Americas 16th President Abraham Lincoln

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

Abraham Lincoln

April 1865, right after the tragic 4 years of the Civil War, America's 16th President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated after standing up for the freedom of slaves and thus added to the list of lives lost due to the war. Abraham Lincoln was the Republican who changed America and the world by his ideals of equality. A one term member of the House of Representative and a modern Liberal of his party he was elected as President in the 1860's election and after having a landslide victory by winning all the Northern states he leaded America from its worst crisis ever, the Civil war. Abraham had a distaste of slavery. He Set to change the course of History of America Abraham Lincoln was truly a remarkable human being, due to the fact that fought to prevent the nation from splitting apart, during the Civil War he was the commander in chief which prevented the USA as on nation and on January 1, 1863 he issued the Emancipation Proclamation which started the process of freedom for African American slaves.

Lincoln hated slavery thanks to to his slave driving father who did not have any slaves but treated his own children like slaves by pushing them into doing hard manual labor in and day out. By state ruling Lincoln had to obey his father wishes till age 21 and work hard on his farm at his father’s every command. After leaving his father’s farm, Lincoln decided to start a small business in a city of Illinois with a partner on credit. During his time as a clerk at his business Lincoln gained the respect and love of his fellow citizens thus encouraging him to run for the Illinois general assembly though he lost due to the fact he was not rich or very educated he gained major creditability as a people person and born leader. After losing the first time in 1834, he decided to run again for Illinois general assembly from the Whig party favored by the Democrats he was successful. After winning Lincoln decided to pursue his dreams of becoming a lawyer due to his passion for knowledge. Lincoln read many Law books and started to teach himself and thus passing the Bar Exam, Lincoln then became an important figure in Illinois by running four successful terms in the Illinois House of Representatives. Being in the Party he started his equality campaigns early by voting on expansion of suffrage on white men and actively setting a tone for abolishing slavery. Abraham was known to give amazing speeches and was known to be the greatest debater of his time, his ability to lure crowds and please people gave him a high ranking in his party. These abilities truly made a poor farm worker into one of the greatest presidents of USA. In 1858 after losing to his rival Stephen A. Douglas in the race for senate he was successful in acquiring the nomination of the Republican Party for the Presidency of the United States of America. Due to his stands on abolishing slavery he was able to win with a land slide in all Northern states thus successfully causing the southern states to succeed from the Union and effectively joining the Confederacy.

Abraham Lincoln was born on a cold winter morning deep in the woods of Hardin (now Larue) County, Kentucky on February 12, 1809. Lincoln’s childhood was different from other children, he would mostly spend his time climbing trees, fishing in the creek and helping his father Thomas with the farm work. Thomas Lincoln was a hard working farmer and carpenter. Like most Americans who lived during this time Thomas's family did own slaves from America but over the time the issue of slavery began to bother him more and more. He and his wife Nancy Hanks Lincoln even changed their church to a new one led by ministers who were antislavery and by the time he was seven Abraham's father had him and the whole family move to free state of Indiana where slavery wasn't allowed. These conscientious views had a huge impact on the way Abraham thought and his logic would soon change the way many Americans lived their lives.

Lincoln was a self educated man and since education was only so limited he had to do his learning mostly from books. Abraham mother always believed that her children should get the right kind of education and even though she could not teach them herself she would try her best to make sure they got some type of education so she would recite passages from the bible that she had memorized and as soon as him and his sister were done with their farm work she would sent them to a school house about two miles away from their home. But sadly his mother then dies of milk sickness and Abraham s father got married a little while after to a woman named Sarah bush Johnston and Abraham's childhood seemed to look better once she entered his life. Sarah and Abraham's father believed that their children should get whatever education possible and sent their kids where ever they could, even though none really saw Abraham as a smart boy Sarah believed in him and this help Abraham a lot, when took in notice all the total amount of formal education Abraham ever had was year he became an excellent speller and had learned to read and write and grew an interest in reading.

Although Abraham was good at manual labor like his father he did not like it. Abraham real interest was in the study of law. He had already taken an interest in Law and often attended the local court; the justice even sometimes asked him to give summaries of cases and was struck by his logic and dramatic style of reporting. The rational thinking Lincoln developed intellectually during his years spent practicing law which later supported and prepared him as a state leader in Illinois. In March 1832, James Rutledhe encouraged Lincoln to run for state legislature and Lincoln did so, he then joined the Whig Party and began to campaign. His main goal was to gain a positive reputation as a politician.

There were two cases that particularly influenced Lincoln. The first case was to do with William Armstrong, who was charged with the crime of murder and was defended by Lincoln. The other trial concerned slavery and nonpayment for an African-American girl named Nance and she was defended by Lincoln. This case was between Nathan Cromwell, and a man named David Bailey over a girl named Nance. Bailey wrote and signed a note to Cromwell for the payment of a black slave named Nance but when Cromwell went to gather the money that was rightfully his, Bailey refused to pay saying that they were in Illinois which was a free state and so Nance could not be bought and then refused to pay for the purchase of Nance. A furious legal battle then started between Logan and Lincoln and even though Logan won Lincoln tried reasoning with the Supreme Court who then said that Nance was a slave and therefore reserved the lower courts decisions. The reason as to why this case was so important is because this was the first Lincoln actually fought in court against slavery, his studying and practicing law inclined his character and logical thinking and eventually influenced our nation’s history.

