Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865), was President of the United States during the Civil War (1861-1865). He is best known for saving the Union and abolishing slavery, and is an icon of American values. With a profound sense of American history, unswerving commitment to republican ideals, and an almost Shakespearean command of the language, Lincoln articulated a vision of a new birth of freedom for the American nation. The destruction of the Confederacy, and of the slave power that menaced republican ideals, affirmed Lincoln's vision in the Gettysburg Address (1863) and guaranteed that "government of the people by the people for the people, shall not perish from the earth."

Frontier Life

Lincoln grew up in a hard-luck, hard-scrabble environment on the middle border. Unusually ambitious and hungry for knowledge, he seemed to his neighbors too tall, too ugly, too clumsy, too lazy, and too disrespectful of his father. But Lincoln told great stories and bawdy jokes and socialized well. His easy rapport with juries, buttressed by meticulous research and attention to detail, facilitated a successful legal career. He rode circuit half the year through central Illinois, then returned to his home in Springfield to handle all sorts of cases, even high-paying ones for the new railroad corporations.

Whig Politician

Lincoln tested his remarkable leadership skills with four brilliant terms as a Whig leader in the Illinois state legislature, and one as an unimportant backbencher in Congress, where he is best known for opposing the war with Mexico.

As an admirer of Henry Clay, Lincoln enthusiastically promoted economic modernization, including banks, internal improvements and tariffs. His political problem was that Whigs rarely carried the state of Illinois. Frustrated by the slow collapse of the Whig party, Lincoln withdrew from politics in the early 1850s.

Crises of 1850s

Returning to the fray in 1854, he played a major role in building a powerful new Republican party in the West. "No man is good enough to govern another man without that other's consent," he insisted. "I say this is the leading principle, the sheet-anchor of American republicanism." Slavery, he continued, was incompatible with the "consent of the governed" clause of the Declaration of Independence. Cultivating the growing German vote, he avoided nativism and the Know Nothings.

In 1855 the Republicans controlled the state legislature and Lincoln was in line for a seat in the U.S. Senate; however, he was outmaneuvered and forced to deliver the seat to Lyman Trumbull.

Challenging the reelection of Democratic Senator Stephen Douglas in 1858, Lincoln found himself in the national spotlight. He attacked Douglas (falsely) for being in league with southern slaveholders, and warned that Douglas efforts to compromise between freedom and slavery were doomed:

"A house divided against itself cannot stand....I believe this government cannot endure permanently 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 arrest the further spread of it, and place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is in the course of ultimate extinction; or its advocates will push it forward till it shall become alike lawful in all the States, old as well as new, North as well as South."

Lincoln's powerful rhetoric downplayed the Constitution and emphasize the Declaration as the expression of core American republican values. Intense study of history and the Constitution convinced Lincoln that the nation was founded on equal rights, which meant that slavery had to be stopped from expansion, and eventually replaced everywhere by free labor. The debates established his reputation as the most articulate and prominent party leader in the West, even though Douglas won reelection.

In 1860 the Republicans expected to win the presidency since they dominated more than enough northern states to control a majority of electoral votes; they needed no southern votes (and received almost none. The party sought the candidate who seemed most likely to carry the close states of Illinois and Indiana. Lincoln's reputation was "moderate"-- antislavery regarding the western territories, but not abolitionist or hostile toward the South--and proved acceptable to all factions of the party. Once nominated he gave no speeches. Instead of the fervent crusading campaign of 1856, the confident young party spent its energy in getting out its votes, using its large network of newspapers and the "Wide Awakes," a young man's marching society,

Four parties contested the presidency in 1860 because Americans had four radically different interpretations of the "republicanism" they were all committed to. Lincoln and the Republicans demanded equal rights and freedom for all men, arguing that federal sponsorship of slavery was incompatible with the Declaration of Independence that created the nation in the first place. Douglas and the northern Democrats fervently believed in democracy; the people were always right, and what they wanted--be it slavery or no--was always best. The Southern Democrats said the Constitution of 1787 had guaranteed rights protected by the states--meaning of course slave property. To the extent that Yankees were repudiating that compact, it was the Yankees who threatened the Union, and the Southerners who were defending their historic rights. The Constitutional Union party said equal rights, democracy and property were all secondary to American nationalism. No two parties could agree on any coalition. Even if Lincoln's three opponents had formed a coalition--a political impossibility--he would still have won the electoral college because of narrow majorities in nearly all the northern states. Eventually during the war Lincoln tried to synthesize all the viewpoints, guaranteeing a permanent union at the cost of slavery.

