Abraham Lincoln
16th President of the United States
In office March 4, 1861 – April 15, 1865
Vice President	Hannibal Hamlin (1861 – 1865) Andrew Johnson (1865)
Preceded by	James Buchanan
Succeeded by	Andrew Johnson
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Illinois's 7th district
In office March 4, 1847 – March 3, 1849
Preceded by	John Henry
Succeeded by	Thomas L. Harris
Born	February 12, 1809(1809-02-12) Hardin County, Kentucky
Died	April 15, 1865 (aged 56) Washington, D.C.
Nationality	American
Political party	Whig (1832-1854), Republican (1854-1864), National Union (1864-1865)
Spouse	Mary Todd Lincoln
Children	Robert Todd Lincoln, Edward Lincoln, Willie Lincoln, Tad Lincoln
Occupation	Lawyer
Religion	See: Abraham Lincoln and religion
Signature
Military service
Service/branch	Illinois Militia
Years of service	1832
Battles/wars	Black Hawk War

Abraham Lincoln (February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was the sixteenth President of the United States. He successfully led the country through its greatest internal crisis, the American Civil War,^{[1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8]} only to be assassinated as the war was coming to an end.^[9] Before becoming the first Republican elected to the Presidency, Lincoln was a lawyer, an Illinois state legislator, a member of the United States House of Representatives, and an unsuccessful candidate for election to the Senate.

As an outspoken opponent of the expansion of slavery in the United States,^[10][11] Lincoln won the Republican Party nomination in 1860 and was elected president later that year. During his time in office, he contributed to the effort to preserve the United States by leading the defeat of the secessionist Confederate States of America in the American Civil War. He introduced measures that resulted in the abolition of slavery, issuing his Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 and promoting the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which passed Congress before Lincoln's death and was ratified by the states later in 1865.

Lincoln closely supervised the victorious war effort, especially the selection of top generals, including Ulysses S. Grant. Historians have concluded that he handled the factions of the Republican Party well, bringing leaders of each faction into his cabinet and forcing them to cooperate. Lincoln successfully defused a war scare with the United Kingdom in 1861. Under his leadership, the Union took control of the border slave states at the start of the war. Additionally, he managed his own reelection in the 1864 presidential election.

Opponents of the war (also known as "Copperheads") criticized Lincoln for refusing to compromise on the slavery issue. Conversely, the Radical Republicans, an abolitionist faction of the Republican Party, criticized him for moving too slowly in abolishing slavery. Even with these road blocks, Lincoln successfully rallied public opinion through his rhetoric and speeches; his Gettysburg Address is but one example of this. At the close of the war, Lincoln held a moderate view of Reconstruction, seeking to speedily reunite the nation through a policy of generous reconciliation. His assassination in 1865 was the first presidential assassination in U.S. history and made him a martyr for the ideal of national unity. Lincoln has been consistently ranked by scholars as one of the greatest U.S. Presidents.

Early life

Main article: Abraham Lincoln's early life and career

Childhood and education

Abraham Lincoln was born on February 12, 1809, to Thomas Lincoln and Nancy Hanks, two uneducated farmers, in a one-room log cabin on the 348-acre (1.4 km²) Sinking Spring Farm, in southeast Hardin County, Kentucky (now part of LaRue County), making him the first president born outside the original Thirteen Colonies. Lincoln's ancestor Samuel Lincoln had arrived in Hingham, Massachusetts from England in the 17th century, but his descendants had gradually moved west, from Pennsylvania to Virginia and then westward to the frontier.^[12]

Symbolic log cabin at the Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Historic Site

For some time, Thomas Lincoln, Abraham's father, was a respected and relatively affluent citizen of the Kentucky backcountry. He had purchased the Sinking Spring Farm in December 1808 for $200 cash and assumption of a debt. The family belonged to a Hardshell Baptist church, although Abraham himself never joined their church, or any other church for that matter.

In 1816, the Lincoln family was forced to make a new start in Perry County (now in Spencer County), Indiana. He later noted that this move was "partly on account of slavery," and partly because of difficulties with land deeds in Kentucky: Unlike land in the Northwest Territory, Kentucky never had a proper U.S. survey, and farmers often had difficulties proving title to their property.

