Online Encyclopedia
Search over 40,000 articles from the original, classic Encyclopedia Britannica, 11th Edition.
LINCOLN, ABRAHAM (1809-1865)
Online EncyclopediaEncyclopedia Home :: LEO-LOB
del.icio.us it!
|
See also:LINCOLN, See also:ABRAHAM (1809-1865) , sixteenth See also:president of the See also:United States of See also:America, was See also:born on " See also:Rock See also:Spring " See also:farm, 3 M. from Hodgenville, in Hardin (now Larne) See also:county, See also:Kentucky, on the 12th of See also:February 1809.' His grandfather,' Abraham Lincoln, settled in Kentucky about 178o and was killed by See also:Indians in 1784. His See also:father, See also: Spencer county was still a See also:wilderness, and the boy See also:grew up in See also:pioneer surroundings, living in a See also:rude See also:log-See also:cabin, enduring many hardships and knowing only the See also:primitive See also:manners, conversation and ambitions of sparsely settled backwoods communities. See also:Schools were rare, and teachers qualified only to impart the merest rudiments. " Of course when I came of See also:age I did not know much," wrote he years afterward, " still somehow I could read, write and See also:cipher to the See also:rule of three, but that was all. I have not been to school since. The little advance I now have upon this See also:store of See also:education, I have picked up from time to time under the pressure of See also:necessity." His entire schooling, in five different schools, amounted to less than a twelvemonth; but he became a See also:good speller and an excellent penman. His own mother taught him to read, and his stepmother urged him to study. He read and re-read in See also:early boyhood the See also:Bible, See also:Aesop, See also:Robinson Crusoe, See also:Pilgrim's Progress, Weems's See also:Life of Washington and a See also:history of the United States; and later read every See also:book he could See also:borrow from the neighbours, See also:Burns and See also:Shakespeare becoming favourites. He wrote rude, coarse satires, crude See also:verse, and compositions on the American See also:government, See also:temperance, &c. At the age of seventeen he had attained his full height, and began to be known as a wrestler, runner and lifter of great weights. When nineteen he made a See also:journey as a hired See also:hand on a flatboat to New See also: In 1831 Offutt made him clerk of his See also:country store at New See also:Salem, a small and unsuccessful See also:settlement in Menard county; this gave him moments of leisure to devote to self-education. He borrowed a See also:grammar and other books, sought explanations from the village schoolmaster and began to read See also:law. In this frontier community law and politics claimed a large proportion of the stronger and the more ambitious men; the law early appealed to Lincoln and his See also:general popularity encouraged him as early as 1832 to enter politics. In this See also:year Offutt failed and Lincoln was thus See also:left without employment. He became a See also:candidate for the Illinois See also:House of Representatives; and on the 9th of March 183 2 issued an address " To the See also:people of Sangamon county " which betokens See also:talent and education far beyond See also:mere ability to " read, write and cipher," though in its preparation he seems to have had the help of a friend. Before the See also:election the See also:Black See also:Hawk See also:Indian See also:War See also:broke out; Lincoln volunteered in one of the Sangamon county companies on the 21st of See also:April and was elected See also:captain by the members of the See also:company. It is said that the See also:oath of See also:allegiance was administered to Lincoln at this time by Lieut. See also:Jefferson See also:Davis. The company, a See also:part of the 4th Illinois, was mustered out after the five See also:weeks' service for which it volunteered, and Lincoln re-enlisted as a private on the 29th of May, and was finally mustered out on the 16th of June by Lieut. See also:Robert See also: He was defeated in his See also:campaign for the legislature in
1832, partly because of his unpopular adherence to See also:Clay and the American See also:system, but in his own election See also:precinct, he received nearly all the votes See also:cast. With a friend, See also: See also:Douglas in adopting the See also:convention system, to which Lincoln had been strongly opposed. In 1837 with one other representativefromSangamon county, named See also:Dan See also: He had become an eloquent and influential public See also:speaker, and in 184o and 1844 was a candidate on the Whig See also:ticket for presidential elector.
