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Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln (/ˈlɪŋkən/ LINK-ən; February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was an American lawyer, politician, and statesman who served as the 16th president of the United States from 1861 until his assassination in 1865. Lincoln led the Union through the American Civil War to defend the nation as a constitutional union and succeeded in abolishing slavery, bolstering the federal government, and modernizing the U.S. economy.

Abraham Lincoln
Portrait by Alexander Gardner, 1863
16th President of the United States
In office
March 4, 1861 – April 15, 1865
Vice President
Preceded byJames Buchanan
Succeeded byAndrew Johnson
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives
from Illinois's 7th district
In office
March 4, 1847 – March 3, 1849
Preceded byJohn Henry
Succeeded byThomas L. Harris
Member of the
Illinois House of Representatives
from Sangamon County
In office
December 1, 1834 – December 4, 1842
Personal details
Born(1809-02-12)February 12, 1809
Hodgenville, Kentucky, U.S.
DiedApril 15, 1865(1865-04-15) (aged 56)
Washington, D.C., U.S.
Manner of deathAssassination
(gunshot wound to the head)
Resting placeLincoln Tomb
Political party
Height6 ft 4 in (193 cm)[1]
Spouse
(m. 1842)
Children
Parents
RelativesLincoln family
Occupation
  • Politician
  • lawyer
Signature
Military service
Branch/serviceIllinois Militia
Years of service1832
Rank
Battles/wars

Lincoln was born into poverty in a log cabin in Kentucky and was raised on the frontier, primarily in Indiana. He was self-educated and became a lawyer, Whig Party leader, Illinois state legislator, and U.S. Congressman from Illinois. In 1849, he returned to his successful law practice in central Illinois. In 1854, he was angered by the Kansas–Nebraska Act, which opened the territories to slavery, and he re-entered politics. He soon became a leader of the new Republican Party. He reached a national audience in the 1858 Senate campaign debates against Stephen A. Douglas. Lincoln ran for president in 1860, sweeping the North to gain victory. Pro-slavery elements in the South viewed his election as a threat to slavery, and Southern states began seceding from the nation. During this time, the newly formed Confederate States of America began seizing federal military bases in the south. Just over one month after Lincoln assumed the presidency, the Confederate States attacked Fort Sumter, a U.S. fort in South Carolina. Following the bombardment, Lincoln mobilized forces to suppress the rebellion and restore the union.

Lincoln, a moderate Republican, had to navigate a contentious array of factions with friends and opponents from both the Democratic and Republican parties. His allies, the War Democrats and the Radical Republicans, demanded harsh treatment of the Southern Confederates. Anti-war Democrats (called "Copperheads") despised Lincoln, and irreconcilable pro-Confederate elements plotted his assassination. He managed the factions by exploiting their mutual enmity, carefully distributing political patronage, and by appealing to the American people. His Gettysburg Address came to be seen as one of the greatest and most influential statements of American national purpose. Lincoln closely supervised the strategy and tactics in the war effort, including the selection of generals, and implemented a naval blockade of the South's trade. He suspended habeas corpus in Maryland and elsewhere, and averted British intervention by defusing the Trent Affair. In 1863, he issued the Emancipation Proclamation, which declared the slaves in the states "in rebellion" to be free. It also directed the Army and Navy to "recognize and maintain the freedom of such persons" and to receive them "into the armed service of the United States." Lincoln also pressured border states to outlaw slavery, and he promoted the Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which upon its ratification abolished slavery.

Lincoln managed his own successful re-election campaign. He sought to heal the war-torn nation through reconciliation. On April 14, 1865, just five days after the war's end at Appomattox, he was attending a play at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C., with his wife, Mary, when he was fatally shot by Confederate sympathizer John Wilkes Booth. Lincoln is remembered as a martyr and a national hero for his wartime leadership and for his efforts to preserve the Union and abolish slavery. Lincoln is often ranked in both popular and scholarly polls as the greatest president in American history.

Family and childhood

Early life

Abraham Lincoln was born on February 12, 1809, the second child of Thomas Lincoln and Nancy Hanks Lincoln, in a log cabin on Sinking Spring Farm near Hodgenville, Kentucky.[2] He was a descendant of Samuel Lincoln, an Englishman who migrated from Hingham, Norfolk, to its namesake, Hingham, Massachusetts, in 1638. The family then migrated west, passing through New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Virginia.[3] Lincoln was also a descendant of the Harrison family of Virginia; his paternal grandfather and namesake, Captain Abraham Lincoln and wife Bathsheba (née Herring) moved the family from Virginia to Jefferson County, Kentucky.[b] The captain was killed in an Indian raid in 1786.[5] His children, including eight-year-old Thomas, Abraham's father, witnessed the attack.[6][c] Thomas then worked at odd jobs in Kentucky and Tennessee before the family settled in Hardin County, Kentucky, in the early 1800s.[6]

The heritage of Lincoln's mother Nancy remains unclear, but it is widely assumed that she was the daughter of Lucy Hanks.[8] Thomas and Nancy married on June 12, 1806, in Washington County, and moved to Elizabethtown, Kentucky.[9] They had three children: Sarah, Abraham, and Thomas, who died as an infant.[10]

Thomas Lincoln bought or leased farms in Kentucky before losing all but 200 acres (81 ha) of his land in court disputes over property titles.[11] In 1816, the family moved to Indiana where the land surveys and titles were more reliable.[12] Indiana was a "free" (non-slaveholding) territory, and they settled in an "unbroken forest"[13] in Hurricane Township, Perry County, Indiana.[14][d] In 1860, Lincoln noted that the family's move to Indiana was "partly on account of slavery", but mainly due to land title difficulties.[16]

 
The farm site where Lincoln grew up in Spencer County, Indiana

In Kentucky and Indiana, Thomas worked as a farmer, cabinetmaker, and carpenter.[17] At various times, he owned farms, livestock, and town lots, paid taxes, sat on juries, appraised estates, and served on county patrols. Thomas and Nancy were members of a Separate Baptists church, which forbade alcohol, dancing, and slavery.[18]

Overcoming financial challenges, Thomas in 1827 obtained clear title to 80 acres (32 ha) in Indiana, an area which became the Little Pigeon Creek Community.[19]

Mother's death

On October 5, 1818, Nancy Lincoln died from milk sickness, leaving 11-year-old Sarah in charge of a household including her father, 9-year-old Abraham, and Nancy's 19-year-old orphan cousin, Dennis Hanks.[20] Ten years later, on January 20, 1828, Sarah died while giving birth to a stillborn son, devastating Lincoln.[21]

On December 2, 1819, Thomas married Sarah Bush Johnston, a widow from Elizabethtown, Kentucky, with three children of her own.[22] Abraham became close to his stepmother and called her "Mother".[23] Lincoln disliked the hard labor associated with farm life. His family even said he was lazy, for all his "reading, scribbling, writing, ciphering, writing Poetry, etc.".[24] His stepmother acknowledged he did not enjoy "physical labor", but loved to read.[25]

Education and move to Illinois

Lincoln was largely self-educated.[26] His formal schooling was from itinerant teachers. It included two short stints in Kentucky, where he learned to read but probably not to write, at age seven,[27] and in Indiana, where he went to school sporadically due to farm chores, for a total of fewer than 12 months in aggregate by the age of 15.[28] He persisted as an avid reader and retained a lifelong interest in learning.[29] Family, neighbors, and schoolmates recalled that his reading included the King James Bible, Aesop's Fables, John Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress, Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe, and The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin.[30]

 
New Salem, Illinois

As a teen, Lincoln took responsibility for chores and customarily gave his father all earnings from work outside the home until he was 21.[31] Lincoln was tall, strong, and athletic, and became adept at using an ax.[32] He was an active wrestler during his youth and trained in the rough catch-as-catch-can style (also known as catch wrestling). He became county wrestling champion at the age of 21.[33] He gained a reputation for strength and audacity after winning a wrestling match with the renowned leader of ruffians known as "the Clary's Grove Boys".[34]

In March 1830, fearing another milk sickness outbreak, several members of the extended Lincoln family, including Abraham, moved west to Illinois, a free state, and settled in Macon County.[35][e] Abraham then became increasingly distant from Thomas, in part due to his father's lack of education.[37] In 1831, as Thomas and other family prepared to move to a new homestead in Coles County, Illinois, Abraham struck out on his own.[38] He made his home in New Salem, Illinois, for six years.[39] Lincoln and some friends took goods by flatboat to New Orleans, Louisiana, where he was first exposed to slavery.[40]

In 1865, Lincoln was asked how he came to acquire his rhetorical skills. He answered that in the practice of law he frequently came across the word "demonstrate" but had insufficient understanding of the term. So, he left Springfield for his father's home to study until he "could give any proposition in the six books of Euclid [here, referencing Euclid's Elements] at sight."[41]

Marriage and children

 
1864 photo of President Lincoln with youngest son, Tad
 
Mary Todd Lincoln, wife of Abraham Lincoln, in 1861

Lincoln's first romantic interest was Ann Rutledge, whom he met when he moved to New Salem. By 1835, they were in a relationship but not formally engaged.[42] She died on August 25, 1835, most likely of typhoid fever.[43] In the early 1830s, he met Mary Owens from Kentucky.[44]

Late in 1836, Lincoln agreed to a match with Owens if she returned to New Salem. Owens arrived that November and he courted her for a time; however, they both had second thoughts. On August 16, 1837, he wrote Owens a letter saying he would not blame her if she ended the relationship, and she never replied.[45]

In 1839, Lincoln met Mary Todd in Springfield, Illinois, and the following year they became engaged.[46] She was the daughter of Robert Smith Todd, a wealthy lawyer and businessman in Lexington, Kentucky.[47] A wedding set for January 1, 1841, was canceled at Lincoln's request, but they reconciled and married on November 4, 1842, in the Springfield mansion of Mary's sister.[48] While anxiously preparing for the nuptials, he was asked where he was going and replied, "To hell, I suppose."[49] In 1844, the couple bought a house in Springfield near his law office. Mary kept house with the help of a hired servant and a relative.[50]

Lincoln was an affectionate husband and father of four sons, though his work regularly kept him away from home. The oldest, Robert Todd Lincoln, was born in 1843 and was the only child to live to maturity. Edward Baker Lincoln (Eddie), born in 1846, died February 1, 1850, probably of tuberculosis. Lincoln's third son, "Willie" Lincoln was born on December 21, 1850, and died of a fever at the White House on February 20, 1862. The youngest, Thomas "Tad" Lincoln, was born on April 4, 1853, and survived his father but died of heart failure at age 18 on July 16, 1871.[51][f] Lincoln "was remarkably fond of children"[53] and the Lincolns were not considered to be strict with their own.[54] In fact, Lincoln's law partner William H. Herndon would grow irritated when Lincoln brought his children to the law office. Their father, it seemed, was often too absorbed in his work to notice his children's behavior. Herndon recounted, "I have felt many and many a time that I wanted to wring their little necks, and yet out of respect for Lincoln I kept my mouth shut. Lincoln did not note what his children were doing or had done."[55]

The deaths of their sons, Eddie and Willie, had profound effects on both parents. Lincoln suffered from "melancholy", a condition now thought to be clinical depression.[56] Later in life, Mary struggled with the stresses of losing her husband and sons, and Robert committed her for a time to an asylum in 1875.[57]

Early career and militia service

During 1831 and 1832, Lincoln worked at a general store in New Salem, Illinois. In 1832, he declared his candidacy for the Illinois House of Representatives, but interrupted his campaign to serve as a captain in the Illinois Militia during the Black Hawk War.[58] When Lincoln returned home from the Black Hawk War, he planned to become a blacksmith, but instead formed a partnership with William Berry, 21, with whom he purchased a New Salem general store on credit. Because a license was required to sell customers single beverages, Berry obtained bartending licenses for $7 each for Lincoln and himself, and in 1833 the Lincoln-Berry General Store became a tavern as well. As licensed bartenders, Lincoln and Berry were able to sell spirits, including liquor, for 12 cents a pint. They offered a wide range of alcoholic beverages as well as food, including takeout dinners. But Berry became an alcoholic, was often too drunk to work, and Lincoln ended up running the store by himself.[59] Although the economy was booming, the business struggled and went into debt, causing Lincoln to sell his share.

In his first campaign speech after returning from his military service, Lincoln observed a supporter in the crowd under attack, grabbed the assailant by his "neck and the seat of his trousers", and tossed him.[35] In the campaign, Lincoln advocated for navigational improvements on the Sangamon River. He could draw crowds as a raconteur, but lacked the requisite formal education, powerful friends, and money, and lost the election.[60] Lincoln finished eighth out of 13 candidates (the top four were elected), though he received 277 of the 300 votes cast in the New Salem precinct.[61]

Lincoln served as New Salem's postmaster and later as county surveyor, but continued his voracious reading and decided to become a lawyer.[62] Rather than studying in the office of an established attorney, as was the custom, Lincoln borrowed legal texts from attorneys John Todd Stuart and Thomas Drummond, purchased books including Blackstone's Commentaries and Chitty's Pleadings, and read law on his own.[62] He later said of his legal education that "I studied with nobody."[63]

Illinois state legislature (1834–1842)

 
Lincoln's home in Springfield, Illinois

Lincoln's second state house campaign in 1834, this time as a Whig, was a success over a powerful Whig opponent.[64] Then followed his four terms in the Illinois House of Representatives for Sangamon County.[65] He championed construction of the Illinois and Michigan Canal, and later was a Canal Commissioner.[66] He voted to expand suffrage beyond white landowners to all white males, but adopted a "free soil" stance opposing both slavery and abolition.[67] In 1837, he declared, "[The] Institution of slavery is founded on both injustice and bad policy, but the promulgation of abolition doctrines tends rather to increase than abate its evils."[68] He echoed Henry Clay's support for the American Colonization Society which advocated a program of abolition in conjunction with settling freed slaves in Liberia.[69]

He was admitted to the Illinois bar in 1836,[70] and moved to Springfield and began to practice law under John T. Stuart, Mary Todd's cousin.[71] Lincoln emerged as a formidable trial combatant during cross-examinations and closing arguments. He partnered several years with Stephen T. Logan, and in 1844 began his practice with William Herndon, "a studious young man".[72]

U.S. House of Representatives (1847–1849)

 
Lincoln in his late 30s as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives. Photo taken by one of Lincoln's law students around 1846.

True to his record, Lincoln professed to friends in 1861 to be "an old line Whig, a disciple of Henry Clay".[73] Their party favored economic modernization in banking, tariffs to fund internal improvements including railroads, and urbanization.[74]

In 1843, Lincoln sought the Whig nomination for Illinois' 7th district seat in the U.S. House of Representatives; he was defeated by John J. Hardin though he prevailed with the party in limiting Hardin to one term. Lincoln not only pulled off his strategy of gaining the nomination in 1846 but also won the election. He was the only Whig in the Illinois delegation, but as dutiful as any participated in almost all votes and made speeches that toed the party line.[75] He was assigned to the Committee on Post Office and Post Roads and the Committee on Expenditures in the War Department.[76] Lincoln teamed with Joshua R. Giddings on a bill to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia with compensation for the owners, enforcement to capture fugitive slaves, and a popular vote on the matter. He dropped the bill when it eluded Whig support.[77][78]

Political views

 
Official Portrait of Lincoln in Congress by Ned Bittinger

On foreign and military policy, Lincoln spoke against the Mexican–American War, which he imputed to President James K. Polk's desire for "military glory—that attractive rainbow, that rises in showers of blood".[79] He supported the Wilmot Proviso, a failed proposal to ban slavery in any U.S. territory won from Mexico.[80]

Lincoln emphasized his opposition to Polk by drafting and introducing his Spot Resolutions. The war had begun with a Mexican slaughter of American soldiers in territory disputed by Mexico, and Polk insisted that Mexican soldiers had "invaded our territory and shed the blood of our fellow-citizens on our own soil."[81] Lincoln demanded that Polk show Congress the exact spot on which blood had been shed and prove that the spot was on American soil.[82] The resolution was ignored in both Congress and the national papers, and it cost Lincoln political support in his district. One Illinois newspaper derisively nicknamed him "spotty Lincoln".[83] Lincoln later regretted some of his statements, especially his attack on presidential war-making powers.[84]

Lincoln had pledged in 1846 to serve only one term in the House. Realizing Clay was unlikely to win the presidency, he supported General Zachary Taylor for the Whig nomination in the 1848 presidential election.[85] Taylor won and Lincoln hoped in vain to be appointed Commissioner of the General Land Office.[86] The administration offered to appoint him secretary or governor of the Oregon Territory as consolation.[87] This distant territory was a Democratic stronghold, and acceptance of the post would have disrupted his legal and political career in Illinois, so he declined and resumed his law practice.[88]

Prairie lawyer

 
Lincoln in 1857

In his Springfield practice, Lincoln handled "every kind of business that could come before a prairie lawyer".[89] Twice a year he appeared for 10 consecutive weeks in county seats in the Midstate county courts; this continued for 16 years.[90] Lincoln handled transportation cases in the midst of the nation's western expansion, particularly river barge conflicts under the many new railroad bridges. As a riverboat man, Lincoln initially favored those interests, but ultimately represented whoever hired him.[91] He later represented a bridge company against a riverboat company in Hurd v. Rock Island Bridge Company, a landmark case involving a canal boat that sank after hitting a bridge.[92] In 1849, he received a patent for a flotation device for the movement of boats in shallow water. The idea was never commercialized, but it made Lincoln the only president to hold a patent.[93]

Lincoln appeared before the Illinois Supreme Court in 175 cases; he was sole counsel in 51 cases, of which 31 were decided in his favor.[94] From 1853 to 1860, one of his largest clients was the Illinois Central Railroad.[95] His legal reputation gave rise to the nickname "Honest Abe".[96]

Lincoln argued in an 1858 criminal trial, defending William "Duff" Armstrong, who was on trial for the murder of James Preston Metzker.[97] The case is famous for Lincoln's use of a fact established by judicial notice to challenge the credibility of an eyewitness. After an opposing witness testified to seeing the crime in the moonlight, Lincoln produced a Farmers' Almanac showing the moon was at a low angle, drastically reducing visibility. Armstrong was acquitted.[97]

Leading up to his presidential campaign, Lincoln elevated his profile in an 1859 murder case, with his defense of Simeon Quinn "Peachy" Harrison who was a third cousin;[g] Harrison was also the grandson of Lincoln's political opponent, Rev. Peter Cartwright.[99] Harrison was charged with the murder of Greek Crafton who, as he lay dying of his wounds, confessed to Cartwright that he had provoked Harrison.[100] Lincoln angrily protested the judge's initial decision to exclude Cartwright's testimony about the confession as inadmissible hearsay. Lincoln argued that the testimony involved a dying declaration and was not subject to the hearsay rule. Instead of holding Lincoln in contempt of court as expected, the judge, a Democrat, reversed his ruling and admitted the testimony into evidence, resulting in Harrison's acquittal.[97]

Republican politics (1854–1860)

Emergence as Republican leader

 
Lincoln in 1858, the year of his debates with Stephen Douglas over slavery

The debate over the status of slavery in the territories failed to alleviate tensions between the slave-holding South and the free North, with the failure of the Compromise of 1850, a legislative package designed to address the issue.[101] In his 1852 eulogy for Clay, Lincoln highlighted the latter's support for gradual emancipation and opposition to "both extremes" on the slavery issue.[102] As the slavery debate in the Nebraska and Kansas territories became particularly acrimonious, Illinois Senator Stephen A. Douglas proposed popular sovereignty as a compromise; the measure would allow the electorate of each territory to decide the status of slavery. The legislation alarmed many Northerners, who sought to prevent the spread of slavery that could result, but Douglas's Kansas–Nebraska Act narrowly passed Congress in May 1854.[103]

Lincoln did not comment on the act until months later in his "Peoria Speech" of October 1854. Lincoln then declared his opposition to slavery, which he repeated en route to the presidency.[104] He said the Kansas Act had a "declared indifference, but as I must think, a covert real zeal for the spread of slavery. I cannot but hate it. I hate it because of the monstrous injustice of slavery itself. I hate it because it deprives our republican example of its just influence in the world...."[105] Lincoln's attacks on the Kansas–Nebraska Act marked his return to political life.[106]

Nationally, the Whigs were irreparably split by the Kansas–Nebraska Act and other efforts to compromise on the slavery issue. Reflecting on the demise of his party, Lincoln wrote in 1855, "I think I am a Whig, but others say there are no Whigs, and that I am an abolitionist.... I do no more than oppose the extension of slavery."[107] The new Republican Party was formed as a northern party dedicated to antislavery, drawing from the antislavery wing of the Whig Party and combining Free Soil, Liberty, and antislavery Democratic Party members,[108] Lincoln resisted early Republican entreaties, fearing that the new party would become a platform for extreme abolitionists.[109] Lincoln held out hope for rejuvenating the Whigs, though he lamented his party's growing closeness with the nativist Know Nothing movement.[110]

In 1854, Lincoln was elected to the Illinois legislature but declined to take his seat. The year's elections showed the strong opposition to the Kansas–Nebraska Act, and in the aftermath, Lincoln sought election to the United States Senate.[106] At that time, senators were elected by the state legislature.[111] After leading in the first six rounds of voting, he was unable to obtain a majority. Lincoln instructed his backers to vote for Lyman Trumbull. Trumbull was an antislavery Democrat, and had received few votes in the earlier ballots; his supporters, also antislavery Democrats, had vowed not to support any Whig. Lincoln's decision to withdraw enabled his Whig supporters and Trumbull's antislavery Democrats to combine and defeat the mainstream Democratic candidate, Joel Aldrich Matteson.[112]

