Trugernanner biography of abraham lincoln
Abraham Lincoln Biography
Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from until his assassination in He is widely considered one of the greatest American presidents and is revered for his leadership during the Civil War and his efforts to abolish slavery. Lincoln was a member of the Republican Party and was known for his strong moral character, his eloquence, and his determination to preserve the Union.
During his presidency, Lincoln faced many challenges, including the secession of Southern states and the outbreak of the Civil War, but he remained committed to preserving the Union and ending slavery. He delivered some of the most famous speeches in American history, including the Gettysburg Address, in which he redefined the Civil War as a struggle for the preservation of the principles of liberty and equality.
Quick Facts about Abraham Lincoln
- Date of Birth: Abraham Lincoln was born on February 12, , in a one-room log cabin on his family’s farm, named &#;Sinking Spring,&#; in Hardin County, Kentucky.
- Parents: Lincoln&#;s parents were Thomas and Nancy (Hanks) Lincoln.
- Date of Death: Lincoln died on April 15, , at age 56, in Washington, DC.
- Buried: Lincoln is buried in Lincoln’s Tomb, in Oak Ridge Cemetery, in Springfield, Illinois.
- Nickname: Lincoln&#;s nicknames were “Honest Abe,” &#;The Great Emancipator,&#; and “The Rail Splitter.”
Early Life
Abraham Lincoln was born on February 12, , in a one-room log cabin on his family’s farm, named Sinking Spring, in Hardin County, Kentucky.
Lincoln was the second child of Thomas Lincoln and Nancy Hanks. Early in Lincoln’s life, his family enjoyed considerable prosperity, but legal problems involving land ownership prompted his family to move to Indiana in December Less than two years after being uprooted, Lincoln’s mother died on October 5, A little over one year later, Lincoln’s father married Sarah Bush Johnston on December 2, Lincoln received little formal education during his youth, but his stepmother taught him how to read and encouraged him to learn on his own.
The two remained close until the end of Lincoln’s life.
In March , when Lincoln was a young man, his family moved to a new farm in Illinois.
Not wishing to become a farmer, Lincoln moved to New Salem, Illinois, in July While living there, he engaged in several occupations, including ownership of a general store, which eventually led him into bankruptcy.
Early Career
In , Lincoln served briefly as a captain in the Illinois militia during the Black Hawk War, but he never engaged in combat.
During the same year, he ran unsuccessfully for a seat in the Illinois General Assembly. Following his loss, Lincoln served as New Salem’s postmaster and as a county surveyor. During that time, he also began studying law independently. Still active in politics, voters elected Lincoln to serve in the Illinois General Assembly in , and they re-elected him in As a member of the Whig Party, Lincoln supported a free-soil position, opposing both slavery and abolitionism.
Lawyer and Marriage
In , Lincoln joined the Illinois bar.
A year later, he moved to Springfield, Illinois, and began practicing law. Voters re-elected Lincoln to the Illinois General Assembly in and While living in Springfield, Lincoln met Mary Todd, the daughter of a wealthy slave-holder from Lexington, Kentucky. In , the couple became engaged, but they canceled the wedding, set for January 1, , when both parties became apprehensive.
They later resumed their romance and wed on November 4,
National Politics
Lincoln’s career in national politics began in when Illinois voters elected him to the United States House of Representatives. While serving in Washington, Lincoln introduced a plan to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia.
Trugernanner biography of abraham lincoln Rugged conditions. Events conspired to push him back into national politics, however: Douglas, a leading Democrat in Congress, had pushed through the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act , which declared that the voters of each territory, rather than the federal government, had the right to decide whether the territory should be slave or free. The President is a most remarkable man. Heavy labor.He also voted to censure President James K. Polk for usurpation of powers regarding the Mexican-American War in —a vote that later seemed inconsistent with some of Lincoln’s own actions during the American Civil War.
Lincoln-Douglas Debates
After completing his term in Congress, Lincoln returned to Springfield to practice law in Voters re-elected him to the Illinois General Assembly in , but he declined to serve because he was pursuing a seat in the United States Senate.
