To save the union, Britain will have to find its own Abraham Lincoln | Martin Kettle

Words and poetry matter more than anything in today’s troubled United Kingdom, but Cameron and Miliband show no skill for the job of national orator

Enter the special exhibition room at the Morgan Library in New York between now and June and, if you are a British visitor, you will immediately be struck by something that our own increasingly petulant and divided little country lacks. Lincoln Speaks: Words That Transformed a Nation is the title of an exhibition highlighting Abraham Lincoln’s remarkable oratory. Even the insular British know a bit about the importance of the two inaugural speeches Lincoln delivered in 1861 and 1865, at the dawn and the close of his nation’s civil war, and at the dedication of the Gettysburg war graveyard midway through the conflict. Thanks to Daniel Day-Lewis, we may even imagine we can hear the tone of voice in which those words were delivered.

What this superb exhibition in New York brings home, however, is the sheer importance to America’s survival of Lincoln’s hard-honed talent with words, not just on those great oratorical occasions but day to day, in his private discourse with his generals, political allies and rivals. In today’s argot, he was a brilliant communicator, and it is no surprise that the film that accompanies the New York exhibition soon features another skilled, though unquestionably lesser, practitioner of the art – Bill Clinton.

Neither David Cameron nor Ed Miliband has displayed any talent for the job of national orator

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