Last time in these pages, I wrote about the sharp division within George Washington’s Presidential administration, that between Alexander Hamilton, founder of the Federalist Party, and Thomas Jefferson, founder of the Democratic-Republican Party. 

     That division between the two parties accelerated throughout the 1790’s.

     In the election of 1796, John Adams won the presidency with 71 electoral votes to Thomas Jefferson’s 68 votes. Per the Constitution then, the one with the most votes would serve as President, and the one with the second most votes would serve as Vice-President. 

     It was an unpleasant situation, Adams as President and Jefferson as Vice-President. In their respective newspapers, the two parties pummeled each other and fell into vicious name calling.

     Newspaper editors who favored the Jeffersonians called John Adams “a hideous character, who has neither the force and firmness of a man nor the gentleness and sensibility of a woman.” The same editors labeled Adams “a fool, a hypocrite, and a tyrant.”

     Editors who supported Adams called Jefferson “a mean-spirited, low-lived fellow, a weakling, an atheist, and a libertine.” In addition, they called into question Jefferson’s English parentage.

     A certain Federalist was convinced that Jefferson intended to “unleash the terrible evils of democracy,” allowing the unwashed masses to seek office in the Federal government. Another Federalist said that “when the pot boils, the scum will rise.”

     In early 1798, Matthew Lyon, a fierce anti-Federalist and a Congressman from Vermont, drifted into a war of words, trading back and forth put-downs, with Roger Griswold, a volatile Democratic-Republican, also a Congressman, but from Connecticut. 

     On January 31, Lyon propelled tobacco juice into Griswold’s eyes.     

     Two weeks later, on February 15, Griswold “walked up to Lyon’s desk and hit him about the head and shoulders with a hickory walking stick. Lyon grabbed a pair of fireplace iron tongs and beat Griswold back. The two men dropped their weapons and threw fists at each other.”

     Because the Federalists had the votes in Congress, they passed four laws that summer. 

     On June 18, 1798, Congress passed the Naturalization Act, that extended the residency requirement for immigrants from five to fourteen years before they could attain citizenship.

     On June 25, Congress passed the Alien Friends Act, that authorized the President to deport any non-citizen deemed dangerous to the peace and safety of the U.S.

     On July 6, Congress passed the Alien Enemies Act, that authorized the President to detain or deport immigrants from a hostile nation during wartime. 

     On July 14, Congress passed the Sedition Act, that made criminal any “false, scandalous, or malicious writing against the government,” in pamphlets or newspapers.

     Jefferson and his fellow Democratic-Republicans were aghast. They perceived those four laws as a political attack upon their party. The four laws raised questions about the proper balance between the two parties, and the limits of free speech and a free press. 

     The Alien Friends Act and the Sedition Act both expired in 1800, and Congress repealed the Naturalization Act in 1802. The Alien Enemies Act (AEA) though is still the law of the land.

     Presidents have used it four times: the War of 1812, World War I, and World War II. The AEA was used to intern in camps certain Japanese, German, and Italian people during World War II.

     Last March, Donald Trump attempted to use the 1798 AEA to “justify deporting Venezuelans to El Salvador, that they were members of a Venezuelan gang that had infiltrated the U.S.”

     In the election of 1800, Thomas Jefferson received 73 votes, the same as Aaron Burr. A vote in Congress made Jefferson President and Burr Vice-President. The Federalists were swept out.    

Last time in these pages, I wrote about the sharp division within George Washington’s Presidential administration, that between Alexander Hamilton, founder of the Federalist Party, and Thomas Jefferson, founder of the Democratic-Republican Party. 

     That division between the two parties accelerated throughout the 1790’s.

     In the election of 1796, John Adams won the presidency with 71 electoral votes to Thomas Jefferson’s 68 votes. Per the Constitution then, the one with the most votes would serve as President, and the one with the second most votes would serve as Vice-President. 

     It was an unpleasant situation, Adams as President and Jefferson as Vice-President. In their respective newspapers, the two parties pummeled each other and fell into vicious name calling.

     Newspaper editors who favored the Jeffersonians called John Adams “a hideous character, who has neither the force and firmness of a man nor the gentleness and sensibility of a woman.” The same editors labeled Adams “a fool, a hypocrite, and a tyrant.”

