WHY WAS IT ALRIGHT IN HIS DAY AND NOT IN OUR DAY?

NOW THEREFORE, I, DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER, President of the United States of America, do hereby invite all of the people of our country to take a direct and active part in the Centennial of the Civil War. 

I request all units and agencies of government, Federal, State and local, and their officials, to encourage, foster and participate in Centennial observances. And I especially urge our Nation's schools and colleges, its libraries and museums, its churches and religious bodies, its civic, service and patriotic organizations, its learned and professional societies, its arts, sciences and industries, and its informational media, to plan and carry out their own appropriate Centennial observances during the years 1961 to 1965; all to the end of enriching our knowledge and appreciation of this great chapter in our Nation's history and of making this memorable period truly a Centennial for all Americans. 

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the Seal of the United States of America to be affixed. 

DONE at the City of Washington this 6th day of December in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and sixty, and of the Independence of the United States of America the one hundred and eighty-fourth. 

By the President: 

Dwight D. Eisenhower