1856 campaign

Violent political confrontations in Kansas continued, and opposition to the Kansas–Nebraska Act remained strong throughout the North. As the 1856 elections approached, Lincoln joined the Republicans and attended the Bloomington Convention, which formally established the Illinois Republican Party. The convention platform endorsed Congress's right to regulate slavery in the territories and backed the admission of Kansas as a free state. Lincoln gave the final speech of the convention supporting the party platform and called for the preservation of the Union.[113] At the June 1856 Republican National Convention, though Lincoln received support to run as vice president, John C. Frémont and William Dayton comprised the ticket, which Lincoln supported throughout Illinois. The Democrats nominated former Secretary of State James Buchanan and the Know-Nothings nominated former Whig President Millard Fillmore.[114] Buchanan prevailed, while Republican William Henry Bissell won election as Governor of Illinois, and Lincoln became a leading Republican in Illinois.[115][h]

Dred Scott v. Sandford

 
A portrait of Dred Scott, petitioner in Dred Scott v. Sandford

Dred Scott was a slave whose master took him from a slave state to a territory that was free as a result of the Missouri Compromise. After Scott was returned to the slave state he petitioned a federal court for his freedom. His petition was denied in Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857).[i] In his opinion, Supreme Court Chief Justice Roger B. Taney wrote that black people were not citizens and derived no rights from the Constitution, and that the Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional for infringing upon slave owners' "property" rights. While many Democrats hoped that Dred Scott would end the dispute over slavery in the territories, the decision sparked further outrage in the North.[118] Lincoln denounced it as the product of a conspiracy of Democrats to support the Slave Power.[119] He argued the decision was at variance with the Declaration of Independence; he said that while the founding fathers did not believe all men equal in every respect, they believed all men were equal "in certain inalienable rights, among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness".[120]

Lincoln–Douglas debates and Cooper Union speech

In 1858, Douglas was up for re-election in the U.S. Senate, and Lincoln hoped to defeat him. Many in the party felt that a former Whig should be nominated in 1858, and Lincoln's 1856 campaigning and support of Trumbull had earned him a favor.[121] Some eastern Republicans supported Douglas for his opposition to the Lecompton Constitution and admission of Kansas as a slave state.[122] Many Illinois Republicans resented this eastern interference. For the first time, Illinois Republicans held a convention to agree upon a Senate candidate, and Lincoln won the nomination with little opposition.[123]

 
Abraham Lincoln, a portrait by Mathew Brady taken February 27, 1860, the day of Lincoln's Cooper Union speech

Lincoln accepted the nomination with great enthusiasm and zeal. After his nomination he delivered his House Divided Speech, with the biblical reference Mark 3:25, "A house divided against itself cannot stand. I believe this government cannot endure permanently half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved—I do not expect the house to fall—but I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing, or all the other."[124] The speech created a stark image of the danger of disunion.[125] The stage was then set for the election of the Illinois legislature which would, in turn, select Lincoln or Douglas.[126] When informed of Lincoln's nomination, Douglas stated, "[Lincoln] is the strong man of the party ... and if I beat him, my victory will be hardly won."[127]

The Senate campaign featured seven debates between Lincoln and Douglas. These were the most famous political debates in American history; they had an atmosphere akin to a prizefight and drew crowds in the thousands.[128] The principals stood in stark contrast both physically and politically. Lincoln warned that Douglas' "Slave Power" was threatening the values of republicanism, and accused Douglas of distorting the Founding Fathers' premise that all men are created equal. Douglas emphasized his Freeport Doctrine, that local settlers were free to choose whether to allow slavery and accused Lincoln of having joined the abolitionists.[129] Lincoln's argument assumed a moral tone, as he claimed Douglas represented a conspiracy to promote slavery. Douglas's argument was more legal, claiming that Lincoln was defying the authority of the U.S. Supreme Court in the Dred Scott decision.[130]

Though the Republican legislative candidates won more popular votes, the Democrats won more seats, and the legislature re-elected Douglas. Lincoln's articulation of the issues gave him a national political presence.[131] In May 1859, Lincoln purchased the Illinois Staats-Anzeiger, a German-language newspaper that was consistently supportive; most of the state's 130,000 German Americans voted Democratically but the German-language paper mobilized Republican support.[132] In the aftermath of the 1858 election, newspapers frequently mentioned Lincoln as a potential Republican presidential candidate, rivaled by William H. Seward, Salmon P. Chase, Edward Bates, and Simon Cameron. While Lincoln was popular in the Midwest, he lacked support in the Northeast and was unsure whether to seek office.[133] In January 1860, Lincoln told a group of political allies that he would accept the nomination if offered, and in the following months' several local papers endorsed his candidacy.[134]

Over the coming months, Lincoln was tireless, making nearly fifty speeches along the campaign trail. By the quality and simplicity of his rhetoric, he quickly became the champion of the Republican party. However, despite his overwhelming support in the Midwestern United States, he was less appreciated in the east. Horace Greeley, editor of the New York Tribune, at that time wrote up an unflattering account of Lincoln's compromising position on slavery and his reluctance to challenge the court's Dred-Scott ruling, which was promptly used against him by his political rivals.[135][136]

On February 27, 1860, powerful New York Republicans invited Lincoln to give a speech at Cooper Union, in which he argued that the Founding Fathers of the United States had little use for popular sovereignty and had repeatedly sought to restrict slavery. He insisted that morality required opposition to slavery, and rejected any "groping for some middle ground between the right and the wrong".[137] Many in the audience thought he appeared awkward and even ugly.[138] But Lincoln demonstrated intellectual leadership that brought him into contention. Journalist Noah Brooks reported, "No man ever before made such an impression on his first appeal to a New York audience."[139]

Historian David Herbert Donald described the speech as "a superb political move for an unannounced presidential aspirant. Appearing in Seward's home state, sponsored by a group largely loyal to Chase, Lincoln shrewdly made no reference to either of these Republican rivals for the nomination".[140] In response to an inquiry about his ambitions, Lincoln said, "The taste is in my mouth a little."[141]

1860 presidential election

 
A Timothy Cole wood engraving taken from a May 20, 1860, ambrotype of Lincoln, two days following his nomination for president

On May 9–10, 1860, the Illinois Republican State Convention was held in Decatur.[142] Lincoln's followers organized a campaign team led by David Davis, Norman Judd, Leonard Swett, and Jesse DuBois, and Lincoln received his first endorsement.[143] Exploiting his embellished frontier legend (clearing land and splitting fence rails), Lincoln's supporters adopted the label of "The Rail Candidate".[144] In 1860, Lincoln described himself: "I am in height, six feet, four inches, nearly; lean in flesh, weighing, on an average, one hundred and eighty pounds; dark complexion, with coarse black hair, and gray eyes."[145] Michael Martinez wrote about the effective imaging of Lincoln by his campaign. At times he was presented as the plain-talking "Rail Splitter" and at other times he was "Honest Abe", unpolished but trustworthy.[146]

On May 18, at the Republican National Convention in Chicago, Lincoln won the nomination on the third ballot, beating candidates such as Seward and Chase. A former Democrat, Hannibal Hamlin of Maine, was nominated for vice president to balance the ticket. Lincoln's success depended on his campaign team, his reputation as a moderate on the slavery issue, and his strong support for internal improvements and the tariff.[147] Pennsylvania put him over the top, led by the state's iron interests who were reassured by his tariff support.[148] Lincoln's managers had focused on this delegation while honoring Lincoln's dictate to "Make no contracts that will bind me".[149]

As the Slave Power tightened its grip on the national government, most Republicans agreed with Lincoln that the North was the aggrieved party. Throughout the 1850s, Lincoln had doubted the prospects of civil war, and his supporters rejected claims that his election would incite secession.[150] When Douglas was selected as the candidate of the Northern Democrats, delegates from eleven slave states walked out of the Democratic convention; they opposed Douglas's position on popular sovereignty, and selected incumbent Vice President John C. Breckinridge as their candidate.[151] A group of former Whigs and Know Nothings formed the Constitutional Union Party and nominated John Bell of Tennessee. Lincoln and Douglas competed for votes in the North, while Bell and Breckinridge primarily found support in the South.[121]

 
The Rail Candidate—Lincoln's 1860 platform, portrayed as being held up by a slave and his party
 
In 1860, northern and western electoral votes (shown in red) put Lincoln into the White House.

Prior to the Republican convention, the Lincoln campaign began cultivating a nationwide youth organization, the Wide Awakes, which it used to generate popular support throughout the country to spearhead voter registration drives, thinking that new voters and young voters tended to embrace new parties.[152] People of the Northern states knew the Southern states would vote against Lincoln and rallied supporters for Lincoln.[153]

As Douglas and the other candidates campaigned, Lincoln gave no speeches, relying on the enthusiasm of the Republican Party. The party did the leg work that produced majorities across the North and produced an abundance of campaign posters, leaflets, and newspaper editorials. Republican speakers focused first on the party platform, and second on Lincoln's life story, emphasizing his childhood poverty. The goal was to demonstrate the power of "free labor", which allowed a common farm boy to work his way to the top by his own efforts.[154] The Republican Party's production of campaign literature dwarfed the combined opposition; a Chicago Tribune writer produced a pamphlet that detailed Lincoln's life and sold 100,000–200,000 copies.[155] Though he did not give public appearances, many sought to visit him and write him. In the runup to the election, he took an office in the Illinois state capitol to deal with the influx of attention. He also hired John George Nicolay as his personal secretary, who would remain in that role during the presidency.[156]

On November 6, 1860, Lincoln was elected the 16th president. He was the first Republican president and his victory was entirely due to his support in the North and West. No ballots were cast for him in 10 of the 15 Southern slave states, and he won only two of 996 counties in all the Southern states, an omen of the impending Civil War.[157][158] Lincoln received 1,866,452 votes, or 39.8% of the total in a four-way race, carrying the free Northern states, as well as California and Oregon.[159] His victory in the Electoral College was decisive: Lincoln had 180 votes to 123 for his opponents.[160]

Presidency (1861–1865)

Secession and inauguration

 
Lincoln's first inaugural at the United States Capitol, March 4, 1861. The Capitol dome above the rotunda was still under construction.
 
New York Times headlines covering Lincoln's first inauguration on March 4, 1861. Less than six weeks later, on April 12, the South attacked Fort Sumter, launching the American Civil War.[161]

The South was outraged by Lincoln's election, and in response secessionists implemented plans to leave the Union before he took office in March 1861.[162] On December 20, 1860, South Carolina took the lead by adopting an ordinance of secession; by February 1, 1861, Florida, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas followed.[163] Six of these states declared themselves to be a sovereign nation, the Confederate States of America, and adopted a constitution.[164] The upper South and border states (Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky, Missouri, and Arkansas) initially rejected the secessionist appeal.[165] President Buchanan and President-elect Lincoln refused to recognize the Confederacy, declaring secession illegal.[166] The Confederacy selected Jefferson Davis as its provisional president on February 9, 1861.[167]

Attempts at compromise followed but Lincoln and the Republicans rejected the proposed Crittenden Compromise as contrary to the Party's platform of free-soil in the territories.[168] Lincoln said, "I will suffer death before I consent ... to any concession or compromise which looks like buying the privilege to take possession of this government to which we have a constitutional right."[169]

Lincoln tacitly supported the Corwin Amendment to the Constitution, which passed Congress and was awaiting ratification by the states when Lincoln took office. That doomed amendment would have protected slavery in states where it already existed.[170] A few weeks before the war, Lincoln sent a letter to every governor informing them Congress had passed a joint resolution to amend the Constitution.[171]

On February 11, 1861, Lincoln gave a particularly emotional farewell address upon leaving Springfield; he would never again return to Springfield alive.[172][173] Lincoln traveled east in a special train. Due to secessionist plots, a then-unprecedented attention to security was given to him and his train. En route to his inauguration, Lincoln addressed crowds and legislatures across the North.[174] The president-elect evaded suspected assassins in Baltimore. On February 23, 1861, he arrived in disguise in Washington, D.C., which was placed under substantial military guard.[175] Lincoln directed his inaugural address to the South, proclaiming once again that he had no inclination to abolish slavery in the Southern states:

Apprehension seems to exist among the people of the Southern States, that by the accession of a Republican Administration, their property, and their peace, and personal security, are to be endangered. There has never been any reasonable cause for such apprehension. Indeed, the most ample evidence to the contrary has all the while existed, and been open to their inspection. It is found in nearly all the published speeches of him who now addresses you. I do but quote from one of those speeches when I declare that "I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so."

Lincoln cited his plans for banning the expansion of slavery as the key source of conflict between North and South, stating "One section of our country believes slavery is right and ought to be extended, while the other believes it is wrong and ought not to be extended. This is the only substantial dispute." The president ended his address with an appeal to the people of the South: "We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies.... The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield, and patriot grave, to every living heart and hearthstone, all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature."[178] The failure of the Peace Conference of 1861 signaled that legislative compromise was impossible. By March 1861, no leaders of the insurrection had proposed rejoining the Union on any terms. Meanwhile, Lincoln and the Republican leadership agreed that the dismantling of the Union could not be tolerated.[179] In his second inaugural address, Lincoln looked back on the situation at the time and said: "Both parties deprecated war, but one of them would make war rather than let the Nation survive, and the other would accept war rather than let it perish, and the war came."

Civil War

 
President Lincoln in 1861
 
Lincoln with officers after the Battle of Antietam. Notable figures (from left) are 1. Col. Delos Sackett; 4. Gen. George W. Morell; 5. Alexander S. Webb, Chief of Staff, V Corps; 6. McClellan;. 8. Dr. Jonathan Letterman; 10. Lincoln; 11. Henry J. Hunt; 12. Fitz John Porter; 15. Andrew A. Humphreys; 16. Capt. George Armstrong Custer.

Major Robert Anderson, commander of the Union's Fort Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina, sent a request for provisions to Washington, and Lincoln's order to meet that request was seen by the secessionists as an act of war. On April 12, 1861, Confederate forces fired on Union troops at Fort Sumter and began the fight. Historian Allan Nevins argued that the newly inaugurated Lincoln made three miscalculations: underestimating the gravity of the crisis, exaggerating the strength of Unionist sentiment in the South, and overlooking Southern Unionist opposition to an invasion.[180]

William Tecumseh Sherman talked to Lincoln during inauguration week and was "sadly disappointed" at his failure to realize that "the country was sleeping on a volcano" and that the South was preparing for war.[181] Donald concludes that, "His repeated efforts to avoid collision in the months between inauguration and the firing on Ft. Sumter showed he adhered to his vow not to be the first to shed fraternal blood. But he also vowed not to surrender the forts. The only resolution of these contradictory positions was for the confederates to fire the first shot; they did just that."[182]

On April 15, Lincoln called on the states to send a total of 75,000 volunteer troops to recapture forts, protect Washington, and "preserve the Union", which, in his view, remained intact despite the seceding states. This call forced states to choose sides. Virginia seceded and was rewarded with the designation of Richmond as the Confederate capital, despite its exposure to Union lines. North Carolina, Tennessee, and Arkansas followed over the following two months. Secession sentiment was strong in Missouri and Maryland, but did not prevail; Kentucky remained neutral.[183] The Fort Sumter attack rallied Americans north of the Mason-Dixon line to defend the nation.

As States sent Union regiments south, on April 19, Baltimore mobs in control of the rail links attacked Union troops who were changing trains. Local leaders' groups later burned critical rail bridges to the capital and the Army responded by arresting local Maryland officials. Lincoln suspended the writ of habeas corpus where needed for the security of troops trying to reach Washington.[184] John Merryman, one Maryland official hindering the U.S. troop movements, petitioned Supreme Court Chief Justice Roger B. Taney to issue a writ of habeas corpus. In June, in Ex parte Merryman, Taney, not ruling on behalf of the Supreme Court,[185] issued the writ, believing that Article I, section 9 of the Constitution authorized only Congress and not the president to suspend it. But Lincoln persisted with the policy of suspension in select areas.[186][187]

Union military strategy

Lincoln took executive control of the war and shaped the Union military strategy. He responded to the unprecedented political and military crisis as commander-in-chief by exercising unprecedented authority. He expanded his war powers, imposed a blockade on Confederate ports, disbursed funds before appropriation by Congress, suspended habeas corpus, and arrested and imprisoned thousands of suspected Confederate sympathizers. Lincoln gained the support of Congress and the northern public for these actions. Lincoln also had to reinforce Union sympathies in the border slave states and keep the war from becoming an international conflict.[188]

 
Running the Machine: an 1864 political cartoon satirizing Lincoln's administration – featuring William Fessenden, Edwin Stanton, William Seward, Gideon Welles, Lincoln, and others

It was clear from the outset that bipartisan support was essential to success, and that any compromise alienated factions on both sides of the aisle, such as the appointment of Republicans and Democrats to command positions. Copperheads criticized Lincoln for refusing to compromise on slavery. The Radical Republicans criticized him for moving too slowly in abolishing slavery.[189] On August 6, 1861, Lincoln signed the Confiscation Act that authorized judicial proceedings to confiscate and free slaves who were used to support the Confederates. The law had little practical effect, but it signaled political support for abolishing slavery.[190]

In August 1861, General John C. Frémont, the 1856 Republican presidential nominee, without consulting Washington, issued a martial edict freeing slaves of the rebels. Lincoln canceled the illegal proclamation as politically motivated and lacking military necessity.[191] As a result, Union enlistments from Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri increased by over 40,000.[192]

Internationally, Lincoln wanted to forestall foreign military aid to the Confederacy.[193] He relied on his combative Secretary of State William Seward while working closely with Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman Charles Sumner.[194] In the 1861 Trent Affair which threatened war with Great Britain, the U.S. Navy illegally intercepted a British mail ship, the Trent, on the high seas and seized two Confederate envoys; Britain protested vehemently while the U.S. cheered. Lincoln ended the crisis by releasing the two diplomats. Biographer James G. Randall dissected Lincoln's successful techniques:[195]

his restraint, his avoidance of any outward expression of truculence, his early softening of State Department's attitude toward Britain, his deference toward Seward and Sumner, his withholding of his paper prepared for the occasion, his readiness to arbitrate, his golden silence in addressing Congress, his shrewdness in recognizing that war must be averted, and his clear perception that a point could be clinched for America's true position at the same time that satisfaction was given to a friendly country.

Lincoln painstakingly monitored the telegraph reports coming into the War Department. He tracked all phases of the effort, consulting with governors, and selecting generals based on their success, their state, and their party. In January 1862, after complaints of inefficiency and profiteering in the War Department, Lincoln replaced War Secretary Simon Cameron with Edwin Stanton. Stanton centralized the War Department's activities, auditing and canceling contracts, saving the federal government $17,000,000.[196] Stanton was a staunch Unionist, pro-business, conservative Democrat who gravitated toward the Radical Republican faction. He worked more often and more closely with Lincoln than any other senior official. "Stanton and Lincoln virtually conducted the war together", say Thomas and Hyman.[197]

Lincoln's war strategy embraced two priorities: ensuring that Washington was well-defended and conducting an aggressive war effort for a prompt, decisive victory.[j] Twice a week, Lincoln met with his cabinet in the afternoon. Occasionally Mary prevailed on him to take a carriage ride, concerned that he was working too hard.[199] For his edification Lincoln relied upon a book by his chief of staff General Henry Halleck entitled Elements of Military Art and Science; Halleck was a disciple of the European strategist Antoine-Henri Jomini. Lincoln began to appreciate the critical need to control strategic points, such as the Mississippi River.[200] Lincoln saw the importance of Vicksburg and understood the necessity of defeating the enemy's army, rather than merely capturing territory.[201]

In directing the Union's war strategy, Lincoln valued the advice of Gen. Winfield Scott, even after his retirement as Commanding General of the United States Army. On June 23–24, 1862, President Lincoln made an unannounced visit to West Point, where he spent five hours consulting with Scott regarding the handling of the Civil War and the staffing of the War Department.[202][203]

General McClellan

After the Union rout at Bull Run and Winfield Scott's retirement, Lincoln appointed Major General George B. McClellan general-in-chief.[204] McClellan then took months to plan his Virginia Peninsula Campaign. McClellan's slow progress frustrated Lincoln, as did his position that no troops were needed to defend Washington. McClellan, in turn, blamed the failure of the campaign on Lincoln's reservation of troops for the capitol.[205]

 
Lincoln and McClellan, October 3, 1862

In 1862, Lincoln removed McClellan for the general's continued inaction. He elevated Henry Halleck in July and appointed John Pope as head of the new Army of Virginia.[206] Pope satisfied Lincoln's desire to advance on Richmond from the north, thus protecting Washington from counterattack.[207] But Pope was then soundly defeated at the Second Battle of Bull Run in the summer of 1862, forcing the Army of the Potomac back to defend Washington.[208]

Despite his dissatisfaction with McClellan's failure to reinforce Pope, Lincoln restored him to command of all forces around Washington.[209] Two days after McClellan's return to command, General Robert E. Lee's forces crossed the Potomac River into Maryland, leading to the Battle of Antietam.[210] That battle, a Union victory, was among the bloodiest in American history; it facilitated Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation in January.[211]

McClellan then resisted the president's demand that he pursue Lee's withdrawing army, while General Don Carlos Buell likewise refused orders to move the Army of the Ohio against rebel forces in eastern Tennessee. Lincoln replaced Buell with William Rosecrans; and after the 1862 midterm elections he replaced McClellan with Ambrose Burnside. The appointments were both politically neutral and adroit on Lincoln's part.[212]

Burnside, against presidential advice, launched an offensive across the Rappahannock River and was defeated by Lee at Fredericksburg in December. Desertions during 1863 came in the thousands and only increased after Fredericksburg, so Lincoln replaced Burnside with Joseph Hooker.[213]

In the 1862 midterm elections the Republicans suffered severe losses due to rising inflation, high taxes, rumors of corruption, suspension of habeas corpus, military draft law, and fears that freed slaves would come North and undermine the labor market. The Emancipation Proclamation gained votes for Republicans in rural New England and the upper Midwest, but cost votes in the Irish and German strongholds and in the lower Midwest, where many Southerners had lived for generations.[214]

