<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="30.8">Abraham LincolnOrder: 16th PresidentTerm of Office: March 4, 1861 - April 15, 1865Predecessor: James BuchananSuccessor: Andrew JohnsonDate of Birth: February 12, 1809Place of Birth: Hardin County, Kentucky (site now in LaRue County)First Lady: Mary Todd LincolnProfession: lawyerPolitical Party: Republican Vice President:Hannibal Hamlin (1861-1865)Andrew Johnson (1865)Abraham Lincoln (February 12, 1809 April 15, 1865) was the 16th (1861-1865) President of the United States, and the first President from the Republican Party.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="25.5">As an anti-slavery abolitionist Lincoln's election polarized the nation.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="4.7">In his effort to preserve the Union during the Civil <MPQA autoclass="negative">War</MPQA>, which began at the outset of his presidency, Lincoln assumed more power than any earlier president in U.S. history.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="25.7">Taking a broad view of the president's <MPQA autoclass="negative">war</MPQA> powers, he proclaimed a blockade, <MPQA autoclass="negative">suspended</MPQA> the writ of habeas corpus for anti-Union activity, spent money without congressional authorization, and personally directed the <MPQA autoclass="negative">war</MPQA> effort, ultimately leading the Union forces to victory over the <MPQA autoclass="negative">rebel</MPQA> Confederacy.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="20.0">Lincoln was an extremely deft politician, emerging as a wartime leader skilled at balancing competing considerations, and adept at getting rival groups to work together toward a common goal.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="8.7">His leadership qualities were evident in his handling of the border slave states at the beginning of the fighting , in his defeat of a congressional attempt to reorganize his cabinet in 1862, and his defusing of the peace issue in the 1864 presidential campaign.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="6.0">Lincoln had a lasting influence on U.S. political institutions, most importantly in setting the precedent of strong, perhaps sweeping, executive powers in time of national emergency .</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="3.3">His assassination so shortly after the end of the Civil War left him something of a martyr, his reputation forever sealed by the victory he won, without the tarnish which may have resulted from having to deal with the messy aftermath of the war .</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="3.2">He is commonly recognized as having been among the best U.S. presidents.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="2.4">1 Early life 2 Early political career 3 Law practice 4 Toward the Presidency 5 Presidency5.1 Lincoln on Slavery 5.2 Emancipation Proclamation 5.3 Gettysburg Address 5.4 The Civil War 5.5 Cabinet 5.6 Supreme Court appointments 6 Assassination 7 Lincoln family 8 Lincoln exhumed 9 Lincoln memorialized 10 Quotes 11 Related articles 12 Further reading 13 External linksEarly lifeLincoln was born on February 12, 1809, on a farm in Hardin County, Kentucky (now in LaRue Co., three miles (5 km) south of the town of Hodgenville), to Thomas Lincoln and Nancy Hanks.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="18.2">Lincoln moved at a young age to Indiana.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="11.9">After economic and land-title difficulties in Indiana the family moved to central Illinois in 1830 to settle government land along the Sangamon River on a site selected by Lincoln's father.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="3.5">The following winter was especially <MPQA autoclass="negative">brutal</MPQA>, and the family nearly moved back to Indiana.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="10.4">When his father relocated the family to a nearby site the following year, the 22-year-old Lincoln struck out on his own, canoeing down the Sangamon to homestead on his own in Menard County near the village of New Salem.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="18.4">Later that year, accompanied by friends on a flatboat, he floated down the Sangamon to the Illinois River, then down the Mississippi River to New Orleans.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="21.2">He began his political career in 1832 with a campaign for the Illinois General Assembly.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="18.0">The centerpiece of his platform was the undertaking of navigational improvements on the Sangamon that opened up the river to steamboat traffic.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="5.9">He served as a captain in a company of the Illinois militia drawn from New Salem during the Black Hawk <MPQA autoclass="negative">War</MPQA>, writing after being elected by his peers that he had not had "any such <MPQA autoclass="negative">success</MPQA> in life which gave him so much satisfaction."</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="7.3">He later tried his hand at several business and political ventures.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="6.1">Admitted to the Illinois bar, he was highly regarded as a practicing lawyer, and became steadily more prosperous.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="5.2">Lincoln served four terms in the Illinois State Legislature, was briefly elected to Congress (1846), and had a successful law practice in Illinois both before and after his single term in the House of Representatives.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="24.2">Early political career Lincoln in 1846 or 1847First elected to the House of Representatives, Lincoln spent most of his time in Washington, DC alone and made a less than spectacular impression on his fellow politicians.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="23.8">He used his office as an opportunity to speak out against the <MPQA autoclass="negative">war</MPQA> with Mexico, which he attributed to President Polk's desire for "military glory -- that attractive rainbow, that rises in showers of blood."