When Lincoln was nine, his mother, then 34 years old, died of milk sickness. Soon afterwards, his father remarried to Sarah Bush Johnston. Lincoln was affectionate toward his stepmother, whom he would call "Mother" for the rest of his life, but he was distant from his father.^[13]

In 1830, after more economic and land-title difficulties in Indiana, the family settled on public land^[14] in Macon County, Illinois. The following winter was desolate and especially brutal, and the family considered moving back to Indiana. The following year, when his father relocated the family to a new homestead in Coles County, Illinois, 22-year-old Lincoln struck out on his own, canoeing down the Sangamon River to the village of New Salem in Sangamon County.^[15] Later that year, hired by New Salem businessman Denton Offutt and accompanied by friends, he took goods from New Salem to New Orleans via flatboat on the Sangamon, Illinois and Mississippi rivers.

Lincoln's formal education consisted of about 18 months of schooling, but he was largely self-educated and an avid reader. He was also a talented local wrestler and skilled with an axe.^[16] Lincoln avoided hunting and fishing because he did not like killing animals, even for food.^[17] At 6 foot 4 inches (1.93 m), he was unusually tall, as well as strong.

Early political career and military service

Sketch of a younger Abraham Lincoln

Lincoln began his political career in 1832, at age 23, with an unsuccessful campaign for the Illinois General Assembly, as a member of the Whig Party. The centerpiece of his platform was the undertaking of navigational improvements on the Sangamon River. He believed that this would attract steamboat traffic, which would allow the sparsely populated, poorer areas along the river to flourish.

He was elected captain of an Illinois militia company drawn from New Salem during the Black Hawk War, and later wrote that he had not had "any such success in life which gave him so much satisfaction."^[18][19]

For several months, Lincoln ran a small store in New Salem. In 1834, he won election to the state legislature, and, after coming across the Commentaries on the Laws of England, began to teach himself law. Admitted to the bar in 1837, he moved to Springfield, Illinois, that same year and began to practice law with John T. Stuart. With a reputation as a formidable adversary during cross-examinations and in his closing arguments, Lincoln became an able and successful lawyer.^[20]

He served four successive terms in the Illinois House of Representatives as a representative from Sangamon County, and became a leader of the Illinois Whig party. In 1837, he made his first protest against slavery in the Illinois House, stating that the institution was "founded on both injustice and bad policy."^[21] It was also in this same year that Lincoln met Joshua Fry Speed, who would become a close friend.

Lincoln wrote a series of anonymous letters, published in 1842 in the Sangamon Journal, mocking State Auditor and prominent Democrat James Shields. Two years later, Lincoln entered law practice with William Herndon, a fellow Whig. In 1854, both men joined the fledgling Republican Party. Following Lincoln's death, Herndon began collecting stories about Lincoln and published them in Herndon's Lincoln.

The first photograph ever taken of Mary Lincoln, a daguerreotype by N.H. Shepherd, about 1846.

Marriage and family

Further information: Sexuality of Abraham Lincoln

On November 4, 1842 Lincoln married Mary Todd, daughter of a prominent slave-owning family from Kentucky. The couple had four sons. Robert Todd Lincoln was born in Springfield, Illinois on August 1, 1843. Their only child to survive into adulthood, young Robert attended Phillips Exeter Academy and Harvard College.

The other Lincoln children were born in Springfield, Illinois, and died either during childhood or their teen years. Edward Baker Lincoln was born on March 10, 1846, and died on February 1, 1850, also in Springfield. William "Willie" Wallace Lincoln was born on December 21, 1850, and died on February 20, 1862 in Washington, D.C., during President Lincoln's first term. Thomas "Tad" Lincoln was born on April 4, 1853, and died on July 16, 1871 in Chicago.

The first photograph ever taken of Abraham Lincoln, a daguerreotype by N.H. Shepherd, about 1846.

Legislative activity

A Whig and an admirer of party leader Henry Clay, Lincoln was elected to a term in the U.S. House of Representatives in 1846. As a freshman House member, he was not a particularly powerful or influential figure. However, he spoke out against the Mexican-American War, which he attributed to President Polk's desire for "military glory" and challenged the President's claims regarding the Texas boundary and offered Spot Resolutions, demanding to know on what "spot" on US soil that blood was first spilt.^[22]

Lincoln later damaged his political reputation with a speech in which he declared, "God of Heaven has forgotten to defend the weak and innocent, and permitted the strong band of murderers and demons from hell to kill men, women, and children, and lay waste and pillage the land of the just." Two weeks later, President Polk sent a peace treaty to Congress. While no one in Washington paid any attention to Lincoln, the Democrats orchestrated angry outbursts from across his district, where the war was popular and many had volunteered.