In the spring of 1863 Lincoln was sufficiently optimistic about upcoming military campaigns to think the end of the war could be near; the plans included attacks by Hooker on Lee north of Richmond, Rosecrans on Chattanooga, Grant on Vicksburg, and a naval assault on Charleston.[215]

Hooker was routed by Lee at the Battle of Chancellorsville in May, then resigned and was replaced by George Meade.[216] Meade followed Lee north into Pennsylvania and beat him in the Gettysburg Campaign, but then failed to follow up despite Lincoln's demands. At the same time, Grant captured Vicksburg and gained control of the Mississippi River, splitting the far western rebel states.[217]

Emancipation Proclamation

The Federal government's power to end slavery was limited by the Constitution, which before 1865 was understood to reserve the issue to the individual states. Lincoln believed that slavery would be rendered obsolete if its expansion into new territories were prevented, because these territories would be admitted to the Union as free states, and free states would come to outnumber slave states. He sought to persuade the states to agree to compensation for emancipating their slaves.[218] Lincoln rejected Major General John C. Frémont's August 1861 emancipation attempt, as well as one by Major General David Hunter in May 1862, on the grounds that it was not within their power and might upset loyal border states enough for them to secede.[219]

In June 1862, Congress passed an act banning slavery on all federal territory, which Lincoln signed. In July, the Confiscation Act of 1862 was enacted, providing court procedures to free the slaves of those convicted of aiding the rebellion; Lincoln approved the bill despite his belief that it was unconstitutional. He felt such action could be taken only within the war powers of the commander-in-chief, which he planned to exercise. Lincoln at this time reviewed a draft of the Emancipation Proclamation with his cabinet.[220]

Privately, Lincoln concluded that the Confederacy's slave base had to be eliminated. Copperheads argued that emancipation was a stumbling block to peace and reunification; Republican editor Horace Greeley of the New York Tribune agreed.[221] In a letter of August 22, 1862, Lincoln said that while he personally wished all men could be free, regardless of that, his first obligation as president was to preserve the Union:[222]

My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union ... [¶] I have here stated my purpose according to my view of official duty; and I intend no modification of my oft-expressed personal wish that all men everywhere could be free.[223]

On September 22, 1862, Lincoln issued the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation,[224] which announced that, in states still in rebellion on January 1, 1863, the slaves would be freed. He kept his word and, on January 1, 1863, issued the Emancipation Proclamation,[225] freeing the slaves in 10 states not then under Union control,[226] with exemptions specified for areas under such control.[227] Lincoln's comment on signing the Proclamation was: "I never, in my life, felt more certain that I was doing right, than I do in signing this paper."[228] He spent the next 100 days preparing the army and the nation for emancipation, while Democrats rallied their voters by warning of the threat that freed slaves posed to northern whites.[229]

With the abolition of slavery in the rebel states now a military objective, Union armies advancing south liberated all three million slaves in the Confederacy.[230] The Emancipation Proclamation having stated that freedmen would be "received into the armed service of the United States," enlisting these freedmen became official policy. By the spring of 1863, Lincoln was ready to recruit black troops in more than token numbers. In a letter to Tennessee military governor Andrew Johnson encouraging him to lead the way in raising black troops, Lincoln wrote, "The bare sight of 50,000 armed and drilled black soldiers on the banks of the Mississippi would end the rebellion at once".[231] By the end of 1863, at Lincoln's direction, General Lorenzo Thomas had recruited 20 regiments of blacks from the Mississippi Valley.[232]

Gettysburg Address (1863)

 
Lincoln (absent his usual top hat and highlighted in red) at Gettysburg on November 19, 1863. Roughly three hours later, he delivered the Gettysburg Address, one of the best known speeches in American history.[233][234]

Lincoln spoke at the dedication of the Gettysburg battlefield cemetery on November 19, 1863.[235] In 272 words, and three minutes, Lincoln asserted that the nation was born not in 1789, but in 1776, "conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal". He defined the war as dedicated to the principles of liberty and equality for all. He declared that the deaths of so many brave soldiers would not be in vain, that slavery would end, and the future of democracy would be assured, that "government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth".[236]

Defying his prediction that "the world will little note, nor long remember what we say here", the Address became the most quoted speech in American history.[237]

Promoting General Grant

General ShermanGeneral GrantPresident LincolnAdmiral Porter 
The Peacemakers, an 1868 painting by George P.A. Healy of events aboard the River Queen in March 1865 (clickable image—use cursor to identify)

General Ulysses Grant's victories at the Battle of Shiloh and in the Vicksburg campaign impressed Lincoln. Responding to criticism of Grant after Shiloh, Lincoln had said, "I can't spare this man. He fights."[238] With Grant in command, Lincoln felt the Union Army could advance in multiple theaters, while also including black troops. Meade's failure to capture Lee's army after Gettysburg and the continued passivity of the Army of the Potomac persuaded Lincoln to promote Grant to supreme commander. Grant then assumed command of Meade's army.[239]

Lincoln was concerned that Grant might be considering a presidential candidacy in 1864. He arranged for an intermediary to inquire into Grant's political intentions, and once assured that he had none, Lincoln promoted Grant to the newly revived rank of Lieutenant General, a rank which had been unoccupied since George Washington.[240] Authorization for such a promotion "with the advice and consent of the Senate" was provided by a new bill which Lincoln signed the same day he submitted Grant's name to the Senate. His nomination was confirmed by the Senate on March 2, 1864.[241]

Grant in 1864 waged the bloody Overland Campaign, which exacted heavy losses on both sides.[242] When Lincoln asked what Grant's plans were, the persistent general replied, "I propose to fight it out on this line if it takes all summer."[243] Grant's army moved steadily south. Lincoln traveled to Grant's headquarters at City Point, Virginia, to confer with Grant and William Tecumseh Sherman.[244] Lincoln reacted to Union losses by mobilizing support throughout the North.[245] Lincoln authorized Grant to target infrastructure—plantations, railroads, and bridges—hoping to weaken the South's morale and fighting ability. He emphasized defeat of the Confederate armies over destruction (which was considerable) for its own sake.[246] Lincoln's engagement became distinctly personal on one occasion in 1864 when Confederate general Jubal Early raided Washington, D.C. Legend has it that while Lincoln watched from an exposed position, Union Captain (and future Supreme Court Justice) Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. shouted at him, "Get down, you damn fool, before you get shot!"[247]

As Grant continued to weaken Lee's forces, efforts to discuss peace began. Confederate Vice President Stephens led a group meeting with Lincoln, Seward, and others at Hampton Roads. Lincoln refused to negotiate with the Confederacy as a coequal; his objective to end the fighting was not realized.[248] On April 1, 1865, Grant nearly encircled Petersburg in a siege. The Confederate government evacuated Richmond and Lincoln visited the conquered capital. On April 9, Lee surrendered to Grant at Appomattox, officially ending the war.[249]

Reelection

 
An electoral landslide for Lincoln (in red) in the 1864 election; southern states (brown) and territories (gray) not in play
 
A poster of the 1864 election campaign with Andrew Johnson as the candidate for vice president

Lincoln ran for reelection in 1864, while uniting the main Republican factions, along with War Democrats Edwin M. Stanton and Andrew Johnson. Lincoln used conversation and his patronage powers—greatly expanded from peacetime—to build support and fend off the Radicals' efforts to replace him.[250] At its convention, the Republicans selected Johnson as his running mate. To broaden his coalition to include War Democrats as well as Republicans, Lincoln ran under the label of the new Union Party.[251]

Grant's bloody stalemates damaged Lincoln's re-election prospects, and many Republicans feared defeat. Lincoln confidentially pledged in writing that if he should lose the election, he would still defeat the Confederacy before turning over the White House;[252] Lincoln did not show the pledge to his cabinet, but asked them to sign the sealed envelope. The pledge read as follows:

This morning, as for some days past, it seems exceedingly probable that this Administration will not be re-elected. Then it will be my duty to so co-operate with the President elect, as to save the Union between the election and the inauguration; as he will have secured his election on such ground that he cannot possibly save it afterward.[253]

The Democratic platform followed the "Peace wing" of the party and called the war a "failure"; but their candidate, McClellan, supported the war and repudiated the platform. Meanwhile, Lincoln emboldened Grant with more troops and Republican party support. Sherman's capture of Atlanta in September and David Farragut's capture of Mobile ended defeatism.[254] The Democratic Party was deeply split, with some leaders and most soldiers openly for Lincoln. The National Union Party was united by Lincoln's support for emancipation. State Republican parties stressed the perfidy of the Copperheads.[255] On November 8, Lincoln carried all but three states, including 78 percent of Union soldiers.[256]

 
Lincoln's second inaugural address at the almost completed Capitol building, March 4, 1865

On March 4, 1865, Lincoln delivered his second inaugural address. In it, he deemed the war casualties to be God's will. Historian Mark Noll places the speech "among the small handful of semi-sacred texts by which Americans conceive their place in the world;" it is inscribed in the Lincoln Memorial.[257] Lincoln said:

Fondly do we hope—fervently do we pray—that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue, until all the wealth piled by the bond-man's 250 years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash, shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said 3,000 years ago, so still it must be said, "the judgments of the Lord, are true and righteous altogether". With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan—to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations.[258]

Reconstruction

Reconstruction preceded the war's end, as Lincoln and his associates considered the reintegration of the nation, and the fates of Confederate leaders and freed slaves. When a general asked Lincoln how the defeated Confederates were to be treated, Lincoln replied, "Let 'em up easy."[259] Lincoln was determined to find meaning in the war in its aftermath, and did not want to continue to outcast the southern states. His main goal was to keep the union together, so he proceeded by focusing not on whom to blame, but on how to rebuild the nation as one.[260] Lincoln led the moderates in Reconstruction policy and was opposed by the Radicals, under Rep. Thaddeus Stevens, Sen. Charles Sumner and Sen. Benjamin Wade, who otherwise remained Lincoln's allies. Determined to reunite the nation and not alienate the South, Lincoln urged that speedy elections under generous terms be held. His Amnesty Proclamation of December 8, 1863, offered pardons to those who had not held a Confederate civil office and had not mistreated Union prisoners, if they were willing to sign an oath of allegiance.[261]

 
A political cartoon of Vice President Andrew Johnson (a former tailor) and Lincoln, 1865, entitled The 'Rail Splitter' At Work Repairing the Union. The caption reads (Johnson): "Take it quietly Uncle Abe and I will draw it closer than ever." (Lincoln): "A few more stitches Andy and the good old Union will be mended."

As Southern states fell, they needed leaders while their administrations were restored. In Tennessee and Arkansas, Lincoln respectively appointed Johnson and Frederick Steele as military governors. In Louisiana, Lincoln ordered General Nathaniel P. Banks to promote a plan that would reestablish statehood when 10 percent of the voters agreed, and only if the reconstructed states abolished slavery. Democratic opponents accused Lincoln of using the military to ensure his and the Republicans' political aspirations. The Radicals denounced his policy as too lenient, and passed their own plan, the 1864 Wade–Davis Bill, which Lincoln vetoed. The Radicals retaliated by refusing to seat elected representatives from Louisiana, Arkansas, and Tennessee.[262]

Lincoln's appointments were designed to harness both moderates and Radicals. To fill Chief Justice Taney's seat on the Supreme Court, he named the Radicals' choice, Salmon P. Chase, who Lincoln believed would uphold his emancipation and paper money policies.[263]

After implementing the Emancipation Proclamation, Lincoln increased pressure on Congress to outlaw slavery throughout the nation with a constitutional amendment. He declared that such an amendment would "clinch the whole matter" and by December 1863 an amendment was brought to Congress.[264] This first attempt fell short of the required two-thirds majority in the House of Representatives. Passage became part of Lincoln's reelection platform, and after his successful reelection, the second attempt in the House passed on January 31, 1865.[265] With ratification, it became the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution on December 6, 1865.[266]

Lincoln believed the federal government had limited responsibility to the millions of freedmen. He signed Senator Charles Sumner's Freedmen's Bureau bill that set up a temporary federal agency designed to meet the immediate needs of former slaves. The law opened land for a lease of three years with the ability to purchase title for the freedmen. Lincoln announced a Reconstruction plan that involved short-term military control, pending readmission under the control of southern Unionists.[267]

Historians agree that it is impossible to predict exactly how Reconstruction would have proceeded had Lincoln lived. Biographers James G. Randall and Richard Current, according to David Lincove, argue that:[268]

It is likely that had he lived, Lincoln would have followed a policy similar to Johnson's, that he would have clashed with congressional Radicals, that he would have produced a better result for the freedmen than occurred, and that his political skills would have helped him avoid Johnson's mistakes.

Eric Foner argues that:[269]

Unlike Sumner and other Radicals, Lincoln did not see Reconstruction as an opportunity for a sweeping political and social revolution beyond emancipation. He had long made clear his opposition to the confiscation and redistribution of land. He believed, as most Republicans did in April 1865, that the voting requirements should be determined by the states. He assumed that political control in the South would pass to white Unionists, reluctant secessionists, and forward-looking former Confederates. But time and again during the war, Lincoln, after initial opposition, had come to embrace positions first advanced by abolitionists and Radical Republicans. ... Lincoln undoubtedly would have listened carefully to the outcry for further protection for the former slaves ... It is entirely plausible to imagine Lincoln and Congress agreeing on a Reconstruction policy that encompassed federal protection for basic civil rights plus limited black suffrage, along the lines Lincoln proposed just before his death.

Native Americans

 
Chippewa Chief Ne-Bah-Quah-Om (Big Dog) of the Pillager Band

Lincoln's experience with Native Americans started early with their killing of his grandfather in front of the family.[270] Later he served as a Captain in the state militia during the Black Hawk War seeing no combat.[271] During his presidency, his policy toward Indians was based on politics. He used appointments to the Indian Bureau as a reward to supporters from Minnesota and Wisconsin. While in office his administration faced difficulties guarding Western settlers, railroads, and telegraphs, from Indian attacks.[272]

On August 17, 1862, the Sioux or Dakota uprising broke out in Minnesota. Hundreds of settlers were killed, 30,000 were displaced from their homes, and Washington was deeply alarmed.[273] Some feared incorrectly that it might represent a Confederate conspiracy to start a war on the Northwestern frontier.[274] Lincoln ordered thousands of Confederate prisoners of war sent by railroad to put down the uprising.[275] When the Confederates protested forcing Confederate prisoners to fight Indians, Lincoln revoked the policy and none set foot in Minnesota. Lincoln sent General John Pope to Minnesota as commander of the new Department of the Northwest a couple of weeks into the hostilities.[276][277] Before he arrived the Fond Du Lac band of Chippewa sent Lincoln a letter begging to go to war for the United States against the Sioux, so Lincoln could send Minnesota's troops to fight the south.[278] Shortly after, a Mille Lacs Band Chief offered the same at St. Cloud, Minnesota.[279] In it the Chippewa specified that they wanted to use the indigenous rules of warfare. That meant there would be no prisoners of war, no surrender, no peace agreement. Lincoln did not accept the Chippewa offer, as he had no means to control the outcome and women and children were considered legitimate casualties in native American warfare. Once word reached the other bands of Chippewa, he had no way of knowing how they would react to his sending the Fond Du Lac on the warpath. One of the Chippewa signing the letter, Chief Naw-Gaw-Nub, had received a Presidential medal from Lincoln earlier in the year.[280]

Serving under Gen. Pope was Minnesota Congressman Henry H. Sibley. Minnesota's Governor had made Sibley a Colonel United States Volunteers to command the US force tasked with fighting the war and that eventually defeated Little Crow's forces at the Battle of Wood Lake.[277] The day the Mdewakanton force surrendered at Camp Release, a Chippewa war council met at Minnesota's capitol with another Chippewa offer to Lincoln, to fight the Sioux.[281] Sibley ordered a military commission to review that actions of the captured to try those that had committed war crimes. The legitimacy of military commissions trying opposing combatants had been established during the Mexican War.[282] Sibley thought he had 16-20 of men he wanted for trial while Gen. Pope ordered that all detained warriors be tried. When it was done, 303 had been given death sentences that were subject to Presidential review. Lincoln ordered Gen Pope send all of the trial transcripts Washington where he and two of his staff poured over the trials. The lawyer in Lincoln saw issues. He slowly realized that the trials could be divided into two groups: combat between combatants and combat against civilians. The groups could be identified by their transcripts, the first group were all just three pages in length while the second group had more pages, some up to twelve. He placed 263 cases into the first group and commuted their sentences for the largest mass commutation in history. Into the second group went forty. One he commuted for turning state's witness. Another Sibley dismissed when overwhelming proof surfaced exonerating the man. The remaining 38 were executed in the largest mass hanging in US history. Very quickly questions arose concerning three of the executions that have not been answered. Less than four months after the executions Lincoln issued General Order 100 that relates more to the Minnesota War than the Civil War. Now a Congressman, Alexander Ramsey told Lincoln, in 1864, that he would have gotten more re-election support in Minnesota had he executed all 303 of the Mdewakanton. Lincoln responded, "I could not afford to hang men for votes."[283] The men whose sentences he commuted were sent to a military prison at Davenport, Iowa. A few of those he had released due to the efforts of Bishop Henry Whipple.

Whig theory of a presidency

Lincoln adhered to the Whig theory of a presidency focused on executing laws while deferring to Congress' responsibility for legislating. Lincoln vetoed only four bills, including the Wade-Davis Bill with its harsh Reconstruction program.[284] The 1862 Homestead Act made millions of acres of Western government-held land available for purchase at low cost. The 1862 Morrill Land-Grant Colleges Act provided government grants for agricultural colleges in each state. The Pacific Railway Acts of 1862 and 1864 granted federal support for the construction of the United States' first transcontinental railroad, which was completed in 1869.[285] The passage of the Homestead Act and the Pacific Railway Acts was enabled by the absence of Southern congressmen and senators who had opposed the measures in the 1850s.[286]

In the selection and use of his cabinet, Lincoln employed the strengths of his opponents in a manner that emboldened his presidency. Lincoln commented on his thought process, "We need the strongest men of the party in the Cabinet. We needed to hold our own people together. I had looked the party over and concluded that these were the very strongest men. Then I had no right to deprive the country of their services."[287] Goodwin described the group in her biography as a Team of Rivals.[288]

There were two measures passed to raise revenues for the Federal government: tariffs (a policy with long precedent), and a Federal income tax. In 1861, Lincoln signed the second and third Morrill Tariffs, following the first enacted by Buchanan. He also signed the Revenue Act of 1861, creating the first U.S. income tax—a flat tax of 3 percent on incomes above $800 (equivalent to $24,100 in 2021[290]).[291] The Revenue Act of 1862 adopted rates that increased with income.[292]

The Lincoln Administration presided over the expansion of the federal government's economic influence in other areas. The National Banking Act created the system of national banks. The US issued paper currency for the first time, known as greenbacks—printed in green on the reverse side.[293] In 1862, Congress created the Department of Agriculture.[291]

In response to rumors of a renewed draft, the editors of the New York World and the Journal of Commerce published a false draft proclamation that created an opportunity for the editors and others to corner the gold market. Lincoln attacked the media for such behavior, and ordered a military seizure of the two papers which lasted for two days.[294]

Lincoln is largely responsible for the Thanksgiving holiday.[295] Thanksgiving had become a regional holiday in New England in the 17th century. It had been sporadically proclaimed by the federal government on irregular dates. The prior proclamation had been during James Madison's presidency 50 years earlier. In 1863, Lincoln declared the final Thursday in November of that year to be a day of Thanksgiving.[295]

In June 1864, Lincoln approved the Yosemite Grant enacted by Congress, which provided unprecedented federal protection for the area now known as Yosemite National Park.[296]

Supreme Court appointments

Supreme Court Justices
Justice Nominated Appointed
Noah Haynes Swayne January 21, 1862 January 24, 1862
Samuel Freeman Miller July 16, 1862 July 16, 1862
David Davis December 1, 1862 December 8, 1862
Stephen Johnson Field March 6, 1863 March 10, 1863
Salmon Portland Chase (Chief Justice) December 6, 1864 December 6, 1864

Lincoln's philosophy on court nominations was that "we cannot ask a man what he will do, and if we should, and he should answer us, we should despise him for it. Therefore we must take a man whose opinions are known."[295] Lincoln made five appointments to the Supreme Court. Noah Haynes Swayne was an anti-slavery lawyer who was committed to the Union. Samuel Freeman Miller supported Lincoln in the 1860 election and was an avowed abolitionist. David Davis was Lincoln's campaign manager in 1860 and had served as a judge in the Illinois court circuit where Lincoln practiced. Democrat Stephen Johnson Field, a previous California Supreme Court justice, provided geographic and political balance. Finally, Lincoln's Treasury Secretary, Salmon P. Chase, became Chief Justice. Lincoln believed Chase was an able jurist, would support Reconstruction legislation, and that his appointment united the Republican Party.[297]

Foreign policy

Lincoln named his main political rival William H. Seward as Secretary of State, and left most diplomatic issues in his portfolio. However Lincoln did select some of the top diplomats as part of his patronage policy.[298] He also closely watched the handling of the Trent Affair in late 1861 to make sure there was no escalation into a war with Britain.[299] Seward's main role was to keep Britain and France from supporting the Confederacy. He was successful after indicating to London and Paris that Washington would declare war on them if they supported Richmond.[300]

Assassination

 
Shown in the presidential booth of Ford's Theatre, from left to right, are assassin John Wilkes Booth, Abraham Lincoln, Mary Todd Lincoln, Clara Harris, and Henry Rathbone.