In 1834 his See also:political friend and colleague John Todd See also:Stuart (1807-1885), a lawyer in full practice, had urged him to See also:fit himself for the See also:bar, and had See also:lent him See also:text-books; and Lincoln, working diligently, was admitted to the bar in September 1836. In April 1837 he quitted New Salem, and removed to Springfield, which was the county-seat and was soon to become the capital of the state, to begin practice in a See also:partnership with Stuart, which was terminated in April 1841; from that time until September 1843 he was junior partner to Stephen Trigg See also:Logan (r800-188o), and from 1843 until his See also:death he was See also:senior partner of William See also: See also:Garrison in 1831, had stirred the See also:conscience of the North, and had had its influence even upon many who strongly deprecated its extreme radicalism; the See also:Compromise of 185o had failed to silence sectional controversy, and the Fugitive Slave Law, which was one of the compromise See also:measures, had throughout the North been bitterly assailed and to a considerable extent had been nullified by state legislation; and finally in 1854 the slavery agitation was fomented by the passage of the Kansas-See also:Nebraska See also:Act, which repealed the See also:Missouri Compromise and gave legislative See also:sanction to the principle of " popular See also:sovereignty " —the principle that the inhabitants of each Territory as well as of each state were to be left See also:free to decide for themselves whether or not slavery was to be permitted therein. In enacting this measure Congress had been dominated largely by one See also:man—Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois—then probably the most powerful figure in national politics. Lincoln had early put himself on record as opposed to slavery, but he was never technically an abolitionist; he allied himself rather with those who believed that slavery should be fought within the Constitution, that, though it could not be constitutionally interfered with in individual states, it should be excluded from territory over which the national government had See also:jurisdiction. In this, as in other things, he was eminently clear-sighted and practical. Already he had shown his capacity as a forcible and able debater; aroused to new activity upon the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Bill, which he regarded as a See also:gross See also:breach of political faith, he now entered upon public discussion with an earnestness and force that by common consent gave him leadership in Illinois of the opposition, which in 1854 elected a majority of the legislature; and it gradually became clear that he was the only man who could be opposed in debate to the powerful and adroit Douglas. He was elected to the state House of Representatives, from which he immediately resigned to become a candidate for United States senator from Illinois, to succeed See also: Douglas," who was the choice of his own party to succeed himself. Lincoln, addressing the convention which nominated him, gave expression to the following bold prophecy: " A house divided against itself cannot stand. I believe this Government cannot endure permanently See also: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. Either the opponents of slavery will See also:arrest the further spread of it, and See also:place it where the public mind shall See also:rest in the belief that it is in course of ultimate In this speech, delivered in the state House of Representatives, Lincoln charged See also:Pierce, See also:Buchanan, See also:Taney and Douglas with See also:conspiracy to secure the Dred See also:Scott decision. Yielding to the wish of his party friends, on the 24th of July, Lincoln challenged Douglas to a See also:joint public discussion.' The antagonists met in debate at seven designated places in the state. The first See also:meeting was at See also:Ottawa, La Salle County, about 90 M. south-west of Chicago, on the 21st of August. At See also:Freeport, on the See also:Wisconsin boundary, on the 27th of August, Lincoln answered questions put to him by Douglas, and by his questions forced Douglas to "betray the South" by his enunciation of the "Freeport See also:heresy," that, no See also:matter what the character of Congressional legislation or the Supreme Court's decision " slavery cannot exist a See also:day or an See also:hour anywhere unless it is supported by local See also:police regulations." This adroit See also:attempt to reconcile the principle of popular sovereignty with the Dred Scott decision, though it undoubtedly helped Douglas in the immediate fight for the senatorship, necessarily alienated his See also:Southern supporters and assured his defeat, as Lincoln foresaw it must, in the presidential campaign of 186o. The other debates were: at Jonesboro, in the southern part of the state, on the 15th of September; at See also:Charleston, 15o M. N.E. of Jonesboro, on the 18th of September; and, in the western part of the state, at See also:Galesburg (Oct. 7), See also:Quincy (Oct. 13) and See also:Alton (Oct. 15). In these debates Douglas, the See also:champion of his party, was over-matched in clearness and force of reasoning, and lacked the great moral earnestness of his opponent; but he dexterously extricated himself time and again from difficult argumentative positions, and retained sufficient support to win the immediate See also:prize. At the See also:November election the Republican vote was 126,o84, the Douglas Democratic vote was 121,940 and the Lecompton (or Buchanan) Democratic vote was 5o91; but the Democrats, through a favourable See also:apportionment of representative districts, secured a majority of the legislature (Senate : 14 Democrats, 11 Republicans; House : 40 Democrats, 35 Republicans), which re-elected Douglas. Lincoln's speeches in this campaign won him a national fame. In 1859 he made two speeches in Ohio—one at See also:Columbus on the 16th of September criticising Douglas's paper in the September Harper's See also:Magazine, and one at See also:Cincinnati on the 17th of September, which was addressed to Kentuckians,—and he spent a few days in Kansas, speaking in See also:Elwood, See