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The Gettysburg Address 162 Years Later

272 words, 10 sentences, 2 minutes in length. That’s all it took for President Abraham Lincoln to deliver one of the most impactful speeches in U.S. History: The Gettysburg Address on November 19, 1863 A few months earlier, from July 1–3, 1863, Union and Confederate armies fought in the Battle of Gettysburg in Pennsylvania. It was one of the bloodiest battles of the war, with tens of thousands killed, wounded, or missing. A new Soldiers’ …

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A Very Big “First Day of School” for Congress

Imagine showing up to a brand-new school where the hallways are still dusty, some walls aren’t painted yet, and workers are hammering away while you unpack your backpack. that’s basically what happened on November 17, 1800 when the U.S. Congress met for the first time in the new capital city of Washington, D.C., inside the still unfinished United States Capitol building. For ten years, Congress had met in Philadelphia, but a law called the Residence …

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