John Wilkes Booth was a well-known actor and a Confederate spy from Maryland; though he never joined the Confederate army, he had contacts with the Confederate secret service.[301] After attending an April 11, 1865 speech in which Lincoln promoted voting rights for blacks, Booth hatched a plot to assassinate the President.[302] When Booth learned of the Lincolns' intent to attend a play with General Grant, he planned to assassinate Lincoln and Grant at Ford's Theatre. Lincoln and his wife attended the play Our American Cousin on the evening of April 14, just five days after the Union victory at the Battle of Appomattox Courthouse. At the last minute, Grant decided to go to New Jersey to visit his children instead of attending the play.[303]

On April 14, 1865, hours before he was assassinated, Lincoln signed legislation establishing the United States Secret Service,[304] and, at 10:15 in the evening, Booth entered the back of Lincoln's theater box, crept up from behind, and fired at the back of Lincoln's head, mortally wounding him. Lincoln's guest, Major Henry Rathbone, momentarily grappled with Booth, but Booth stabbed him and escaped.[305] After being attended by Doctor Charles Leale and two other doctors, Lincoln was taken across the street to Petersen House. After remaining in a coma for eight hours, Lincoln died at 7:22 in the morning on April 15.[306][k] Stanton saluted and said, "Now he belongs to the ages."[311][l] Lincoln's body was placed in a flag-wrapped coffin, which was loaded into a hearse and escorted to the White House by Union soldiers.[312] President Johnson was sworn in later that same day.[313]

Two weeks later, Booth, refusing to surrender, was tracked to a farm in Virginia, and was mortally shot by Sergeant Boston Corbett and died on April 26. Secretary of War Stanton had issued orders that Booth be taken alive, so Corbett was initially arrested to be court martialed. After a brief interview, Stanton declared him a patriot and dismissed the charge.[314]

Funeral and burial

 
This funeral train, called the Lincoln Special, carried Lincoln's body on the three week trip from Washington, D.C. to Springfield, Illinois. Along the way, it was met by hundreds of thousands of American mourners.

The late President lay in state, first in the East Room of the White House, and then in the Capitol Rotunda from April 19 through April 21. The caskets containing Lincoln's body and the body of his son Willie traveled for three weeks on the Lincoln Special funeral train.[315] The train followed a circuitous route from Washington D.C. to Springfield, Illinois, stopping at many cities for memorials attended by hundreds of thousands. Many others gathered along the tracks as the train passed with bands, bonfires, and hymn singing[316] or in silent grief. Poet Walt Whitman composed "When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd" to eulogize him, one of four poems he wrote about Lincoln.[317] African Americans were especially moved; they had lost their "Moses".[318] In a larger sense, the reaction was in response to the deaths of so many men in the war.[319] Historians emphasized the widespread shock and sorrow, but noted that some Lincoln haters celebrated his death.[320] Lincoln's body was buried at Oak Ridge Cemetery in Springfield and now lies within the Lincoln Tomb.[321]

Religious and philosophical beliefs

As a young man, Lincoln was a religious skeptic.[322] He was deeply familiar with the Bible, quoting and praising it.[323] He was private about his position on organized religion and respected the beliefs of others.[324] He never made a clear profession of Christian beliefs.[325] Throughout his public career, Lincoln often quoted Scripture.[326] His three most famous speeches—the House Divided Speech, the Gettysburg Address, and his second inaugural—each contain direct allusions to Providence and quotes from Scripture.

In the 1840s, Lincoln subscribed to the Doctrine of Necessity, a belief that the human mind was controlled by a higher power.[327] With the death of his son Edward in 1850 he more frequently expressed a dependence on God.[328] He never joined a church, although he frequently attended First Presbyterian Church with his wife beginning in 1852.[329][m]

In the 1850s, Lincoln asserted his belief in "providence" in a general way, and rarely used the language or imagery of the evangelicals; he regarded the republicanism of the Founding Fathers with an almost religious reverence.[330] The death of his son Willie in February 1862 may have caused him to look toward religion for solace.[331] After Willie's death, he questioned the divine necessity of the war's severity. He wrote at this time that God "could have either saved or destroyed the Union without a human contest. Yet the contest began. And having begun, He could give the final victory to either side any day. Yet the contest proceeds."[332]

Lincoln did believe in an all-powerful God that shaped events and by 1865 was expressing that belief in major speeches.[325] By the end of the war, he increasingly appealed to the Almighty for solace and to explain events, writing on April 4, 1864, to a newspaper editor in Kentucky:

I claim not to have controlled events, but confess plainly that events have controlled me. Now, at the end of three years struggle the nation's condition is not what either party, or any man devised, or expected. God alone can claim it. Whither it is tending seems plain. If God now wills the removal of a great wrong, and wills also that we of the North as well as you of the South, shall pay fairly for our complicity in that wrong, impartial history will find therein new cause to attest and revere the justice and goodness of God.[333]

This spirituality can best be seen in his second inaugural address, considered by some scholars[334] as the greatest such address in American history, and by Lincoln himself as his own greatest speech, or one of them at the very least.[n][335] Lincoln explains therein that the cause, purpose, and result of the war was God's will.[336] Lincoln's frequent use of religious imagery and language toward the end of his life may have reflected his own personal beliefs or might have been a device to reach his audiences, who were mostly evangelical Protestants.[337] On the day Lincoln was assassinated, he reportedly told his wife he desired to visit the Holy Land.[338]

Health

 
Lincoln in February 1865, two months before his death

Lincoln is believed to have had depression, smallpox, and malaria.[339] He took blue mass pills, which contained mercury,[340] to treat constipation.[341] It is unknown to what extent this may have resulted in mercury poisoning.[342]

Several claims have been made that Lincoln's health was declining before the assassination. These are often based on photographs of Lincoln appearing to show weight loss and muscle wasting.[343] It is also suspected that he might have had a rare genetic disease such as Marfan syndrome or multiple endocrine neoplasia type 2B.[343]

Legacy

Republican values

Lincoln's redefinition of republican values has been stressed by historians such as John Patrick Diggins, Harry V. Jaffa, Vernon Burton, Eric Foner, and Herman J. Belz.[344] Lincoln called the Declaration of Independence—which emphasized freedom and equality for all—the "sheet anchor" of republicanism beginning in the 1850s. He did this at a time when the Constitution, which "tolerated slavery", was the focus of most political discourse.[345] Diggins notes, "Lincoln presented Americans a theory of history that offers a profound contribution to the theory and destiny of republicanism itself" in the 1860 Cooper Union speech.[346] Instead of focusing on the legality of an argument, he focused on the moral basis of republicanism.[347]

His position on war was founded on a legal argument regarding the Constitution as essentially a contract among the states, and all parties must agree to pull out of the contract. Furthermore, it was a national duty to ensure the republic stands in every state.[348] Many soldiers and religious leaders from the north, though, felt the fight for liberty and freedom of slaves was ordained by their moral and religious beliefs.[349]

As a Whig activist, Lincoln was a spokesman for business interests, favoring high tariffs, banks, infrastructure improvements, and railroads, in opposition to Jacksonian democrats.[350] Lincoln shared the sympathies that the Jacksonians professed for the common man, but he disagreed with the Jacksonian view that the government should be divorced from economic enterprise.[351] Nevertheless, Lincoln admired Andrew Jackson's steeliness as well as his patriotism.[352] According to historian Sean Wilentz:[352]

Just as the Republican Party of the 1850s absorbed certain elements of Jacksonianism, so Lincoln, whose Whiggery had always been more egalitarian than that of other Whigs, found himself absorbing some of them as well. And some of the Jacksonian spirit resided inside the Lincoln White House.

William C. Harris found that Lincoln's "reverence for the Founding Fathers, the Constitution, the laws under it, and the preservation of the Republic and its institutions strengthened his conservatism."[353] James G. Randall emphasizes his tolerance and moderation "in his preference for orderly progress, his distrust of dangerous agitation, and his reluctance toward ill digested schemes of reform." Randall concludes that "he was conservative in his complete avoidance of that type of so-called 'radicalism' which involved abuse of the South, hatred for the slaveholder, thirst for vengeance, partisan plotting, and ungenerous demands that Southern institutions be transformed overnight by outsiders."[354]

Reunification of the states

 
Bureau of Engraving and Printing portrait of Lincoln as president

In Lincoln's first inaugural address, he explored the nature of democracy. He denounced secession as anarchy, and explained that majority rule had to be balanced by constitutional restraints. He said "A majority held in restraint by constitutional checks and limitations, and always changing easily with deliberate changes of popular opinions and sentiments, is the only true sovereign of a free people."[355]

The successful reunification of the states had consequences for how people viewed the country. The term "the United States" has historically been used sometimes in the plural ("these United States") and other times in the singular. The Civil War was a significant force in the eventual dominance of the singular usage by the end of the 19th century.[356]

Historical reputation

In his company, I was never reminded of my humble origin, or of my unpopular color.[357]

In surveys of U.S. scholars ranking presidents conducted since 1948, the top three presidents are Lincoln, Washington, and Franklin Delano Roosevelt, although the order varies.[358][o] Between 1999 and 2011, Lincoln, John F. Kennedy, and Ronald Reagan have been the top-ranked presidents in eight public opinion surveys, according to Gallup.[360] A 2004 study found that scholars in the fields of history and politics ranked Lincoln number one, while legal scholars placed him second after George Washington.[361]

 
Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C.

Lincoln's assassination left him a national martyr. He was viewed by abolitionists as a champion of human liberty. Republicans linked Lincoln's name to their party. Many, though not all, in the South considered Lincoln as a man of outstanding ability.[362] Historians have said he was "a classical liberal" in the 19th-century sense. Allen C. Guelzo states that Lincoln was a "classical liberal democrat—an enemy of artificial hierarchy, a friend to trade and business as ennobling and enabling, and an American counterpart to Mill, Cobden, and Bright", whose portrait Lincoln hung in his White House office.[363][364]

Sociologist Barry Schwartz argues that Lincoln's American reputation grew slowly from the late 19th century until the Progressive Era (1900–1920s), when he emerged as one of America's most venerated heroes, even among white Southerners. The high point came in 1922 with the dedication of the Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.[365]

Union nationalism, as envisioned by Lincoln, "helped lead America to the nationalism of Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, and Franklin Delano Roosevelt."[366] In the New Deal era, liberals honored Lincoln not so much as the self-made man or the great war president, but as the advocate of the common man who they claimed would have supported the welfare state.[367]

 
The Lincoln cent, an American coin portraying Lincoln

Schwartz argues that in the 1930s and 1940s the memory of Abraham Lincoln was practically sacred and provided the nation with "a moral symbol inspiring and guiding American life." During the Great Depression, he argues, Lincoln served "as a means for seeing the world's disappointments, for making its sufferings not so much explicable as meaningful." Franklin D. Roosevelt, preparing America for war, used the words of the Civil War president to clarify the threat posed by Germany and Japan. Americans asked, "What would Lincoln do?"[368] However, Schwartz also finds that since World War II Lincoln's symbolic power has lost relevance, and this "fading hero is symptomatic of fading confidence in national greatness." He suggested that postmodernism and multiculturalism have diluted greatness as a concept.[369]

In the Cold War years, Lincoln's image shifted to a symbol of freedom who brought hope to those oppressed by Communist regimes.[367] He had long been known as the Great Emancipator,[370] but, by the late 1960s, some African American intellectuals, led by Lerone Bennett Jr., denied that Lincoln deserved that title.[371][372] Bennett won wide attention when he called Lincoln a white supremacist in 1968.[373] He noted that Lincoln used ethnic slurs and told jokes that ridiculed blacks. Bennett argued that Lincoln opposed social equality and proposed that freed slaves voluntarily move to another country. The emphasis shifted away from Lincoln the emancipator to an argument that blacks had freed themselves from slavery, or at least were responsible for pressuring the government to emancipate them.[374] Defenders of Lincoln, such as authors Dirck and Cashin, retorted that he was not as bad as most politicians of his day[375] and that he was a "moral visionary" who deftly advanced the abolitionist cause, as fast as politically possible.[376] Dirck stated that few Civil War scholars take Bennett seriously, pointing to his "narrow political agenda and faulty research".[377]

By the 1970s, Lincoln had become a hero to political conservatives[378]—apart from neo-Confederates such as Mel Bradford, who denounced his treatment of the white South—for his intense nationalism, his support for business, his insistence on stopping the spread of slavery, his acting on Lockean and Burkean principles on behalf of both liberty and tradition, and his devotion to the principles of the Founding Fathers.[379] Lincoln became a favorite of liberal intellectuals across the world.[380]

Barry Schwartz wrote in 2009 that Lincoln's image suffered "erosion, fading prestige, benign ridicule" in the late 20th century.[381] On the other hand, Donald opined in his 1996 biography that Lincoln was distinctly endowed with the personality trait of negative capability, defined by the poet John Keats and attributed to extraordinary leaders who were "content in the midst of uncertainties and doubts, and not compelled toward fact or reason".[382]

In the 21st century, President Barack Obama named Lincoln his favorite president and insisted on using the Lincoln Bible for his inaugural ceremonies.[383][384][385] Lincoln has often been portrayed by Hollywood, almost always in a flattering light.[386][387]

Memory and memorials

Lincoln's portrait appears on two denominations of United States currency, the penny and the $5 bill. His likeness also appears on many postage stamps.[388] While he is usually portrayed bearded, he did not grow a beard until 1860 at the suggestion of 11-year-old Grace Bedell. He was the first of five presidents to do so.[389]

He has been memorialized in many town, city, and county names,[390] including the capital of Nebraska.[391] The United States Navy Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN-72) is named after Lincoln, the second Navy ship to bear his name.[392]

 
The Lincoln Memorial designed by Daniel Chester French and carved by the Piccirilli Brothers

The Lincoln Memorial is one of the most visited monuments in the nation's capital[393] and is one of the top five most visited National Park Service sites in the country.[394] Ford's Theatre, among the most visited sites in Washington, D.C.,[394] is across the street from Petersen House, where Lincoln died.[395] Memorials in Springfield, Illinois, include the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum, Lincoln's home, and his tomb.[396] A portrait carving of Lincoln appears with those of three other presidents on Mount Rushmore, which receives about 3 million visitors a year.[397] An influential statue of Lincoln stands in Lincoln Park, Chicago, with recastings given as diplomatic gifts standing in Parliament Square, London, and Parque Lincoln, Mexico City.[398][399][400]

In 2019, Congress officially dedicated room H-226 in the US Capitol to Abraham Lincoln.[401] The room is located off of National Statuary Hall and previously served as the post office of the House while then-Representative Abraham Lincoln served in Congress from 1847-1849.[402][403]

See also

Notes

  1. ^ a b Discharged from command-rank of Captain and re-enlisted at rank of Private.
  2. ^ The identity of Lincoln's grandmother Bathsheba Herring, though without certainty, is the consensus of multiple Lincoln biographers. She was the daughter of Alexander and Abigail Herring (née Harrison).[4]
  3. ^ Thomas, born January 1778, would have been 8 at the attack, May 1786. Older sources use six.[7]
  4. ^ Their land eventually became part of Space, when the county was established in 1818.[15]
  5. ^ Historians disagree on who initiated the move; Thomas Lincoln had no obvious reason to do so. One possibility is that other members of the family, including Dennis Hanks, may not have matched Thomas's stability and steady income.[36]
  6. ^ The Lincolns' last descendant, great-grandson Robert Todd Lincoln Beckwith, died in 1985.[52]
  7. ^ Lincoln was a descendant of the Harrisons through his grandmother, Bathsheba Herring.[98]
  8. ^ Eric Foner contrasts the abolitionists and anti-slavery Radical Republicans of the Northeast, who saw slavery as a sin, with the conservative Republicans, who thought it was bad because it hurt white people and blocked progress. Foner argues that Lincoln was in the middle, opposing slavery primarily because it violated the republicanism principles of the Founding Fathers, especially the equality of all men and democratic self-government as expressed in the Declaration of Independence.[116]
  9. ^ Although the name of the Supreme Court case is Dred Scott v. Sandford, the respondent's surname was actually "Sanford". A clerk misspelled the name, and the court never corrected the error.[117]
  10. ^ Major Northern newspapers, however, demanded more—they expected victory within 90 days.[198]
  11. ^ At the moment of death some observers said his face seemed to relax into a smile.[307][308][309][310]
  12. ^ Other versions of the quotation have been offered, including "He now belongs to the ages," "He is a man for the ages," and "Now he belongs to the angels." Gopnik, Adam, "Angels and Ages: Lincoln's language and its legacy," The New Yorker, May 21, 2007.
  13. ^ On claims that Lincoln was baptized by an associate of Alexander Campbell, see Martin, Jim (1996). . Restoration Quarterly. 38 (2). Archived from the original on October 19, 2012. Retrieved May 27, 2012.
  14. ^ Lincoln wrote to Thurlow Weed on March 4, 1865, "on the recent Inaugeral [sic] Address. I expect the latter to wear as well as—perhaps better than—any thing I have produced...."
  15. ^ While the book Rating The Presidents: A Ranking of U.S. Leaders, From the Great and Honorable to the Dishonest and Incompetent acknowledges that polls have rated Lincoln among the top presidents since 1948, the authors find him to be among the two best presidents, along with Franklin Delano Roosevelt.[359]

