WHEREAS, Abraham Lincoln was inaugurated as President of the United States on March 4, 1861; and
     WHEREAS, Lincoln was a champion of the American experiment in self-government, a student of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, who said in his First Inaugural Address, "This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it"; and
     WHEREAS, Lincoln was a child of the frontier, a self-taught lawyer, and an Illinois legislator whose example of honesty, work, and discipline epitomize the American character; and
     WHEREAS, Lincoln found that the practice of slavery violated the equal rights of human beings, and sought through reasoned debate to persuade his fellow citizens of its injustice; and
     WHEREAS, In his First Inaugural Address, Lincoln called Americans back to their tradition of deliberation and discourse, instead of to war, saying, "My countrymen, one and all, think calmly and well upon this whole subject. Nothing valuable can be lost by taking time"; and
     WHEREAS, Lincoln subsequently led the nation through Civil War, giving himself to the cause of national Union, and displaying throughout those terrible days the virtues of wisdom, courage, justice, and moderation; and
     WHEREAS, Lincoln proclaimed emancipation for slaves in the American South and maintained throughout his public service a steady defense of human equality; and
     WHEREAS, Lincoln looked forward from his Inauguration to a time when "the mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature";
     NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, That the Washington State House of Representatives take inspiration from the life and legacy of Abraham Lincoln, and that we seek in our own ways to be champions of liberty and equality.