Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln (February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865), sometimes called Abe Lincoln and nicknamed Honest Abe, the Rail Splitter, and the Great Emancipator, was the 16th President of the United States (1861 to 1865), and the first president from the Republican Party.

Election and early Presidency

Lincoln was chosen as the Republican candidate for several reasons: because his views on slavery were seen as more moderate; because of his Western origins (in contrast to his main rival for the nomination, the New Yorker William H. Seward), and because several other contenders had enemies within the party. During the campaign, Lincoln was dubbed "The Rail Splitter" by Republicans to emphasize Lincoln's humility and humble origins, though in fact Lincoln was quite wealthy at the time due to his successful law practice.

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On November 6, 1860, Lincoln was elected as the 16th President of the United States, beating Douglas and two other major candidates. Lincoln was the first Republican president. He won entirely on the strength of his support in the North: he was not even on the ballot in nine states in the South — and won only 2 of 996 counties in the entire South. Even before Lincoln's election, leaders in the South made it clear that their states would leave the Union in response to a Lincoln victory. A total of seven states seceded before Lincoln took office, forming the Confederate States of America.

Related Topics:
November 6 - 1860 - Republican - South - Confederate States of America

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President-elect Lincoln survived an assassination attempt in Baltimore, Maryland, and on February 23, 1861 arrived secretly in disguise to Washington, D.C. Southerners ridiculed Lincoln for this subterfuge, but the efforts at security may have been prudent. At Lincoln's inauguration on March 4, 1861, the Turners formed Lincoln's bodyguard; and a sizable garrison of federal troops was also present, ready to protect the president and the capital from rebel invasion.

Related Topics:
President-elect - Assassination - Baltimore, Maryland - February 23 - 1861 - Washington, D.C. - March 4 - Turners

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In his First Inaugural Address, Lincoln declared, "I hold that in contemplation of universal law and of the Constitution the Union of these States is perpetual. Perpetuity is implied, if not expressed, in the fundamental law of all national governments", arguing further that the purpose of the United States Constitution was "to form a more perfect union" than the Articles of Confederation which were explicitly perpetual, and thus the Constitution too was perpetual. He asked rhetorically that even were the Constitution construed as a simple contract, would it not require the agreement of all parties to rescind it?

Related Topics:
First Inaugural - United States Constitution - Articles of Confederation

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Also in his inaugural address, in a final attempt to unite the Union and prevent the looming war, Lincoln supported the proposed Corwin Amendment to the constitution, of which he was a driving force. This proposed amendment would have explicitly protected slavery in those states in which it already existed, and had already passed both houses. Lincoln, however, adamantly opposed the Crittenden Compromise, which would have permitted slavery in the territories, renewing the boundary set by the Missouri Compromise and extending it to California. Despite support for this compromise among moderate Republicans and across the nation, Lincoln declared that were the Crittenden Compromise accepted, it "would amount to a perpetual covenant of war against every people, tribe, and state owning a foot of land between here and Tierra del Fuego." Lincoln also spurned requests to appoint a Southerner to his cabinet (Sam Houston, at that time governor of Texas and supporting the Union but rejecting offered troops to prevent secession, being a prominent suggestion).

Related Topics:
Corwin Amendment - Crittenden Compromise - Missouri Compromise - California - Tierra del Fuego - Sam Houston

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Because opposition to slavery expansion was the key issue uniting the Republican Party at the time, Lincoln is sometimes criticized for putting politics ahead of the national interest in refusing to compromise on the slavery expansion issue. Supporters of Lincoln, however, point out that he did not oppose slavery because he was a Republican, but became a Republican because of his opposition to the expansion of slavery, that he opposed several other Republicans who were in favor of compromise, and that he clearly thought his course of action was in the national interest.

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After Union troops at Fort Sumter were fired on and forced to surrender in April, Lincoln called for more troops from each remaining state to recapture forts, protect the capital, and "preserve the Union", which in his view still existed intact despite the actions of the seceding states. In response, four more slave states seceded by May 1861, and splinter factions from Missouri and Kentucky joined the Confederacy by December.

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Slavery and the Emancipation Proclamation

Lincoln is well known for ending slavery in the United States and he personally opposed slavery as a moral evil. Yet, Lincoln's views of the role of the federal government on the subject of slavery are more complicated. He believed that the Declaration of Independence's statement that "all men are created equal" should apply also to black slaves, and that slavery was a profound evil which should not spread to the Territories. Thus, he campaigned against the Kansas-Nebraska Act. However, Lincoln maintained that the federal government could not constitutionally bar slavery in states where it already existed, and he supported colonization, believing that freed black slaves were too different to live in the same society as white Americans. Lincoln addresses the issue of his consistency (or lack thereof) between his earlier position and his later position of emancipation in an 1864 letter to Albert G. Hodgeshttp://showcase.netins.net/web/creative/lincoln/speeches/hodges.htm See: Abraham Lincoln on slavery.

Related Topics:
Declaration of Independence - Territories - Kansas-Nebraska Act - Colonization - Albert G. Hodges - Abraham Lincoln on slavery

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Lincoln is often credited with freeing enslaved African Americans with the Emancipation Proclamation. However, territories and states that still allowed slavery but were under Union control were exempt from the emancipation. The proclamation initially freed only a few escaped slaves, but also enabled the freeing of slaves in territories captured after its proclamation. Lincoln signed the Proclamation as a wartime measure, insisting that only the outbreak of war gave constitutional power to the President to free slaves in states where it already existed. He later said: "I never, in my life, felt more certain that I was doing right, than I do in signing this paper." The proclamation made abolishing slavery in the rebel states an official war goal and it became the impetus for the enactment of the 13th Amendment to the United States Constitution which abolished slavery. Politically, the Emancipation Proclamation did much to help the Northern cause; Lincoln's strong abolitionist stand finally convinced the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and other foreign countries that they could not support the South.

Related Topics:
African Americans - Emancipation Proclamation - 13th Amendment - United States Constitution - Abolitionist - United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland

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