References

  1. ^ Carpenter, Francis B. (1866). Six Months in the White House: The Story of a Picture. Hurd and Houghton. p. 217.
  2. ^ Donald 1996, pp. 20–22.
  3. ^ Warren 2017, p. 3–4.
  4. ^ Harrison 1935, p. 276.
  5. ^ Warren 2017, p. 4.
  6. ^ a b Donald 1996, p. 21.
  7. ^ Wilson et al. 1998, pp. 35–36.
  8. ^ Bartelt 2008, p. 79.
  9. ^ Warren 2017, p. 9.
  10. ^ Warren 2017, p. 9–10.
  11. ^ Sandburg 1926, p. 20.
  12. ^ Warren 2017, p. 13.
  13. ^ Warren 2017, p. 26.
  14. ^ Warren 2017, p. 16, 43.
  15. ^ Bartelt 2008, pp. 3, 5, 16.
  16. ^ Sandburg 1926, p. 20; Donald 1996, pp. 23–24.
  17. ^ Bartelt 2008, pp. 34, 156.
  18. ^ Donald 1996, p. 22–24.
  19. ^ Bartelt 2008, pp. 24, 104.
  20. ^ Bartelt 2008, pp. 22–23, 77.
  21. ^ Donald 1996, pp. 34, 116.
  22. ^ Bartelt 2008, pp. 23, 83.
  23. ^ Donald 1996, p. 26–27.
  24. ^ White 2009, pp. 25, 31, 47.
  25. ^ Bartelt 2008, p. 66.
  26. ^ Bartelt 2008, pp. 10, 33.
  27. ^ Donald 1996, p. 23.
  28. ^ Donald 1996, p. 29.
  29. ^ Madison 2014, p. 110.
  30. ^ Donald 1996, pp. 29–31, 38–43.
  31. ^ Donald 1996, pp. 30–33.
  32. ^ Warren 2017, p. 134–135.
  33. ^ Dellinger, Bob. "Wrestling in the USA". National Wrestling Hall of Fame. Retrieved April 9, 2021.
  34. ^ Donald 1996, p. 41.
  35. ^ a b Donald 1996, p. 36.
  36. ^ Bartelt 2008, pp. 38–40.
  37. ^ Bartelt 2008, p. 71.
  38. ^ Oates 1974, pp. 15–17.
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  40. ^ Sandburg 1926, pp. 22–23; Donald 1996, p. 38.
  41. ^ Ellenberg 2021.
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  45. ^ Donald 1996, p. 67.
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  47. ^ Lamb & Swain 2008, p. 3.
  48. ^ Sandburg 1926, pp. 46–51.
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  50. ^ Baker 1989, p. 142.
  51. ^ White 2009, pp. 179–181, 476.
  52. ^ Emerson, Jason (2012). Giant in the Shadows: The Life of Robert T. Lincoln. SIU Press. p. 420. ISBN 978-0-8093-3055-3. Retrieved June 27, 2015.
  53. ^ White 2009, p. 126.
  54. ^ Baker 1989, p. 120.
  55. ^ Hertz, Emanuel (1938). The Hidden Lincoln. The Viking Press. p. 105.
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  57. ^ Steers 2010, p. 341.
  58. ^ Winkle 2001, pp. 86–95.
  59. ^ Blazeski, Goran (October 15, 2016). "Abraham Lincoln was the only President who was also a licensed bartender". The Vintage News. Retrieved March 4, 2022.
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  65. ^ Simon 1990, p. 283.
  66. ^ Weik, Jesse William. "Abraham Lincoln and Internal Improvements". Abraham Lincoln's Classroom. from the original on February 12, 2015. Retrieved February 12, 2015.
  67. ^ Simon 1990, p. 130.
  68. ^ Donald 1996, p. 134.
  69. ^ Foner 2010, p. 17–19, 67.
  70. ^ Donald 1996, p. 64.
  71. ^ White 2009, pp. 71, 79, 108.
  72. ^ Donald 1996, p. 17.
  73. ^ Donald 1996, p. 222.
  74. ^ Boritt & Pinsker 2002, pp. 137–153.
  75. ^ Oates 1974, p. 79.
  76. ^ "US Congressman Lincoln – Abraham Lincoln Historical Society". Abraham-lincoln-history.org. from the original on December 15, 2018. Retrieved February 2, 2019.
  77. ^ Harris 2007, p. 54; Foner 2010, p. 57.
  78. ^ "LINCOLN, Abraham | US House of Representatives: History, Art & Archives". history.house.gov. Retrieved July 1, 2022.
  79. ^ Heidler & Heidler 2006, pp. 181–183.
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abraham, lincoln, this, article, about, president, united, states, other, uses, disambiguation, link, february, 1809, april, 1865, american, lawyer, politician, statesman, served, 16th, president, united, states, from, 1861, until, assassination, 1865, lincoln. This article is about the president of the United States For other uses see Abraham Lincoln disambiguation Abraham Lincoln ˈ l ɪ ŋ k en LINK en February 12 1809 April 15 1865 was an American lawyer politician and statesman who served as the 16th president of the United States from 1861 until his assassination in 1865 Lincoln led the Union through the American Civil War to defend the nation as a constitutional union and succeeded in abolishing slavery bolstering the federal government and modernizing the U S economy Abraham LincolnPortrait by Alexander Gardner 186316th President of the United StatesIn office March 4 1861 April 15 1865Vice PresidentHannibal Hamlin 1861 1865 Andrew Johnson March April 1865 Preceded byJames BuchananSucceeded byAndrew JohnsonMember of the U S House of Representatives from Illinois s 7th districtIn office March 4 1847 March 3 1849Preceded byJohn HenrySucceeded byThomas L HarrisMember of theIllinois House of Representativesfrom Sangamon CountyIn office December 1 1834 December 4 1842Personal detailsBorn 1809 02 12 February 12 1809Hodgenville Kentucky U S DiedApril 15 1865 1865 04 15 aged 56 Washington D C U S Manner of deathAssassination gunshot wound to the head Resting placeLincoln TombPolitical partyRepublican 1856 1865 Whig before 1856 Height6 ft 4 in 193 cm 1 SpouseMary Todd m 1842 wbr ChildrenRobertEdwardWillieTadParentsThomas Lincoln father Nancy Hanks mother RelativesLincoln familyOccupationPoliticianlawyerSignatureMilitary serviceBranch serviceIllinois MilitiaYears of service1832RankCaptain a Private a Battles warsAmerican Indian Wars Black Hawk War Battle of Stillman s Run Battle of Kellogg s GroveLincoln was born into poverty in a log cabin in Kentucky and was raised on the frontier primarily in Indiana He was self educated and became a lawyer Whig Party leader Illinois state legislator and U S Congressman from Illinois In 1849 he returned to his successful law practice in central Illinois In 1854 he was angered by the Kansas Nebraska Act which opened the territories to slavery and he re entered politics He soon became a leader of the new Republican Party He reached a national audience in the 1858 Senate campaign debates against Stephen A Douglas Lincoln ran for president in 1860 sweeping the North to gain victory Pro slavery elements in the South viewed his election as a threat to slavery and Southern states began seceding from the nation During this time the newly formed Confederate States of America began seizing federal military bases in the south Just over one month after Lincoln assumed the presidency the Confederate States attacked Fort Sumter a U S fort in South Carolina Following the bombardment Lincoln mobilized forces to suppress the rebellion and restore the union Lincoln a moderate Republican had to navigate a contentious array of factions with friends and opponents from both the Democratic and Republican parties His allies the War Democrats and the Radical Republicans demanded harsh treatment of the Southern Confederates Anti war Democrats called Copperheads despised Lincoln and irreconcilable pro Confederate elements plotted his assassination He managed the factions by exploiting their mutual enmity carefully distributing political patronage and by appealing to the American people His Gettysburg Address came to be seen as one of the greatest and most influential statements of American national purpose Lincoln closely supervised the strategy and tactics in the war effort including the selection of generals and implemented a naval blockade of the South s trade He suspended habeas corpus in Maryland and elsewhere and averted British intervention by defusing the Trent Affair In 1863 he issued the Emancipation Proclamation which declared the slaves in the states in rebellion to be free It also directed the Army and Navy to recognize and maintain the freedom of such persons and to receive them into the armed service of the United States Lincoln also pressured border states to outlaw slavery and he promoted the Thirteenth Amendment to the U S Constitution which upon its ratification abolished slavery Lincoln managed his own successful re election campaign He sought to heal the war torn nation through reconciliation On April 14 1865 just five days after the war s end at Appomattox he was attending a play at Ford s Theatre in Washington D C with his wife Mary when he was fatally shot by Confederate sympathizer John Wilkes Booth Lincoln is remembered as a martyr and a national hero for his wartime leadership and for his efforts to preserve the Union and abolish slavery Lincoln is often ranked in both popular and scholarly polls as the greatest president in American history Contents 1 Family and childhood 1 1 Early life 1 2 Mother s death 1 3 Education and move to Illinois 1 4 Marriage and children 2 Early career and militia service 3 Illinois state legislature 1834 1842 4 U S House of Representatives 1847 1849 4 1 Political views 5 Prairie lawyer 6 Republican politics 1854 1860 6 1 Emergence as Republican leader 6 1 1 1856 campaign 6 1 2 Dred Scott v Sandford 6 2 Lincoln Douglas debates and Cooper Union speech 6 3 1860 presidential election 7 Presidency 1861 1865 7 1 Secession and inauguration 7 2 Civil War 7 2 1 Union military strategy 7 2 2 General McClellan 7 2 3 Emancipation Proclamation 7 2 4 Gettysburg Address 1863 7 2 5 Promoting General Grant 7 3 Reelection 7 4 Reconstruction 7 5 Native Americans 7 6 Whig theory of a presidency 7 7 Supreme Court appointments 7 8 Foreign policy 8 Assassination 8 1 Funeral and burial 9 Religious and philosophical beliefs 10 Health 11 Legacy 11 1 Republican values 11 2 Reunification of the states 11 3 Historical reputation 11 4 Memory and memorials 12 See also 13 Notes 14 References 14 1 Bibliography 15 External links 15 1 Official 15 2 Organizations 15 3 Media coverage 15 4 OtherFamily and childhoodEarly life Main article Early life and career of Abraham Lincoln Abraham Lincoln was born on February 12 1809 the second child of Thomas Lincoln and Nancy Hanks Lincoln in a log cabin on Sinking Spring Farm near Hodgenville Kentucky 2 He was a descendant of Samuel Lincoln an Englishman who migrated from Hingham Norfolk to its namesake Hingham Massachusetts in 1638 The family then migrated west passing through New Jersey Pennsylvania and Virginia 3 Lincoln was also a descendant of the Harrison family of Virginia his paternal grandfather and namesake Captain Abraham Lincoln and wife Bathsheba nee Herring moved the family from Virginia to Jefferson County Kentucky b The captain was killed in an Indian raid in 1786 5 His children including eight year old Thomas Abraham s father witnessed the attack 6 c Thomas then worked at odd jobs in Kentucky and Tennessee before the family settled in Hardin County Kentucky in the early 1800s 6 The heritage of Lincoln s mother Nancy remains unclear but it is widely assumed that she was the daughter of Lucy Hanks 8 Thomas and Nancy married on June 12 1806 in Washington County and moved to Elizabethtown Kentucky 9 They had three children Sarah Abraham and Thomas who died as an infant 10 Thomas Lincoln bought or leased farms in Kentucky before losing all but 200 acres 81 ha of his land in court disputes over property titles 11 In 1816 the family moved to Indiana where the land surveys and titles were more reliable 12 Indiana was a free non slaveholding territory and they settled in an unbroken forest 13 in Hurricane Township Perry County Indiana 14 d In 1860 Lincoln noted that the family s move to Indiana was partly on account of slavery but mainly due to land title difficulties 16 The farm site where Lincoln grew up in Spencer County Indiana In Kentucky and Indiana Thomas worked as a farmer cabinetmaker and carpenter 17 At various times he owned farms livestock and town lots paid taxes sat on juries appraised estates and served on county patrols Thomas and Nancy were members of a Separate Baptists church which forbade alcohol dancing and slavery 18 Overcoming financial challenges Thomas in 1827 obtained clear title to 80 acres 32 ha in Indiana an area which became the Little Pigeon Creek Community 19 Mother s death On October 5 1818 Nancy Lincoln died from milk sickness leaving 11 year old Sarah in charge of a household including her father 9 year old Abraham and Nancy s 19 year old orphan cousin Dennis Hanks 20 Ten years later on January 20 1828 Sarah died while giving birth to a stillborn son devastating Lincoln 21 On December 2 1819 Thomas married Sarah Bush Johnston a widow from Elizabethtown Kentucky with three children of her own 22 Abraham became close to his stepmother and called her Mother 23 Lincoln disliked the hard labor associated with farm life His family even said he was lazy for all his reading scribbling writing ciphering writing Poetry etc 24 His stepmother acknowledged he did not enjoy physical labor but loved to read 25 Education and move to Illinois Lincoln was largely self educated 26 His formal schooling was from itinerant teachers It included two short stints in Kentucky where he learned to read but probably not to write at age seven 27 and in Indiana where he went to school sporadically due to farm chores for a total of fewer than 12 months in aggregate by the age of 15 28 He persisted as an avid reader and retained a lifelong interest in learning 29 Family neighbors and schoolmates recalled that his reading included the King James Bible Aesop s Fables John Bunyan s The Pilgrim s Progress Daniel Defoe s Robinson Crusoe and The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin 30 New Salem Illinois As a teen Lincoln took responsibility for chores and customarily gave his father all earnings from work outside the home until he was 21 31 Lincoln was tall strong and athletic and became adept at using an ax 32 He was an active wrestler during his youth and trained in the rough catch as catch can style also known as catch wrestling He became county wrestling champion at the age of 21 33 He gained a reputation for strength and audacity after winning a wrestling match with the renowned leader of ruffians known as the Clary s Grove Boys 34 In March 1830 fearing another milk sickness outbreak several members of the extended Lincoln family including Abraham moved west to Illinois a free state and settled in Macon County 35 e Abraham then became increasingly distant from Thomas in part due to his father s lack of education 37 In 1831 as Thomas and other family prepared to move to a new homestead in Coles County Illinois Abraham struck out on his own 38 He made his home in New Salem Illinois for six years 39 Lincoln and some friends took goods by flatboat to New Orleans Louisiana where he was first exposed to slavery 40 In 1865 Lincoln was asked how he came to acquire his rhetorical skills He answered that in the practice of law he frequently came across the word demonstrate but had insufficient understanding of the term So he left Springfield for his father s home to study until he could give any proposition in the six books of Euclid here referencing Euclid s Elements at sight 41 Marriage and children Further information Lincoln family Health of Abraham Lincoln and Sexuality of Abraham Lincoln 1864 photo of President Lincoln with youngest son Tad Mary Todd Lincoln wife of Abraham Lincoln in 1861 Lincoln s first romantic interest was Ann Rutledge whom he met when he moved to New Salem By 1835 they were in a relationship but not formally engaged 42 She died on August 25 1835 most likely of typhoid fever 43 In the early 1830s he met Mary Owens from Kentucky 44 Late in 1836 Lincoln agreed to a match with Owens if she returned to New Salem Owens arrived that November and he courted her for a time however they both had second thoughts On August 16 1837 he wrote Owens a letter saying he would not blame her if she ended the relationship and she never replied 45 In 1839 Lincoln met Mary Todd in Springfield Illinois and the following year they became engaged 46 She was the daughter of Robert Smith Todd a wealthy lawyer and businessman in Lexington Kentucky 47 A wedding set for January 1 1841 was canceled at Lincoln s request but they reconciled and married on November 4 1842 in the Springfield mansion of Mary s sister 48 While anxiously preparing for the nuptials he was asked where he was going and replied To hell I suppose 49 In 1844 the couple bought a house in Springfield near his law office Mary kept house with the help of a hired servant and a relative 50 Lincoln was an affectionate husband and father of four sons though his work regularly kept him away from home The oldest Robert Todd Lincoln was born in 1843 and was the only child to live to maturity Edward Baker Lincoln Eddie born in 1846 died February 1 1850 probably of tuberculosis Lincoln s third son Willie Lincoln was born on December 21 1850 and died of a fever at the White House on February 20 1862 The youngest Thomas Tad Lincoln was born on April 4 1853 and survived his father but died of heart failure at age 18 on July 16 1871 51 f Lincoln was remarkably fond of children 53 and the Lincolns were not considered to be strict with their own 54 In fact Lincoln s law partner William H Herndon would grow irritated when Lincoln brought his children to the law office Their father it seemed was often too absorbed in his work to notice his children s behavior Herndon recounted I have felt many and many a time that I wanted to wring their little necks and yet out of respect for Lincoln I kept my mouth shut Lincoln did not note what his children were doing or had done 55 The deaths of their sons Eddie and Willie had profound effects on both parents Lincoln suffered from melancholy a condition now thought to be clinical depression 56 Later in life Mary struggled with the stresses of losing her husband and sons and Robert committed her for a time to an asylum in 1875 57 Early career and militia serviceFurther information Early life and career of Abraham Lincoln and Abraham Lincoln in the Black Hawk War During 1831 and 1832 Lincoln worked at a general store in New Salem Illinois In 1832 he declared his candidacy for the Illinois House of Representatives but interrupted his campaign to serve as a captain in the Illinois Militia during the Black Hawk War 58 When Lincoln returned home from the Black Hawk War he planned to become a blacksmith but instead formed a partnership with William Berry 21 with whom he purchased a New Salem general store on credit Because a license was required to sell customers single beverages Berry obtained bartending licenses for 7 each for Lincoln and himself and in 1833 the Lincoln Berry General Store became a tavern as well As licensed bartenders Lincoln and Berry were able to sell spirits including liquor for 12 cents a pint They offered a wide range of alcoholic beverages as well as food including takeout dinners But Berry became an alcoholic was often too drunk to work and Lincoln ended up running the store by himself 59 Although the economy was booming the business struggled and went into debt causing Lincoln to sell his share In his first campaign speech after returning from his military service Lincoln observed a supporter in the crowd under attack grabbed the assailant by his neck and the seat of his trousers and tossed him 35 In the campaign Lincoln advocated for navigational improvements on the Sangamon River He could draw crowds as a raconteur but lacked the requisite formal education powerful friends and money and lost the election 60 Lincoln finished eighth out of 13 candidates the top four were elected though he received 277 of the 300 votes cast in the New Salem precinct 61 Lincoln served as New Salem s postmaster and later as county surveyor but continued his voracious reading and decided to become a lawyer 62 Rather than studying in the office of an established attorney as was the custom Lincoln borrowed legal texts from attorneys John Todd Stuart and Thomas Drummond purchased books including Blackstone s Commentaries and Chitty s Pleadings and read law on his own 62 He later said of his legal education that I studied with nobody 63 Illinois state legislature 1834 1842 Lincoln s home in Springfield Illinois Lincoln s second state house campaign in 1834 this time as a Whig was a success over a powerful Whig opponent 64 Then followed his four terms in the Illinois House of Representatives for Sangamon County 65 He championed construction of the Illinois and Michigan Canal and later was a Canal Commissioner 66 He voted to expand suffrage beyond white landowners to all white males but adopted a free soil stance opposing both slavery and abolition 67 In 1837 he declared The Institution of slavery is founded on both injustice and bad policy but the promulgation of abolition doctrines tends rather to increase than abate its evils 68 He echoed Henry Clay s support for the American Colonization Society which advocated a program of abolition in conjunction with settling freed slaves in Liberia 69 He was admitted to the Illinois bar in 1836 70 and moved to Springfield and began to practice law under John T Stuart Mary Todd s cousin 71 Lincoln emerged as a formidable trial combatant during cross examinations and closing arguments He partnered several years with Stephen T Logan and in 1844 began his practice with William Herndon a studious young man 72 U S House of Representatives 1847 1849 Lincoln in his late 30s as a member of the U S House of Representatives Photo taken by one of Lincoln s law students around 1846 True to his record Lincoln professed to friends in 1861 to be an old line Whig a disciple of Henry Clay 73 Their party favored economic modernization in banking tariffs to fund internal improvements including railroads and urbanization 74 In 1843 Lincoln sought the Whig nomination for Illinois 7th district seat in the U S House of Representatives he was defeated by John J Hardin though he prevailed with the party in limiting Hardin to one term Lincoln not only pulled off his strategy of gaining the nomination in 1846 but also won the election He was the only Whig in the Illinois delegation but as dutiful as any participated in almost all votes and made speeches that toed the party line 75 He was assigned to the Committee on Post Office and Post Roads and the Committee on Expenditures in the War Department 76 Lincoln teamed with Joshua R Giddings on a bill to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia with compensation for the owners enforcement to capture fugitive slaves and a popular vote on the matter He dropped the bill when it eluded Whig support 77 78 Political views Official Portrait of Lincoln in Congress by Ned Bittinger On foreign and military policy Lincoln spoke against the Mexican American War which he imputed to President James K Polk s desire for military glory that attractive rainbow that rises in showers of blood 79 He supported the Wilmot Proviso a failed proposal to ban slavery in any U S territory won from Mexico 80 Lincoln emphasized his opposition to Polk by drafting and introducing his Spot Resolutions The war had begun with a Mexican slaughter of American soldiers in territory disputed by Mexico and Polk insisted that Mexican soldiers had invaded our territory and shed the blood of our fellow citizens on our own soil 81 Lincoln demanded that Polk show Congress the exact spot on which blood had been shed and prove that the spot was on American soil 82 The resolution was ignored in both Congress and the national papers and it cost Lincoln political support in his district One Illinois newspaper derisively nicknamed him spotty Lincoln 83 Lincoln later regretted some of his statements especially his attack on presidential war making powers 84 Lincoln had pledged in 1846 to serve only one term in the House Realizing Clay was unlikely to win the presidency he supported General Zachary Taylor for the Whig nomination in the 1848 presidential election 85 Taylor won and Lincoln hoped in vain to be appointed Commissioner of the General Land Office 86 The administration offered to appoint him secretary or governor of the Oregon Territory as consolation 87 This distant territory was a Democratic stronghold and acceptance of the post would have disrupted his legal and political career in Illinois so he declined and resumed his law practice 88 Prairie lawyerSee also List of cases involving Abraham Lincoln Lincoln in 1857 In his Springfield practice Lincoln handled every kind of business that could come before a prairie lawyer 89 Twice a year he appeared for 10 consecutive weeks in county seats in the Midstate county courts this continued for 16 years 90 Lincoln handled transportation cases in the midst of the nation s western expansion particularly river barge conflicts under the many new railroad bridges As a riverboat man Lincoln initially favored those interests but ultimately represented whoever hired him 91 He later represented a bridge company against a riverboat company in Hurd v Rock Island Bridge Company a landmark case involving a canal boat that sank after hitting a bridge 92 In 1849 he received a patent for a flotation device for the movement of boats in shallow water The idea was never commercialized but it made Lincoln the only president to hold a patent 93 Lincoln appeared before the Illinois Supreme Court in 175 cases he was sole counsel in 51 cases of which 31 were decided in his favor 94 From 1853 to 1860 one of his largest clients was the Illinois Central Railroad 95 His legal reputation gave rise to the nickname Honest Abe 96 Lincoln argued in an 1858 criminal trial defending William Duff Armstrong who was on trial for the murder of James Preston Metzker 97 The case is famous for Lincoln s use of a fact established by judicial notice to challenge the credibility of an eyewitness After an opposing witness testified to seeing the crime in the moonlight Lincoln produced a Farmers Almanac showing the moon was at a low angle drastically reducing visibility Armstrong was acquitted 97 Leading up to his presidential campaign Lincoln elevated his profile in an 1859 murder case with his defense of Simeon Quinn Peachy Harrison who was a third cousin g Harrison was also the grandson of Lincoln s political opponent Rev Peter Cartwright 99 Harrison was charged with the murder of Greek Crafton who as he lay dying of his wounds confessed to Cartwright that he had provoked Harrison 100 Lincoln angrily protested the judge s initial decision to exclude Cartwright s testimony about the confession as inadmissible hearsay Lincoln argued that the testimony involved a dying declaration and was not subject to the hearsay rule Instead of holding Lincoln in contempt of court as expected the judge a Democrat reversed his ruling and admitted the testimony into evidence resulting in Harrison s acquittal 97 Republican politics 1854 1860 Main article Abraham Lincoln in politics 1849 1861 Emergence as Republican leader Further information Slave states and free states and Abraham Lincoln and slavery Lincoln in 1858 the year of his debates with Stephen Douglas over slavery The debate over the status of slavery in the territories failed to alleviate tensions between the slave holding South and the free North with the failure of the Compromise of 1850 a legislative package designed to address the issue 101 In his 1852 eulogy for Clay Lincoln highlighted the latter s support for gradual emancipation and opposition to both extremes on the slavery issue 102 As the slavery debate in the Nebraska and Kansas territories became particularly acrimonious Illinois Senator Stephen A Douglas proposed popular sovereignty as a compromise the measure would allow the electorate of each territory to decide the status of slavery The legislation alarmed many Northerners who sought to prevent the spread of