     Editors who supported Adams called Jefferson “a mean-spirited, low-lived fellow, a weakling, an atheist, and a libertine.” In addition, they called into question Jefferson’s English parentage.

     A certain Federalist was convinced that Jefferson intended to “unleash the terrible evils of democracy,” allowing the unwashed masses to seek office in the Federal government. Another Federalist said that “when the pot boils, the scum will rise.”

     In early 1798, Matthew Lyon, a fierce anti-Federalist and a Congressman from Vermont, drifted into a war of words, trading back and forth put-downs, with Roger Griswold, a volatile Democratic-Republican, also a Congressman, but from Connecticut. 

     On January 31, Lyon propelled tobacco juice into Griswold’s eyes.     

     Two weeks later, on February 15, Griswold “walked up to Lyon’s desk and hit him about the head and shoulders with a hickory walking stick. Lyon grabbed a pair of fireplace iron tongs and beat Griswold back. The two men dropped their weapons and threw fists at each other.”

     Because the Federalists had the votes in Congress, they passed four laws that summer. 

     On June 18, 1798, Congress passed the Naturalization Act, that extended the residency requirement for immigrants from five to fourteen years before they could attain citizenship.

     On June 25, Congress passed the Alien Friends Act, that authorized the President to deport any non-citizen deemed dangerous to the peace and safety of the U.S.

     On July 6, Congress passed the Alien Enemies Act, that authorized the President to detain or deport immigrants from a hostile nation during wartime. 

     On July 14, Congress passed the Sedition Act, that made criminal any “false, scandalous, or malicious writing against the government,” in pamphlets or newspapers.

     Jefferson and his fellow Democratic-Republicans were aghast. They perceived those four laws as a political attack upon their party. The four laws raised questions about the proper balance between the two parties, and the limits of free speech and a free press. 

     The Alien Friends Act and the Sedition Act both expired in 1800, and Congress repealed the Naturalization Act in 1802. The Alien Enemies Act (AEA) though is still the law of the land.

     Presidents have used it four times: the War of 1812, World War I, and World War II. The AEA was used to intern in camps certain Japanese, German, and Italian people during World War II.

     Last March, Donald Trump attempted to use the 1798 AEA to “justify deporting Venezuelans to El Salvador, that they were members of a Venezuelan gang that had infiltrated the U.S.”

     In the election of 1800, Thomas Jefferson received 73 votes, the same as Aaron Burr. A vote in Congress made Jefferson President and Burr Vice-President. The Federalists were swept out.    

Nine months after World War II began, the German Nazi war machine drove French, British, and Belgian troops west across France into a town on the English Channel’s coast, called Dunkirk. By late May of 1940, the German army controlled almost all of France.

     Those 338,000 Allied soldiers were pinned to the coast at Dunkirk. Their backs to the English Channel, they faced certain annihilation should the German army attack a final time.

     Britain’s Prime Minister Winston Churchill said that, “The whole root and core and brain of the British Army . . . seemed about to perish upon the field or to be led into an ignominious and starving captivity.”

     With this catastrophic situation unfolding, British, Belgian, Dutch, Canadian, Polish, and French navies brought into play a host of warships to ferry stranded soldiers from France to England, a distance of forty-four miles between Dunkirk in France, and Dover in England.

     In addition, the British government requested private owners of small vessels to sail or motor across the English Channel multiple times and assist in the evacuation. 

     “Because of shortages of military personnel, civilian crews manned the ‘little ships at Dunkirk,’” and “The most useful were the motor lifeboats which had good capacity and speed.”

     Code named Operation Dynamo, it proved successful. Between May 27 and June 4, 1940, 338,226 troops crossed the English Channel and landed at Dover.

     On June 4, Winston Churchill spoke to the House of Commons, and called the Dunkirk evacuation a miracle, yet he warned, “Wars are not won by evacuation.” He also spoke of what he feared most: “We are told that Herr Hitler has a plan for invading the British Isles.”

     Churchill then spoke of the “originality of malice, the ingenuity of aggression, which our enemy displays, and that we may prepare ourselves for every kind of novel stratagem.” 

     Yet, Churchill refused to succumb to despair. Instead, he said that he and England will fight.

