On Memorial Day I spent the morning working in my office. Before returning home for lunch, I stopped to visit the grave of my son. The cemetery was beautiful with American flags marking the graves of the veterans. It brought to mind these lines from Thornton Wilder’s Our Town:
“Over there are some Civil War veterans. Iron flags on their graves…New Hampshire boys… had a notion that the Union ought to be kept together, though they’d never seen more than fifty miles of it themselves. All they knew was the name, friends – the United States of America. The United States of America. And they went and died about it.”
Appropriate for the day after Memorial Day. Starting with the good press that soldiers generally receive in the New Testament, Bishop Sheen in 1954 celebrated the good qualities that typify many of the members of the profession of arms.
It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
Abraham Lincoln
I have always loved Memorial Day. A simple holiday, it unofficially marks the beginning of Summer in the US. Fun and frolic marks the long weekend. In many places school has ended or will be ending, and families are getting into vacation mode. In my lifetime I have always been able to enjoy the holiday in peace and freedom, and that is due to the men the holiday honors.
Our war dead, stretching from the Revolution to the most recent skirmishes in Afghanistan and Iraq, I wonder what they make of all this. Varying reactions no doubt, as varied as the men who died in our wars. I assume that most of them wouldn’t begrudge people having fun, or gathering with their families. During their lives almost all them liked having fun and loved their families. Parting from loved ones is always a terrible burden on anyone who has gone to war, and today we remember those who never came back to their families. Thus I assume that the fun aspect of the weekend would not offend most of them, but rather please them. However, Memorial Day is so much more than that.
The pain of a family, especially parents and spouses, who lose someone in a war is an agony that only time can dim but can never end. Those of us who have fortunately not suffered such a loss can only imagine the grief and pain. The least we can do for those families, and for their dead, is what I call the Memorial Day Pledge, taken from the last sentence of Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address:
It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
Never should our war dead die in vain. Never should our troops be asked to make the ultimate sacrifice unless the nation is ready to win the conflict they are fighting in. Never again should politicians play with war, cheering it at the beginning and then quickly running for cover when the going gets tough. If the nation is unwilling to fight to win, no matter the cost, then it is better not to get involved in a conflict. Anything less is a betrayal of every man who dies in battle.
Of course the circumstances of the war in which they fell in no way takes away from either the valor of our war dead or the value of their sacrifice. We owe them and all our war dead a debt we can never repay. Living Lincoln’s words each day is the best remembrance we can have for the men who died to ensure that we remained free and safe here at home.
Go, tell the Spartans, stranger passing by
That here, obedient to their laws, we lie.
Ernst Janning: Judge Haywood… the reason I asked you to come: Those people, those millions of people… I never knew it would come to that. You must believe it, You must believe it!
Judge Dan Haywood: Herr Janning, it “came to that” the first time you sentenced a man to death you knew to be innocent.
Judgment at Nuremberg, (1961)
Judgment at Nuremberg (1961), loosely based on the trial of German jurists after World War II, is a powerful film. Burt Lancaster, an actor of the first calibre, gives the performance of his career as Ernst Janning. The early portion of the movie makes clear that Ernst Janning is in many ways a good man. Before the Nazis came to power Janning was a world respected German jurist. After the Nazis came to power evidence is brought forward by his defense counsel that Janning attempted to help people persecuted by the Nazis, and that he even personally insulted Hitler on one occasion. Janning obviously despises the Nazis and the other judges who are on trial with him. At his trial he refuses to say a word in his defense. He only testifies after being appalled by the tactics of his defense counsel. His magnificent and unsparing testimony convicts him and all the other Germans who were good men and women, who knew better, and who failed to speak out or to act against the Nazis. Janning’s testimony tells us that sins of omission can be as damning as sins of commission. When he reveals that he sentenced a man to death he knew to be innocent because of pressure from the Nazi government, we can only agree with his bleak assessment that he reduced his life to excrement. Yet we have to respect Janning. It is a rare man who can so publicly take responsibility for his own evil acts.
Yet even this respect is taken away from Janning in the final scene of the film where he attempts to justify himself to Judge Haywood, superbly portrayed by Spencer Tracy, by saying that he never believed that it would all come to the millions of dead in the concentration camps. Judge Haywood delivers his verdict on this attempt by Janning to save some shred of self-respect: “Herr Janning, it came to that the first time you sentenced a man to death you knew to be innocent.”(more…)
Perhaps the greatest American character actor of his time, Powers Boothe passed away in his sleep at age 68 on Pentecost this year. An anomaly in Hollywood, he was married to his one and only wife since 1969 and he was a Republican. He could play anything: from insane villains like Jim Jones to heroes like Lieutenant Colonel Andrew Tanner in Red Dawn (1984). Like most great actors and actresses he made it look easy. The son of a Texas sharecropper, Boothe had a down to earth quality he brought to most roles he was playing. I will miss him.
On Memorial Day in 2017 I spent the morning working in my office. Before returning home for lunch, I stopped to visit the grave of my son. Mount Olivet cemetery was beautiful with American flags marking the graves of the veterans. It brought to mind these lines from Thornton Wilder’s Our Town:
“Over there are some Civil War veterans. Iron flags on their graves…New Hampshire boys… had a notion that the Union ought to be kept together, though they’d never seen more than fifty miles of it themselves. All they knew was the name, friends – the United States of America. The United States of America. And they went and died about it.”
President Wilson realized it would be many months before the US ground forces could be trained, equipped and shipped across the Atlantic in numbers sufficient to make a difference on the battlefields of France. However, he also knew that Allied, and American, morale would soar with the news that the Americans had landed in France, no matter how many they were. Thus on May 19, 1917 Wilson ordered that the First Expeditionary Division be formed, and that units of the Division sail to France as soon as possible. Thus was born the First Infantry Division, the Big Red One. By the end of the War the Division would incur casualties of 4,964 killed in action, 17,201 wounded in action, and 1,056 missing or died of wounds. It would be the first Division to cross the Rhine into occupied Germany. Five soldiers of the Division earned Medals of Honor during the War, out of a total of 92 earned by the Army. The Big Red One has been in continuous service with the Army since its creation in 1917. (more…)
Something for the weekend. Nearer, My God, to Thee, sung by Mahalia Jackson. Written in 1841 by Sarah Fuller Flower Adams, it retells the story of Jacob’s Dream. A hymn of surpassing power in time of grief and loss, it was played by Confederate bands after Pickett’s Charge, and was sounded while the Rough Riders buried their dead. Its title was the last words said by a dying President McKinley and the band on the Titanic ended their heroic service by playing the hymn as the ship sank beneath the waves. (more…)
[53] For this corruptible must put on incorruption; and this mortal must put on immortality. [54] And when this mortal hath put on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written: Death is swallowed up in victory. [55] O death, where is thy victory? O death, where is thy sting?
The first draft imposed since the Civil War, the Selective Service Act of 1917, passed by overwhelming majorities in Congress, was signed by President Wilson a century ago. The Act provided for the enlistment, at the discretion of the President, of the four volunteer divisions that Theodore Roosevelt planned to lead. Go here to read about this provision. Wilson, alarmed that Roosevelt would either be killed in France and he would be blamed, or that he would come back a national hero and be swept into the Presidency in 1920, would refuse to ever authorize the four volunteer divisions. By the end of the War some 2 million Americans volunteered for service and some 2.8 million were drafted.
Individuals who belonged to religions or organizations opposed to War were exempted from combatant service but not from noncombatant service. Members of the clergy were exempted from conscription as were seminarians. (more…)
Donald R. McClarey
Paul Zummo
Almost Chosen People 