slavery that could result but Douglas s Kansas Nebraska Act narrowly passed Congress in May 1854 103 Lincoln did not comment on the act until months later in his Peoria Speech of October 1854 Lincoln then declared his opposition to slavery which he repeated en route to the presidency 104 He said the Kansas Act had a declared indifference but as I must think a covert real zeal for the spread of slavery I cannot but hate it I hate it because of the monstrous injustice of slavery itself I hate it because it deprives our republican example of its just influence in the world 105 Lincoln s attacks on the Kansas Nebraska Act marked his return to political life 106 Nationally the Whigs were irreparably split by the Kansas Nebraska Act and other efforts to compromise on the slavery issue Reflecting on the demise of his party Lincoln wrote in 1855 I think I am a Whig but others say there are no Whigs and that I am an abolitionist I do no more than oppose the extension of slavery 107 The new Republican Party was formed as a northern party dedicated to antislavery drawing from the antislavery wing of the Whig Party and combining Free Soil Liberty and antislavery Democratic Party members 108 Lincoln resisted early Republican entreaties fearing that the new party would become a platform for extreme abolitionists 109 Lincoln held out hope for rejuvenating the Whigs though he lamented his party s growing closeness with the nativist Know Nothing movement 110 In 1854 Lincoln was elected to the Illinois legislature but declined to take his seat The year s elections showed the strong opposition to the Kansas Nebraska Act and in the aftermath Lincoln sought election to the United States Senate 106 At that time senators were elected by the state legislature 111 After leading in the first six rounds of voting he was unable to obtain a majority Lincoln instructed his backers to vote for Lyman Trumbull Trumbull was an antislavery Democrat and had received few votes in the earlier ballots his supporters also antislavery Democrats had vowed not to support any Whig Lincoln s decision to withdraw enabled his Whig supporters and Trumbull s antislavery Democrats to combine and defeat the mainstream Democratic candidate Joel Aldrich Matteson 112 1856 campaign Violent political confrontations in Kansas continued and opposition to the Kansas Nebraska Act remained strong throughout the North As the 1856 elections approached Lincoln joined the Republicans and attended the Bloomington Convention which formally established the Illinois Republican Party The convention platform endorsed Congress s right to regulate slavery in the territories and backed the admission of Kansas as a free state Lincoln gave the final speech of the convention supporting the party platform and called for the preservation of the Union 113 At the June 1856 Republican National Convention though Lincoln received support to run as vice president John C Fremont and William Dayton comprised the ticket which Lincoln supported throughout Illinois The Democrats nominated former Secretary of State James Buchanan and the Know Nothings nominated former Whig President Millard Fillmore 114 Buchanan prevailed while Republican William Henry Bissell won election as Governor of Illinois and Lincoln became a leading Republican in Illinois 115 h Dred Scott v Sandford A portrait of Dred Scott petitioner in Dred Scott v Sandford Dred Scott was a slave whose master took him from a slave state to a territory that was free as a result of the Missouri Compromise After Scott was returned to the slave state he petitioned a federal court for his freedom His petition was denied in Dred Scott v Sandford 1857 i In his opinion Supreme Court Chief Justice Roger B Taney wrote that black people were not citizens and derived no rights from the Constitution and that the Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional for infringing upon slave owners property rights While many Democrats hoped that Dred Scott would end the dispute over slavery in the territories the decision sparked further outrage in the North 118 Lincoln denounced it as the product of a conspiracy of Democrats to support the Slave Power 119 He argued the decision was at variance with the Declaration of Independence he said that while the founding fathers did not believe all men equal in every respect they believed all men were equal in certain inalienable rights among which are life liberty and the pursuit of happiness 120 Lincoln Douglas debates and Cooper Union speech Further information Lincoln Douglas debates and Cooper Union speech In 1858 Douglas was up for re election in the U S Senate and Lincoln hoped to defeat him Many in the party felt that a former Whig should be nominated in 1858 and Lincoln s 1856 campaigning and support of Trumbull had earned him a favor 121 Some eastern Republicans supported Douglas for his opposition to the Lecompton Constitution and admission of Kansas as a slave state 122 Many Illinois Republicans resented this eastern interference For the first time Illinois Republicans held a convention to agree upon a Senate candidate and Lincoln won the nomination with little opposition 123 Abraham Lincoln a portrait by Mathew Brady taken February 27 1860 the day of Lincoln s Cooper Union speech Lincoln accepted the nomination with great enthusiasm and zeal After his nomination he delivered his House Divided Speech with the biblical reference Mark 3 25 A house divided against itself cannot stand I believe this government cannot endure permanently half slave and half free I do not expect the Union to be dissolved I do not expect the house to fall but I do expect it will cease to be divided It will become all one thing or all the other 124 The speech created a stark image of the danger of disunion 125 The stage was then set for the election of the Illinois legislature which would in turn select Lincoln or Douglas 126 When informed of Lincoln s nomination Douglas stated Lincoln is the strong man of the party and if I beat him my victory will be hardly won 127 The Senate campaign featured seven debates between Lincoln and Douglas These were the most famous political debates in American history they had an atmosphere akin to a prizefight and drew crowds in the thousands 128 The principals stood in stark contrast both physically and politically Lincoln warned that Douglas Slave Power was threatening the values of republicanism and accused Douglas of distorting the Founding Fathers premise that all men are created equal Douglas emphasized his Freeport Doctrine that local settlers were free to choose whether to allow slavery and accused Lincoln of having joined the abolitionists 129 Lincoln s argument assumed a moral tone as he claimed Douglas represented a conspiracy to promote slavery Douglas s argument was more legal claiming that Lincoln was defying the authority of the U S Supreme Court in the Dred Scott decision 130 Though the Republican legislative candidates won more popular votes the Democrats won more seats and the legislature re elected Douglas Lincoln s articulation of the issues gave him a national political presence 131 In May 1859 Lincoln purchased the Illinois Staats Anzeiger a German language newspaper that was consistently supportive most of the state s 130 000 German Americans voted Democratically but the German language paper mobilized Republican support 132 In the aftermath of the 1858 election newspapers frequently mentioned Lincoln as a potential Republican presidential candidate rivaled by William H Seward Salmon P Chase Edward Bates and Simon Cameron While Lincoln was popular in the Midwest he lacked support in the Northeast and was unsure whether to seek office 133 In January 1860 Lincoln told a group of political allies that he would accept the nomination if offered and in the following months several local papers endorsed his candidacy 134 Over the coming months Lincoln was tireless making nearly fifty speeches along the campaign trail By the quality and simplicity of his rhetoric he quickly became the champion of the Republican party However despite his overwhelming support in the Midwestern United States he was less appreciated in the east Horace Greeley editor of the New York Tribune at that time wrote up an unflattering account of Lincoln s compromising position on slavery and his reluctance to challenge the court s Dred Scott ruling which was promptly used against him by his political rivals 135 136 On February 27 1860 powerful New York Republicans invited Lincoln to give a speech at Cooper Union in which he argued that the Founding Fathers of the United States had little use for popular sovereignty and had repeatedly sought to restrict slavery He insisted that morality required opposition to slavery and rejected any groping for some middle ground between the right and the wrong 137 Many in the audience thought he appeared awkward and even ugly 138 But Lincoln demonstrated intellectual leadership that brought him into contention Journalist Noah Brooks reported No man ever before made such an impression on his first appeal to a New York audience 139 Historian David Herbert Donald described the speech as a superb political move for an unannounced presidential aspirant Appearing in Seward s home state sponsored by a group largely loyal to Chase Lincoln shrewdly made no reference to either of these Republican rivals for the nomination 140 In response to an inquiry about his ambitions Lincoln said The taste is in my mouth a little 141 1860 presidential election Main article 1860 United States presidential election A Timothy Cole wood engraving taken from a May 20 1860 ambrotype of Lincoln two days following his nomination for president On May 9 10 1860 the Illinois Republican State Convention was held in Decatur 142 Lincoln s followers organized a campaign team led by David Davis Norman Judd Leonard Swett and Jesse DuBois and Lincoln received his first endorsement 143 Exploiting his embellished frontier legend clearing land and splitting fence rails Lincoln s supporters adopted the label of The Rail Candidate 144 In 1860 Lincoln described himself I am in height six feet four inches nearly lean in flesh weighing on an average one hundred and eighty pounds dark complexion with coarse black hair and gray eyes 145 Michael Martinez wrote about the effective imaging of Lincoln by his campaign At times he was presented as the plain talking Rail Splitter and at other times he was Honest Abe unpolished but trustworthy 146 On May 18 at the Republican National Convention in Chicago Lincoln won the nomination on the third ballot beating candidates such as Seward and Chase A former Democrat Hannibal Hamlin of Maine was nominated for vice president to balance the ticket Lincoln s success depended on his campaign team his reputation as a moderate on the slavery issue and his strong support for internal improvements and the tariff 147 Pennsylvania put him over the top led by the state s iron interests who were reassured by his tariff support 148 Lincoln s managers had focused on this delegation while honoring Lincoln s dictate to Make no contracts that will bind me 149 As the Slave Power tightened its grip on the national government most Republicans agreed with Lincoln that the North was the aggrieved party Throughout the 1850s Lincoln had doubted the prospects of civil war and his supporters rejected claims that his election would incite secession 150 When Douglas was selected as the candidate of the Northern Democrats delegates from eleven slave states walked out of the Democratic convention they opposed Douglas s position on popular sovereignty and selected incumbent Vice President John C Breckinridge as their candidate 151 A group of former Whigs and Know Nothings formed the Constitutional Union Party and nominated John Bell of Tennessee Lincoln and Douglas competed for votes in the North while Bell and Breckinridge primarily found support in the South 121 The Rail Candidate Lincoln s 1860 platform portrayed as being held up by a slave and his party In 1860 northern and western electoral votes shown in red put Lincoln into the White House Prior to the Republican convention the Lincoln campaign began cultivating a nationwide youth organization the Wide Awakes which it used to generate popular support throughout the country to spearhead voter registration drives thinking that new voters and young voters tended to embrace new parties 152 People of the Northern states knew the Southern states would vote against Lincoln and rallied supporters for Lincoln 153 As Douglas and the other candidates campaigned Lincoln gave no speeches relying on the enthusiasm of the Republican Party The party did the leg work that produced majorities across the North and produced an abundance of campaign posters leaflets and newspaper editorials Republican speakers focused first on the party platform and second on Lincoln s life story emphasizing his childhood poverty The goal was to demonstrate the power of free labor which allowed a common farm boy to work his way to the top by his own efforts 154 The Republican Party s production of campaign literature dwarfed the combined opposition a Chicago Tribune writer produced a pamphlet that detailed Lincoln s life and sold 100 000 200 000 copies 155 Though he did not give public appearances many sought to visit him and write him In the runup to the election he took an office in the Illinois state capitol to deal with the influx of attention He also hired John George Nicolay as his personal secretary who would remain in that role during the presidency 156 On November 6 1860 Lincoln was elected the 16th president He was the first Republican president and his victory was entirely due to his support in the North and West No ballots were cast for him in 10 of the 15 Southern slave states and he won only two of 996 counties in all the Southern states an omen of the impending Civil War 157 158 Lincoln received 1 866 452 votes or 39 8 of the total in a four way race carrying the free Northern states as well as California and Oregon 159 His victory in the Electoral College was decisive Lincoln had 180 votes to 123 for his opponents 160 Presidency 1861 1865 Main article Presidency of Abraham Lincoln Secession and inauguration Main article Presidential transition of Abraham Lincoln Further information Secession winter and Baltimore Plot Lincoln s first inaugural at the United States Capitol March 4 1861 The Capitol dome above the rotunda was still under construction New York Times headlines covering Lincoln s first inauguration on March 4 1861 Less than six weeks later on April 12 the South attacked Fort Sumter launching the American Civil War 161 The South was outraged by Lincoln s election and in response secessionists implemented plans to leave the Union before he took office in March 1861 162 On December 20 1860 South Carolina took the lead by adopting an ordinance of secession by February 1 1861 Florida Mississippi Alabama Georgia Louisiana and Texas followed 163 Six of these states declared themselves to be a sovereign nation the Confederate States of America and adopted a constitution 164 The upper South and border states Delaware Maryland Virginia North Carolina Tennessee Kentucky Missouri and Arkansas initially rejected the secessionist appeal 165 President Buchanan and President elect Lincoln refused to recognize the Confederacy declaring secession illegal 166 The Confederacy selected Jefferson Davis as its provisional president on February 9 1861 167 Attempts at compromise followed but Lincoln and the Republicans rejected the proposed Crittenden Compromise as contrary to the Party s platform of free soil in the territories 168 Lincoln said I will suffer death before I consent to any concession or compromise which looks like buying the privilege to take possession of this government to which we have a constitutional right 169 Lincoln tacitly supported the Corwin Amendment to the Constitution which passed Congress and was awaiting ratification by the states when Lincoln took office That doomed amendment would have protected slavery in states where it already existed 170 A few weeks before the war Lincoln sent a letter to every governor informing them Congress had passed a joint resolution to amend the Constitution 171 On February 11 1861 Lincoln gave a particularly emotional farewell address upon leaving Springfield he would never again return to Springfield alive 172 173 Lincoln traveled east in a special train Due to secessionist plots a then unprecedented attention to security was given to him and his train En route to his inauguration Lincoln addressed crowds and legislatures across the North 174 The president elect evaded suspected assassins in Baltimore On February 23 1861 he arrived in disguise in Washington D C which was placed under substantial military guard 175 Lincoln directed his inaugural address to the South proclaiming once again that he had no inclination to abolish slavery in the Southern states Apprehension seems to exist among the people of the Southern States that by the accession of a Republican Administration their property and their peace and personal security are to be endangered There has never been any reasonable cause for such apprehension Indeed the most ample evidence to the contrary has all the while existed and been open to their inspection It is found in nearly all the published speeches of him who now addresses you I do but quote from one of those speeches when I declare that I have no purpose directly or indirectly to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists I believe I have no lawful right to do so and I have no inclination to do so First inaugural address 4 March 1861 176 177 Lincoln cited his plans for banning the expansion of slavery as the key source of conflict between North and South stating One section of our country believes slavery is right and ought to be extended while the other believes it is wrong and ought not to be extended This is the only substantial dispute The president ended his address with an appeal to the people of the South We are not enemies but friends We must not be enemies The mystic chords of memory stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land will yet swell the chorus of the Union when again touched as surely they will be by the better angels of our nature 178 The failure of the Peace Conference of 1861 signaled that legislative compromise was impossible By March 1861 no leaders of the insurrection had proposed rejoining the Union on any terms Meanwhile Lincoln and the Republican leadership agreed that the dismantling of the Union could not be tolerated 179 In his second inaugural address Lincoln looked back on the situation at the time and said Both parties deprecated war but one of them would make war rather than let the Nation survive and the other would accept war rather than let it perish and the war came Civil War Main articles American Civil War and Battle of Fort Sumter President Lincoln in 1861 Lincoln with officers after the Battle of Antietam Notable figures from left are 1 Col Delos Sackett 4 Gen George W Morell 5 Alexander S Webb Chief of Staff V Corps 6 McClellan 8 Dr Jonathan Letterman 10 Lincoln 11 Henry J Hunt 12 Fitz John Porter 15 Andrew A Humphreys 16 Capt George Armstrong Custer Major Robert Anderson commander of the Union s Fort Sumter in Charleston South Carolina sent a request for provisions to Washington and Lincoln s order to meet that request was seen by the secessionists as an act of war On April 12 1861 Confederate forces fired on Union troops at Fort Sumter and began the fight Historian Allan Nevins argued that the newly inaugurated Lincoln made three miscalculations underestimating the gravity of the crisis exaggerating the strength of Unionist sentiment in the South and overlooking Southern Unionist opposition to an invasion 180 William Tecumseh Sherman talked to Lincoln during inauguration week and was sadly disappointed at his failure to realize that the country was sleeping on a volcano and that the South was preparing for war 181 Donald concludes that His repeated efforts to avoid collision in the months between inauguration and the firing on Ft Sumter showed he adhered to his vow not to be the first to shed fraternal blood But he also vowed not to surrender the forts The only resolution of these contradictory positions was for the confederates to fire the first shot they did just that 182 On April 15 Lincoln called on the states to send a total of 75 000 volunteer troops to recapture forts protect Washington and preserve the Union which in his view remained intact despite the seceding states This call forced states to choose sides Virginia seceded and was rewarded with the designation of Richmond as the Confederate capital despite its exposure to Union lines North Carolina Tennessee and Arkansas followed over the following two months Secession sentiment was strong in Missouri and Maryland but did not prevail Kentucky remained neutral 183 The Fort Sumter attack rallied Americans north of the Mason Dixon line to defend the nation As States sent Union regiments south on April 19 Baltimore mobs in control of the rail links attacked Union troops who were changing trains Local leaders groups later burned critical rail bridges to the capital and the Army responded by arresting local Maryland officials Lincoln suspended the writ of habeas corpus where needed for the security of troops trying to reach Washington 184 John Merryman one Maryland official hindering the U S troop movements petitioned Supreme Court Chief Justice Roger B Taney to issue a writ of habeas corpus In June in Ex parte Merryman Taney not ruling on behalf of the Supreme Court 185 issued the writ believing that Article I section 9 of the Constitution authorized only Congress and not the president to suspend it But Lincoln persisted with the policy of suspension in select areas 186 187 Union military strategy Lincoln took executive control of the war and shaped the Union military strategy He responded to the unprecedented political and military crisis as commander in chief by exercising unprecedented authority He expanded his war powers imposed a blockade on Confederate ports disbursed funds before appropriation by Congress suspended habeas corpus and arrested and imprisoned thousands of suspected Confederate sympathizers Lincoln gained the support of Congress and the northern public for these actions Lincoln also had to reinforce Union sympathies in the border slave states and keep the war from becoming an international conflict 188 Running the Machine an 1864 political cartoon satirizing Lincoln s administration featuring William Fessenden Edwin Stanton William Seward Gideon Welles Lincoln and others It was clear from the outset that bipartisan support was essential to success and that any compromise alienated factions on both sides of the aisle such as the appointment of Republicans and Democrats to command positions Copperheads criticized Lincoln for refusing to compromise on slavery The Radical Republicans criticized him for moving too slowly in abolishing slavery 189 On August 6 1861 Lincoln signed the Confiscation Act that authorized judicial proceedings to confiscate and free slaves who were used to support the Confederates The law had little practical effect but it signaled political support for abolishing slavery 190 In August 1861 General John C Fremont the 1856 Republican presidential nominee without consulting Washington issued a martial edict freeing slaves of the rebels Lincoln canceled the illegal proclamation as politically motivated and lacking military necessity 191 As a result Union enlistments from Maryland Kentucky and Missouri increased by over 40 000 192 Internationally Lincoln wanted to forestall foreign military aid to the Confederacy 193 He relied on his combative Secretary of State William Seward while working closely with Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman Charles Sumner 194 In the 1861 Trent Affair which threatened war with Great Britain the U S Navy illegally intercepted a British mail ship the Trent on the high seas and seized two Confederate envoys Britain protested vehemently while the U S cheered Lincoln ended the crisis by releasing the two diplomats Biographer James G Randall dissected Lincoln s successful techniques 195 his restraint his avoidance of any outward expression of truculence his early softening of State Department s attitude toward Britain his deference toward Seward and Sumner his withholding of his paper prepared for the occasion his readiness to arbitrate his golden silence in addressing Congress his shrewdness in recognizing that war must be averted and his clear perception that a point could be clinched for America s true position at the same time that satisfaction was given to a friendly country Lincoln painstakingly monitored the telegraph reports coming into the War Department He tracked all phases of the effort consulting with governors and selecting generals based on their success their state and their party In January 1862 after complaints of inefficiency and profiteering in the War Department Lincoln replaced War Secretary Simon Cameron with Edwin Stanton Stanton centralized the War Department s activities auditing and canceling contracts saving the federal government 17 000 000 196 Stanton was a staunch Unionist pro business conservative Democrat who gravitated toward the Radical Republican faction He worked more often and more closely with Lincoln than any other senior official Stanton and Lincoln virtually conducted the war together say Thomas and Hyman 197 Lincoln s war strategy embraced two priorities ensuring that Washington was well defended and conducting an aggressive war effort for a prompt decisive victory j Twice a week Lincoln met with his cabinet in the afternoon Occasionally Mary prevailed on him to take a carriage ride concerned that he was working too hard 199 For his edification Lincoln relied upon a book by his chief of staff General Henry Halleck entitled Elements of Military Art and Science Halleck was a disciple of the European strategist Antoine Henri Jomini Lincoln began to appreciate the critical need to control strategic points such as the Mississippi River 200 Lincoln saw the importance of Vicksburg and understood the necessity of defeating the enemy s army rather than merely capturing territory 201 In directing the Union s war strategy Lincoln valued the advice of Gen Winfield Scott even after his retirement as Commanding General of the United States Army On June 23 24 1862 President Lincoln made an unannounced visit to West Point where he spent five hours consulting with Scott regarding the handling of the Civil War and the staffing of the War Department 202 203 General McClellan After the Union rout at Bull Run and Winfield Scott s retirement Lincoln appointed Major General George B McClellan general in chief 204 McClellan then took months to plan his Virginia Peninsula Campaign McClellan s slow progress frustrated Lincoln as did his position that no troops were needed to defend Washington McClellan in turn blamed the failure of the campaign on Lincoln s reservation of troops for the capitol 205 Lincoln and McClellan October 3 1862 In 1862 Lincoln removed McClellan for the general s continued inaction He elevated Henry Halleck in July and appointed