Warned by his law partner, William Herndon, that the damage was mounting and irreparable, Lincoln decided not to run for reelection. His statements were not easily forgotten, and would haunt him during the Civil War. These statements were also held against him when he applied for a position in the new Taylor administration. Instead, Taylor's people offered Lincoln various positions in the remote Oregon Territory, primarily the governorship. Acceptance of this offer would have ended his career in the rapidly growing state of Illinois, so Lincoln declined the position. Returning to Springfield, Lincoln gave up politics for several years and turned his energies to his law practice.

Prairie lawyer

By the mid-1850s, Lincoln's caseload focused largely on the competing transportation interests of river barges and railroads. In one prominent 1851 case, he represented the Alton & Sangamon Railroad in a dispute with a shareholder, James A. Barret. Barret had refused to pay the balance on his pledge to the railroad on the grounds that it had changed its originally planned route. Lincoln argued that as a matter of law a corporation is not bound by its original charter when that charter can be amended in the public interest, that the newer route proposed by Alton & Sangamon was superior and less expensive, and that accordingly, the corporation had a right to sue Barret for his delinquent payment. He won this case, and the decision by the Illinois Supreme Court was eventually cited by several other courts throughout the United States.^[23]

The civil case which won Lincoln fame as a lawyer was the landmark Hurd v. Rock Island Bridge Company. America's expansion west, which Lincoln strongly supported, was seen as an economic threat to the river trade, which ran north-to-south, primarily on the Mississippi river. In 1856 a steamboat collided with a bridge, built by the Rock Island Railroad, between Rock Island, Illinois, and Davenport, Iowa, the first railroad bridge to span the Mississippi. The steamboat owner sued for damages, claiming the bridge was a hazard to navigation. Lincoln argued in court for the railroad and won, removing a costly impediment to western expansion by establishing the right of land routes to bridge waterways.

In the 1920s, historical markers were placed at the county lines along the route Lincoln traveled in the eighth judicial district. This example is on the border of Piatt and DeWitt counties.

Possibly the most notable criminal trial of Lincoln's career as a lawyer came in 1858, when he defended William "Duff" Armstrong, who had been charged with murder. The case became famous for Lincoln's use of judicial notice — a rare tactic at that time — to show that an eyewitness had lied on the stand. After the witness testified to having seen the crime by moonlight, Lincoln produced a Farmers' Almanac to show that the moon on that date was at such a low angle that it could not have provided enough illumination to see anything clearly. Based almost entirely on this evidence, Armstrong was acquitted.^[24]

Lincoln was involved in more than 5,100 cases in Illinois alone during his 23-year legal career. Though many of these cases involved little more than filing a writ, others were more substantial and quite involved. Lincoln and his partners appeared before the Illinois State Supreme Court more than 400 times.

Republican politics 1854–1860

Lincoln returned to politics in response to the Kansas-Nebraska Act (1854), which expressly repealed the limits on slavery's extent as determined by the Missouri Compromise (1820). Illinois Democrat Stephen A. Douglas, the most powerful man in the Senate, proposed popular sovereignty as the solution to the slavery impasse, and incorporated it into the Kansas–Nebraska Act. Douglas argued that in a democracy the people should have the right to decide whether or not to allow slavery in their territory, rather than have such a decision imposed on them by Congress.^[25]

In the October 16, 1854, "Peoria Speech",^[26] Lincoln first stood out among the other free soil orators of the day:^[27]

[The Act has a] declared indifference, but as I must think, 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 — enables the enemies of free institutions, with plausibility, to taunt us as hypocrites — causes the real friends of freedom to doubt our sincerity, and especially because it forces so many really good men amongst ourselves into an open war with the very fundamental principles of civil liberty — criticizing the Declaration of Independence, and insisting that there is no right principle of action but self-interest.^[28]

Drawing on remnants of the old Whig, Free Soil, Liberty and Democratic parties, he was instrumental in forming the new Republican Party. In a stirring campaign, the Republicans carried Illinois in 1854 and elected a senator. Lincoln was the obvious choice, but to keep the new party balanced he allowed the election to go to an ex-Democrat Lyman Trumbull. At the Republican convention in 1856, Lincoln placed second in the contest to become the party's candidate for Vice-President.

