Well, I'm in Philadelphia today for a very exciting conference -- on cemeteries in the nineteenth century. I think they asked me to speak because they thought that I knew something about nineteenth-century cemetery law -- my work on cemetery law is all contemporary. But I am interested in cemeteries in the nineteenth century for other reasons -- one is because they tell us something about the ways that private, charitable organizations were able to mobilize for the public benefit. A propos of this, consider the sign posted at the entrance to Mount Auburn Cemetery, "These are private grounds consecrated as a memorial to the dead and an inspiration to the living. Their use for visitation and business is limited to those who comply with the rules and regulations of the cemetery, a private organization." Rarely have I seen so much information packed into a plaque.
Mostly what I'll be talking about, though, is what cemetery dedication addresses reveal about constitutional ideas -- the most famous, obviously, is Lincoln's addresss at Gettysburg, though I don't talk about his at all because -- well, everyone's already written on it. But I will talk a little bit about the first Gettysburg dedication address, in 1855, at Ever Green Cemetery -- made famous during the battle as the location of Cemetery Ridge. One of the speakers asked that day of the cemetery, “could a more lovely spot have been chosen?”
One of the things that interests me a lot is the way that cemeteries were reserves from the market -- places where nature's beauty could be improved. This was part of the Whig mission of beautifying nature and refining American culture, and getting people to contemplate the lessons of both individual and national virtue. One of the reasons that rural cemeteries were started was to give a place of repose, where people could contemplate the lessons of the cemetery -- but they also had to be close enough to cities so that people could get to them. Thus, I particularly like the picture of Hollywood Cemetery in Richmond, Virginia, at right -- it reveals that the cemetery is both in a beautiful setting -- high above the James River, but also within sight of Richmond and the railroad tracks that run alongisde the cemetery. (Note the railroad car at the lower right). As I was taking this picture a woman came over and asked why I was taking that shot -- what was it about downtown Richmond that I found interesting? I'm sure that was the strangest explanation she had all day of why someone was taking pictures of the cemetery! I'm guessing that she thought that I had an ancestor buried there.
I think one of the real tricks to this paper is to link the addresses -- which operated at a very high level of generality -- to specific constitutional doctrine. There are some suggestive ways of going about this; for instance, Justices Joseph Story gave the dedication address at Mount Auburn in 1831, Justice John McLean gave one at the Spring Grove cemetery in Cincinnati, and Whig politician Daniel Barnard gave the dedication address at the Albany Cemetery. Barnard left extensive discussion of his constitutional thought in the form of addresses at Yale and Amherst, as well as on the floor of the House of Representatives and some writing in teh 1840s supporting the property rights of landlords during the anti-rent movement in New York. I won't try to do this in the talk today, which I'll be more concerned with highlighting the themes of Whig constitutional thought and how the cemeteries fit into them -- in creating a world of order and beauty (what one orator called a "Christian Republic"), a world that was related to the economic, technological, and moral progress of the pre-Civil War era that they so celebrated. The more technical stuff, including how the cemetery charters and their rules evolved from Mount Auburn's dedication in 1831 to the Civil War, await another venue.
Here's an mp3 version of my lecture and a wav version of it as well.
Al, I'm jealous. That sounds like a fun conference and I would have enjoyed hearing your talk. I am looking forward to reading your paper!
Posted by: Tanya Marsh | March 16, 2011 at 04:17 PM
I'm looking forward to your comments on it, Tanya!
Posted by: Alfred Brophy | March 16, 2011 at 11:11 PM