also:Troy, Doniphan, See also:Atchison and Leavenworth, in the first See also:week of December. On the 27th of February 186o in See also: On the 26th of June 1859 Lincoln in a speech at Springfield answered Douglas's speech of the 12th in which he made over his See also:doctrine of popular sovereignty to suit the Dred Scott decision. Before the actual debate in 1858 Douglas made a speech in Chicago on the 9th of July, to which Lincoln replied the next day; Douglas spoke at Bloomington on the 16th of July and Lincoln answered him in Springfield on the 17th. I4 See also:Manchester, See also:Exeter and See also:Dover in New See also:Hampshire, at See also:Hartford (5th March), New Haven (6th March), See also:Woonsocket (8th March) and See also:Norwich (9th March). The Illinois State Convention of the Republican party, held at Decatur on the 9th and loth of May 186o, amid great See also:enthusiasm declared Abraham Lincoln its first choice for the presidential nomination, and instructed the delegation to the National Convention to cast the vote of the state as a unit for him. The Republican national convention, which made " No See also:Extension of Slavery " the essential part of the party See also:platform, met at Chicago on the 16th of May 186o. At this time William H. See also:Seward was the most conspicuous Republican in national politics, and See also:Salmon P. See also:Chase had long been in the fore-front of the political contest against slavery. Both had won greater national fame than had Lincoln, and, before the convention met, each hoped to be nominated for president. Chase, however, had little See also:chance, and the contest was virtually between Seward and Lincoln, who by many was considered more " available," because it was thought that he could (and Seward could not) secure the vote of certain doubtful states. Lincoln's name was presented by Illinois and seconded by Indiana. At first Seward had the strongest support. On the first ballot Lincoln received only 102 votes to 1731 for Seward. On the second ballot Lincoln received 181 votes to Seward's 1841. On the third ballot the 501 votes formerly given to See also:Simon See also:Cameron' were given to Lincoln, who received 2311 votes to 18o for Seward, and without taking another ballot enough votes were changed to make Lincoln's See also:total 354 (233 being necessary for a choice) and the nomination was then made unanimous. See also:Hannibal See also:Hamlin, of See also:Maine, was nominated for the vice-See also:presidency. The convention was singularly tumultuous and noisy; large claques were hired by both Lincoln's and Seward's managers. During the campaign Lincoln remained in Springfield, making few speeches and See also:writing practically no letters for publication. The campaign was unusually animated—only the Whig campaign for William Henry Harrison in 184o is comparable to it: there were great torchlight processions of " wide-awake " clubs, which did " See also:rail-fence," or zigzag, See also:marches, and carried rails in See also:honour of their candidate, the " rail-splitter." Lincoln was elected by a popular vote of 1,866,452 to 1,375,157 for Douglas, 847,953 for See also:Breckinridge and 590,631 for See also:Bell—as the combined vote of his opponents was so much greater than his own he was often called " the minority president "; the electoral vote was: Lincoln, 18o; John C. Breckiriridge, 72; John Bell, 39; Stephen A. Douglas, 12. On the 4th of March 1861 Lincoln was inaugurated as president. (For an account of his See also:administration see UNITED STATES: History.) During the campaign See also:radical leaders in the South frequently asserted that the success of the Republicans at the polls would mean that the rights of the slave-holding states under the Federal constitution, as interpreted by them, would no longer be respected by the North, and that, if Lincoln were elected, it would be the See also:duty of these slave-holding states to secede from the Union. There was much opposition in these states to such a course, but the secessionists triumphed, and by the time President Lincoln was inaugurated, South Carolina, See also:Georgia, See also:Alabama, Florida, Mississippi, See also:Louisiana and See also:Texas had formally withdrawn from the Union. A provisional government under the designation " The Confederate States of America," with Jefferson Davis as president, was organized by the seceding states, which seized by force nearly all the forts, arsenals and public buildings within their limits. Great division of sentiment existed in the North, whether in this emergency acquiescence or See also:coercion was the preferable policy. Lincoln's inaugural address declared the Union perpetual and acts of See also:secession void, and announced the determination of the government to defend its authority, and to hold forts and places yet in its See also:possession. He disclaimed any intention to invade, subjugate or oppress ' Without Lincoln's knowledge or consent, the managers of his candidacy before the convention bargained for Cameron's votes by promising to Cameron a place in Lincoln's See also:cabinet, should Lincoln :,e elected. Cameron became Lincoln's first secretary of war.the seceding states. " You can have no conflict," he said, " without being yourselves the aggressors." Fort Sumter, in Charleston See also:harbour, had been besieged by the secessionists since January; and, it being now on the point of surrender through See also:starvation, Lincoln sent the besiegers See also:official See also:notice on the 8th of April that a See also:fleet was on its way to carry provisions to the fort, but that he would not attempt to reinforce it unless this effort were resisted. The Confederates, however, immediately ordered its reduction, and after a See also:thirty-four hours' See also:bombardment the garrison capitulated on the 13th of April 186r. (For the military history of the war, see AMERICAN See also:CIVIL WAR.) With civil war thus provoked, Lincoln, on the 15th of April, by See also:proclamation called 95,000 three months' See also:militia under arms, and on the 4th of May ordered the further enlistment of 64,748 soldiers and 18,000 See also:seamen for three years' service. He instituted by proclamation of the loth