In 1857-58, Douglas broke with President Buchanan, leading to a fight for control of the Democratic Party. Some eastern Republicans even favored the reelection of Douglas in 1858, since he had led the opposition to the Lecompton Constitution, which would have admitted Kansas as a slave state. Accepting the Republican nomination for Senate in 1858, Lincoln delivered his famous speech: "'A house divided against itself cannot stand.'(Mark 3:25) 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."^[29] The speech created an evocative image of the danger of disunion caused by the slavery debate, and rallied Republicans across the north.

Lincoln-Douglas debates of 1858

Main article: Lincoln-Douglas debates of 1858

The 1858 campaign featured the Lincoln-Douglas debates, a famous contest on slavery. Lincoln warned that "The Slave Power" was threatening the values of republicanism, while Douglas emphasized the supremacy of democracy, as set forth in his Freeport Doctrine, which said that local settlers should be free to choose whether to allow slavery or not. Though the Republican legislative candidates won more popular votes, the Democrats won more seats, and the legislature reelected Douglas to the Senate. Nevertheless, Lincoln's speeches on the issue transformed him into a national political star.

1860 Presidential Election

Lincoln in New York City the day of his famous Cooper Union speech, February 27, 1860 by Mathew Brady

"The Rail Candidate" - Lincoln's 1860 candidacy is held up by the slavery issue (slave on left) and party organization (New York Tribune editor Horace Greeley on right).

Main article: United States presidential election, 1860

Lincoln was chosen as the Republican candidate for the 1860 election for several reasons. His expressed views on slavery were seen as more moderate than those of rivals William H. Seward and Salmon P. Chase. His "Western" origins also appealed to the newer states: other contenders, especially those with more governmental experience, had acquired enemies within the party and were weak in the critical western states, while Lincoln was perceived as a moderate who could win the West. Most Republicans agreed with Lincoln that the North was the aggrieved party as the Slave Power tightened its grasp on the national government. Throughout the 1850s he denied that there would ever be a civil war, and his supporters repeatedly rejected claims that his election would incite secession.^{[30][need quote]} On May 9-10, 1860, the Illinois Republican State Convention was held in Decatur. At this convention, Lincoln received his first endorsement to run for the presidency.

Throughout the general election, Lincoln did not campaign or give speeches. This was handled by the state and county Republican organizations, who used the latest techniques to sustain party enthusiasm and thus obtain high turnout. There was little effort to convert non-Republicans, and there was virtually no campaigning in the South except for a few border cities such as St. Louis, Missouri, and Wheeling, Virginia; indeed, the party did not even run a slate in most of the South. In the North, there were thousands of Republican speakers, tons of campaign posters and leaflets, and thousands of newspaper editorials. These focused first on the party platform, and second on Lincoln's life story, making the most of his boyhood poverty, his pioneer background, his native genius, and his rise from obscurity. His nicknames, "Honest Abe" and "the Rail-Splitter," were exploited to the full. The goal was to emphasize the superior power of "free labor," whereby a common farm boy could work his way to the top by his own efforts.^[31]

On November 6, 1860, Lincoln was elected as the 16th President of the United States, beating Democrat Stephen A. Douglas, John C. Breckinridge of the Southern Democrats, and John Bell of the new Constitutional Union Party. He was the first Republican president, winning entirely on the strength of his support in the North: he was not even on the ballot in nine states in the South, and won only 2 of 996 counties in the other Southern states. Lincoln gained 1,865,908 votes (39.9% of the total), for 180 electoral votes; Douglas, 1,380,202 (29.5%) for 12 electoral votes; Breckenridge, 848,019 (18.1%) for 72 electoral votes; and Bell, 590,901 (12.5%) for 39 electoral votes. There were fusion tickets in some states, but even if his opponents had combined in every state, Lincoln had a majority vote in all but two of the states in which he won the electoral votes and would still have won the electoral college and the election.

Lincoln was the first U. S. President elected from Illinois, and the only one until Barack Obama was elected 148 years later.^[32]