Five-minute digest

Second Inaugural Address

Ronald Reagan

Summary

Extreme cold forced Reagan's second inaugural indoors to the Capitol Rotunda on 21 January 1985. He marked the fiftieth time "we the people" had celebrated the recurring ceremony, gave thanks, and pledged to deserve the trust conferred. The Constitution's opening chorus of popular sovereignty returns as the true seat of American rule. Strength is linked to the hope of peace in a still-dangerous Cold War. Gratitude and responsibility replace the sharper antitheses of 1981, though continuity of purpose is claimed. Pair the two Reagan inaugurals with the Brandenburg Gate speech for a short unit on how ceremonial and confrontational rhetoric differ in the same presidency. The second inaugural is the quieter bookend: less diagnosis of government-as-problem, more chorus of popular sovereignty under God and under law.txt.txt.txt.txt.txt.txt.txt. Indoor cold-weather ceremony softens the sharper edges of 1981. Pair both Reagan inaugurals with the Brandenburg Gate address to contrast quiet popular-sovereignty chorus with confrontational Cold War rhetoric. Seminar readers should also note how 1985 ceremony and argument shape one another without repeating the abstract's section labels. Continuity of purpose is claimed without repeating the sharper government-as-problem antithesis that defined the West Front speech four years earlier. That pedagogical angle keeps 1985 ceremony from collapsing into mere campaign echo. For classical Christian schools the inaugural form itself is part of the lesson: a republic pauses to bind power with words before it spends power in deeds.

Top Lessons

We the people again
Reagan answers Cold War continuing; second-term agenda of growth and peace through strength through we the people as the active subject of American government, indoors on a bitter day. Naming the real problem before remedies is the first civic lesson of the 1985 text.
Related across the library
- Inaugural Address (John Adams), John Adams's Inaugural Address
  a full proof of a general dissemination of knowledge and virtue throughout the whole body of the people And what object or consideration more pleasing than this can be presented to the human mind If national pride is ever justifiable or excusable it is when it springs not from power or riches grandeur or glory but from conviction of national innocence information and benevolence In the midst of these pleasing ideas we should be unfaithful to ourselves if we should ever lose sight of the danger to our liberties i...
- First Inaugural Address, Lesson: Piety before program
  Piety before program. Washington answers launching the untried federal Constitution after ratification through anxious piety and the claim that private virtue underwrites republican happiness. Naming the real problem before remedies is the first civic lesson of the 1789 text.
- Prometheus Bound and Other Plays, Lesson: A king asks his people
  A king asks his people. Pelasgus will not choose between sacrilege and war on his own authority. Aeschylus stages an early picture of a ruler binding his city by consent, while showing that consent does not make the choice painless.
- Henry VI, Part 1, Lesson: The son who would not fly
  The son who would not fly. Talbot begs John to escape so that the family name will survive; John answers that a Talbot who runs is no Talbot. Their dialogue in rhymed couplets (Act 4, Scenes 5-7) sets two loves against each other, a father's care and a son's honor, and the play does not make either simply wrong. It is worth asking what courage is, and when it shades into a refusal of prudence.
- West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, Lesson: Rights withdrawn from the vote
  Rights withdrawn from the vote. Jackson writes that the very purpose of a Bill of Rights was to remove certain subjects from political controversy and place them under the protection of courts. This directly answers Frankfurter's view in Gobitis that remedies should be sought at the ballot box, and it remains one of the clearest statements of why written guarantees exist.
Strength and peace
Test whether the rest of the speech earns the claim that This is, as Senator Mathias told us, the 50th time that we the people have celebrated this historic occasion. Quotation without argument is not yet persuasion.
Related across the library
- A Letter Concerning Toleration, Lesson: Belief cannot be compelled
  Belief cannot be compelled. Locke's central argument is that faith is the inward persuasion of the mind, and force can produce only outward conformity. A worship offered against conscience is not pleasing to God but an added sin. The magistrate's sword is therefore the wrong instrument for the care of souls.
- First Inaugural Address, Lesson: Virtue as public architecture
  Virtue as public architecture. Test whether the rest of the speech earns the claim that no people can be bound to acknowledge and adore the Invisible Hand which conducts the affairs of men more than those of the United States. Quotation without argument is not yet persuasion.
- The Age of Louis XIV, Lesson: Glory purchased with a kingdom's strength
  Glory purchased with a kingdom's strength. The Durants show Louis XIV making France the first power of Europe through administration, art and war, and they show the bill coming due in famine, debt and military defeat by 1709-1715. Students can weigh what kind of greatness the reign achieved and who paid for it, distinguishing the authors' judgment from the evidence they present.
- Ethics, Lesson: Emotions follow natural law like geometry
  Emotions follow natural law like geometry. Instead of condemning anger or envy as vices to be mocked, Spinoza treats them as natural effects with definite causes. The Ethics models a non-moralising stance toward the passions that later influenced naturalistic psychology.
- A Letter Concerning Toleration, Lesson: Toleration with stated limits
  Toleration with stated limits. Locke does not argue that every opinion must be allowed. He excludes teachings destructive of civil society, churches that place members under a foreign prince, and atheists, whose word he believes cannot be secured by oath. These limits rest on his view of what holds a commonwealth together, and readers have debated them since the 1690s.
Gratitude and trust
When Reagan asks that America remain a beacon of hope and a force for good, responsibility returns to hearers. Ask what citizens owe after such a ceremonial charge.
Related across the library
- The Birth of Tragedy, Lesson: The cost of believing knowledge can heal everything
  The cost of believing knowledge can heal everything. Socrates is criticised not for reasoning but for the optimistic faith that reason can fathom and correct existence. The book asks whether science, pursued to its limits, must eventually return to art and myth to make life bearable.
- Tear Down This Wall (Brandenburg Gate Address), Source
  Tear Down This Wall Brandenburg Gate Address Thank you very much Chancellor Kohl Governing Mayor Diepgen ladies and gentlemen Twenty four years ago President John F Kennedy visited Berlin speaking to the people of this city and the world at the city hall Well since then two other presidents have come each in his turn to Berlin And today I myself make my second visit to your city We come to Berlin we American Presidents because it's our duty to speak in this place of freedom But I must confess we're drawn here by...
- The Republic and The Laws, BOOK Ii
  done the same The latter being a virtuous man supported the proposition which I laid before the people after the decree of the senate The former on the other side opposed it vehemently If modesty probity or faith had been regarded Mancinus would have carried his point but in reason counsel and prudence Pompey surpassed him Whether Six or eight pages are missing here Several pages are lost here XIX If a man should have a faithless slave or an unwholesome house with whose defect he alone was acquainted and he adve...
- First Inaugural Address, Lesson: Securing freedom by law
  Securing freedom by law. When Grant asks calm discussion of unsettled questions and divine guidance, responsibility returns to hearers. Ask what citizens owe after such a ceremonial charge.
- The Devils, CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTORY
  to describe the subject for I really do not understand it It is some sort of an allegory in lyrical-dramatic form recalling the second part of Faust The scene opens with a chorus of women followed by a chorus of men then a chorus of incorporeal powers of some sort and at the end of all a chorus of spirits not yet living but very eager to come to life All these choruses sing about something very indefinite for the most part about somebody's curse but with a tinge of the higher humour But the scene is suddenly cha...