Abraham Lincoln in 1865. Top photo: The Library of Congress/Alexander Gardner - photographer
Abraham Lincoln (
/ˈlɪŋkən/ LINK-ən; February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was an American lawyer and statesman who served as the 16th
president of the United States from 1861 until
his assassination in 1865. Lincoln led the nation through the
American Civil War and succeeded in preserving the
Union,
abolishing slavery, bolstering the
federal government, and modernizing the
U.S. economy.
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 law practice but became vexed by the opening of additional lands to slavery as a result of the
Kansas–Nebraska Act of 1854. He reentered politics in 1854, becoming a leader in the new
Republican Party, and he reached a national audience in the
1858 Senate campaign debates against
Stephen 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 Union. 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 he 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 United States 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 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. Abraham 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.
(Wikipedia)
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