Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) was an American statesman and sixteenth President of the United States from 1861 to 1865 . The election to the presidency of this Republican and militant anti-slavery deputy caused the secession of the Southern States, which created the Confederate States of America in February 1861. This is the beginning of the Civil War, which opposes until 1865 the northerners and the southerners. Without waiting for the end of the conflict, Abraham Lincoln began the process of emancipation of slaves and on January 31, 1865, an anti-slavery amendment was incorporated into the American Constitution. Re-elected president, Abraham Lincoln was assassinated on April 14, 1865 by a southern opponent.
First political engagements of Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln was born on February 12, 1809 in Kentucky. He came from a modest family of farmers, very religious, who emigrated to Indiana in 1816, in particular to escape the competition represented by farms using slaves (Kentucky authorized slavery, whereas Indiana prohibits it). The Lincolns would move again in 1830, this time to settle further west in Illinois.
An avid and largely self-taught reader, he became a lawyer and then entered politics very early, standing for election in 1832 to enter the state assembly of Illinois. He does not succeed, but his talents as a speaker are already asserting themselves. The same year, he served in the militia during the war fought against the Indian chief Black Hawk, but did not have the opportunity to participate directly in the fighting.
He tried his luck again in the 1834 elections, this time managing to be elected; he will be renewed three more times, serving until 1842. During this period, he asserts his political affiliation:the Whig party, the main force of opposition to the Democratic party at the national level. It was almost quite naturally, given his family background and his religious convictions, that he declared himself opposed to slavery in 1837. However, anxious to spare his electorate, it is always with great oratorical precautions that he expresses his opinion on an already "delicate" subject.
It was still self-taught that he became a lawyer in 1837, building in a few years the reputation of being one of the best in his state. He drew enough attention to himself to start a national political career:in 1846, he was elected to the House of Representatives. However, his two-year term will not be renewed, mainly because of his opposition to the war against Mexico (1846-48).
Lincoln and the fight against slavery
At the end of his term as representative, Abraham Lincoln was offered the post of governor of Oregon, which he preferred to decline to devote himself to his cabinet of lawyer. He returned to politics in 1854, after the passing of the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Considered by many to be an unacceptable concession to the institution of slavery, this act would spark the creation of the Republican Party, which Lincoln would join the following year.
It was during the senatorial election of 1858 that he asserted himself as one of its main leaders. During the campaign, he confronted the Democrat Stephen Douglas, the author of the Kansas-Nebraska law and cantor of the doctrine of "popular sovereignty", the principle that the inhabitants of a future State of the Union choose their own whether or not they will accept slavery on their soil. Lincoln, for his part, will develop a moderate but firm rhetoric, focused on stopping the spread of slavery rather than its outright abolition.
He will be narrowly beaten, but his speech appeals to undecided voters in the North and contributes to the rise of the Republican Party. The latter, after the failure of John Frémont and his radical program in the presidential elections of 1856, chose to opt for a more moderate line, and nominated Lincoln as presidential candidate for the elections of 1860.
During the campaign, he repeats with his usual eloquence that he has no intention of abolishing slavery during his mandate, only to prohibit its extension . He thus wins the support of northern voters, all the more easily as the Democrats are divided against him. This is how he was elected President of the United States on November 6, 1860.
But the most vocal supporters of slavery interpret his election as a sign of the emancipation of slaves to come. They manage to rally around them the public opinion of the Southern States, and push it towards what they consider the only solution allowing slavery to be maintained, secession. South Carolina was the first state to separate from the Union on December 20, 1860.
As Lincoln prophesied in a famous 1858 speech, the nation is now divided. Four months of political negotiations will have no effect, and Lincoln's entry into the White House on March 4, 1861, will not change anything. The Southern states banded together to form their own nation, the Confederate States of America, and began to assert sovereignty over their territory.
The crisis around Fort Sumter, an installation in South Carolina occupied by Northern soldiers, would plunge the country into civil war after the bombardment of the fort by the Southerners (12 April 1861).
A president in the turmoil of the Civil War
The Lincoln presidency had to resign itself to leading the northern war effort to restore the integrity of the Union. Corruption and military defeats made the first months difficult, but the Union acquired a strategic advantage by securing control of the "border states" between North and South, and the President gradually knew how to surround himself with efficient and zealous administrators.
Despite this, the year 1862 was difficult and if General Grant won important victories in Western country, it was not the same on the east coast and Washington was even threatened, until the battle of Antietam (September 17, 1862).
This defensive victory for the Union armies, won on northern soil, was a decisive political milestone for Abraham Lincoln. It enabled him to show his fellow citizens that the North, far from being the aggressor in this conflict, should on the contrary defend itself vigorously to avoid having slavery imposed on it, and that it was its duty to destroy this institution.
Abolitionists had long called on Lincoln to free all slaves, and public opinion seemed to support the idea. Nevertheless, Lincoln moved slowly and very carefully. On March 13, 1862, the federal government prohibited all officers of the Union Army from returning fugitive slaves, effectively rendering the Fugitive Slave Laws null and void.
On April 10, on Lincoln's initiative, Congress declared that the federal government would compensate all slaveholders who voluntarily freed their slaves. All the slaves of the District of Columbia were freed in this way, as of April 16, 1862. On June 19 of that same year, Congress enacted a measure which prohibited slavery on the territory of the United States.
On September 22, 1862, the President issued an Emancipation Proclamation, declaring all slaves in the land free to from January 1, 1863. By transforming the war aims of the Union into a fight to the death against slavery, Lincoln united behind his administration a section of public opinion that had hitherto been wavering.
From 1863, the industrial and human mobilization of the North began to give it the advantage on the battlefield. Military successes, however, did not prevent weariness from setting in in the North, faced with the scale of the sacrifices to be made. In addition to conducting the war, Lincoln had to contest the presidential campaign of 1864.
In front of him, George McClellan promised peace to his fellow citizens, even if it meant negotiating with the Confederates. The president therefore urged his generals to get out of the stalemate and obtain decisive victories, which they did not without difficulty, and at the cost of many human lives.
The assassination of Abraham Lincoln
Finally re-elected on November 8, 1864, Lincoln only had to bring to an end a war that was coming to an end anyway, so successful were the Southern armies in end of their strength. In fact, Richmond, the Confederate capital, was taken on April 3, 1865. The time would soon be for reconstruction... But Abraham Lincoln, savior of the United States, could only glimpse the final victory, leaving his work unfinished. He was fatally shot in the head in his dressing room at the Ford Theater on April 14, 1865, by John Wilkes Booth, actor and Southern sympathizer. The President of the United States died the following morning, April 15, 1865.
He is still today a major figure in the collective memory of the United States, both for his enlightened opinions as much than inflexible on the abolition of slavery, than by his wartime government. He is undoubtedly the American president about whom the most has been written, on all aspects of his life, including the most private. A statue in memory of Abraham Lincoln is also on display in New York on Union Square and there is also a magnificent memorial in Washington, in West Potomac Park.
Bibliography
- Lincoln , biography of Stephen B Oates. Fayard, 1984.
- Abraham Lincoln:The Man Who Saved America by Bernard Vincent, The Archipelago, 2009.
To go further
- The biography of Abraham Lincoln on the White House website
- Lincoln, f ilm by Steven Spielberg with Daniel Day-Lewis. 20th Century Studios, 2012.