Soon enough Lincoln met the love of his life; this was around 1839, when Mary Todd, the love of his life and future wife, came to Springfield so that she could live with her sister, Elizabeth Edwards. She was the cousin John Todd Stuart who was Abraham’s partner and soon enough, Mary and Abraham met at a dance at her sister’s house. From the begging the relationship was a troubled one. The Edward’s and the Todd’s did disprove of one another. Abraham was a country bumpkin unfit for the graceful Mary. After dating secretly Mary and Abraham were married on the evening of Novembers 4th 1842 in the parlor of her sister’s home.

Around the 1850s the north and south started to change more and more. The north was quickly developing into an industrialized society. Most of the innovations were to improve transportation or industrial production had been improved by northerners. With an increase in production also came an increase in the population. Workers were also needed and the immigrants who came from Europe and other countries settled mainly in the North, there they could find jobs working in factories, railroads etc. The south on the other hand was mainly agricultural, and only a 10 % of the nation’s goods were produced in the south and their economy relied heavily on growing crops which relied heavily on slavery.

The big issue however which split the north and south apart was slavery. An important point to keep in mind was that for numerous politicians including Lincoln the goal wasn't to abolish slavery but to preserve the Union. Lincoln had long believed that slavery would die out on its own, but the Kansas-Nebraska Act threatened that belief. He said:

"It is wrong, wrong in its effect, letting slavery into Kansas and Nebraska- and wrong in...Principle, allowing it to spread to every other part of the wide world..."(Stone 51).

Both democrat and Whig parties suffered to stay together due to their different feelings regarding slavery, soon the Whig part began to break apart and even though Lincoln tried staying with the Whigs he could not do so and joined the republican party due to the common belief they shared that slavery should not be allowed. Another important event in Lincoln’s political time was the Lincoln-Douglas debates. They were basically a series of argumentation or discussion of political issues, these debates were between Lincoln and Douglass, and were in a contest for one of the two United States Senate seats in Illinois. Even though he lost the election in November he won fame and the opportunity to reach multitudes of people, these debates gave him a nationwide reputation which ultimately became responsible for his election as the 16th President of the United States.

The election of 1860

The election of 1860 started with the Democratic Party who meet or got together, in South Carolina on April 1860, so that they could choose a candidate worthy enough to be president for the upcoming election. The North Democratic Party decided that it was Douglas who was best to defeat the black Republicans. The election of 1860 was just another step closer to the start of the American civil war. In, 1860 the issue of slavery finally came ahead defeating the strong Democratic party and bringing Abraham as the leader and Republican Party to vote, lacking the support of any Sothern states.

The States secede

After Lincoln’s victory in the election of 1860 some states decided to secede from the Union, these included, Texas, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, Louisiana, and South Carolina. Then President Lincoln announced through his first inaugural speech, addressing the people and telling them that he would take no actions and that here affirmed the North’s friendship with the South and asked southerners to give up secession. Moreover he announced that seceding was illegal and he would try to control and maintain the union at all costs and no moves shall be made against the south unless provoked.

The civil war

During the spring of 1861, tensions between northern and southern United States over issues of, slavery and westward expansion finally broke down into what is known as the American civil war. This war was basically a war fought between the north and south over their different views but mainly it was over slavery. The war originally began when Lincoln was elected as president and the southern states seceded. The reason they did this was because Lincoln was an Anti-Slavery Republican and most people during that time in America could not live in a country that didn't support slavery so they seceded from the Union. The presidential election of Abraham Lincoln of 1860 caused seven southern states to depart from the Union to create the Confederate States of the USA; four more of these states joined them right after the Civil War begun.

. The War Between the States as it was called pitted neighbor against neighbor and sometimes even brother against brother. By the time the war ended with a confederate victory, the civil war was known to be the excessive war ever fought on American ground with some 620,000 out of 2.4 million soldiers killed, and other millions injured and the south was devastated. On January 1, 1863 the president issued the emancipation proclamation, as the nation approached its third bloody year of the civil war. This proclamation declared "that all persons held as slaves within the rebellious states are, and henceforward shall be free." Even though the emancipation proclamation did not end slavery in the nation, it caught the hearts of millions of Americans and then in a way transformed the character of war. After January 1, 1864 every advancement and victory of federal troops then and also expanded the authority of freedom. Moreover, the proclamation publically declared the acceptance of African Americans into the Union army and the US navy. By the end of the war, almost 200,000 African American soldiers and sailors had fought the Union for freedom. Still after the proclamation people thoughts and beliefs stayed the same and they refused to change. After the emancipation of African American slaves in 1862, the feelings concerning African Americans in post civil war USA, up until the start of the twentieth century did not go through a great deal of modification. A lot of laws and legislations were passed during this time to help African Americans but even with these new government issued legislations these newly " freedmen" were still discriminated against and were soon to be restricted and segregated against under government ruling in important court cases of this era.

Then there was the era of Reconstruction, the following era was intended to bring African Americans the chance for a fresh and excelling life, but it was not that effective since many of them decided to stay with their old owners while the others left for opportunities which they would achieve through education as well as land ownership. But there were many things standing in the way of these hopeful African Americans, most of whom were white supremacists and the laws and restrictions that were placed upon them. Then there was the issue if the thirteen amendment. It was passed by Congress on January 31, 1875 and was ratified on December 6th, 1865. This amendment abolished slavery in the United States and it stated "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been dully convicted, shall exist within the United States, nor any place subject to their jurisdiction." On April 4th, 1865, the 16th President of the United States had been shot by John Wilkes booth, who fatally shot the president at a performance taking place in Washington, DC at the Ford’s theatre. News of the Lincoln’s assassination traveled quickly and by the end of April 15, 1865 flags across the country flew. Most, businesses closed and people came to grief. On April 26th Union troops found booth surrendered him and then shot him his last words were "useless, useless"