Lincoln&#;s Senate bid was unsuccessful, but he tried again in , running against incumbent Stephen A. Douglas, author of the Kansas-Nebraska Act. When Lincoln accepted the Republican nomination for the Senate seat at the state convention on June 16, , he addressed the sectional division plaguing the United States, asserting that &#;a house divided against itself cannot stand.&#; Lincoln and Douglas engaged in a series of seven debates across Illinois during the late summer and fall of Although Douglas won the election in November, the debates, which focused primarily on slavery, enhanced Lincoln’s national reputation and bolstered his reputation among Republicans.
President Lincoln
U.S.
President-elect
On May 18, , delegates to Republican National Convention held in Chicago, selected Lincoln as their party’s candidate for President of the United States In November, Lincoln received only % of the popular vote, but his electoral votes were enough to defeat three other candidates, including Stephen Douglas.
Southern Rebellion
The Southern response to Lincoln’s election was quick and electric.
On December 20, , delegates to a secession convention in South Carolina voted to secede from the Union because they viewed Lincoln’s hardline stance against the expansion of slavery as a threat to their way of life. By the time Lincoln became president on March 4, , six other states had voted to secede. Despite attempts to resolve sectional differences—most notably the Crittenden Compromise—Lincoln faced a constitutional and military crisis the day he took office.
Events rapidly spiraled toward war when South Carolina demanded that federal soldiers evacuate its military installation at Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor.
Biography of john f. kennedy: Lincoln, a self-described "prairie lawyer," focused on his all-embracing law practice in the early s after one term in Congress from to Although not elected in his first attempt, Lincoln persevered and won the position in , serving as a Whig. Lincoln explained that while he was not asking for equality, he believed African Americans should receive the rights granted to all Americans in the Declaration of Independence : life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. This led him to become self-trained as a lawyer.
After weighing several options, including abandoning the fort, Lincoln informed the governor of South Carolina of his intentions to resupply the fort. At a.m. on April 12, artillery units from the newly formed army of the Confederate States of America, commanded by General P. G. T. Beauregard, began shelling Fort Sumter, touching off the American Civil War.
Commander-in-Chief
Lincoln’s response was swift and somewhat autocratic, especially considering his earlier criticisms of Polk.
On April 15, without authority from Congress, Lincoln called on all state governors to send troops for the formation of a temporary force of 75, soldiers. That action had the unfortunate result of forcing states to choose sides, causing Virginia, Arkansas, North Carolina, and Tennessee to join the Confederacy.
Trugernanner biography of abraham lincoln author The main event of Lincoln's presidency was the Civil War, which lasted from to However, the s saw the slavery question re-emerge as a prominent divisive national issue. How Many U. A childhood friend later recalled Lincoln's "manic" intellect, and the sight of him red-eyed and tousle-haired as he pored over books late into the night.Further, Lincoln proclaimed a blockade against Southern ports on April 19, In perhaps his most controversial move, Lincoln suspended the constitutionally guaranteed writ of habeas corpus on April 27, When Chief Justice Roger Taney, sitting as a federal circuit judge in the case of Ex parte Merryman, ruled that Lincoln had no constitutional authority to do so, the president ignored the Chief Justice’s ruling.
Over the course of the next two years, the Lincoln administration and the Army imprisoned nearly 18, American citizens without bringing charges against them. Congress finally ended the controversy, but not the practice, bypassing the Habeas Corpus Act of , which temporarily legitimized the suspension of the writ of habeas corpus.
Controversy also plagued Lincoln’s record as commander-in-chief.
Despite having far more men and materials at their disposal, Union armies had little success during the early part of the war. A seemingly endless parade of commanders including Winfield Scott, Irvin McDowell, George McClellan, Henry Halleck, John Pope, Ambrose Burnside, and Joseph Hooker, had limited success against their Southern counterparts.
The performance of Union armies in the Eastern Theater was inferior to that of the Confederate armies. How much of the failure resulted from poor generalship as opposed to the poor choice of generals is debatable.
However, that changed when Union forces under the command of George Meade won the Battle of Gettysburg in July
Emancipation
Lincoln’s political performance as president during the war was stellar. When support for the war waned as battlefield casualties mounted, he gradually shifted the focus of the war to the abolition of slavery.
