Abraham Lincoln
During the American Civil War, Abraham Lincoln served as the 16th President of the United States, from 1861 to 1865. During his tenure, he kept the Union together during the American Civil War and helped to free enslaved people in the United States.
PERSONAL LIFE• Thomas Lincoln and Nancy Hanks Lincoln gave birth to Abraham Lincoln on February 12, 1809, near Hodgenville, Kentucky.
• He grew up in a poor Kentucky and Indiana family. Abraham Lincoln had a younger brother, Thomas, who died in infancy, and a sister, Sarah.
• When Abraham was nine years old, his mother died on October 5, 1818, from tremetol, or milk sickness.
• Abraham's father married Sarah Bush Johnston, a widow with three children, less than a year after his mother died.
• In 1817, Abraham Lincoln and his family relocated from Kentucky to Perry County, Indiana, due to land disputes.
• He went to school for a year and then continued to study on his own to improve his knowledge.
• His family moved to Macon County, Illinois, in March 1830.
• He worked as a postmaster, surveyor, and shopkeeper, among other things.
• When the Black Hawk War broke out in 1832, he volunteered and was elected captain of his company.
• After being defeated in his first attempt at becoming a legislator, he was re-elected to the state assembly.
• He began studying law books after studying grammar and mathematics.
• He passed the bar exam and became a lawyer in 1836, and he began practising in 1837.
• Abraham Lincoln married Mary Todd in 1842, and they had four sons.
• When John Wilkes Booth shot and killed Abraham Lincoln in his box at Ford's Theater in Washington on April 14, 1865, he became the first person to assassinate an American president.
• As a pro-slavery supporter, Booth believed Lincoln was hell-bent on overturning the Constitution and destroying his beloved South.
POLITICAL VIEWS
• When it came to foreign and military policy, Lincoln opposed the Mexican–American War, which he blamed on President James K. Polk's desire for "military glory."
• He backed the Wilmot Proviso, a failed proposal to abolish slavery in any territory taken from Mexico by the United States.
• By drafting and introducing his Spot Resolutions, Lincoln emphasised his opposition to Polk. Mexican soldiers had "invaded our territory and shed the blood of our fellow-citizens on our soil," according to Polk, who claimed that Mexican soldiers had "invaded our territory and shed the blood of our fellow-citizens on our soil."
• Lincoln demanded that Polk show Congress the exact location of the bloodshed and prove that it occurred on American soil. The resolution was ignored by Congress and the national press, and Lincoln's political support in his district suffered as a result.
• Later, he left politics due to a lack of opportunities and returned to his law practise.
PRAIRIE LAWYER
• In his Springfield law firm, Lincoln handled every type of business that a prairie lawyer could encounter.
• Twice a year, he appeared in county seats in the midstate county courts for ten weeks in a row; this lasted 16 years.
• During the nation's western expansion, Lincoln dealt with transportation issues, particularly river barge conflicts under the many new railroad bridges.
• In a landmark case involving a canal boat that sank after hitting a bridge, he later represented a bridge company against a riverboat company.
• In 1849, he was granted a patent for a flotation device that allowed boats to move in shallow water. Although the idea was never commercialised, Lincoln became the first president to hold a patent.
• Lincoln appeared in 175 cases before the Illinois Supreme Court; he was sole counsel in 51 of them, and 31 of them were decided in his favour.
• The Illinois Central Railroad was one of his most important clients from 1853 to 1860.
• His reputation as a lawyer earned him the moniker Honest Abe.
• In an 1858 criminal trial, Lincoln argued in favour of William "Duff" Armstrong, who was charged with the murder of James Preston Metzker. In this case, he questioned the credibility of an eyewitness.
• After an opposing witness testified that the crime was committed in the moonlight, Lincoln produced a Farmers' Almanac that showed the moon was at a low angle, reducing visibility dramatically. Armstrong was found not guilty.
• In the run-up to his presidential campaign, Lincoln raised his profile by defending Simeon Quinn Peachy Harrison in an 1859 murder case, which he also won.
POLITICAL LIFE
• Abraham Lincoln served in the Illinois state legislature from 1834 to 1840.
• He also practised law in Illinois in the 1830s and 1840s, becoming one of the state's most renowned lawyers during that time.
• He first entered national politics in 1847, when he was elected to Congress for a single term. In 1858, he ran for the Senate in a highly publicised race, which he eventually lost but which elevated him to a national political figure.
• Abraham Lincoln was the founder of the Republican Party and a political moderate.
• He argued that slavery should be limited to the states where it existed, and in 1854 he described slavery as a problem that needed to be resolved.
• Although he lost a senatorial election in 1858, he gained national recognition as a powerful political force.
• In 1860, he was nominated as the Republican Party's presidential candidate at the Republican National Convention, and he ran a successful presidential campaign.
PRESIDENCY
• Southerners reacted angrily to President Abraham Lincoln's election. They believed the country had elected an abolitionist to the presidency. The South considered secession to be the only viable option.
• The South believed it had the right to secede from the Union. The people have the right to change or abolish a government that denies its citizens' rights, according to the Declaration of Independence. They believed Lincoln would take away their right to own slaves.
• South Carolina seceded from the Union in 1860.
• Alabama, Florida, Texas, Georgia, Louisiana, and Mississippi had seceded by February 1861.
• Abraham Lincoln was instrumental in keeping the United States of America united.
• He would not allow southern states to secede from the Union.
• The abolition of slavery was his greatest contribution to humanity.
• Citizenship and equal rights were granted to citizens of all states in the United States following the civil war.
• Abraham Lincoln is credited with coining the phrase "government of the people, by the people, and for the people."
AMERICAN CIVIL WAR• On February 9, 1861, seven southern states declared secession from the Union and established the Confederate States of America, a Southern government.
• The Confederate States of America drafted their own constitution. Its President was Jefferson Davis.
• In April 1861, the Confederates attacked a US fortress (Fort Sumter) in South Carolina, igniting the Civil War.
• The Confederacy gained four more states, bringing the total number of states to eleven.
• In September 1862, Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, freeing millions of slaves.
• Nearly 50,000 soldiers were killed in the Battle of Gettysburg.
• Abraham Lincoln delivered the famous Gettysburg Address, in which he charged the nation with preserving the Union and democracy. His vision was for a government that was run by, for, and for the people.
• The war ended in 1865, when all Confederate armies surrendered and the Confederate government fell apart. General Ulysses S Grant accepted General Lee's surrender of his Confederate army.
JUNETEENTH
• Juneteenth is a portmanteau of June and nineteenth, and while it is not a federal holiday, it is celebrated as a state holiday in over 45 states across the United States.
• June 19 is the oldest nationally recognised commemoration of the abolition of slavery in the United States. Juneteenth Independence Day is another name for Emancipation Day.
• On January 1, 1863, then-President Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, declaring that "all persons held as slaves" within the rebellious states "are, and henceforth shall be free."
• Even so, according to the Congressional Research Service, many slave owners continued to hold their slaves captive over 2.5 years after Lincoln's proclamation by concealing this information from them and keeping them as slaves for one more harvest season (CRS).