Civil War: 1861

To the seven cotton states, Lincoln's election signaled the a declaration of permanent Yankee hostility, and the inexorable destruction of states' rights. Calling upon the right of rebellion, they seceded one by one. By February, 1861, they had formed a new country, the Confederate States of America, and elected Jefferson Davis. The border states tried to remain neutral, elder statesmen met to fashion some sort of compromise, and the Buchanan administration stood paralyzed as the new Confederacy peacefully took over federal properties in its territory.

Aware that this was a crisis in mankind's history, Lincoln pledged never to surrender "that sentiment in the Declaration of Independence which gave liberty, not alone to the people of this country, but I hope to the world for all future time." Yet for the most part Lincoln stood silent, focusing his attention on the patronage compromises necessary to fashion the first Republican administration. Believing (falsely) that most southerners were unionists at heart, Lincoln refused to compromise or even negotiate with Confederate delegations. He resolved to keep the one bit of property still in Federal hands, Ft. Sumter. The Confederates, knowing they could never be recognized as a legitimate nation if some other country had a fort in its major harbor, insisted on surrender, and finally fired the first shot.

Lincoln consistently underestimated the scope and strength of the rebellion. After Ft. Sumter was attacked he asked the governors for only 75,000 soldiers for only 90 days--not appreciating that over twenty times more men would be needed, for nearly twenty times as long. In terms of military policy, Lincoln demanded that his generals march "On to Richmond," in the conviction that the capture of the rebel capital would delegitimize the very existence of a rival nation, and lead to the speedy downfall of the Confederacy. Richmond proved impossible to capture until the very end, when Lee's army had practically melted away and the Yankees had an overwhelming numerical advantage. As for slavery he needed support from the Unionist slaveowners early in the war, and therefore reversed a proclamation by General Fremont to free slaves in Missouri in August, 1861.

On the other hand, his naval blockade shut down all commercial shipping from all southern ports and played a major role in defeating "King Cotton" by strangling the southern economy. The Confederacy soon became a prison, with only fast, small blockade-running ships able to sneak in and out. Cooperation between the Army and Navy, under Lincoln's close supervision, soon led to landings at key points along the southern coast, and to the enormously important capture of New Orleans in April 1862.

Civil War: 1862-3

Lincoln's success as president stemmed from his single-minded devotion to the Union. His fixed policy was to never compromise with secession. Everything else was on the table, including civil liberties and slavery. He suspended habeas corpus, allowing his army to arrest 18,000 outspoken supporters of the rebellion and hold them in military prison without trial. There were some summary executions by federal forces, especially in Kentucky.

Throughout 1862 he worked up plans for unionist elections in the South, including stillborn schemes for compensated emancipation and deportation of the freed slaves out of the country. His preliminary proclamation in September, 1862, threatened emancipation of slaves in areas that did not start returning to the Union. The proclamation mollified radical elements in his party, but drove the majority of northern Democrats into opposition to the war. Recruiting became much more difficult, and the effort to impose a draft produced more resentment than soldiers.

He worked closely with his secretaries of War and Navy, for Lincoln felt his role as Commander in Chief of the military was paramount. He was keenly interested in the development of new rifles, guns and ships, and in recruitment and conscription. He selected all the generals, promoting or removing them according to a complex calculus of party politics, public opinion, and--most of all--victory on the battlefield. He ran through a series of inept or under- confident generals who kept failing to defeat Lee or capture Richmond. George McClellan was brilliant at training and organizing an army, but proved most reluctant to actually fight a battle. Frustrated, Lincoln demoted McClellan, but then had to reinstate him when the replacements failed.

The western theatre provided bigger victories and better generals. Lincoln brought Halleck east in 1862 to act as chief of staff, and Ulysses S. Grant in 1864 to assume overall command of all the armies. Grant shrewdly accepted all of Lincoln's suggestions regarding military strategy, and in turn Lincoln gave him complete political support. This proved especially critical in the hot summer of 1864, when agonizingly high casualty totals from Grant's relentless attrition campaign against Lee threatened Lincoln's reelection chances.