of April a See also:blockade of the Southern ports, took effective steps to extemporize a See also:navy, convened Congress in See also:special session (on the 4th of July), and asked for legislation and authority to make the war " short, See also:sharp and decisive." The country responded with enthusiasm to his See also:summons and suggestions; and the South on its side was not less active. The slavery question presented vexatious difficulties in conducting the war. Congress in August 1861 passed an act (approved August 6th) confiscating rights of slave-owners to slaves employed in hostile service against the Union. On the 3oth of August General Fremont by military See also:order declared See also:martial law and See also:confiscation against active enemies, with freedom to their slaves, in the State of Missouri. Believing that under existing conditions such a step was both detrimental in present policy and unauthorized in law, President Lincoln directed him (2nd September) to modify the order to make it conform to the Confiscation Act of Congress, and on the 11th of September annulled the parts of the order which conflicted with this act. Strong political factions were instantly formed for and against military emancipation, and the government was hotly beset by antagonistic counsel. The Unionists of the border slave states were greatly alarmed, but Lincoln by his moderate conservatism held them to the military support of the government.2 Meanwhile he sagaciously prepared the way for the supreme act of statesmanship which the gathering national crisis already dimly foreshadowed. On the 6th of March 1862, he sent a special See also:message to Congress recommending the passage of a resolution offering pecuniary aid from the general government to induce states to adopt See also:gradual abolishment of slavery. Promptly passed by Congress, the resolution produced no immediate result except in its influence on public See also:opinion. A practical step, however, soon followed. In April Congress passed and the president approved (6th April) an act emancipating the slaves in the District of Columbia, with See also:compensation to owners—a measure which Lincoln had proposed when in Congress. Meanwhile slaves of loyal masters were constantly escaping to military camps. Some commanders excluded them altogether; others surrendered them on demand; while still others sheltered and protected them against their owners. Lincoln tolerated this See also:latitude as falling properly within the military discretion pertaining to local See also:army operations. A new case, however, soon demanded his official interference. On the 9th of May 1862 General David See also:Hunter, commanding in the limited areas gained along the southern See also:coast, issued a short order declaring his See also:department under martial law, and adding—" Slavery and martial law in a free country are altogether incompatible. The persons in these three States—Georgia, Florida and South Carolina—heretofore
2In November 1861 the president drafted a bill providing (I) that all slaves more than thirty-five years old in the state of Delaware should immediately become free; (2) that all children of slave parentage born after the passage of the act should be free; (3) that all others should be free on attaining the age of thirty-five or after the 1st of January 1893, except for terms of apprenticeship; and (4) that the national government should pay to the state of Delaware $23,200 a year for twenty-one years. But this bill, which Lincoln had hoped would introduce a system of " compensated emancipation," was not approved by the legislature of Delaware, which considered it in February 1862.
held as slaves are, therefore, declared for ever free." As soon as this order, by the slow method of communication by See also:sea, reached the See also:newspapers, Lincoln (May 19) published a proclamation declaring it void; adding further, " Whether it be competent for me as See also:commander-in-See also:chief of the army and navy to declare the slaves of any state or states free, and whether at any time or in any case it shall have become a necessity indispensable to the See also:maintenance of the government to exercise such supposed power, are questions which under my responsibility I reserve to myself, and which I cannot feel justified in leaving to the decision of commanders in the See also: During the See also:month of July his own mind reached the virtual determination to give slavery its coup de grdce; on the 17th he approved a new Confiscation Act, much broader than that of the 6th of August 186r (which freed only those slaves in military service against the Union) and giving to the president power to employ persons of See also:African descent for the suppression of the See also:rebellion; and on the 22nd he submitted to his cabinet the draft of an emancipation proclamation substantially as afterward issued. Serious military reverses See also:con-strained him for the present to withhold it, while on the other hand they served to increase the pressure upon him from anti-slavery men. See also:Horace See also:Greeley having addressed a public See also:letter to him complaining of " the policy you seem to be pursuing with regard to the slaves of the rebels," the president replied on the 22nd of August, saying, " My See also:paramount object is to See also:save the Union, and not either to save or destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it; if I could save it by freeing all the slaves, I would do it; and, if I could do it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do that." Thus still holding back violent reformers with one hand, and leading up halting conservatives with the other, he on the 13th of September replied among other things to an address from a delegation: " I do not want to issue a document that the whole See also:world will see must necessarily be inoperative like the See also:pope's See also:bull against the See also:comet. . . . I view this matter as a practical war measure, to be decided on according to the advantages or disadvantages it may offer to the suppression of the rebellion... . I have not decided against a proclamation of See also:liberty to the slaves, but hold the matter under advisement."