John Pope as head of the new Army of Virginia 206 Pope satisfied Lincoln s desire to advance on Richmond from the north thus protecting Washington from counterattack 207 But Pope was then soundly defeated at the Second Battle of Bull Run in the summer of 1862 forcing the Army of the Potomac back to defend Washington 208 Despite his dissatisfaction with McClellan s failure to reinforce Pope Lincoln restored him to command of all forces around Washington 209 Two days after McClellan s return to command General Robert E Lee s forces crossed the Potomac River into Maryland leading to the Battle of Antietam 210 That battle a Union victory was among the bloodiest in American history it facilitated Lincoln s Emancipation Proclamation in January 211 McClellan then resisted the president s demand that he pursue Lee s withdrawing army while General Don Carlos Buell likewise refused orders to move the Army of the Ohio against rebel forces in eastern Tennessee Lincoln replaced Buell with William Rosecrans and after the 1862 midterm elections he replaced McClellan with Ambrose Burnside The appointments were both politically neutral and adroit on Lincoln s part 212 Burnside against presidential advice launched an offensive across the Rappahannock River and was defeated by Lee at Fredericksburg in December Desertions during 1863 came in the thousands and only increased after Fredericksburg so Lincoln replaced Burnside with Joseph Hooker 213 In the 1862 midterm elections the Republicans suffered severe losses due to rising inflation high taxes rumors of corruption suspension of habeas corpus military draft law and fears that freed slaves would come North and undermine the labor market The Emancipation Proclamation gained votes for Republicans in rural New England and the upper Midwest but cost votes in the Irish and German strongholds and in the lower Midwest where many Southerners had lived for generations 214 In the spring of 1863 Lincoln was sufficiently optimistic about upcoming military campaigns to think the end of the war could be near the plans included attacks by Hooker on Lee north of Richmond Rosecrans on Chattanooga Grant on Vicksburg and a naval assault on Charleston 215 Hooker was routed by Lee at the Battle of Chancellorsville in May then resigned and was replaced by George Meade 216 Meade followed Lee north into Pennsylvania and beat him in the Gettysburg Campaign but then failed to follow up despite Lincoln s demands At the same time Grant captured Vicksburg and gained control of the Mississippi River splitting the far western rebel states 217 Emancipation Proclamation Main articles Abraham Lincoln and slavery and Emancipation Proclamation First Reading of the Emancipation Proclamation of President Lincoln by Francis Bicknell Carpenter 1864 clickable image use cursor to identify The Federal government s power to end slavery was limited by the Constitution which before 1865 was understood to reserve the issue to the individual states Lincoln believed that slavery would be rendered obsolete if its expansion into new territories were prevented because these territories would be admitted to the Union as free states and free states would come to outnumber slave states He sought to persuade the states to agree to compensation for emancipating their slaves 218 Lincoln rejected Major General John C Fremont s August 1861 emancipation attempt as well as one by Major General David Hunter in May 1862 on the grounds that it was not within their power and might upset loyal border states enough for them to secede 219 In June 1862 Congress passed an act banning slavery on all federal territory which Lincoln signed In July the Confiscation Act of 1862 was enacted providing court procedures to free the slaves of those convicted of aiding the rebellion Lincoln approved the bill despite his belief that it was unconstitutional He felt such action could be taken only within the war powers of the commander in chief which he planned to exercise Lincoln at this time reviewed a draft of the Emancipation Proclamation with his cabinet 220 Privately Lincoln concluded that the Confederacy s slave base had to be eliminated Copperheads argued that emancipation was a stumbling block to peace and reunification Republican editor Horace Greeley of the New York Tribune agreed 221 In a letter of August 22 1862 Lincoln said that while he personally wished all men could be free regardless of that his first obligation as president was to preserve the Union 222 My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union and is not either to save or to destroy slavery If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that What I do about slavery and the colored race I do because I believe it helps to save the Union and what I forbear I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union I have here stated my purpose according to my view of official duty and I intend no modification of my oft expressed personal wish that all men everywhere could be free 223 On September 22 1862 Lincoln issued the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation 224 which announced that in states still in rebellion on January 1 1863 the slaves would be freed He kept his word and on January 1 1863 issued the Emancipation Proclamation 225 freeing the slaves in 10 states not then under Union control 226 with exemptions specified for areas under such control 227 Lincoln s comment on signing the Proclamation was I never in my life felt more certain that I was doing right than I do in signing this paper 228 He spent the next 100 days preparing the army and the nation for emancipation while Democrats rallied their voters by warning of the threat that freed slaves posed to northern whites 229 With the abolition of slavery in the rebel states now a military objective Union armies advancing south liberated all three million slaves in the Confederacy 230 The Emancipation Proclamation having stated that freedmen would be received into the armed service of the United States enlisting these freedmen became official policy By the spring of 1863 Lincoln was ready to recruit black troops in more than token numbers In a letter to Tennessee military governor Andrew Johnson encouraging him to lead the way in raising black troops Lincoln wrote The bare sight of 50 000 armed and drilled black soldiers on the banks of the Mississippi would end the rebellion at once 231 By the end of 1863 at Lincoln s direction General Lorenzo Thomas had recruited 20 regiments of blacks from the Mississippi Valley 232 Gettysburg Address 1863 Main article Gettysburg Address Lincoln absent his usual top hat and highlighted in red at Gettysburg on November 19 1863 Roughly three hours later he delivered the Gettysburg Address one of the best known speeches in American history 233 234 Lincoln spoke at the dedication of the Gettysburg battlefield cemetery on November 19 1863 235 In 272 words and three minutes Lincoln asserted that the nation was born not in 1789 but in 1776 conceived in Liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal He defined the war as dedicated to the principles of liberty and equality for all He declared that the deaths of so many brave soldiers would not be in vain that slavery would end and the future of democracy would be assured that government of the people by the people for the people shall not perish from the earth 236 Defying his prediction that the world will little note nor long remember what we say here the Address became the most quoted speech in American history 237 Promoting General Grant The Peacemakers an 1868 painting by George P A Healy of events aboard the River Queen in March 1865 clickable image use cursor to identify General Ulysses Grant s victories at the Battle of Shiloh and in the Vicksburg campaign impressed Lincoln Responding to criticism of Grant after Shiloh Lincoln had said I can t spare this man He fights 238 With Grant in command Lincoln felt the Union Army could advance in multiple theaters while also including black troops Meade s failure to capture Lee s army after Gettysburg and the continued passivity of the Army of the Potomac persuaded Lincoln to promote Grant to supreme commander Grant then assumed command of Meade s army 239 Lincoln was concerned that Grant might be considering a presidential candidacy in 1864 He arranged for an intermediary to inquire into Grant s political intentions and once assured that he had none Lincoln promoted Grant to the newly revived rank of Lieutenant General a rank which had been unoccupied since George Washington 240 Authorization for such a promotion with the advice and consent of the Senate was provided by a new bill which Lincoln signed the same day he submitted Grant s name to the Senate His nomination was confirmed by the Senate on March 2 1864 241 Grant in 1864 waged the bloody Overland Campaign which exacted heavy losses on both sides 242 When Lincoln asked what Grant s plans were the persistent general replied I propose to fight it out on this line if it takes all summer 243 Grant s army moved steadily south Lincoln traveled to Grant s headquarters at City Point Virginia to confer with Grant and William Tecumseh Sherman 244 Lincoln reacted to Union losses by mobilizing support throughout the North 245 Lincoln authorized Grant to target infrastructure plantations railroads and bridges hoping to weaken the South s morale and fighting ability He emphasized defeat of the Confederate armies over destruction which was considerable for its own sake 246 Lincoln s engagement became distinctly personal on one occasion in 1864 when Confederate general Jubal Early raided Washington D C Legend has it that while Lincoln watched from an exposed position Union Captain and future Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr shouted at him Get down you damn fool before you get shot 247 As Grant continued to weaken Lee s forces efforts to discuss peace began Confederate Vice President Stephens led a group meeting with Lincoln Seward and others at Hampton Roads Lincoln refused to negotiate with the Confederacy as a coequal his objective to end the fighting was not realized 248 On April 1 1865 Grant nearly encircled Petersburg in a siege The Confederate government evacuated Richmond and Lincoln visited the conquered capital On April 9 Lee surrendered to Grant at Appomattox officially ending the war 249 Reelection Main article 1864 United States presidential election An electoral landslide for Lincoln in red in the 1864 election southern states brown and territories gray not in play A poster of the 1864 election campaign with Andrew Johnson as the candidate for vice president Lincoln ran for reelection in 1864 while uniting the main Republican factions along with War Democrats Edwin M Stanton and Andrew Johnson Lincoln used conversation and his patronage powers greatly expanded from peacetime to build support and fend off the Radicals efforts to replace him 250 At its convention the Republicans selected Johnson as his running mate To broaden his coalition to include War Democrats as well as Republicans Lincoln ran under the label of the new Union Party 251 Grant s bloody stalemates damaged Lincoln s re election prospects and many Republicans feared defeat Lincoln confidentially pledged in writing that if he should lose the election he would still defeat the Confederacy before turning over the White House 252 Lincoln did not show the pledge to his cabinet but asked them to sign the sealed envelope The pledge read as follows This morning as for some days past it seems exceedingly probable that this Administration will not be re elected Then it will be my duty to so co operate with the President elect as to save the Union between the election and the inauguration as he will have secured his election on such ground that he cannot possibly save it afterward 253 The Democratic platform followed the Peace wing of the party and called the war a failure but their candidate McClellan supported the war and repudiated the platform Meanwhile Lincoln emboldened Grant with more troops and Republican party support Sherman s capture of Atlanta in September and David Farragut s capture of Mobile ended defeatism 254 The Democratic Party was deeply split with some leaders and most soldiers openly for Lincoln The National Union Party was united by Lincoln s support for emancipation State Republican parties stressed the perfidy of the Copperheads 255 On November 8 Lincoln carried all but three states including 78 percent of Union soldiers 256 Lincoln s second inaugural address at the almost completed Capitol building March 4 1865 On March 4 1865 Lincoln delivered his second inaugural address In it he deemed the war casualties to be God s will Historian Mark Noll places the speech among the small handful of semi sacred texts by which Americans conceive their place in the world it is inscribed in the Lincoln Memorial 257 Lincoln said Fondly do we hope fervently do we pray that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away Yet if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bond man s 250 years of unrequited toil shall be sunk and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword as was said 3 000 years ago so still it must be said the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether With malice toward none with charity for all with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right let us strive on to finish the work we are in to bind up the nation s wounds to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations 258 Reconstruction Main article Reconstruction era Reconstruction preceded the war s end as Lincoln and his associates considered the reintegration of the nation and the fates of Confederate leaders and freed slaves When a general asked Lincoln how the defeated Confederates were to be treated Lincoln replied Let em up easy 259 Lincoln was determined to find meaning in the war in its aftermath and did not want to continue to outcast the southern states His main goal was to keep the union together so he proceeded by focusing not on whom to blame but on how to rebuild the nation as one 260 Lincoln led the moderates in Reconstruction policy and was opposed by the Radicals under Rep Thaddeus Stevens Sen Charles Sumner and Sen Benjamin Wade who otherwise remained Lincoln s allies Determined to reunite the nation and not alienate the South Lincoln urged that speedy elections under generous terms be held His Amnesty Proclamation of December 8 1863 offered pardons to those who had not held a Confederate civil office and had not mistreated Union prisoners if they were willing to sign an oath of allegiance 261 A political cartoon of Vice President Andrew Johnson a former tailor and Lincoln 1865 entitled The Rail Splitter At Work Repairing the Union The caption reads Johnson Take it quietly Uncle Abe and I will draw it closer than ever Lincoln A few more stitches Andy and the good old Union will be mended As Southern states fell they needed leaders while their administrations were restored In Tennessee and Arkansas Lincoln respectively appointed Johnson and Frederick Steele as military governors In Louisiana Lincoln ordered General Nathaniel P Banks to promote a plan that would reestablish statehood when 10 percent of the voters agreed and only if the reconstructed states abolished slavery Democratic opponents accused Lincoln of using the military to ensure his and the Republicans political aspirations The Radicals denounced his policy as too lenient and passed their own plan the 1864 Wade Davis Bill which Lincoln vetoed The Radicals retaliated by refusing to seat elected representatives from Louisiana Arkansas and Tennessee 262 Lincoln s appointments were designed to harness both moderates and Radicals To fill Chief Justice Taney s seat on the Supreme Court he named the Radicals choice Salmon P Chase who Lincoln believed would uphold his emancipation and paper money policies 263 After implementing the Emancipation Proclamation Lincoln increased pressure on Congress to outlaw slavery throughout the nation with a constitutional amendment He declared that such an amendment would clinch the whole matter and by December 1863 an amendment was brought to Congress 264 This first attempt fell short of the required two thirds majority in the House of Representatives Passage became part of Lincoln s reelection platform and after his successful reelection the second attempt in the House passed on January 31 1865 265 With ratification it became the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution on December 6 1865 266 Lincoln believed the federal government had limited responsibility to the millions of freedmen He signed Senator Charles Sumner s Freedmen s Bureau bill that set up a temporary federal agency designed to meet the immediate needs of former slaves The law opened land for a lease of three years with the ability to purchase title for the freedmen Lincoln announced a Reconstruction plan that involved short term military control pending readmission under the control of southern Unionists 267 Historians agree that it is impossible to predict exactly how Reconstruction would have proceeded had Lincoln lived Biographers James G Randall and Richard Current according to David Lincove argue that 268 It is likely that had he lived Lincoln would have followed a policy similar to Johnson s that he would have clashed with congressional Radicals that he would have produced a better result for the freedmen than occurred and that his political skills would have helped him avoid Johnson s mistakes Eric Foner argues that 269 Unlike Sumner and other Radicals Lincoln did not see Reconstruction as an opportunity for a sweeping political and social revolution beyond emancipation He had long made clear his opposition to the confiscation and redistribution of land He believed as most Republicans did in April 1865 that the voting requirements should be determined by the states He assumed that political control in the South would pass to white Unionists reluctant secessionists and forward looking former Confederates But time and again during the war Lincoln after initial opposition had come to embrace positions first advanced by abolitionists and Radical Republicans Lincoln undoubtedly would have listened carefully to the outcry for further protection for the former slaves It is entirely plausible to imagine Lincoln and Congress agreeing on a Reconstruction policy that encompassed federal protection for basic civil rights plus limited black suffrage along the lines Lincoln proposed just before his death Native Americans Chippewa Chief Ne Bah Quah Om Big Dog of the Pillager Band Lincoln s experience with Native Americans started early with their killing of his grandfather in front of the family 270 Later he served as a Captain in the state militia during the Black Hawk War seeing no combat 271 During his presidency his policy toward Indians was based on politics He used appointments to the Indian Bureau as a reward to supporters from Minnesota and Wisconsin While in office his administration faced difficulties guarding Western settlers railroads and telegraphs from Indian attacks 272 On August 17 1862 the Sioux or Dakota uprising broke out in Minnesota Hundreds of settlers were killed 30 000 were displaced from their homes and Washington was deeply alarmed 273 Some feared incorrectly that it might represent a Confederate conspiracy to start a war on the Northwestern frontier 274 Lincoln ordered thousands of Confederate prisoners of war sent by railroad to put down the uprising 275 When the Confederates protested forcing Confederate prisoners to fight Indians Lincoln revoked the policy and none set foot in Minnesota Lincoln sent General John Pope to Minnesota as commander of the new Department of the Northwest a couple of weeks into the hostilities 276 277 Before he arrived the Fond Du Lac band of Chippewa sent Lincoln a letter begging to go to war for the United States against the Sioux so Lincoln could send Minnesota s troops to fight the south 278 Shortly after a Mille Lacs Band Chief offered the same at St Cloud Minnesota 279 In it the Chippewa specified that they wanted to use the indigenous rules of warfare That meant there would be no prisoners of war no surrender no peace agreement Lincoln did not accept the Chippewa offer as he had no means to control the outcome and women and children were considered legitimate casualties in native American warfare Once word reached the other bands of Chippewa he had no way of knowing how they would react to his sending the Fond Du Lac on the warpath One of the Chippewa signing the letter Chief Naw Gaw Nub had received a Presidential medal from Lincoln earlier in the year 280 Serving under Gen Pope was Minnesota Congressman Henry H Sibley Minnesota s Governor had made Sibley a Colonel United States Volunteers to command the US force tasked with fighting the war and that eventually defeated Little Crow s forces at the Battle of Wood Lake 277 The day the Mdewakanton force surrendered at Camp Release a Chippewa war council met at Minnesota s capitol with another Chippewa offer to Lincoln to fight the Sioux 281 Sibley ordered a military commission to review that actions of the captured to try those that had committed war crimes The legitimacy of military commissions trying opposing combatants had been established during the Mexican War 282 Sibley thought he had 16 20 of men he wanted for trial while Gen Pope ordered that all detained warriors be tried When it was done 303 had been given death sentences that were subject to Presidential review Lincoln ordered Gen Pope send all of the trial transcripts Washington where he and two of his staff poured over the trials The lawyer in Lincoln saw issues He slowly realized that the trials could be divided into two groups combat between combatants and combat against civilians The groups could be identified by their transcripts the first group were all just three pages in length while the second group had more pages some up to twelve He placed 263 cases into the first group and commuted their sentences for the largest mass commutation in history Into the second group went forty One he commuted for turning state s witness Another Sibley dismissed when overwhelming proof surfaced exonerating the man The remaining 38 were executed in the largest mass hanging in US history Very quickly questions arose concerning three of the executions that have not been answered Less than four months after the executions Lincoln issued General Order 100 that relates more to the Minnesota War than the Civil War Now a Congressman Alexander Ramsey told Lincoln in 1864 that he would have gotten more re election support in Minnesota had he executed all 303 of the Mdewakanton Lincoln responded I could not afford to hang men for votes 283 The men whose sentences he commuted were sent to a military prison at Davenport Iowa A few of those he had released due to the efforts of Bishop Henry Whipple Whig theory of a presidency Lincoln adhered to the Whig theory of a presidency focused on executing laws while deferring to Congress responsibility for legislating Lincoln vetoed only four bills including the Wade Davis Bill with its harsh Reconstruction program 284 The 1862 Homestead Act made millions of acres of Western government held land available for purchase at low cost The 1862 Morrill Land Grant Colleges Act provided government grants for agricultural colleges in each state The Pacific Railway Acts of 1862 and 1864 granted federal support for the construction of the United States first transcontinental railroad which was completed in 1869 285 The passage of the Homestead Act and the Pacific Railway Acts was enabled by the absence of Southern congressmen and senators who had opposed the measures in the 1850s 286 In the selection and use of his cabinet Lincoln employed the strengths of his opponents in a manner that emboldened his presidency Lincoln commented on his thought process We need the strongest men of the party in the Cabinet We needed to hold our own people together I had looked the party over and concluded that these were the very strongest men Then I had no right to deprive the country of their services 287 Goodwin described the group in her biography as a Team of Rivals 288 The Lincoln cabinet 289 OfficeNameTermPresidentAbraham Lincoln1861 1865Vice PresidentHannibal Hamlin1861 1865Andrew Johnson1865Secretary of StateWilliam H Seward1861 1865Secretary of the TreasurySalmon P Chase1861 1864William P Fessenden1864 1865Hugh McCulloch1865Secretary of WarSimon Cameron1861 1862Edwin M Stanton1862 1865Attorney GeneralEdward Bates1861 1864James Speed1864 1865Postmaster GeneralMontgomery Blair1861 1864William Dennison Jr 1864 1865Secretary of the NavyGideon Welles1861 1865Secretary of the InteriorCaleb Blood Smith1861 1862John Palmer Usher1863 1865There were two measures passed to raise revenues for the Federal government tariffs a policy with long precedent and a Federal income tax In 1861 Lincoln signed the second and third Morrill Tariffs following the first enacted by Buchanan He also signed the Revenue Act of 1861 creating the first U S income tax a flat tax of 3 percent on incomes above 800 equivalent to 24 100 in 2021 290 291 The Revenue Act of 1862 adopted rates that increased with income 292 The Lincoln Administration presided over the expansion of the federal government s economic influence in other areas The National Banking Act created the system of national banks The US issued paper currency for the first time known as greenbacks printed in green on the reverse side 293 In 1862 Congress created the Department of Agriculture 291 In response to rumors of a renewed draft the editors of the New York World and the Journal of Commerce published a false draft proclamation that created an opportunity for the editors and others to corner the gold market Lincoln attacked the media for such behavior and ordered a military seizure of the two papers which lasted for two days 294 Lincoln is largely responsible for the Thanksgiving holiday 295 Thanksgiving had become a regional holiday in New England in the 17th century It had been sporadically proclaimed by the federal government on irregular dates The prior proclamation had been during James Madison s presidency 50 years earlier In 1863 Lincoln declared the final Thursday in November of that year to be a day of Thanksgiving 295 Wikisource has original text related to this article Thanksgiving Proclamation 1863 In June 1864 Lincoln approved the Yosemite Grant enacted by Congress which provided unprecedented federal protection for the area now known as Yosemite National Park 296 Supreme Court appointments Supreme Court Justices Justice Nominated AppointedNoah Haynes Swayne January 21 1862 January 24 1862Samuel Freeman Miller July 16 1862 July 16 1862David Davis December 1 1862 December 8 1862Stephen Johnson Field March 6 1863 March 10 1863Salmon Portland Chase Chief Justice December 6 1864 December 6 1864Lincoln s philosophy on court nominations was that we cannot ask a man what he will do and if we should and he should answer us we should despise him for it Therefore we must take a man whose opinions are known 295 Lincoln made five appointments to the Supreme Court Noah Haynes Swayne was an anti slavery lawyer who was committed to the Union Samuel Freeman