</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="1.4">When his term ended, the incoming Taylor administration offered him the governorship of the Oregon Territory.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="11.0">He declined , returning instead to Springfield, Illinois where, although he remained active in Whig Party affairs in the state, he turned most of his energies to making a living at the bar.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="13.9">Law practiceLincoln acquired prominence in Illinois legal circles by the mid 1850s, especially through his involvement in litigation involving competing transportation interests both the river barges and the railroads.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="21.5">He represented the Alton & Sangamon Railroad, for example, in an 1851 dispute with one of its shareholders, James A. Barret.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="13.5">Barret had refused to pay the balance on his pledge to that corporation on the ground that it had changed its originally <MPQA autoclass="objectiveSpeech">planned</MPQA> route.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="10.8">Lincoln argued that as a matter of law a corporation is not bound by its <MPQA autoclass="negative">original</MPQA> charter when that charter can be amended in the public interest, that the newer proposed Alton & Sangamon route was superior and less <MPQA autoclass="negative">expensive</MPQA>, and that accordingly the corporation had a right to sue Mr. Barret for his <MPQA autoclass="negative">delinquent</MPQA> payment.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="11.6">He won this case, and the <MPQA autoclass="objectiveSpeech">decision</MPQA> by the Illinois Supreme Court was eventually cited by several other courts throughout the United States.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="20.3">Another important example of Lincoln's skills as a railroad lawyer was a lawsuit over a tax exemption that the state granted to the Illinois Central Railroad.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="1.9">McLean County argued that the state had no authority to grant such an exemption, and it sought to impose taxes on the railroad notwithstanding.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="2.0">In January 1856, the Illinois Supreme Court delivered its opinion upholding the tax exemption, accepting Lincoln's arguments.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="0.5">Toward the Presidency While Lincoln is usually portrayed bearded, he only grew a beard the last few years of his life, perhaps at the suggestion of 11 year old Grace Bedell.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="3.0">The Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854, which opened the named territories to slavery - thus erasing the limits on slavery's spread which had been part of the Missouri Compromise of 1820 - also helped draw Lincoln back into electoral politics.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="2.4">It was a speech against Kansas-Nebraska, on October 16, 1854 in Peoria, that caused Lincoln to stand out among the other free-soil orators of the day.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="15.1">During his <MPQA autoclass="negative">unsuccessful</MPQA> 1858 campaign for the United States Senate against Stephen A. Douglas, Lincoln debated Douglas in a series of events which represented a national discussion on the issues that were about to split the nation in two.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="9.4">The Lincoln-Douglas debates presaged the Presidential election of 1860, in which Douglas and Lincoln were once again <MPQA autoclass="negative">opponents</MPQA>.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="3.5">On November 6, 1860, Lincoln was elected as the 16th President of the United States, the first Republican to hold that office.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="43.1">Shortly after his election, the South made it clear that <MPQA autoclass="negative">secession</MPQA> was inevitable, which greatly increased <MPQA autoclass="negative">tension</MPQA> across the nation.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="42.4">President-elect Lincoln survived an assassination attempt in Baltimore, Maryland, and on February 23, 1861 arrived secretly in <MPQA autoclass="negative">disguise</MPQA> to Washington, DC. The South <MPQA autoclass="negative">ridiculed</MPQA> Lincoln for this seemingly cowardly act, but the efforts at security may have been prudent.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="5.7">PresidencyAt Lincoln's inauguration on March 4, 1861, the Turners formed Lincoln's bodyguard; and a sizable garrison of federal troops was also present, ready to protect the president and the capital from <MPQA autoclass="negative">rebel</MPQA> invasion.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="11.5">Lincoln on SlaveryLincoln's actual position on freeing <MPQA autoclass="negative">enslaved</MPQA> African-Americans is controversial today, despite the frequency and clarity with which he stated it both before his election to president (i.e. Lincoln-Douglas Debates of 1858) and after (see Lincoln's First Inaugural) He stated his position forcefully and succinctly in a letter to Horace Greeley of August 22, 1862.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="11.1">I would save the Union.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="11.8">I would save it the shortest way under the Constitution.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="7.5">The sooner the national authority can be restored; the nearer the Union will be "the Union as it was."</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="50.2">If there be those who would not save the Union, unless they could at the same time save slavery, I do not agree with them.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="48.9">If there be those who would not save the Union unless they could at the same time <MPQA autoclass="negative">destroy</MPQA> slavery, I do not agree with them.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="19.1">My paramount object in this <MPQA autoclass="negative">struggle</MPQA> is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to <MPQA autoclass="negative">destroy</MPQA> slavery.