---
title: The Gettysburg Address
url: https://propagandaarchive.org/library/lincoln-gettysburg-address-1863/
description: The Gettysburg Address by Abraham Lincoln (1863-11-19), full text with provenance and rights.
section: FRAME
---

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[Library](https://propagandaarchive.org/library/) · Speech

# The Gettysburg Address

At a glance

The short address Lincoln gave at the dedication of the Gettysburg soldiers' cemetery four and a half months after the battle.

- **Author:** Abraham Lincoln
- **Published:** November 19, 1863
- **Origin:** United States
- **Length:** 264 words

Full details

- **Edition:** Address at the dedication of the Soldiers' National Cemetery, Gettysburg, 19 November 1863, as transcribed by the Avalon Project. The page does not say which of the five manuscript copies it follows.
- **Language:** English
- **Text source:** [Avalon Project, Yale Law School](https://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/gettyb.asp)
- **Text basis:** The Avalon Project's own transcription. It was not checked here against a manuscript copy, and the wording of the manuscript copies differs slightly.
- **Rights:** An address by the President of the United States in his official capacity, a work of the US federal government and not eligible for copyright (17 U.S.C. 105); it is also public domain by age.
- **Rights checked:** October 2, 2026

On this page

- [The text](https://propagandaarchive.org/library/lincoln-gettysburg-address-1863/#read)
- [Provenance and rights](https://propagandaarchive.org/library/lincoln-gettysburg-address-1863/#provenance)

President Abraham Lincoln's address of 19 November 1863 at the dedication of the Soldiers' National Cemetery at Gettysburg. The versions that survive in his hand differ in small details, and the Avalon Project page does not say which one it uses.

## The text

[Download as plain text](https://propagandaarchive.org/library/lincoln-gettysburg-address-1863/lincoln-gettysburg-address-1863.txt) 264 words, with the provenance header above the text

"Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on 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 here gave their lives that 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 poor 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 here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. 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."

## Provenance and rights

- **Edition:** Address at the dedication of the Soldiers' National Cemetery, Gettysburg, 19 November 1863, as transcribed by the Avalon Project. The page does not say which of the five manuscript copies it follows.
- **Text source:** [Avalon Project, Yale Law School](https://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/gettyb.asp)
- **Text basis:** The Avalon Project's own transcription. It was not checked here against a manuscript copy, and the wording of the manuscript copies differs slightly.
- **Rights:** An address by the President of the United States in his official capacity, a work of the US federal government and not eligible for copyright (17 U.S.C. 105); it is also public domain by age. Checked October 2, 2026.
- **Changes made:** The text was copied from the page as fetched on October 2, 2026; page furniture removed. Wording, spelling and punctuation are the source's own.
- **Source file checksum:** `13d434a8ccb7118b…` (SHA-256 of the download this text was made from)