The year 1862 had opened with important Union victories. See also:Admiral A.H. See also:Foote captured Fort Henry on the 6th of February, and Gen. U. S. See also: Gen. A. E. See also:Burnside took possession of See also:Roanoke island on the North Carolina coast (7th February). The famous contest between the new ironclads " See also:Monitor " and " See also:Merrimac " (7th April), though indecisive, effectually stopped the career of the Confederate See also:vessel, which was later destroyed by the Confederates themselves. (See See also:HAMPTON ROADS.) See also:Farragut, with a wooden fleet, ran past the twin forts St See also: The systematic enlistment of negroes and their See also:incorporation into the army by regiments, hitherto only tried as exceptional experiments, were now pushed with vigour, and, being followed by several conspicuous instances of their gallantry on the battlefield, added another strong impulse to the sweeping See also:change of popular sentiment. To put the finality of emancipation beyond all question, Lincoln in the See also:winter session of 1863–1864 strongly supported a movement in Congress to abolish slavery by constitutional amendment, but the necessary two-thirds vote of the House of Representatives could not then be obtained. In his See also:annual message of the 6th of December 1864, he urged the immediate passage of the measure. Congress now acted promptly: on the 31st of January 1865, that body by joint resolution proposed to the states the 13th amendment of the Federal Constitution, providing that " neither slavery nor involuntary See also:servitude, except as a See also:punishment for See also:crime, whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States or any place subject to their jurisdiction." Before the end of that year twenty-seven out of the thirty-six states of the Union (being the required three-fourths) had ratified the
' It is to be noted that slavery in the border slave states was not affected by the proclamation. The parts of Virginia and Louisiana not affected were those then considered to be under Federal jurisdiction; in Virginia 55 counties were excepted (including the 48 which became the See also:separate state of West Virginia), and in Louisiana 13 parishes (including the See also:parish of Orleans). As the Federal Government did not, at the time, actually have jurisdiction over the rest of the territory of the Confederate States, that really affected, some writers have questioned whether the proclamation really emancipated any slaves when it was issued. The proclamation had the most important political effect in the North of rallying more than ever to the support of the administration the large anti-slavery See also:element. The See also:adoption of the 13th amendment to the Federal Constitution in 1865 rendered unnecessary any decision of the U.S. Supreme Court upon the validity of the proclamation.
amendment, and official proclamation made by President See also: Public opinion in America almost unanimously sustained the act; but Lincoln, convinced that the rights of Great See also:Britain as a neutral had been violated, promptly, upon the demand of England, ordered the liberation of the prisoners (26th of December). Later friendly relations between the United States and Great Britain, where, among the upper classes, there was a strong sentiment in favour of the Confederacy, were seriously threatened by the fitting out of Confederate privateers in British ports, and the Administration owed much to the skilful See also:diplomacy of the American See also:minister in See also:London, Charles See also:Francis See also: In the east Lee had the second time marched his army into Pennsylvania to suffer a disastrous defeat at See also:Gettysburg, on the 1st, 2nd and 3rd of July, though he was able to withdraw his shattered forces south of the See also:Potomac. At the See also:dedication of this battlefield as a soldiers' See also:cemetery in November, President Lincoln made the following oration, which has taken permanent place as a classic in American literature: " Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this See also:continent a new nation conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war testing whether that nation, or any nation so concecved and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting-place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here have consecrated it far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living rather to be dedicated here to the unfinished See also:work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honoured dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these ABRAHAM dead shall not have died in vain, that this nation under See also:God shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the See also:earth." In the unexpected prolongation of the war, volunteer enlistments became too slow to replenish the See also:waste of armies, and in 1863 the government was forced to resort to a draft. The enforcement of the See also:conscription created much opposition in various parts of the country, and led to a serious See also:riot in the city of New York on the 13th–16th of July. President Lincoln executed the draft with all possible justice and forbearance, but refused every importunity to postpone it. It was made a special subject of See also:criticism by the Democratic party of the North, which was now organizing itself on the basis of a discontinuance of the war, to endeavour to win the presidential election of the following year. See also:Clement L. See also:Vallandigham of Ohio, having made a violent public speech at Mt. See also:Vernon, Oho, on the 1st of May against the war and military proceedings, vas arrested on the 5th of May by General Burnside, tried by military See also:commission, and sentenced on the 16th to imprisonment; a See also:writ of habeas corpus had been refused, and the See also:sentence was changed by the president to transportation beyond the military lines. By way of political See also:defiance the Democrats of Ohio nominated Vallandigham for governor on the 11th of June. Prominent Democrats and a See also:committee of the Convention having appealed for his See also:release, Lincoln wrote two long letters in reply discussing the constitutional question, and