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="28.4">If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="44.5">What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">believe</MPQA> it helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">believe</MPQA> it would <MPQA autoclass="negative">help</MPQA> to save the Union.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="49.0">I shall do less whenever I shall <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">believe</MPQA> what I am doing <MPQA autoclass="negative">hurts</MPQA> the cause, and I shall do more whenever I shall <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">believe</MPQA> doing more will help the cause.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="56.5">I shall try to correct <MPQA autoclass="negative">errors</MPQA> when shown to be <MPQA autoclass="negative">errors</MPQA>; and I shall adopt new views so fast as they shall appear to be true views.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="53.8">I have here stated my purpose according to my view of official duty; and I intend no modification of my oft-expressed personal wish that all men everywhere could be free.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="10.4">However, at the time of the writing this letter, Lincoln was already leaning towards emancipation, which would lead to the Emancipation Proclamation.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="7.5">Also revealing was his letter a year later to James Conkling of August 26, 1863, which included the following excerpt: There was more than a year and a half of trial to <MPQA autoclass="negative">suppress</MPQA> the <MPQA autoclass="negative">rebellion</MPQA> before the proclamation issued, the last one hundred days of which passed under an explicit notice that it was coming, unless <MPQA autoclass="negative">averted</MPQA> by those in revolt, returning to their allegiance.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="23.8">The <MPQA autoclass="negative">war</MPQA> has certainly progressed as favorably for us, since the issue of proclamation as before.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="48.4">I <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">know</MPQA>, as fully as one can <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">know</MPQA> the opinions of others, that some of the commanders of our armies in the field who have given us our most important successes <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">believe</MPQA> the emancipation policy and the use of the colored troops constitute the heaviest <MPQA autoclass="negative">blow</MPQA> yet dealt to the <MPQA autoclass="negative">Rebellion</MPQA>, and that at least one of these important successes could not have been achieved when it was but for the aid of black soldiers.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="42.9">Among the commanders holding these views are some who have never had any affinity with what is <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">called</MPQA> abolitionism or with the Republican party policies but who held them purely as military opinions.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="40.4">I submit these opinions as being entitled to some weight against the <MPQA autoclass="negative">objections</MPQA> often urged that emancipation and arming the blacks are <MPQA autoclass="negative">unwise</MPQA> as military measures and were not adopted as such in good faith.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="2.8">You <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">say</MPQA> you will not fight to <MPQA autoclass="negative">free</MPQA> negroes.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="1.7">Some of them seem willing to <MPQA autoclass="negative">fight</MPQA> for you; but, no matter.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="19.1"> Fight you, then exclusively to save the Union.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="12.7">I issued the proclamation on purpose to aid you in saving the Union.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="31.9">Whenever you shall have conquered all resistance to the Union, if I shall urge you to continue <MPQA autoclass="negative">fighting</MPQA>, it will be an apt time, then, for you to declare you will not fight to <MPQA autoclass="negative">free</MPQA> negroes.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="47.3">I <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">thought</MPQA> that in your <MPQA autoclass="negative">struggle</MPQA> for the Union, to whatever extent the negroes should cease helping the <MPQA autoclass="negative">enemy</MPQA>, to that extent it <MPQA autoclass="negative">weakened</MPQA> the <MPQA autoclass="negative">enemy</MPQA> in his resistance to you.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="20.5">Do you <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">think</MPQA> differently?</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="9.8">I <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">thought</MPQA> that whatever negroes can be got to do as soldiers, leaves just so much less for white soldiers to do, in saving the Union.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="11.7">Does it appear otherwise to you?</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="21.0">But negroes, like other people, act upon motives.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="1.8">Why should they do any thing for us, if we will do nothing for them?</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="37.3">If they stake their lives for us, they must be prompted by the strongest motiveeven the promise of freedom.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="28.0">And the promise being made, must be kept.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="1.4">Emancipation Proclamation Lincoln met with his Cabinet for the first reading of the Emancipation Proclamation draft on July 22, 1862.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="5.8">He later <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">said</MPQA>: "I never, in my life, felt more certain that I was doing right, than I do in signing this paper."