Abraham Lincoln

September 22. Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln was not only a statesman, a lawyer, and the 16th President of the United States. As a young man, he was also a star wrestler and not above talking some smack in the ring. In about 300 matches, he was defeated only once. And after one of his winning matches, he challenged the spectators. 

He yelled, “I’m the big buck of this lick. If any of you want to try it, come on and whet your horns.” Nobody came. And Lincoln received an “Outstanding American” award in the National Wrestling Hall of Fame. 

Lincoln’s adult life is full of achievement. He led the country through the Civil War, promoted national healing, and on this date in 1862, President Lincoln signed the first order to end slavery in the United States—the Emancipation Proclamation. 

Restore the individual, and be merciful, as God is merciful. 

It was a couple of years before the end of the Civil War, and one after another, a parade of people visited President Lincoln. Some wanted their spying relatives saved from execution; some just wanted a day pass to visit a husband in jail. Lincoln listened to them all. 

On September 7, 1863, a young Mrs. Thomas Theophilus Brown came to see the president. With a young baby in her arms, she had traveled all the way from Alexandria, Virginia, in Confederate Territory. She had already been to the War Department looking for help for her husband and his brother, but nobody would help her. 

Mrs. Brown begged to be allowed to tell her story. And Lincoln obliged. The young woman should have all the time she needed. 

She told how her husband and his brother had been at the Battle of Gettysburg, and they had been arrested as spies and imprisoned in the Old Capitol Prison. They had been locked in there for weeks, and now people were saying the men were going to be shot. Mrs. Brown couldn’t hold back the tears. 

She explained that they had never been on the side of the Confederate Army, had always been loyal to the country, but had been drafted and forced to fight. Lincoln must realize her men were no spies, and she hoped he could somehow save them. 

The whole time she talked, the baby girl Mrs. Brown held had been watching the president and smiling and burbling. 

Enjoying the tender moment, Lincoln held the baby and brought her close and embraced her. 

The baby cooed, “Papa.” 

The President laughed and placed the baby back into Mrs. Brown’s arms. For a moment, he was silent and paced back and forth several times. Finally, he stopped and wrote something on a slip of paper. “Mrs. Brown, you are a brave little woman,” he said warmly and handed the piece of paper to her. 

She glanced at the paper and saw it was a letter for the prison. In it, Lincoln had written that “This lady says that … they were conscripted into the rebel army, and were never for the rebel cause, and they are now willing to do anything reasonable to be at liberty. This may be true, and if true, they should be liberated. Please take hold of the case, and do what may seem proper in it.” 

Within three days, the men had taken the Oath of Union Allegiance, and Thomas Theophilus Brown and his brother walked out of the Old Capitol Prison. Mrs. Brown “kissed her ragged, shaggy husband, trembling with fever and nerves, his feet torn and scarred.” She took them back to Alexandria and nursed the men back to health before she told her husband about the tall man his daughter had called “Papa” in the White House. 

Carl Sandburg wrote, “With the North squeezing the South toward its last loaf of bread and final bullet, Lincoln looked to the day when it would be an advantage to have a political record free from vengeance.” 

“Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due, when it is in your power to act” (Proverbs 3:27 NIV). 

Mercy is a choice. Choose to extend it today. Restore the individual, and be merciful, as God is merciful.