NDA (I) 2022 General Ability Test · Question 116 of 150

Correct — A, Abraham Lincoln. The phrase "government of the people, by the people, for the people" comes from Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, delivered on 19 November 1863 during the American Civil War. Lincoln, the 16th U.S. President, closed the short speech with the hope that this form of government "shall not perish from the earth," and the line has since become the classic one-sentence definition of democracy.

• (b)Thomas Jefferson — Jefferson drafted the Declaration of Independence (1776), but the 'government of the people' formulation is Lincoln's from the 1863 Gettysburg Address.
• (c)George Washington — Washington was the first President and led the Revolutionary War, but this definition of democracy is not his; it is Lincoln's.
• (d)John F. Kennedy — Kennedy's best-remembered line is 'ask not what your country can do for you'; the 'of the people, by the people, for the people' definition belongs to Lincoln.

Abraham Lincoln (President 1861-65) led the United States through the Civil War and issued the Emancipation Proclamation. At the dedication of the Soldiers' National Cemetery at Gettysburg in 1863 he gave a two-minute address whose closing words became the most widely quoted definition of democracy.

All four are famous U.S. Presidents, which is what makes the question a memory test. The anchor is the Gettysburg Address and the Civil War era — that points to Lincoln, not the Founding-era Presidents or the 20th-century Kennedy.

• The line is from Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, 19 November 1863.
• It defines democracy as 'government of the people, by the people, for the people'.
• Lincoln was the 16th President and led the Union during the American Civil War (1861-65).
• He issued the Emancipation Proclamation (1863) declaring freedom for slaves in the rebelling states.

• Picking Thomas Jefferson or George Washington because they are Founding-era Presidents.
• Attributing the quote to a modern orator like Kennedy.

A direct 'who said' recall, sometimes paired with the year or the name of the Gettysburg Address.

No directly related past PYQ was found.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Abraham Lincoln delivered his famous definition of democracy in the

  • (a)Gettysburg Address
  • (b)Declaration of Independence
  • (c)Emancipation Proclamation
  • (d)Inaugural Oath

  Answer(a) Gettysburg Address (1863).

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The Emancipation Proclamation, declaring freedom for slaves in the rebelling states, was issued by

  • (a)George Washington
  • (b)Abraham Lincoln
  • (c)Woodrow Wilson
  • (d)Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Answer(b) Abraham Lincoln (1863).