Lincoln put strong men in his cabinet and let them run their domains. He did monitor the distribution of major patronage appointments, but otherwise largely rubber-stamped Secretary of State William Seward's conduct of foreign affairs, and Treasury Secretary Salmon Chase's financial legerdemain. Meanwhile the Republican Congress was passing momentous legislation ranging from heavy new income taxes, excises, high tariffs and massive spending bills, to a national banking system, transcontinental railroads and land grants to education. The Republicans were enacting their program for rapid modernization of the economy; although Lincoln had little to do with this legislation, he approved it enthusiastically and repeatedly boasted of the economic growth and prosperity during his term.

Civil War: 1864-5

When Congress passed the harsh "Wade-Davis" plan for Reconstruction in 1864, Lincoln vetoed it. The plan would allow ex-Confederates no role in their states after the war. Lincoln wanted to reincorporate them into the Union; in his plan they only had to promise future loyalty to the Union. He planned to control reconstruction himself, following a policy of "charity to all, and malice to none," with the fastest possible return to full citizenship of the erring southern brethren. Lincoln took the lead in signing up black soldiers, in the knowledge that a record of fighting for the country was the surest test of republican citizenship. The Emancipation Proclamation was not legislation but merely a presidential proclamation that would expire at the end of the war; Lincoln worked hard to replace it with the permanent Thirteenth Amendment, which passed Congress by a handful of extra votes in February, 1865.

McPherson (2004) examines why it is "harder to end a war than to start one." As in the case of World War II, the Civil War did not end with a negotiated peace but with unconditional surrender by the losing armies. The issues over which the Civil War was fought - union versus disunion, freedom versus slavery - proved to be nonnegotiable. Nevertheless, during the war there were numerous efforts to achieve peace through negotiations. These efforts proceeded through three stages: foreign mediation, unofficial contacts, and quasi-official conversations. All failed. The author analyzes the aborted effort by Britain and France to mediate the conflict and end the war on the basis of Confederate independence in 1862, the unofficial contacts between Northern civilians and Confederate officials in 1864, and the Hampton Roads conference of February 1865, in which Lincoln and Secretary of State William H. Seward met with three Confederate officials, including Vice President Alexander Stephens. All of these efforts foundered on the irreconcilable positions of Lincoln and Confederate president Jefferson Davis. As Lincoln stated in his message to Congress in December 1864, the central issue of union or disunion "can only be tried by war, and decided by victory."

Bibliography

Biographies

• Beveridge, Albert J. Abraham Lincoln: 1809-1858 (1928). 2 vol. to 1858; notable for strong, unbiased political coverage online edition
• Carwardine, Richard. Lincoln: A Life of Purpose and Power (2003), prize winning
• Donald, David Herbert. Lincoln (1999) The most useful scholarly biography.
• Gienapp, William E. Abraham Lincoln and Civil War America: A Biography (2002), short bio by scholar, online edition
• Guelzo, Allen C. Abraham Lincoln: Redeemer President (1999) online edition
• Nicolay, John George and John Hay. Abraham Lincoln: a History (1890); online at Volume 1 and Volume 2 10 volumes in all; highly detailed narrative of era written by Lincoln's top aides
• Luthin, Reinhard H. The Real Abraham Lincoln (1960), emphasis on politics
• Neely, Mark E. The Abraham Lincoln Encyclopedia (1984), detailed articles on many men and movements associated with AL
• Neely, Mark E. The Last Best Hope of Earth: Abraham Lincoln and the Promise of America (1993), Pulitzer prize winning author
• Oates, Stephen B. With Malice Toward None: The Life of Abraham Lincoln (1994)
• Randall, James G. Lincoln the President (4 vol., 1945–55; reprint 2000.) by prize winning scholar
  • Mr. Lincoln excerpts ed. by Richard N. Current (1957) online edition
• Carl Sandburg Abraham Lincoln: The Prairie Years (2 vol 1926); The War Years (4 vol 1939). Pulitzer Prize winning biography by famous poet vol1 online vol 2 online
• Thomas, Benjamin P. Abraham Lincoln: A Biography (1952) online edition