</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="19.0">Lincoln is often credited with freeing <MPQA autoclass="negative">enslaved</MPQA> African-Americans with the Emancipation Proclamation, though this only freed the slaves in areas of the Confederacy not yet controlled by the Union; in occupied and northern territories, slaves were not freed.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="10.5">However, the proclamation made abolishing slavery in the <MPQA autoclass="negative">rebel</MPQA> states an official <MPQA autoclass="negative">war</MPQA> goal and it did become the impetus for the enactment of the 13th and 14th Amendments of the United States Constitution which respectively <MPQA autoclass="negative">abolished</MPQA> slavery and established the federal enforcement of civil rights.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="4.4">Gettysburg AddressHe showed tremendous leadership to the Union populace during the <MPQA autoclass="negative">war</MPQA> as evidenced by the Gettysburg Address, a speech dedicating a cemetery of Union soldiers from the Battle of Gettysburg in 1863.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="0.1">While most of the speakerse.g.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="14.3">Edward Everettat the event spoke at length, some for hours, Lincoln's few choice words resonated across the nation and across history, <MPQA autoclass="negative">defying</MPQA> Lincoln's own prediction that "The world will little note, nor long remember what we <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">say</MPQA> here."</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="13.7">While there is little documentation of the other speeches of the day, Lincoln's address is regarded as one of the great speeches in history.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="0.7">In tribute, he was presented with a Waltham Watch Company Wm Ellery, key wind watch model 1857, serial number 67613.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="19.9">The Civil <MPQA autoclass="negative">War</MPQA>The <MPQA autoclass="negative">war</MPQA> was a source of constant <MPQA autoclass="negative">frustration</MPQA> for the president, and it occupied nearly all of his time.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="44.0">After repeated <MPQA autoclass="negative">difficulties</MPQA> with General George McClellan and a string of other <MPQA autoclass="negative">unsuccessful</MPQA> commanding generals, Lincoln made the fateful <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">decision</MPQA> to appoint a <MPQA autoclass="negative">radical</MPQA> and somewhat <MPQA autoclass="negative">scandalous</MPQA> army commander: General Ulysses S. Grant.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="21.3">Grant would apply his military knowledge and leadership talents to bring about the close of the Civil <MPQA autoclass="negative">War</MPQA>.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="3.5">When Richmond, the Confederate capital, was at long last captured, Lincoln went there to make a public gesture of sitting at Jefferson Davis's own desk, symbolically <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">saying</MPQA> to the nation that the President of the United States held authority over the entire land.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="13.2">He was greeted at the city as a conquering hero by freed slaves, whose sentiments were epitomized by one admirer's quote, "I <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">know</MPQA> I am free for I have seen the face of Father Abraham and have felt him."</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="0.3">The reconstruction of the Union weighed heavy on the President's mind.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="13.2">He was determined to take a course that would not permanently alienate the former Confederate states.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="11.7">"Let 'em up easy," he told his assembled military leaders Gen. Ulysses S. Grant, Gen. William T. Sherman and Adm. David Dixon Porter in an 1865 meeting on the steamer River Queen.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="13.9">In 1864, Lincoln was the first and only President to face a presidential election during a civil war .</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="7.7">The long <MPQA autoclass="negative">war</MPQA> and the issue of emancipation appeared to be severely <MPQA autoclass="negative">hampering</MPQA> his prospects and an electoral <MPQA autoclass="negative">defeat</MPQA> appeared likely against the Democratic nominee and former general, George McClellan.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="3.0">However, a series of timely Union victories shortly before election day changed the situation dramatically and Lincoln was reelected.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="4.7">During the Civil War , Lincoln held powers no previous president had wielded; he suspended the writ of habeas corpus and frequently imprisoned Southern spies and sympathizers without trial.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="2.4">On the other hand, he often commuted executions.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="19.5">Just days before Lincoln's assassination, the war ended with Union victory on April 9, 1865, when Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered at Appomattox Court House in Virginia.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="25.3">The defeat of the Confederacy paved the way for the abolishment of slavery in the United States.