I'm John Batchel with Professor Richard Cowardy, in the book His Righteous

Strife, How Warring Religious Nationalists Forged Lincoln's Union.

We've seen the fast day called by President Buchanan not succeed.

It is now September of 1861.

This is a relatively quiet period of the war, given the bloodletting that's ahead.

The battle that was a failure in the first meeting is behind them, and the president now has an opportunity again to speak out through a fast day.

And Lincoln establishes September 26th as a fast day for America to heal, to come together.

Again, it's important to say that the president, as the professor has said, is not a radical Republican at this point.

There are three parts of the country. They're the

abolitionists, the radicals, and they're Republicans. There are the barn burn burners, those who

are pro-slavery men, and antithetical to the way the Washington has conducted itself so far.

And then there's everything in between.

And we're going to begin with what success Lincoln's Fast Day has, what it can have.

This is about something called anti-slavery nationalism.

What was that, Professor?

How did they think of it?

Quite simply, anti-slaver, I would define anti-slavery nationalists as those who

believe that the nation under God had a responsibility to live up to the principles there

on which it was founded, the Declaration of Independence and the equality of or men.

And, of course, they would have questions of how far men embraced women was a contested one.

But the belief in human equality as set out in Jefferson's Declaration, Declaration of Independence,

is the inspiring document for these anti-slavery nationalists. They are Republicans in the main, that there'll be some

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