Prewar

• Angle, Paul M., Here I Have Lived: A History of Lincoln's Springfield, 1821-1865, (1935) online edition
• Baker, Jean H. Mary Todd Lincoln: A Biography (1987) online edition
• Boritt, Gabor S. Lincoln and the Economics of the American Dream (1994). Lincoln's economic theory and policies
• Fehrenbacher, Don E. "The Origins and Purpose of Lincoln's "House-Divided" Speech," The Mississippi Valley Historical Review, Vol. 46, No. 4. (Mar., 1960), pp. 615-643. in JSTOR
• Foner, Eric. Free Soil, Free Labor, Free Men: The Ideology of the Republican Party before the Civil War (1970) intellectual history of different prewar faction's in AL's party
• Holzer, Harold. Lincoln at Cooper Union: The Speech That Made Abraham Lincoln President (2004).
• Jaffa, Harry V.,A New birth of Freedom: Abraham Lincoln and the Coming of the Civil War (2000) ISBN 0-8476-9952-8.
• Nevins, Allan. Ordeal of the Union 8-volume (1947-1971). 1. Fruits of Manifest Destiny, 1847-1852; 2. A House Dividing, 1852-1857; 3. Douglas, Buchanan, and Party Chaos, 1857-1859. most thorough coverage of the era, with Lincoln at center
• Schneider, Thomas E. Lincoln's Defense of Politics: The Public Man and His Opponents in the Crisis over Slavery. U. of Missouri Pr., 2006. 224 pp.
• Shenk, Joshua Wolf. Lincoln's Melancholy: How Depression Challenged a President and Fueled His Greatness (2005).

Lincoln Administration

• Ford, Lacy K., ed. A Companion to the Civil War and Reconstruction. Blackwell, 2005. 518 pp.
• Hendrick, Burton J. Lincoln's War Cabinet (1946) online edition
• Goodwin, Doris Kearns. Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln (2005)
• McPherson, James M. Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era (1988). Pulitzer Prize winner surveys all aspects of the war online edition
• Nevins, Allan. Ordeal of the Union 8-volume (1947-1971). vol 5. The Improvised War, 1861-1862; 6. War Becomes Revolution, 1862-1863; 7. The Organized War, 1863-1864; 8. The Organized War to Victory, 1864-1865; most thorough coverage of the era, with Lincoln at center
• Paludan, Philip S. The Presidency of Abraham Lincoln (1994), thorough treatment of Lincoln's administration
• Richardson, Heather Cox. The Greatest Nation of the Earth: Republican Economic Policies during the Civil War (1997)
• Williams, Kenneth P. Lincoln Finds a General: A Military Study of the Civil War (1959) 5 volumes on Lincoln's control of the war

Lincolnia

• Belz, Herman. Abraham Lincoln, Constitutionalism, and Equal Rights in the Civil War Era (1998)
• Boritt, Gabor S. ed. Lincoln the War President (1994)
• Briggs, John Channing. Lincoln's Speeches Reconsidered. Johns Hopkins U. Pr., 2005. 370 pp.
• Bruce, Robert V. Lincoln and the Tools of War (1956) on weapons development during the war online edition
• Donald, David Herbert. Lincoln Reconsidered: Essays on the Civil War Era (1960)
• Donald, David Herbert. We Are Lincoln Men: Abraham Lincoln and His Friends Simon & Schuster, (2003).
• Goodwin, Doris Kearns. "'My Whole Soul Is in It.'" Smithsonian 2006 36(10): 48+ Fulltext: at Ebsco, on the writing of the Emancipation Proclamation
• Harris, William C. With Charity for All: Lincoln and the Restoration of the Union (1997). AL's plans for Reconstruction
• Hofstadter, Richard. The American Political Tradition: And the Men Who Made It (1948) ch 5: "Abraham Lincoln and the Self-Made Myth."
• McPherson, James M. Abraham Lincoln and the Second American Revolution (1992)
• Neely, Mark E. The Fate of Liberty: Abraham Lincoln and Civil Liberties (1992). Pulitzer Prize winner. online version
• Geoffrey Perret. Lincoln's War: The Untold Story of America's Greatest President as Commander in Chief (2004). well-written but has many factual errors and questionable interpretations
• Polsky, Andrew J. "'Mr. Lincoln's Army' Revisited: Partisanship, Institutional Position, and Union Army Command, 1861–1865." Studies in American Political Development (2002), 16: 176-207
• Randall, James G. Lincoln the Liberal Statesman (1947).
• Schmitz, Neil. "Refiguring Lincoln: Speeches and Writings, 1832-1865," American Literary History, Vol. 6, No. 1. (Spring, 1994), pp. 103-118 in JSTOR
• Striner, Richard. Father Abraham: Lincoln's Relentless Struggle to End Slavery. Oxford U. Pr., 2006. 295 pp.
• Williams, T. Harry. Lincoln and His Generals (1967).
• Wills, Garry. Lincoln at Gettysburg: The Words That Remade America (1993)
• Wilson, Douglas L. Honor's Voice: The Transformation of Abraham Lincoln by (1999).

