(Brief Biography)


Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President. (The U.S. has now had nearly 50 presidents.) He is probably best known for being President during the U.S. Civil War and having signed the Emancipation Proclamation that declared forever free those slaves within the Confederacy (southern slave states) in 1863.


Lincoln was not born into a wealthy family. He grew up in Kentucky and had limited access to higher education. He did not have the money to attend law school. He taught himself the law by reading William Blackstone's Commentaries on the Laws of England. In his youth, he worked on a farm, in a store, and served as a lawyer in a law firm partnership with another lawyer. Sometimes, as the Circuit Court (a court with a judge that travels among small towns) traveled through various counties, to make a living as a lawyer, Lincoln, on horseback, would travel with the court as well, representing clients in need of a lawyer.

At the age of 33, he married Mary Todd, who was a high-spirited woman from a well-known family in Kentucky. They had 4 sons, though only one lived into adulthood.


Lincoln served in the Illinois state government. Later, while serving in the U.S. House of Representatives, he spoke out against the Mexican-American War. He ran for Senator in Illinois, and following many spirited debates attended by hundreds of people, lost to Steven Douglas. But as a result of his performance, he gained a reputation as an excellent speaker and thinker, that later helped him win the Presidency.

As President, he swore in his Inaugural Address to uphold his oath to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States. Traditionally, the person being sworn in as President places their hand on a bible as they recite this same oath. (When Barack Obama was sworn in as President, he placed his hand on a bible owned by President Lincoln some 150 years before.)


Abraham Lincoln wanted the American people to know how important the Civil War was to history, and to the future of the United States. To fight the Civil War, he distributed $2,000,000 (two million) from the U.S. Treasury for war weapons, supplies, and food for soldiers, without an appropriation (permission) from Congress. He called for 75,000 volunteers into military service without a declaration of war.


Lincoln suspended the 'writ of habeas corpus' (due process for a suspect). This called for the arrest and imprisonment of suspected Southern Sympathizers without a warrant. Lincoln faced antagonism (anger and disagreement) from the opposition, his own staff, Army Generals, and the majority of the American People over the way he handled the war.

Abraham Lincoln wanted the American people to know how important the Civil War was to history, and to the future of the United States. To fight the Civil War, he distributed $2,000,000 (two million) from the U.S. Treasury for war weapons, supplies, and food for soldiers, without an appropriation (permission) from Congress. He called for 75,000 volunteers into military service without a declaration of war.


Lincoln suspended the 'writ of habeas corpus' (due process for a suspect). This called for the arrest and imprisonment of suspected Southern Sympathizers without a warrant. Lincoln faced antagonism (anger and disagreement) from the opposition, his own staff, Army Generals, and the majority of the American People over the way he handled the war.


He was a very active Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces in the Civil War. He often slept in the telegraph room of the White House at night to send and receive messages (transmitted in Morse code) from generals in the battlefields. He also made appearances with his generals and soldiers in the places where they fought. There are a few grainy black and white Civil War photographs of Lincoln outside of the White House. (Primitive, heavy cameras on wooden tripods had only recently been invented.) There are also a limited number of photos of Union and Confederate war dead lying on fields after a battle. Lincoln studied military strategies, and was aware of which of his Union Generals fought aggressively, and which ones were more tentative (cautious) in seeking combat with Confederate troops.

His Gettysburg Address is considered to be one of the most important speeches ever made. The speech was given at a ceremony to establish a cemetery to honor soldiers who died in the Civil War. In his very short speech he said that,

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“We here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain - that this nation, under 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 earth.”
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Lincoln won re-election in 1864, planning for the return of the Confederate (Southern) States to the Union. In his Second Inaugural Address, he stated his spirit of reconciliation (forgiveness and getting along) towards the Confederate (Southern states) that had seceded (left, or separated themselves). The famous words are now inscribed on one wall of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C.:

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“With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation’s wounds…. ”
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President Lincoln was assassinated by gunshot while attending a play at Ford's Theatre near the White House. The assassin was a man named John Wilkes Booth, who was an actor, and a Confederate Sympathizer. Upon Lincoln's death, which was announced via telegraph to newspapers around the country, people as far away as California mourned for days. Lincoln's Vice President, Andrew Johnson, then became President.


Abraham Lincoln is considered to be one of America’s greatest heroes. He appears on the U.S. five dollar bill. His likeness also appears on Mount Rushmore, in South Dakota.

Sources:
https://www.whitehouse.gov/about-the-white-house/presidents/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
https://www.whitehousehistory.org/slavery-in-the-presidents-neighborhood-faq
https://www.biography.com/us-president
https://www.history.com/topics/us-presidents

-Compiled by Henry Anker-