declaring that in his See also:judgment the president as commander-in-chief in time of rebellion or invasion holds the power and responsibility of suspending the See also:privilege of the writ of habeas corpus, but offering to release Vallandigham if the committee would sign a See also:declaration that rebellion exists, that an army and navy are constitutional means to suppress it, and that each of them would use his See also:personal power and influence to prosecute the war. This liberal offer and their refusal to accept it counteracted all the political capital they hoped to make out of the case; and public opinion was still more powerfully influenced in behalf of the president's See also:action, by the pathos of the query which he propounded in one of his letters: " Must I shoot the See also:simple-minded soldier boy who deserts, while I must not See also:touch a See also:hair of a wily agitator who induces him to See also:desert?" When the election took place in Ohio, Vallandigham was defeated by a majority of more than a See also:hundred thousand. Many unfounded rumours of a willingness on the part of the Confederate States to make peace were circulated to weaken the Union war spirit. To all such suggestions, up to the time of issuing his emancipation proclamation, Lincoln announced his readiness to stop fighting and grant See also:amnesty, whenever they would submit to and maintain the national authority under the Constitution of the United States. Certain agents in See also:Canada having in 1864 intimated that they were empowered to treat for peace, Lincoln; through Greeley, tendered them safe conduct to Washington. They were by this forced to confess that they possessed no authority to negotiate. The president thereupon sent them, and made public, the following See also:standing offer:
" To whom it may concern:
" Any proposition which embraces the restoration of peace, the integrity of the whole Union, and the See also:abandonment of slavery, and which comes by and with an authority that can control the armies now at war against the United States, will be received and considered by the Executive Government of the United States, and will be met by liberal terms on substantial and See also:collateral points, and the See also:bearer or bearers thereof shall have safe conduct both ways.
" July 18, 1864." " ABRAHAM LINCOLN."
A noteworthy See also:conference on this question took place near the close of the Civil War, when the strength of the Confederacy was almost exhausted. F. P. See also:Blair, senior, a personal friend of Jefferson Davis, acting solely on his own responsibility, was permitted to go from Washington to Richmond, where, on the 12th of January 1865, after a private and unofficial interview, Davis in writing declared his willingness to enter a conference " to secure peace to the two countries." See also:Report being duly made to President Lincoln, he wrote a note (dated 18th January) consenting to receive any See also:agent sent informally " with the view of securing peace to the people of our common country." Upon
the basis of this latter proposition three Confederate commissioners (A. H. See also:Stevens, J. A. C. See also: Hunter) finally came to Hampton Roads, where President Lincoln and Secretary Seward met them on the U.S. See also:steam transport " River See also:Queen," and on the 3rd of February 1865 an informal conference of four hours' duration was held. Private reports of the interview agree substantially in the statement that the Confederates proposed a cessation of the Civil War, and postponement of its issues for future See also:adjustment, while for the present the belligerents should unite in a campaign to expel the French from Mexico, and to enforce the See also:Monroe doctrine. President Lincoln, however, although he offered to use his influence to secure compensation by the Federal government to slave-owners for their slaves, if there should be " voluntary abolition of slavery by the states," a liberal and generous administration of the Confiscation Act, and the immediate See also:representation of the southern states in Congress, refused to consider any See also:alliance against the French in Mexico, and adhered to the instructions he had given Seward before deciding to personally accompany him. These formulated three indispensable conditions to adjustment: first, the restoration of the national authority throughout all the states; second, no receding by the executive of the United States on the slavery question; third, no cessation of hostilities short of an end of the war, and the disbanding of all forces hostile to the government. These terms the commissioners were not authorized to accept, and the interview ended without result. As Lincoln's first presidential term of four years neared its end, the Democratic party gathered itself for a supreme effort to regain the ascendancy lost in 186o. The slow progress of the war, the severe See also:sacrifice of life in campaign and battle, the enormous See also:accumulation of public debt, arbitrary arrests and suspension of habeas corpus, the rigour of the draft, and the proclamation of military emancipation furnished ample subjects of See also:bitter and vindictive campaign See also:oratory. A See also:partisan coterie which surrounded M'Clellan loudly charged the failure of his Richmond campaign to official interference in his plans. Vallandigham had returned to his home in defiance of his banishment beyond military lines, and was leniently suffered to remain. The aggressive spirit of the party, however, pushed it to a fatal extreme. The Democratic National Convention adopted (August 29, 1864) a resolution (drafted by Vallandigham) declaring the war a failure, and demanding a cessation of hostilities; it nominated M'Clellan for president, and instead of adjourning sine See also:die as usual, remained organized, and subject to be convened at any time and place by the executive national committee. This threatening attitude, in See also:conjunction with alarming indications of a conspiracy to resist the draft, had the effect to thoroughly consolidate the war party, which had on the 8th of June unanimously renominated Lincoln, and had nominated Andrew Johnson of Tennessee for the vice-presidency. At the election held on the 8th of November 