The principal addresses were delivered in
Central Hall, Westminster.[32] In 1964, United States President
Lyndon Johnson presented a Saint Gaudens to the people of Mexico, which is displayed in
Mexico City's Parque Lincoln.[33] Also in Mexico, a monument in
Tijuana was unveiled in 1981 while a reciprocal statue of Lincoln's contemporary and friend President
Benito Juarez was unveiled in neighboring
San Diego.[34]
Birthday
Abraham Lincoln's birthday, February 12, was never a national holiday, but it was at one time observed by as many as 30 states.[1] In 1971,
Presidents Day became a national holiday, combining Lincoln's and Washington's birthdays and replacing most states' celebration of his birthday.[35] The
Abraham Lincoln Association was formed in 1908 to commemorate the centennial of Lincoln's birth.[36] In 2000, Congress established the
Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission to commemorate his 200th birthday in February 2009.[37]
^William W. Cummings, and James B. Hatcher Scott Specialized Catalogue of United States Stamps (1982) p. 284.
^Kenmore Stamp Company <
https://www.kenmorestamp.com/united-states>; Jones, William A., & James Kloetzel, editors, Scott Specialized Catalogue of United States Stamps and Covers (Scott Publishing Company, 2010); Abraham Lincoln Famous People Postal Stamps <
https://www.ebay.com/b/Abraham-Lincoln-Famous-People-Postal-Stamps/68096/bn_27135833?rt=nc> (Retrieved June 1, 2020). Perhaps because he had a Countries with Lincoln himself pictured on stamps (not including the Lincoln Memorial or the cabin of his birth) have been: Aden, Agman, Antiqua, Argentina, Beguia, Cameroon, Canouan, Central Africa, Cameroun, Chad, China, Columbia, Congo, Cuba, Dominica, Fujairah, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Grenada, Grenadines, Guatemala, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Guyana, Haiti, Honduras, India, Indonesia, Kathiri, Lesotho, Liberia, Maldives, Mali, Manama Michel, Marshall Islands, Mauritania, Micronesia, Monaco, Mozambique, Nevis, Nicaragua, Niger, Palau, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, Rwanda, San Marino, Scotland, Sharjah, Sierra Leone, Solomon Islands, St. Thomas, St. Vincent, Surinam, Taiwan, Tanzania, Togo, Tuvalu, Uganda, Venezuela, Union Island.
^Twenty-Sixth Annual Report of the American Scenic and Historic Preservation Society, 1921 (Albany, NY: J. B. Lyon Company Printers, 1922), pp. 194–95.
Dennis, Matthew. Red, White, and Blue Letter Days: an American Calendar (2002).
Gallagher, Gary. Causes Won, Lost, and Forgotten: How Hollywood and Popular Art Shape What We Know About the Civil War (2008)
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Neely, Mark. The Abraham Lincoln Encyclopedia (1984)
Peterson, Merrill D. Lincoln in American Memory (1994), an encyclopedic catalogue of viewpoints
Sandage, Scott A. "A Marble House Divided: The Lincoln Memorial, the Civil Rights Movement, and the Politics of Memory, 1939–1963," Journal of American History Vol. 80, No. 1 (Jun., 1993), pp. 135–167
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Schuman, Howard; Corning, Amy; Schwartz, Barry. "Framing Variations and Collective Memory," Social Science History (2012) 36#4 pp 451–472.
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