The President’s Office held a public commemoration yesterday afternoon in honor of the 150th anniversary of Lincoln’s death.
Dean of the Van Andel Graduate School of Statesmanship and Professor of Politics Ronald Pestritto addressed the crowd while standing next to the bronze Lincoln statue. His speech focused on the fallen president’s principled legacy for conservatives and America.
Graduate student Zachary Reynolds introduced Pestritto to the crowd, which consisted of students and politics professors. Special guests from Hillsdale’s graduating class of 1965, celebrating their reunion as well as Lincoln’s life, were also present. Pestritto took the podium to remember a legacy that is often debated but always remembered.
“I hope that today’s commemoration will be an opportunity for us — if we worry that America has lost its way — to do what Lincoln always urged: to return to the principles of the Revolution,” Pestritto said. “To do what we can to emulate the example of his statesmanship by bringing this principle to bear in the great questions of our time.”
Lincoln’s principles are highly debated on Hillsdale’s campus, and many students have formulated their own arguments and defenses for the 16th president. Pestritto addressed the crowd, saying that this was one of the reasons why we remember such a “controversial figure.”
“The contested status of Lincoln’s legacy is at the heart of debates among conservatives about the American political tradition,” Pestritto said. “Conservatives agree that there is something worth conserving in that tradition — that we have lost it, and must get it back; but we disagree, often fundamentally, about what that thing is.”
Pestritto continued to discuss the issue of many liberals claiming Lincoln as their own for his progressive ideals, while many conservatives argue against him.
“We have the claim that Lincoln was the first progressive,” Pestritto explained. “Even though, in fact, he was probably the greatest advocate in American history for the very principles which progressives urge us to turn our back on.”
The speech was concluded with a performance of “The Battle Hymn of The Republic,” sung by members of the Hillsdale College Chamber Choir and conducted by Professor of Music James Holleman.
“Lincoln said in his Lyceum address that the ideals of freedom must be protected, and that we need to whisper the principles of the Constitution to our children,” Reynolds said. “Today we commemorate the man who understood what made this nation great.”