1864, Lincoln received 2,216,076 of the popular votes, and M'Clellan (who had openly disapproved of the resolution declaring the war a failure) but 1,808,725; while of the presidential See also:electors 212 voted for Lincoln and 21 for M'Clellan. Lincoln's second term of office began on the 4th of March 1865. While this political contest was going on the Civil War was being brought to a decisive close. Grant, at the See also:head of the Army of the Potomac, followed Lee to Richmond and See also:Peters-See also:burg, and held him in See also:siege to within a few days of final surrender. General W. T. See also:Sherman', commanding the bulk of the Union forces in the Mississippi Valley, swept in a victorious march through the See also:heart of the Confederacy to See also:Savannah on the coast, and thence northward to North Carolina. Lee evacuated Richmond on the 2nd of April, and was overtaken by Grant and compelled to surrender his entire army on the 9th of April 1865. Sherman pushed Johnston to a surrender on the 26th of April. This ended the war. Lincoln being at the time on a visit to the army, entered Richmond the day after its surrender. Returning to Washington, he made his last public address on the evening of the 11th of April, devoted mainly to the question of reconstructing loyal govern-ments in the conquered states. On the evening of the 14th of April he attended See also:Ford's See also:theatre in Washington. While seated with his See also:family and friends absorbed in the See also:play, John Wilkes See also:Booth, an actor, who with others had prepared a See also:plot to See also:assassin-See also:ate the several heads of government, went into the little See also:corridor leading to the upper See also:stage-See also:box, and secured it against See also:ingress by a wooden bar. Then stealthily entering the box, he discharged a pistol at the head of the president from behind, the See also:ball penetrating the See also:brain. Brandishing a huge See also:knife, with which he wounded See also:Colonel Rathbone who attempted to hold him, the assassin rushed through the stage-box to the front and leaped down upon the stage, escaping behind the scenes and from the See also:rear of the See also:building, but was pursued, and twelve days afterwards shot in a See also:barn where he had concealed himself. The wounded president was See also:borne to a house across the See also:street, where he breathed his last at 7 A.M. on the 15th of April 1865. President Lincoln was of unusual stature, 6 ft. 4 in., and of spare but See also:muscular build; he had been in youth remarkably strong and skilful in the athletic See also:games of the frontier, where, however, his popularity and recognized impartiality oftener made him an See also:umpire than a champion. He had See also:regular and prepossessing features, dark complexion, broad high forehead, prominent cheek bones, See also:grey deep-set eyes, and bushy black hair, turning to grey at the time of his death. Abstemious in his habits, he possessed great See also:physical endurance. He was almost as See also:tender-hearted as a woman. "I have not willingly planted a See also:thorn in any man's bosom," he was able to say. His See also:patience was inexhaustible. He had naturally a most cheerful and sunny See also:temper, was highly social and sympathetic, loved pleasant conversation, wit, See also:anecdote and See also:laughter. Beneath this, however, ran an undercurrent of sadness; he was occasionally subject to hours of deep silence and See also:introspection that approached a See also:condition of See also:trance. In manner he was simple, See also:direct, void of the least affectation, and entirely free from awkwardness, oddity or eccentricity. His See also:mental qualities were—a See also:quick See also:analytic See also:perception, strong logical See also:powers, a tenacious memory, a liberal estimate and tolerance of the opinions of others, ready See also:intuition of human nature; and perhaps his most valuable See also:faculty was rare ability to divest himself of all feeling or See also:passion in weighing motives of persons or problems of state. His speech and diction were See also:plain, terse, forcible. See also:Relating anecdotes with appreciative See also:humour and fascinating dramatic skill, he used them freely and effectively in conversation and argument. He loved manliness, truth and justice. He despised all trickery and selfish greed. In arguments at the bar he was so See also:fair to his opponent that he frequently appeared to concede away his client's case. He was ever ready to take blame on himself and bestow praise on others. " I claim not to have controlled events," he said, " but confess plainly that events have controlled me." The Declaration of See also:Independence was his political See also:chart and See also:inspiration. He acknowledged a universal equality of human rights. " Certainly the negro is not our equal in See also:colour," he said, " perhaps not in many other respects; still, in the right to put into his mouth the bread that his own hands have earned, he is the equal of every other man white or black." He had unchanging faith in self-government. " The people," he said, " are the rightful masters of both congresses and courts, not to overthrow the constitution, but to overthrow the men who pervert the constitution." Yielding and accommodating in non-essentials, he was inflexibly firm in a principle or position deliberately taken. " Let us have faith that right makes might," he said, " and in that faith let us to the end dare to do our duty as we understand it." The emancipation proclamation once issued, he reiterated his purpose never to retract or modify it. " There have been men See also:base enough," he said, " to propose to me to return to slavery our black warriors of Port Hudson and See also:Olustee, and thus win the respect of the masters they fought. Should I do so I should deserve to be damned in time and eternity. Come what will, I will keep my faith with friend and foe." Benevolence and forgiveness were the very basis of his character; his world-wide humanity is aptly embodied in a phrase of his second inaugural: ".With malice toward none, with charity for all." His nature was deeply religious, but he belonged to no See also:denomination.
