The Obamas arrive at Maxwell Air Force Base in Montgomery, Ala., on Saturday before events to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the "Bloody Sunday" civil rights march in Selma. (Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images)
President Obama and his daughters, Malia and Sasha, visited the Library of Congress on Sunday to view the original manuscript of President Abraham Lincoln’s second inaugural address.
The visit continued a history-themed weekend for the Obamas after the family took part in events Saturday in Selma, Ala., commemorating the 50th anniversary of the "Bloody Sunday" civil rights march.
The Lincoln address on display at the Library of Congress was delivered 150 years ago, on March 4, 1965, just a month before Lincoln’s assassination, and was part of the president’s attempt to bind the wounds of a war-torn nation. Its famous closing line was, “With malice toward none, with charity for all.”
Lincoln’s handwritten manuscript had been on public exhibition for only four days. The exhibition closed on Saturday.
All of the Obamas took part in Saturday's events in Selma. The Obama daughters are often shielded from the media, but the president had said earlier he thought it important for the girls to be part of the ceremonies honoring civil rights leaders. They were pictured on newspaper front pages across the nation holding hands with others and crossing the Edmund Pettus Bridge, where marchers were beaten on what became known as "Bloody Sunday."
Sunday’s outing to the Library of Congress lasted less than an hour.
The Obama girls were not the only children whose parents thought it important they see Selma firsthand. Attorney General Eric Holder and his wife took their son to Alabama, and Hunter Biden took his daughter, who is Sasha Obama's classmate at Sidwell Friends School in Washington.
Robert Barnes has been a Washington Post reporter and editor since 1987. He has covered the Supreme Court since November 2006.
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