Historiography and Memory

• Boritt, Gabor S., ed. The Historian's Lincoln U. of Illinois Press, 1988, historiography
• Braeman, John. "Albert J. Beveridge and Demythologizing Lincoln." Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association 2004 25(2): 1-24. Issn: 0898-4212 Fulltext: online in History Cooperative. Albert J. Beveridge (1862-1927), former US senator from Indiana began work on a multivolume biography of Abraham Lincoln in 1922. His goal was to demolish the myths surrounding Lincoln and present the facts. Beveridge tended to sympathize with the South and admire Stephen A. Douglas, as well as rely on information collected by William H. Herndon. But, he did more intense research on Lincoln's pre-presidential career than any previous biographer. Beveridge died as he reached 1858.
• Cross, Roland R. "Edgar Lee Masters's Peculiar Biographies of Abraham Lincoln and Vachel Lindsay." Journal of Illinois History 2004 7(4): 281-296. Issn: 1522-0532. The poet Edgar Lee Masters in 1931 wrote the only hostile biography of Lincoln; he debunks the "myth of Honest Abe." In Masters's view, Lincoln's actions as president was a corruption of true American ideals. The theme has occasionally resurfaced among neoconfederates and extreme libertarians who tolerate slavery but not strong government.
• Fields, Kevin. "Historiographical Trends and Interpretations of President Abraham Lincoln's Reputation and the Morality on the Slavery Question: Part I and II." Lincoln Herald Lincoln Herald 2004 106(4): 150-167 and 2005 107(1): 11-30. Issn: 0024-3671; Part 1 siscusses William Herndon, John Nicolay, and John Hay.; Part 2 notes the civil rights movement prompted historians to reevaluate Lincoln's attitude toward race and emancipation. Many continued to portray him as the pragmatic, essentially conservative, "reluctant emancipator." However, by the 1980s a postrevisionist consensus had emerged, which emphasized the evolution of Lincoln's attitudes and asserted that freedom for black slaves, and not merely the preservation of the Union, became one of his key objectives.
• McPherson, James M. "No Peace Without Victory, 1861-1865." American Historical Review 2004 109(1): Xvi, 1-18. Issn: 0002-8762 Fulltext: in History Cooperative and Ebsco.
• Peterson, Merrill D. Lincoln in American Memory (1994). how Lincoln was remembered after 1865
• Schwartz, Barry and Schuman, Howard. "History, Commemoration, and Belief: Abraham Lincoln in American Memory, 1945-2001." American Sociological Review 2005 70(2): 183-203. Issn: 0003-1224 Fulltext: in Ingenta
• Trefousse, Hans L. "First among Equals?" Abraham Lincoln's Reputation during His Administration. 2005. 199 pp.

Primary sources

• Basler, Roy P. ed. Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, 9 vol Rutgers Univ. Press 1953–55
• Basler, Roy P. ed. Abraham Lincoln: His Speeches and Writings, (1946) online edition
• Lincoln, Abraham. Lincoln: Speeches and Writings 2 vol Library of America edition, 1989

Memoirs and interviews

• Chittenden, Lucius E., Recollections of President Lincoln and His Administration, (1891). – Google Books
• Holzer, Harold, ed. Dear Mr. Lincoln: Letters to the President. (1993). 380 pp.
• Nicolay, John G. ed. Oral History of Abraham Lincoln: John G. Nicolay's Interviews and Essays. Michael Burlingame, ed. (1996). 186 pp.

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