Miller supported Lincoln in the 1860 election and was an avowed abolitionist David Davis was Lincoln s campaign manager in 1860 and had served as a judge in the Illinois court circuit where Lincoln practiced Democrat Stephen Johnson Field a previous California Supreme Court justice provided geographic and political balance Finally Lincoln s Treasury Secretary Salmon P Chase became Chief Justice Lincoln believed Chase was an able jurist would support Reconstruction legislation and that his appointment united the Republican Party 297 Foreign policy Main articles Presidency of Abraham Lincoln Foreign policy and Diplomacy of the American Civil War Lincoln named his main political rival William H Seward as Secretary of State and left most diplomatic issues in his portfolio However Lincoln did select some of the top diplomats as part of his patronage policy 298 He also closely watched the handling of the Trent Affair in late 1861 to make sure there was no escalation into a war with Britain 299 Seward s main role was to keep Britain and France from supporting the Confederacy He was successful after indicating to London and Paris that Washington would declare war on them if they supported Richmond 300 AssassinationMain article Assassination of Abraham Lincoln Shown in the presidential booth of Ford s Theatre from left to right are assassin John Wilkes Booth Abraham Lincoln Mary Todd Lincoln Clara Harris and Henry Rathbone John Wilkes Booth was a well known actor and a Confederate spy from Maryland though he never joined the Confederate army he had contacts with the Confederate secret service 301 After attending an April 11 1865 speech in which Lincoln promoted voting rights for blacks Booth hatched a plot to assassinate the President 302 When Booth learned of the Lincolns intent to attend a play with General Grant he planned to assassinate Lincoln and Grant at Ford s Theatre Lincoln and his wife attended the play Our American Cousin on the evening of April 14 just five days after the Union victory at the Battle of Appomattox Courthouse At the last minute Grant decided to go to New Jersey to visit his children instead of attending the play 303 On April 14 1865 hours before he was assassinated Lincoln signed legislation establishing the United States Secret Service 304 and at 10 15 in the evening Booth entered the back of Lincoln s theater box crept up from behind and fired at the back of Lincoln s head mortally wounding him Lincoln s guest Major Henry Rathbone momentarily grappled with Booth but Booth stabbed him and escaped 305 After being attended by Doctor Charles Leale and two other doctors Lincoln was taken across the street to Petersen House After remaining in a coma for eight hours Lincoln died at 7 22 in the morning on April 15 306 k Stanton saluted and said Now he belongs to the ages 311 l Lincoln s body was placed in a flag wrapped coffin which was loaded into a hearse and escorted to the White House by Union soldiers 312 President Johnson was sworn in later that same day 313 Two weeks later Booth refusing to surrender was tracked to a farm in Virginia and was mortally shot by Sergeant Boston Corbett and died on April 26 Secretary of War Stanton had issued orders that Booth be taken alive so Corbett was initially arrested to be court martialed After a brief interview Stanton declared him a patriot and dismissed the charge 314 Funeral and burial This funeral train called the Lincoln Special carried Lincoln s body on the three week trip from Washington D C to Springfield Illinois Along the way it was met by hundreds of thousands of American mourners Main article Funeral and burial of Abraham Lincoln The late President lay in state first in the East Room of the White House and then in the Capitol Rotunda from April 19 through April 21 The caskets containing Lincoln s body and the body of his son Willie traveled for three weeks on the Lincoln Special funeral train 315 The train followed a circuitous route from Washington D C to Springfield Illinois stopping at many cities for memorials attended by hundreds of thousands Many others gathered along the tracks as the train passed with bands bonfires and hymn singing 316 or in silent grief Poet Walt Whitman composed When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom d to eulogize him one of four poems he wrote about Lincoln 317 African Americans were especially moved they had lost their Moses 318 In a larger sense the reaction was in response to the deaths of so many men in the war 319 Historians emphasized the widespread shock and sorrow but noted that some Lincoln haters celebrated his death 320 Lincoln s body was buried at Oak Ridge Cemetery in Springfield and now lies within the Lincoln Tomb 321 Religious and philosophical beliefsFurther information Religious views of Abraham Lincoln Abraham Lincoln painting by George Peter Alexander Healy in 1869 As a young man Lincoln was a religious skeptic 322 He was deeply familiar with the Bible quoting and praising it 323 He was private about his position on organized religion and respected the beliefs of others 324 He never made a clear profession of Christian beliefs 325 Throughout his public career Lincoln often quoted Scripture 326 His three most famous speeches the House Divided Speech the Gettysburg Address and his second inaugural each contain direct allusions to Providence and quotes from Scripture In the 1840s Lincoln subscribed to the Doctrine of Necessity a belief that the human mind was controlled by a higher power 327 With the death of his son Edward in 1850 he more frequently expressed a dependence on God 328 He never joined a church although he frequently attended First Presbyterian Church with his wife beginning in 1852 329 m In the 1850s Lincoln asserted his belief in providence in a general way and rarely used the language or imagery of the evangelicals he regarded the republicanism of the Founding Fathers with an almost religious reverence 330 The death of his son Willie in February 1862 may have caused him to look toward religion for solace 331 After Willie s death he questioned the divine necessity of the war s severity He wrote at this time that God could have either saved or destroyed the Union without a human contest Yet the contest began And having begun He could give the final victory to either side any day Yet the contest proceeds 332 Lincoln did believe in an all powerful God that shaped events and by 1865 was expressing that belief in major speeches 325 By the end of the war he increasingly appealed to the Almighty for solace and to explain events writing on April 4 1864 to a newspaper editor in Kentucky I claim not to have controlled events but confess plainly that events have controlled me Now at the end of three years struggle the nation s condition is not what either party or any man devised or expected God alone can claim it Whither it is tending seems plain If God now wills the removal of a great wrong and wills also that we of the North as well as you of the South shall pay fairly for our complicity in that wrong impartial history will find therein new cause to attest and revere the justice and goodness of God 333 This spirituality can best be seen in his second inaugural address considered by some scholars 334 as the greatest such address in American history and by Lincoln himself as his own greatest speech or one of them at the very least n 335 Lincoln explains therein that the cause purpose and result of the war was God s will 336 Lincoln s frequent use of religious imagery and language toward the end of his life may have reflected his own personal beliefs or might have been a device to reach his audiences who were mostly evangelical Protestants 337 On the day Lincoln was assassinated he reportedly told his wife he desired to visit the Holy Land 338 HealthMain article Health of Abraham Lincoln Lincoln in February 1865 two months before his death Lincoln is believed to have had depression smallpox and malaria 339 He took blue mass pills which contained mercury 340 to treat constipation 341 It is unknown to what extent this may have resulted in mercury poisoning 342 Several claims have been made that Lincoln s health was declining before the assassination These are often based on photographs of Lincoln appearing to show weight loss and muscle wasting 343 It is also suspected that he might have had a rare genetic disease such as Marfan syndrome or multiple endocrine neoplasia type 2B 343 LegacySee also Cultural depictions of Abraham Lincoln Republican values Lincoln s redefinition of republican values has been stressed by historians such as John Patrick Diggins Harry V Jaffa Vernon Burton Eric Foner and Herman J Belz 344 Lincoln called the Declaration of Independence which emphasized freedom and equality for all the sheet anchor of republicanism beginning in the 1850s He did this at a time when the Constitution which tolerated slavery was the focus of most political discourse 345 Diggins notes Lincoln presented Americans a theory of history that offers a profound contribution to the theory and destiny of republicanism itself in the 1860 Cooper Union speech 346 Instead of focusing on the legality of an argument he focused on the moral basis of republicanism 347 His position on war was founded on a legal argument regarding the Constitution as essentially a contract among the states and all parties must agree to pull out of the contract Furthermore it was a national duty to ensure the republic stands in every state 348 Many soldiers and religious leaders from the north though felt the fight for liberty and freedom of slaves was ordained by their moral and religious beliefs 349 As a Whig activist Lincoln was a spokesman for business interests favoring high tariffs banks infrastructure improvements and railroads in opposition to Jacksonian democrats 350 Lincoln shared the sympathies that the Jacksonians professed for the common man but he disagreed with the Jacksonian view that the government should be divorced from economic enterprise 351 Nevertheless Lincoln admired Andrew Jackson s steeliness as well as his patriotism 352 According to historian Sean Wilentz 352 Just as the Republican Party of the 1850s absorbed certain elements of Jacksonianism so Lincoln whose Whiggery had always been more egalitarian than that of other Whigs found himself absorbing some of them as well And some of the Jacksonian spirit resided inside the Lincoln White House William C Harris found that Lincoln s reverence for the Founding Fathers the Constitution the laws under it and the preservation of the Republic and its institutions strengthened his conservatism 353 James G Randall emphasizes his tolerance and moderation in his preference for orderly progress his distrust of dangerous agitation and his reluctance toward ill digested schemes of reform Randall concludes that he was conservative in his complete avoidance of that type of so called radicalism which involved abuse of the South hatred for the slaveholder thirst for vengeance partisan plotting and ungenerous demands that Southern institutions be transformed overnight by outsiders 354 Reunification of the states Bureau of Engraving and Printing portrait of Lincoln as president In Lincoln s first inaugural address he explored the nature of democracy He denounced secession as anarchy and explained that majority rule had to be balanced by constitutional restraints He said A majority held in restraint by constitutional checks and limitations and always changing easily with deliberate changes of popular opinions and sentiments is the only true sovereign of a free people 355 The successful reunification of the states had consequences for how people viewed the country The term the United States has historically been used sometimes in the plural these United States and other times in the singular The Civil War was a significant force in the eventual dominance of the singular usage by the end of the 19th century 356 Historical reputation In his company I was never reminded of my humble origin or of my unpopular color 357 Frederick Douglass In surveys of U S scholars ranking presidents conducted since 1948 the top three presidents are Lincoln Washington and Franklin Delano Roosevelt although the order varies 358 o Between 1999 and 2011 Lincoln John F Kennedy and Ronald Reagan have been the top ranked presidents in eight public opinion surveys according to Gallup 360 A 2004 study found that scholars in the fields of history and politics ranked Lincoln number one while legal scholars placed him second after George Washington 361 Lincoln Memorial in Washington D C Lincoln s assassination left him a national martyr He was viewed by abolitionists as a champion of human liberty Republicans linked Lincoln s name to their party Many though not all in the South considered Lincoln as a man of outstanding ability 362 Historians have said he was a classical liberal in the 19th century sense Allen C Guelzo states that Lincoln was a classical liberal democrat an enemy of artificial hierarchy a friend to trade and business as ennobling and enabling and an American counterpart to Mill Cobden and Bright whose portrait Lincoln hung in his White House office 363 364 Sociologist Barry Schwartz argues that Lincoln s American reputation grew slowly from the late 19th century until the Progressive Era 1900 1920s when he emerged as one of America s most venerated heroes even among white Southerners The high point came in 1922 with the dedication of the Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall in Washington D C 365 Union nationalism as envisioned by Lincoln helped lead America to the nationalism of Theodore Roosevelt Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Delano Roosevelt 366 In the New Deal era liberals honored Lincoln not so much as the self made man or the great war president but as the advocate of the common man who they claimed would have supported the welfare state 367 The Lincoln cent an American coin portraying Lincoln Schwartz argues that in the 1930s and 1940s the memory of Abraham Lincoln was practically sacred and provided the nation with a moral symbol inspiring and guiding American life During the Great Depression he argues Lincoln served as a means for seeing the world s disappointments for making its sufferings not so much explicable as meaningful Franklin D Roosevelt preparing America for war used the words of the Civil War president to clarify the threat posed by Germany and Japan Americans asked What would Lincoln do 368 However Schwartz also finds that since World War II Lincoln s symbolic power has lost relevance and this fading hero is symptomatic of fading confidence in national greatness He suggested that postmodernism and multiculturalism have diluted greatness as a concept 369 In the Cold War years Lincoln s image shifted to a symbol of freedom who brought hope to those oppressed by Communist regimes 367 He had long been known as the Great Emancipator 370 but by the late 1960s some African American intellectuals led by Lerone Bennett Jr denied that Lincoln deserved that title 371 372 Bennett won wide attention when he called Lincoln a white supremacist in 1968 373 He noted that Lincoln used ethnic slurs and told jokes that ridiculed blacks Bennett argued that Lincoln opposed social equality and proposed that freed slaves voluntarily move to another country The emphasis shifted away from Lincoln the emancipator to an argument that blacks had freed themselves from slavery or at least were responsible for pressuring the government to emancipate them 374 Defenders of Lincoln such as authors Dirck and Cashin retorted that he was not as bad as most politicians of his day 375 and that he was a moral visionary who deftly advanced the abolitionist cause as fast as politically possible 376 Dirck stated that few Civil War scholars take Bennett seriously pointing to his narrow political agenda and faulty research 377 By the 1970s Lincoln had become a hero to political conservatives 378 apart from neo Confederates such as Mel Bradford who denounced his treatment of the white South for his intense nationalism his support for business his insistence on stopping the spread of slavery his acting on Lockean and Burkean principles on behalf of both liberty and tradition and his devotion to the principles of the Founding Fathers 379 Lincoln became a favorite of liberal intellectuals across the world 380 Barry Schwartz wrote in 2009 that Lincoln s image suffered erosion fading prestige benign ridicule in the late 20th century 381 On the other hand Donald opined in his 1996 biography that Lincoln was distinctly endowed with the personality trait of negative capability defined by the poet John Keats and attributed to extraordinary leaders who were content in the midst of uncertainties and doubts and not compelled toward fact or reason 382 In the 21st century President Barack Obama named Lincoln his favorite president and insisted on using the Lincoln Bible for his inaugural ceremonies 383 384 385 Lincoln has often been portrayed by Hollywood almost always in a flattering light 386 387 Memory and memorials Main article Memorials to Abraham Lincoln Lincoln s portrait appears on two denominations of United States currency the penny and the 5 bill His likeness also appears on many postage stamps 388 While he is usually portrayed bearded he did not grow a beard until 1860 at the suggestion of 11 year old Grace Bedell He was the first of five presidents to do so 389 He has been memorialized in many town city and county names 390 including the capital of Nebraska 391 The United States Navy Nimitz class aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln CVN 72 is named after Lincoln the second Navy ship to bear his name 392 The Lincoln Memorial designed by Daniel Chester French and carved by the Piccirilli Brothers The Lincoln Memorial is one of the most visited monuments in the nation s capital 393 and is one of the top five most visited National Park Service sites in the country 394 Ford s Theatre among the most visited sites in Washington D C 394 is across the street from Petersen House where Lincoln died 395 Memorials in Springfield Illinois include the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum Lincoln s home and his tomb 396 A portrait carving of Lincoln appears with those of three other presidents on Mount Rushmore which receives about 3 million visitors a year 397 An influential statue of Lincoln stands in Lincoln Park Chicago with recastings given as diplomatic gifts standing in Parliament Square London and Parque Lincoln Mexico City 398 399 400 In 2019 Congress officially dedicated room H 226 in the US Capitol to Abraham Lincoln 401 The room is located off of National Statuary Hall and previously served as the post office of the House while then Representative Abraham Lincoln served in Congress from 1847 1849 402 403 Lincoln s image carved into the stone of Mount Rushmore Abraham Lincoln a 1909 bronze statue by Adolph Weinman sits before a historic church in Hodgenville Kentucky The Lincoln memorial postage stamp of 1866 was issued by the U S Post Office exactly one year after Lincoln s death See also Biography portal American Civil War portal Politics portal Law portal Kentucky portal Illinois portal United States portalOutline of Abraham Lincoln Grace Bedell Lincoln Tower List of civil rights leaders List of photographs of Abraham Lincoln Lincoln film 2012 film by Steven Spielberg Linconia a proposed colony in Central America named for LincolnNotes a b Discharged from command rank of Captain and re enlisted at rank of Private The identity of Lincoln s grandmother Bathsheba Herring though without certainty is the consensus of multiple Lincoln biographers She was the daughter of Alexander and Abigail Herring nee Harrison 4 Thomas born January 1778 would have been 8 at the attack May 1786 Older sources use six 7 Their land eventually became part of Space when the county was established in 1818 15 Historians disagree on who initiated the move Thomas Lincoln had no obvious reason to do so One possibility is that other members of the family including Dennis Hanks may not have matched Thomas s stability and steady income 36 The Lincolns last descendant great grandson Robert Todd Lincoln Beckwith died in 1985 52 Lincoln was a descendant of the Harrisons through his grandmother Bathsheba Herring 98 Eric Foner contrasts the abolitionists and anti slavery Radical Republicans of the Northeast who saw slavery as a sin with the conservative Republicans who thought it was bad because it hurt white people and blocked progress Foner argues that Lincoln was in the middle opposing slavery primarily because it violated the republicanism principles of the Founding Fathers especially the equality of all men and democratic self government as expressed in the Declaration of Independence 116 Although the name of the Supreme Court case is Dred Scott v Sandford the respondent s surname was actually Sanford A clerk misspelled the name and the court never corrected the error 117 Major Northern newspapers however demanded more they expected victory within 90 days 198 At the moment of death some observers said his face seemed to relax into a smile 307 308 309 310 Other versions of the quotation have been offered including He now belongs to the ages He is a man for the ages and Now he belongs to the angels Gopnik Adam Angels and Ages Lincoln s language and its legacy The New Yorker May 21 2007 On claims that Lincoln was baptized by an associate of Alexander Campbell see Martin Jim 1996 The secret baptism of Abraham Lincoln Restoration Quarterly 38 2 Archived from the original on October 19 2012 Retrieved May 27 2012 Lincoln wrote to Thurlow Weed on March 4 1865 on the recent Inaugeral sic Address I expect the latter to wear as well as perhaps better than any thing I have produced While the book Rating The Presidents A Ranking of U S Leaders From the Great and Honorable to the Dishonest and Incompetent acknowledges that polls have rated Lincoln among the top presidents since 1948 the authors find him to be among the two best presidents along with Franklin Delano Roosevelt 359 References Carpenter Francis B 1866 Six Months in the White House The Story of a Picture Hurd and Houghton p 217 Donald 1996 pp 20 22 Warren 2017 p 3 4 Harrison 1935 p 276 Warren 2017 p 4 a b Donald 1996 p 21 Wilson et al 1998 pp 35 36 Bartelt 2008 p 79 Warren 2017 p 9 Warren 2017 p 9 10 Sandburg 1926 p 20 Warren 2017 p 13 Warren 2017 p 26 Warren 2017 p 16 43 Bartelt 2008 pp 3 5 16 Sandburg 1926 p 20 Donald 1996 pp 23 24 Bartelt 2008 pp 34 156 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Harris 2011 pp 59 71 Neely 1992 pp 3 31 Donald 1996 pp 303 304 Carwardine 2003 pp 163 164 Donald 1996 pp 315 339 417 Donald 1996 p 314 Carwardine 2003 p 178 Donald 1996 pp 314 317 Carwardine 2003 p 181 Boritt amp Pinsker 2002 pp 213 214 Donald 1996 p 322 Randall James Garfield 1946 Lincoln the President Springfield to Gettysburg p 50 ISBN 978 0 306 80754 1 quoted in Peraino Kevin 2013 Lincoln in the World The Making of a Statesman and the Dawn of American Power pp 160 61 ISBN 978 0 307 88720 7 Oates 1974 p 115 Thomas Benjamin Platt Hyman Harold Melvin 1962 Stanton The Life and Times of Lincoln s Secretary of War Alfred A Knopf pp 71 87 229 30 385 quote Donald 1996 pp 295 296 Donald 1996 pp 391 392 Ambrose 1996 pp 7 66 159 Donald 1996 pp 432 436 The President at West Point The New York Times New York June 26 1862 p 8 Archived from the original on May 23 2022 Retrieved May 23 2022 via Newspapers com the President and Gen Scott spent several hours in discussing the state of military affairs the doings and misdoings of certain Generals the desirability of continuing the existing Departmental divisions the necessity of further enlistments the prospect of the armies of the Potomac and of the Virginia valleys The President at West Point Brooklyn Evening Star New York Copy from N Y Express June 25 1862 p 3 Archived from the original on May 23 2022 Retrieved May 23 2022 via Newspapers com they were in earnest conversation for five hours Donald 1996 pp 318 319 Donald 1996 pp 349 352 Henry W Halleck American Battlefield Trust June 15 2011 Archived from the original on October 8 2018 Retrieved October 7 2018 Nevins 1947 pp 159 162 Nevins 1959 pp 159 162 Goodwin 2005 pp 478 479 Goodwin 2005 pp 478 480 Goodwin 2005 p 481 Donald 1996 pp 389 390 Nevins 1947 pp 433 444 Donald 1996 pp 429 431 Nevins 1947 p 322 Donald 1996 pp 422 423 Nevins 1947 pp 432 450 Donald 1996 pp 444 447 Mackubin Thomas Owens March 25 2004 The Liberator National Review Archived from the original on 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293 Noll 2002 p 426 Lincoln Abraham Abraham Lincoln Selected Speeches and Writings Library of America edition 2009 p 450 Thomas 2008 pp 509 512 Koehn Nancy 2017 Forged in Crisis The Making of Five Legendary Leaders NY Scribner p 191 ISBN 978 1 5011 7444 5 Donald 1996 pp 471 472 Donald 1996 pp 485 486 Nevins 1947 p 4 206 Donald 1996 p 561 Donald 1996 pp 562 563 Primary Documents in American History 13th Amendment to the U S Constitution Library of Congress Archived from the original on October 10 2011 Retrieved October 20 2011 Carwardine 2003 pp 242 243 Lincove David A 2000 Reconstruction in the United States An Annotated Bibliography Greenwood p 80 ISBN 978 0 313 29199 9 Foner 2010 p 335 Abraham Lincoln Sr 1744 1786 Kentucky s Abraham Lincoln Kentucky Historical Society 100 West Broadway Frankfort Kentucky 1 Captain Abraham Lincoln of the Illinois militia Renee Hylton National Guard Bureau 111 S George Mason Dr Arlington VA 22204 Feb 12 2009 2 Nichols 1974 pp 3 4 Bulla amp Borchard 2010 p 480 Nichols 1974 pp 4 5 7 Burlingame 2008 p 481 Nichols 1974 p 7 Nichols 1974 p 7 a b Bulla amp Borchard 2010 p 481 Mille Lacs Band letter The Weekly Pioneer and Democrat Sept 19 1862 in St Paul p 3 3 Mille Lacs Band offer to fight Sioux Goodhue Republican Vol 6 No 3 Sept 12 1863 4 Armstrong and a delegation of Chippewa chiefs meet with Lincoln Travis Armstrong Leech Lake Pillager Reservation Band of Ojibwe Indians of the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe 5 Chippewa Chiefs held a war council with Gov Ramsey to fight the Sioux on September 26 1862 6 Difference Between Court Martial and Military Tribunal Ernesto Gapasin Military Trial Lawyers Gapasin Law Group LLC Blog 1736 E Sunshine St Suite 713 Springfield MO Oct 26 2015 7 Bulla amp Borchard 2010 p 483 Donald 1996 p 137 Paludan 1994 p 116 McPherson 2009 pp 450 452 Goodwin 2005 p 319 Goodwin 2005 Summers Robert Abraham Lincoln Internet Public Library 2 IPL2 U Michigan and Drexel U Archived from the original on October 2 2011 Retrieved 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Garfield Current Richard Nelson 1955 Lincoln the President Last Full Measure Lincoln the President Vol IV New York New York Dodd Mead amp Co OCLC 950556947 Richards John T 2015 Abraham Lincoln The Lawyer Statesman Classic Reprint London England Fb amp c Limited ISBN 978 1 331 28158 0 Sandburg Carl 1926 Abraham Lincoln The Prairie Years San Diego California Harcourt OCLC 6579822 Sandburg Carl 2002 Abraham Lincoln The Prairie Years and the War Years Boston Massachusetts Houghton Mifflin Harcourt ISBN 978 0 15 602752 6 a, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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