     Even though many of Europe’s governments “have fallen or may fall into the grip of the Gestapo and all the odious apparatus of Nazi rule, we shall not flag or fail. We shall go on to the end, we shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans.

     “We shall defend our Island, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender.”

     Four years passed. On Tuesday morning, June 6, 1944, D-Day, the Allies—British, American, and other armies—began Operation Overlord, the Battle of Normandy for the liberation of Nazi-occupied Western Europe.

     Normandy lies south of Dunkirk, some 250 miles distant.

     Led by the American general Dwight D. Eisenhower, D-Day was the largest amphibious invasion in military history. It landed 156,000 troops on Normandy’s beaches the first day. 

     By late August, three months later, a little over 2,000,000 Allied troops were poised to march across Europe toward Berlin to crush “the Gestapo, and all the odious apparatus of Nazi rule.”

     Citizens across Europe and America celebrated Victory in Europe Day on May 8, 1945, eleven months after D-Day. Hitler was gone, and men and women whom he had shoehorned into concentration camps burst into tears of joy.

     Shakespeare wrote, “The smallest worm will turn, being trodden on,” meaning that over time a worm will tact in different directions. Power structures too will shift, dependent upon force of will, ideology, resources, skill, and strategy. All worms turn, especially when stepped on.

On June 28, 1863, Robert E. Lee, Confederate General, dared to cross the border and invade Pennsylvania, a Union state. Lee hoped to force Lincoln into negotiations to end the war.

     Lincoln felt dismayed. He understood that Union troops must repel Lee’s advance.

     On the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd of July, a horrific battle unfolded, involving tens of thousands of troops that fought, clawed, and struggled at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. Neither side defeated the other, but Union troops withstood Pickett’s charge up to Cemetery Ridge on the last day. 

     Lee was forced to withdraw, to head south. For a week after, Lincoln urged the Union General, George Meade, to attack Lee a fourth day, who was trapped because of a flooded Potomac River, but because Meade refused, the war drug on for almost two more years.

     What to do with the dead? The historian Garry Wills wrote in his account, “Lincoln at Gettysburg: The Words That Remade America,” “Gettysburg, a town of only 2,500 inhabitants, was one make-shift burial ground, fetid and steaming.”

     At least 5000 dead and rotting horses and mules lay in and around the town, plus 7058 dead human beings: 3155 Union soldiers and 3903 Confederate soldiers.   

     Fire consumed the horses, but the dead soldiers were covered with a thin blanket of earth. Upright boards standing beside each mound identified the names of each Union body.

    A prominent Gettysburg resident named David Wills formed an interstate commission to collect funds to purchase seventeen acres of land near Gettysburg for a cemetery, to find and hire an architect to design a cemetery there, and to hire a team to rebury the dead into that cemetery.

     Wills hired an architect named William Saunders, who designed a cemetery composed of a series of semicircles that ascended an incline, so that each plot was neither greater or lesser in value to any other plot. The work of reburying the dead into that new cemetery began. 

     By the fall of 1863, officials of the interstate commission began to form plans for a dedication ceremony. Wills extended offers to others, but it was the renowned orator Edward Everett who agreed to speak. President Abraham Lincoln agreed to say a few Dedicatory Remarks.  

     On Thursday, November 19, 1863, Edward Everett spoke for two hours, Lincoln for two minutes. Lincoln said only 272 words, divided into ten sentences and three paragraphs.

     The seventh sentence resonates still today. “The world will little note nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here.”

     Consider how Lincoln contrasted two words, “say” and “did.” He and his fellow officials can “say” a massive number of words at a dedication ceremony, but it is what the Northern soldiers “did” that is of greater importance. They “gave their lives that that nation might live.”

    Consider also in that sentence how Lincoln introduces memory into his text, when he contrasts the word “remember” to “forget.”

     The word “note” refers to jotting words onto paper, so as to not forget, but to remember.

     Lincoln concluded his Remarks. “[W]e here highly resolve that the dead shall, under God, have a new birth of freedom, and that the government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall not perish from the earth.”

     Memorial Day approaches. We cannot forget. We remember. We have our notes. We reflect upon our hard-fought-for freedoms that Lincoln insisted “shall not perish from the earth.”