Lincoln married in Springfield on the 4th of November 1842, See also:Mary Todd (1818-1882), also a native of Kentucky, who See also:bore him four sons, of whom the only one to grow up was the eldest, Robert Todd Lincoln (b. 1843), who graduated at Harvard in 1864, served as a captain on the See also:staff of General Grant in 1865, was admitted to the Illinois bar in 1867, was secretary of war in the cabinets of Presidents See also:Garfield and See also:Arthur in 1881-1885, and United States Minister to Great Britain in 1889-1893, and was prominently connected with many large corporations, becoming in 1897 president of the See also:Pullman Co.
Of the many statues of President Lincoln in American cities, the best known is that, in Chicago, by St Gaudens. Among the
others are two by Thomas Ball, one in statuary See also: A. See also: See also:Morse, Jr., Abraham Lincoln (2 vols., Boston, 1896), in the " American Statesmen " series, an excellent brief See also:biography, dealing chiefly with Lincoln's political career; See also:Ida M. See also:Tarbell, The Early Life of Lincoln (New York, 1896) and Life of Abraham Lincoln (2 vols., New York, 1900), containing new material to which too great prominence and See also:credence is some-times given; Carl See also:Schurz, Abraham Lincoln: An See also:Essay (Boston, 1891), a remarkably able estimate; Ward H. Lamon, The Life of Abraham Lincoln from his Birth to his Inauguration as President (Boston, 1872), supplemented by Recollections of Abraham Lincoln 1847–1865 (Chicago, 1895), compiled by Dorothy Lamon, valuable for some personal recollections, but tactless, uncritical, and marred by the effort of the writer, who as See also:marshal of the District of Columbia, knew Lincoln intimately, to prove that Lincoln's See also:melancholy was due to his lack of religious belief of the orthodox sort; William H. Herndon and See also:Jesse W. Weik, Abraham Lincoln, the True Story of a Great Life (3 vols., Chicago, 1889; revised, 2 vols., New York, 1892), an intimate and ill-proportioned biography by Lincoln's law partner who exaggerates the importance of the See also:petty incidents of his youth and See also:young manhood; See also:Isaac N. See also:Arnold, History of Abraham Lincoln and the Overthrow of Slavery (Chicago, 1867), revised and enlarged as Life of Abraham Lincoln (Chicago, 1885), valuable for personal reminiscences; See also:Gideon See also:Welles, Lincoln and Seward (New York, 1874), the reply of Lincoln's secretary of the navy to Charles Francis Adams's eulogy (delivered in See also:Albany in April 1873) on Lincoln's secretary of state, W. H. Seward, in which Adams claimed that Seward was the premier of Lincoln's administration; F. B. Carpenter, Six Months in the White House (New York, 1866), an excellent account of Lincoln's daily life while president; Robert T. See also: See also:Eaton and E. O. See also:Mason, Grant, Lincoln, and the Freedmen (New York, 1907) ; R. W. See also:Gilder, Lincoln, the See also:Leader, and Lincoln's See also:Genius for Expression (New York, 1909); M. L. Learned, Abraham Lincoln: An American See also:Migration (See also:Philadelphia, 1909), a careful study of the Lincoln family in America; W. P. Pickett, The Negro Problem: Abraham Lincoln's See also:Solution (New York, 1909) ; James H. See also:Lea and J. R. See also:Hutchinson, The Ancestry of Abraham Lincoln (Boston, 1909), a careful genealogical monograph; and C. H. McCarthy, Lincoln's Plan of Reconstruction (New York, 1901). For an excellent account of Lincoln as president see J. F. See also:Rhodes, history of the United States from the Compromise of 185o (7 vols., 1893-1906). (J. G. N.; C. C. Additional information and CommentsThere are no comments yet for this article.
» Add information or comments to this article.
Please link directly to this article:
Highlight the code below, right click, and select "copy." Then paste it into your website, email, or other HTML. Site content, images, and layout Copyright © 2006 - Net Industries, worldwide. |
|
|
[back] LINCOLN JUDGMENT, FILE |
[next] LINCOLN, EARLS OF |