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="19.6">CabinetOFFICE NAME TERMPresident Abraham Lincoln 18611865 Vice President Hannibal Hamlin 18611865Andrew Johnson 1865Secretary of State William H. Seward 18611865Secretary of the Treasury Salmon P. Chase 18611864William P. Fessenden 18641865Hugh McCulloch 1865Secretary of War Simon Cameron 18611862Edwin M. Stanton 18621865Attorney General Edward Bates 18611864James Speed 18641865Postmaster General Horatio King 1861Montgomery Blair 18611864William Dennison 18641865Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles 18611865Secretary of the Interior Caleb B. Smith 18611863John P. Usher 18631865Supreme Court appointmentsLincoln appointed the following Justices to the Supreme Court of the United States:Noah Haynes Swayne - 1862Samuel Freeman Miller - 1862David Davis - 1862Stephen Johnson Field - 1863Salmon P. Chase - Chief Justice - 1864AssassinationLincoln met frequently with Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant as the war drew to a close.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="13.8">The two men <MPQA autoclass="objectiveSpeech">planned</MPQA> matters of reconstruction, and it was evident to all that they held each other in high regard.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="17.4">During their last meeting, on April 14, 1865 (Good Friday), Lincoln invited Grant to a social engagement that evening.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="3.5">Grant declined (his wife was not eager to spend time with Mary Todd Lincoln).</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="12.8">Without the General and his wife, or his bodyguard Ward Hill Lamon, to whom he related his famous dream of his own assassination, the Lincolns left to attend a play at Ford's Theater.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="18.6">The play was Our American Cousin, a musical comedy by the British writer Tom Taylor (1817-1880).</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="20.7">As Lincoln sat in the balcony, John Wilkes Booth, a well-known actor and Southern sympathizer from Virginia, crept up behind Lincoln in his State Box and aimed a single-shot, round-slug .44 caliber Deringer at the President's head, firing at point-blank range.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="14.6">He shouted "Sic semper tyrannis!" (Latin: "Thus always to tyrants," and Virginia's state motto; some accounts <MPQA autoclass="objectiveSpeech">say</MPQA> he <MPQA autoclass="objectiveSpeech">added</MPQA> "The South is avenged!") and jumped from the balcony to the stage below, breaking his leg in the fall.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="0.5">Booth and several other <MPQA autoclass="negative">conspirators</MPQA> had <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">planned</MPQA> to <MPQA autoclass="negative">kill</MPQA> a number of other government officials at the same time, but for various reasons Lincoln's was the only assassination actually carried out (although Secretary of State William H. Seward was badly <MPQA autoclass="negative">injured</MPQA> by an assailant).</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="17.5">Booth managed to limp to his horse and escape, and the mortally-wounded president was taken to a house across the street, now <MPQA autoclass="objectiveSpeech">called</MPQA> the Petersen House, where he lay in a coma for some time before he quietly expired.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="24.1">Abraham Lincoln was officially pronounced dead at 7:21 AM, in April 15, 1865.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="25.3">Booth and several of his conspirators were eventually captured, and either hanged or imprisoned .</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="25.3">Booth himself was shot when discovered holed up in a barn.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="24.5">Four people were tried by military tribunal and hanged for the assassination plot (David Herold, George Atzerodt, Lewis Powell (aka Lewis Payne), and Mary Surratt, the first woman ever executed by the United States government.) Three people were sentenced to life imprisonment (Michael O'Laughlin, Samuel Arnold, and Samuel Mudd).</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="24.9">Edman Spangler was sentenced to six years imprisonment .</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="18.3">John Surratt, tried later by a civilian court, was acquitted.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="2.4">The fairness of the convictions, particularly of Mary Surratt, have been <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">called</MPQA> into question, and there are <MPQA autoclass="negative">doubts</MPQA> as to the exact degree of her involvement, if any, in the <MPQA autoclass="negative">conspiracy</MPQA>.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="13.3">Lincoln's funeral train carried his remains, as well as 300 mourners and the casket of his son William, 1,654 miles to Illinois.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="2.7">Lincoln's body was carried by train in a grand funeral procession through several states on its way back to Illinois.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="32.7">The nation <MPQA autoclass="negative">mourned</MPQA> a man who many viewed as the savior of the United States, and protector and defender of what Lincoln himself <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">called</MPQA> "the government of the people, by the people, and for the people."</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="38.9"><MPQA autoclass="negative">Critics</MPQA> <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">say</MPQA> that in fact the Confederates were the ones defending the right to self-governance and Lincoln was <MPQA autoclass="negative">suppressing</MPQA> that right.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="24.1">They further insist that Lincoln only preserved the Union in a geographical sense while <MPQA autoclass="negative">destroying</MPQA> its voluntary nature.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="20.3">Lincoln familyPresident Lincoln and Mary Todd Lincoln had four sons.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="30.8">Only one survived into adulthood.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="31.1">Robert Todd Lincoln: b. August 1, 1843 in Springfield, Illinois - d. July 26, 1926 in Manchester, Vermont.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="31.7">Edward Baker Lincoln: b. March 10, 1846 in Springfield, Illinois - d. February 1, 1850 in Springfield, IllinoisWilliam Wallace Lincoln: b. December 21, 1850 in Springfield, Illinois - d. February 20, 1862 in Washington, D.C.Thomas "Tad" Lincoln: b. April 4, 1853 in Springfield, Illinois - d. July 16, 1871 in Chicago, Illinois.