A Spelling Mistake That Lincoln Himself Might Have Made

Alexander Gardner/Hulton Archive, via Getty Images Abraham Lincoln

Too bad Abraham Lincoln isn’t around to argue on behalf of Thomas Hurley III of Newtown, Conn. Thomas, an eighth grader, lost a wager on the popular game show “Jeopardy!” last week when he was asked to name the 1863 document that Lincoln called a “fit and necessary war measure.” He referred to it as the “Emanciptation Proclamation.”

“The irony here is that Lincoln couldn’t always spell ‘emancipation’ either,” said Harold Holzer, a Lincoln scholar and senior vice president at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. “When he used the word in a speech in 1859, he wrote ‘immancipation’ with an ‘i.’ Nobody told him he couldn’t get credit for it in 1863. He spelled it ‘inaugeral’ but no one told him he couldn’t be sworn in.

“Maybe time for a little ‘malice toward none’ and ‘charity for all’ for Thomas Hurley,” Mr. Holzer added.

Thomas was competing during “Kids Week” on “Jeopardy!” when he committed the unfortunate gaffe.

Although the host of the game show, Alex Trebek, clearly understood what the boy was trying to get across, he said that the judges had ruled against the contestant. As a result, Thomas lost his wager of $3,000.

But if it is any solace, the man associated with the Emancipation Proclamation was among the worst spellers ever to be the leader of the country.

Mr. Holzer went on to offer many more examples:

“It was ‘Fort Sumpter,’ not ‘Fort Sumter,’ ‘Anapolis,’ rather than ‘Annapolis,’ and ‘Mannassas’ instead of ‘Manassas.’ Sometimes he couldn’t even get the names of Civil War battles right. Good speeches had to be ‘audable,’ his check book had to be ‘ballanced,’ thorny problems had to be ‘analized,’ good politicians seized every ‘opertunity,’ uncontestable issues were all too ‘apparant,’ people he’d offended deserved ‘appologies,’ and tyrannical opponents were guilty of ‘demagougeism.’”

“I think ‘Jeopardy!’ is guilty of what Lincoln would have called ‘hypocracy,’” Mr. Holzer said.