Lincoln Page #24

LINCOLN:

(scribbling a note,

signing the petition:)

He was afraid, that's all it was.

I don't care to hang a boy for

being frightened, either. What good

would it do him?

He signs the pardon. Then he gives Hay's leg a few hard

thwacks and a squeeze. It hurts a little. Hay winces.

74.

LINCOLN (CONT'D)

War's nearly done. Ain't that so?

What use one more corpse? Any more

corpses?

Putting the rest of the petitions on Hay's bed, he stands to

leave.

JOHN HAY:

Do you need company?

INT. HALLWAY, THE WHITE HOUSE - LATE NIGHT

As before, Lincoln continues his slow and solitary walk.

LINCOLN (V.O.)

Times like this, I'm best alone.

INT. THE TELEGRAPH ROOM, WAR DEPARTMENT - PRE-DAWN

Lincoln is seated at Eckert's desk, shawl wrapped around his

shoulders, glasses on; he stares down into his hat, held

between his knees. Homer Bates and Sam Beckwith are waiting

for him.

Lincoln draws a handwritten note from his hat and carefully

unfolds it.

LINCOLN:

"Lieutenant General Ulysses S.

Grant, City Point. I have read your

words with interest."

Sam Beckwith transcribes Lincoln's words into code on a pad

with a pencil.

LINCOLN (CONT'D)

"I ask that, regardless of any

action I take in the matter of the

visit of the Richmond

commissioners, you maintain among

your troops military preparedness

for battle, as you have done until

now."

He stops for a moment. Beckwith waits, pencil poised.

Lincoln looks at the note, folds it, tucks it in a band

inside his hat.

75.

LINCOLN (CONT'D)

"Have Captain Saunders convey the

commissioners to me here in

Washington."

(ANOTHER PAUSE)

"A. Lincoln." And the date.

SAMUEL BECKWITH:

(WHILE WRITING:
)

Yes sir.

Lincoln places the hat on the floor.

SAMUEL BECKWITH (CONT'D)

Shall I transmit, sir?

LINCOLN:

(a beat, then:
)

You think we choose to be born?

SAMUEL BECKWITH:

I don't suppose so.

LINCOLN:

Are we fitted to the times we're

born into?

SAMUEL BECKWITH:

I don't know about myself. You may

be, sir. Fitted.

LINCOLN:

(TO HOMER:
)

What do you reckon?

HOMER BATES:

I'm an engineer. I reckon there's

machinery but no one's done the

fitting.

LINCOLN:

You're an engineer, you must know

Euclid's axioms and common notions.

HOMER BATES:

I must've in school, but...

LINCOLN:

I never had much of schooling, but

I read Euclid, in an old book I

borrowed. Little enough ever found

its way in here -

(touching his cranium)

- but once learnt it stayed learnt.

76.

Euclid's first common notion is

this:
"Things which are equal to

the same thing are equal to each

other."

Homer doesn't get it; neither does Sam.

LINCOLN (CONT'D)

That's a rule of mathematical

reasoning. It's true because it

works; has done and always will do.

In his book, Euclid says this is

"self-evident."

(A BEAT)

D'you see? There it is, even in

that two-thousand year old book of

mechanical law:
it is a self-

evident truth that things which are

equal to the same thing are equal

to each other. We begin with

equality. That's the origin, isn't

it? That balance, that's fairness,

that's justice.

He looks at his scribbled note, then at Sam and Homer.

LINCOLN (CONT'D)

Read me the last sentence of my

telegram.

SAMUEL BECKWITH:

"Have Captain Saunders convey the

commissioners to me here in

Washington."

LINCOLN:

A slight emendation, Sam, if you

would.

Beckwith writes as Lincoln dictates.

LINCOLN (CONT'D)

"Have Captain Saunders convey the

gentlemen aboard the River Queen as

far as Hampton Roads, Virginia, and

there wait until..."

(BEAT)

"...further advice from me. Do not

proceed to Washington."

77.

INT. HOUSE CHAMBER, THE CAPITOL - LATE MORNING

The chamber's noisy and packed. In the balcony's front row, a

wall of newspapermen, notebooks at the ready.

TITLE:
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

Rate this script:2.9 / 8 votes