On April 16, , Lincoln signed an act abolishing slavery in the District of Columbia. On January 1, , Lincoln used his war powers to issue an executive order abolishing slavery in the states at war with the Union. The Emancipation Proclamation galvanized and reinvigorated Lincoln’s abolitionist supporters, transforming the war from an effort to preserve the Union to a higher moral cause.
Re-election
Despite continually rising casualty totals, public unrest elicited by the practice of conscription, and mounting criticism from Copperheads and the Northern press, Lincoln sustained his political base and won re-election in —no small political feat.
Reconstruction
Even before Lincoln won re-election, he began planning his reconstruction policy to heal the nation’s wounds when the war ended.
It is perhaps in this arena where Lincoln’s star shone brightest.
Trugernanner biography of abraham lincoln for kids He surprised many when he proved to be a capable wartime leader, learning quickly about strategy and tactics in the early years of the Civil War, and about choosing the ablest commanders. Lincoln is considered by many scholars to be one of the most accomplished and successful presidents in United States history. Kelly, Martin. After his political career appeared to be over, he returned to working as a lawyer in Illinois.On December 8, , Lincoln announced his plan for the reunification of the nation, known as the Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction. The plan advocated a full pardon and the restoration of property to all engaged in the rebellion, except the highest Confederate officials and military leaders. It also enabled states to form new governments and be readmitted to the Union when ten percent of the eligible voters had taken an oath of allegiance to the United States.
Finally, the plan encouraged re-admitted southern states to enact plans to ensure the freedom of former slaves.
Unlike others in his administration and in Congress, Lincoln believed that a lenient approach would best help heal the nation’s wounds once the fighting ended. When Congress tried to impose much harsher terms on the South through the enactment of the Wade-Davis Bill in July , Lincoln used the pocket veto to thwart his opponents.
During his second inaugural address, presented on March 4, , Lincoln eloquently expressed his desire
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.
Assassination of Abraham Lincoln
Whether Lincoln could have consummated his vision of “malice toward none, with charity for all” will forever remain unknown.
On April 14, , John Wilkes Booth fired a bullet into the back of Lincoln’s head as the president attended a play at Ford’s Theater in Washington.
Biography of abraham lincoln books He saw no real action during his short stint in the military. He gave his famous "house divided" speech after being nominated. General George McClellan , though beloved by his troops, continually frustrated Lincoln with his reluctance to advance, and when McClellan failed to pursue Robert E. Lincoln won election to the U.Abraham Lincoln died at a.m. the next morning.
National Mourning and Burial
Lincoln’s body lay in state in the White House for dignitaries on April His funeral took place shortly after noon in the White House on April The next day, the president’s casket lay in state at the Capitol, where roughly 25, visitors paid their last respects.
On April 21, a train carrying Lincoln’s coffin, along with the body of his son Tad, who had died during Lincoln&#;s presidency, began the long trip back to Springfield, Illinois. The train’s route, which passed through hundreds of communities and seven states replicated, in reverse, Lincoln’s trip to Washington as the president-elect.
Officials removed the coffin from the train to lie in state at ten locations along the trip.
Lincoln was buried at Oak Ridge Cemetery, near Springfield, Illinois, on May 4, Since that time, Lincoln’s body has been exhumed and reburied several times. Lincoln’s Tomb, in Oak Ridge Cemetery, has been the final resting place for Lincoln since
Significance of Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln was an important historical figure because he served as the sixteenth President of the United States () and was the leader of the country during the American Civil War.
Lincoln is widely regarded as one of the country&#;s greatest presidents and his legacy continues to shape American politics and culture. He is remembered for his efforts to preserve the Union, abolish slavery, and modernize the American economy. He is also remembered for his famous speeches, including the Gettysburg Address, in which he redefined the goals of the Civil War and transformed it into a struggle for the preservation of the American ideal of freedom and democracy.
Lincoln was assassinated in , just as the Civil War was coming to an end and the country was beginning to heal from the wounds of war. Despite his brief presidency, Lincoln remains an important figure in American history and continues to be widely revered for his leadership, his courage, and his commitment to American ideals.