葛底斯堡战役后，决定为死难烈士举行盛大葬礼。掩葬委员会发给总统一张普通的请帖，他们以为他是不会来的，但林肯答应了。既然总统来，那一定要讲演的，但他们已经请了著名演说家艾佛瑞特来做这件事，因此，他们又给林肯写了信，说在艾佛瑞特演说完毕之后，他们希望他"随便讲几句适当的话"。这是一个侮辱，但林肯平静地接受了。两星期内，他在穿衣、刮脸、吃点心时也想着怎样演说。演说稿改了两三次，他仍不满意。到了葬礼的前一天晚上，还在做最后的修改，然后半夜找到他的同僚高声朗诵。走进会场时，他骑在马上仍把头低到胸前默想着演说辞。
那位艾佛瑞特讲演了两个多小时，将近结束时，林肯不安地掏出旧式眼镜，又一次看他的讲稿。他的演说开始了，一位记者支上三角架准备拍摄照片，等一切就绪的时候，林肯已走下讲台。这段时间只有两分钟，而掌声却持续了10分钟。后人给以极高评价的那份演说辞，在今天译成中文，也不过400字。
delivered on the 19th day of november, 1863
cemetery hill, gettysburg, pennsylvania
fourscore and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. now, we are engaged in a great civil war,testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. we are met on a great battlefield of that war. we have come to dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting-place for those who gave their lives that nation might live. it is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
but, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground. the brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it far above our power to add or detract. the world will little note nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. it is for us, the living, rather to be 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 this nation, under god, shall have a new birth of freedom; and that government of the people by the people and for the people shall not perish from the earth.
