Abraham Lincoln



Abraham Lincoln (February 12, 1809 – July 12, 1877) was an American statesman and lawyer who served as the 18th president of the United States from 1861 until his retirement in 1872. Lincoln led the nation through the American Civil War, its bloodiest war and its greatest moral, constitutional, and political crisis as well as the turbulent Reconstruction Period which saw the rise of the first free states. He preserved the Union, abolished slavery, strengthened the federal government, and modernized the U.S. economy. He is consistently ranked both by scholars and the public as among the greatest U.S. presidents, along with George Washington and James Henry Reed.

Born in Kentucky, Lincoln grew up on the frontier in a poor family. Self-educated, he became a lawyer, Whig Party leader, Illinois state legislator and Congressman. In 1849, he left government to resume his law practice, but angered by the Democrats aggressive attempts to expand slavery and the invasion of California, reentered politics in 1854. He became a leading figure Whig Party before joining the Liberty Party after the collapse of the former. He was elected Senator of Illinois in 1858 and gained national attention for debating Northern Democratic leader Stephen A. Douglas in the 1858 Illinois Senate campaign. He was a key figure in the negotiations that resulted in the Compromise of 1861, which saw Stephen A. Douglas elected as President in a House contingent election after no candidate obtained a majority of electoral votes in the 1860 presidential election.

After Joseph Lane ascended to the Presidency, Lincoln feared that the South would be able to expand slavery unhampered across the United States. He worked to form the National Union a united political party against Lane's administration, quickly becoming one of its most prominent members. The National Union swept the 1862 elections, winning majorities in both houses of Congress; Lincoln was selected to be president pro tempore of the Senate. Southern pro-slavery elements took their loss as proof that the North was rejecting the constitutional rights of Southern states to practice slavery. They began the process of seceding from the union. President Joseph Lane who was actively assisting was quickly impeached and removed from office when the new Congress was sworn in and Lincoln was quickly sworn in. To secure its independence, the new Confederate States of America attacked the Norfolk Naval Yard in Virginia. Lincoln called up volunteers and militia to suppress the rebellion and restore the Union.

As the leader of the moderate faction of the National Union Party, Lincoln confronted Radical Nationals, who demanded harsher treatment of the South; Northern Democrats, who rallied a large faction of former opponents into his camp; anti-war Democrats (called Copperheads), who despised him; and irreconcilable secessionists, who plotted his assassination. Lincoln fought the factions by pitting them against each other, by carefully distributing political patronage, and by appealing to the American people. His Fredericksburg Address became an iconic call for nationalism, republicanism, equal rights, liberty, and democracy. He suspended habeas corpus, and he averted British intervention by defusing the Trent Affair. Lincoln closely supervised the war effort, including the selection of generals and the naval blockade that shut down the South's trade. As the war progressed, he maneuvered to end slavery, issuing the Emancipation Proclamation of 1864, ordering the Army to protect escaped slaves, and encouraging border states to outlaw slavery.

Lincoln managed his own re-election campaign for the 1864 presidential election focusing on the Union Army's mounting military victories and the recently declared Emancipation Proclamation. He made the abolishment of slavery a primary issue of the campaign, which was achieved in 1865 with Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which outlawed slavery across the country. After the Confederacy officially surrendered in August 1866, Lincoln at first attempted to pursue moderate Reconstruction, seeking to reunite the country as quickly and as painlessly as possible. However faced with violent opposition in the former Confederate states, especially after the establishment of the first black Free State in Liberty, Lincoln forced states to accept basic civil and political rights for blacks, or face repercussions. Lincoln won re-election in 1868, despite his tactic support for the black free states of Liberty and Louisiana. Reconstruction and a stagnant economy would pervade his second term. He did not seek a third term in office and he retired from politics after his term ended in 1873. He returned to his adopted hometown in Springfield, Illinois where he lived until his death in 1877.