A vote for justice

I have not seen Spielberg's movie Lincoln yet, but it is on my holiday schedule.  From the moment years ago when I read Lincoln's second inaugural address, I have been taken with Lincoln's humble understanding of what it means to 'stand before God.'  At a critical moment in our history as a nation founded on democratic principles, Lincoln pressed forward with what he thought was right and just and issued the Emancipation Proclamation. 

Yet he never discounted the political realities of his day.  I quote from Michael Gerson's column of 11/27.  It was necessary for Lincoln to "divide moral sympathies from ...pragmatic judgments."  This was Lincoln's burden, for "while justice is not defined by the majority, it can't be pursued without support from the majority." 

Lincoln is a towering figure in our history and a study of a man who felt called by God to stand in the breech when chaos reigned around him.  It is helpful, however, to remember that the constitutional changes which finally acknowledged what God had known all along, that no person can rightfully be owned by another, took the combined effort of many totally forgotten men who sat in Congress. The "dramatic culmination of the movie is a roll call - a list of forgotten legislators whose hesitant, conflicted choices were as important as the outcome of the battle."  It was these little known and even less remembered individuals who changed the course of our history.

So, my friends, it is good for us to remember that the little things we do for the sake of justice may never bring us fame, but when counted with the other anonymous acts of justice can move nations.