In his speech Thursday evening, President Donald Trump claimed “the fake news,” at the time, criticized Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg address.
“You know when Abraham Lincoln made that Gettysburg Address speech, the great speech, you know he was ridiculed?” Trump claimed. “And he was excoriated by the fake news. They had fake news then. They said it was a terrible, terrible speech.”
He continued by suggesting that a similar phenomenon was taking place now, musing that in the same way Lincoln’s address was revered years later, “I have a feeling that’s going to happen with us. In different ways, that’s going to happen with us.”
The following morning, Huffington Post criticized Trump’s remark in a piece largely comprised of tweets mocking the president. “Donald Trump Gets Torched On Twitter Over Abraham Lincoln Comparison” the headline ran.
(TWS Fact Check must interject, If It’s ‘News’ on Twitter, Is It ‘News’ Everywhere Else?)
Some of these tweets suggested that Trump was incorrect about Lincoln’s speech being “ridiculed” by the press.
Wow Trump just said that the “Fake News” in 1863 “excoriated” Lincoln for the Gettysburg Address. Here’s the write-up in the (already failing) New York Times, November 21, 1863. pic.twitter.com/7BYwX7dLuw
— Nicholas Guyatt (@NicholasGuyatt) September 7, 2018
Leaving the Trump/Lincoln comparisons aside, was Lincoln’s Gettysburg address “ridiculed” and “excoriated” by the contemporary press?
As the Cornell University library notes, “reaction to Lincoln’s address was frequently divided along political lines.” The Chicago Times criticized the speech, suggesting that “the cheeks of every American must tingle with shame as he reads the silly, flat, and dishwatery utterances.” (TWS Fact Check is not sure how one’s cheeks “tingle with shame”—but it was a different time then, for cheeks.)
Meanwhile, the Chicago Tribune praised the speech and correctly predicted its long-lived approval: “The dedicatory remarks by President Lincoln will live among the annals of man.”
Some Twitter users suggested that the New York Times gave a positive review of the speech. But, it would be more accurate to state that the Times simply reported how it was delivered:
The sentence prior to this section in the Times’ report does note that the opening prayer by Reverend Stockton “was touching and beautiful.” It’s difficult to suggest that the immediate reporting from the Times “was quite favorable” as one tweet suggested (which received several thousand retweets and “favorites”).
Lincoln was asked to rewrite a copy of the speech to raise funds for soldiers, which he obliged, pointing to its popularity in later years.
Leaving aside the comparison of Trump to Lincoln, it is fair to say that the Gettysburg address was criticized by newspapers (aka “Fake News”) at the time. However, it was also praised by contemporary newspapers, a fact not mentioned by the president.
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