Two Maine governors separated by 162 years found a hill they were willing to die on.

At Gettysburg in July 1863, Col. Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain determined that Little Round Top was a hill worth dying on. He had no choice. He was ordered to hold Little Round Top because it was the end of the Union line. If the Confederates dislodged Chamberlain and the 20th Maine Infantry, they would be able to attack the Union Army from the rear.

A Union rout would open Washington to the Army of Northern Virginia, with potentially catastrophic results for the cause of liberty and all that America was destined to become. Chamberlain and the 20th Maine repelled several uphill charges by the 15th Alabama until they were almost out of ammunition.

Making use of his only tactical advantage — high ground — Chamberlain electrified the sturdy men of the 20th Maine with the order “Fix bayonets,” and led them in a downhill wheeling movement charge, like a door swinging on a hinge, that swept the shocked Confederates from the rocky slopes of Little Round Top and saved the day for the Union Army. A Union officer observing from a distance said it was “the damnedest thing [he’d] ever seen.”

Although Chamberlain survived Little Round Top, he was so seriously wounded at the Second Battle of Petersburg in 1864 that he was given a “deathbed promotion” to brigadier general. But had he died at Little Round Top it would have been a hill worth dying on; it saved the Union.

Generations of Mainers have been thrilled by Chamberlain’s heroic actions, which have been cataloged in countless books, articles and film accounts of the Civil War and Gettysburg. Chamberlain commanded Union troops at the Appomattox surrender ceremony, was elected to four consecutive one-year terms as Maine governor (1867-71), served as president of Bowdoin College until 1883 and was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor in 1893. He died in 1914 still carrying his Petersburg bullet — the last Union soldier to die of wounds sustained in the war. Sen. Angus King has called him the greatest Mainer ever.

The hill Gov. Janet Mills recently chose to die on is the idea that a young biological boy who “identifies” as a girl should be allowed to compete against young biological girls in high school sports. Can you imagine someone choosing this hill to die on even 10 years ago? Can you imagine Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, or Percival Baxter, or Ed Muskie, or Bill Cohen, Joe Brennan, Olympia Snowe, Jock McKernan or George Mitchell choosing this hill to die on?

What enduring, inspiring label will attach to Mills? Stephen King said that Mills “makes me proud to be a Maine man,” and in that sentiment I’d bet that he is joined by at least 13 other Maine “men,” none of whom has a daughter. The feminists who once championed girls in sports have been cowed into silence by the intemperate screechings of trans activists, as has been the political class in Augusta that provided cover for this barbarous insult to women and girls.

Confronted by President Donald Trump at the White House, who threatened to withhold tens of millions of dollars in education funding for Maine if it didn’t toe the line on trans sports, Gov. Mills said, “See you in court.”

Given that, at her Senate confirmation hearing, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson was unable to provide a definition for the word “woman,” who knows what will happen in the courts. Whatever is decided, Mills has revealed that Crazy Mountain is the hill she is willing to die on.

Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain helped save a nation from the hill he was willing to die on. Janet Mills is helping to ruin one from hers. President Trump told the governor that he didn’t think she’d be elected again. One can only hope.