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="31.3">Lincoln has no living descendants.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="29.5">Lincoln exhumedLincoln was buried in Oak Ridge Cemetery in Springfield, where a 177-foot-tall granite tomb surmounted with several bronze statues of Lincoln was constructed by 1874.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="26.9">Lincoln's wife and three of his four sons are also buried there (Robert is buried in Arlington National Cemetery).</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="23.8">In the years following his death , attempts were made to steal Lincoln's body and hold it for ransom.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="12.3">Around 1900, Robert Todd Lincoln decided that, in order to prevent body theft , it was necessary to build a permanent crypt for his father.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="6.4">Lincoln's coffin would be encased in concrete several feet thick, surrounded by a cage, and buried beneath a rock slab.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="2.7">On September 26, 1901, Lincoln's body was exhumed so that it could be reinterred in the newly built crypt.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="13.4">However, those present (there were 23 of them, including Robert Lincoln) <MPQA autoclass="negative">feared</MPQA> that his body might have been <MPQA autoclass="negative">stolen</MPQA> in the intervening years.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="1.1">They decided to open the coffin and check.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="6.9">When they did, they were amazed at the sight.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="5.6">Lincoln's body was almost perfectly preserved.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="3.8">It had been embalmed so many times following his <MPQA autoclass="negative">death</MPQA> that his body had not decayed.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="29.1">In fact, he was perfectly recognizable, even more than thirty years after his <MPQA autoclass="negative">death</MPQA>.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="12.7">On his chest, they could see red, white, and blue specks remnants of the American flag with which he was <MPQA autoclass="negative">buried</MPQA>, which had by then disintegrated.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="1.0">All 23 of the people who viewed the remains of Mr. Lincoln have long since passed away.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="24.6">One of the last, a youth of 13 at the time, was Fleetwood Lindley, who died on February 1, 1963.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="25.6">Three days before he died, Mr. Lindley was interviewed.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="20.6">He <MPQA autoclass="objectiveSpeech">said</MPQA>, "Yes, his face was chalky white.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="25.4">His clothes were mildewed.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="24.8">And I was allowed to hold one of the leather straps as we lowered the casket for the concrete to be poured.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="8.4">I was not scared at the time but I slept with Lincoln for the next six months."</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="20.1">([1] (http://members.aol.com/RVSNorton/Lincoln13.html))</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="10.4">Another youth present, George Cashman, also remembered the event until his death and it made even more of an impression on him, even as an adult.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="10.1">The last years of his life, George Cashman was the curator of the National Landmark in Springfield <MPQA autoclass="objectiveSpeech">called</MPQA> "Lincoln's Tomb." He particularly enjoyed relating his story to the more than one million visitors to the site each year.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="5.8">Mr. Cashman passed away in 1979, the last person to have viewed the remains of Abraham Lincoln.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="11.2">Lincoln memorialized Daniel Chester French's seated Lincoln faces the National Mall to the east.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="10.9">Lincoln has been memorialized in many city names, notably the capital of Nebraska; with the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC (illustrated, right); on the U.S. $5 bill and the 1 cent coin; and as part of the Mount Rushmore National Memorial.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="6.4">Lincoln's Tomb, Lincoln's Home in Springfield, New Salem, Illinois (a reconstruction of Lincoln's early adult hometown), Ford's Theater and Petersen House are all preserved as museums.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="0.4">On February 12, 1892 Abraham Lincoln's birthday was declared to be a federal holiday in the United States, though it was later combined with Washington's birthday in the form of President's Day.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="27.4">(They are still celebrated separately in Illinois.)The ballistic missile submarine Abraham Lincoln (SSBN-602) and the aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln (CVN-72) were named in his honor.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="30.4">Quotes "I should like to <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">know</MPQA>, if taking this old Declaration of Independence, which declares that all men are equal upon principle, and making exceptions to it, where will it stop?</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="9.2">If one man <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">says</MPQA> it does not mean a negro, why may not another man <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">say</MPQA> it does not mean another man?</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="0.7">If the Declaration is not the truth, let us get the statute book in which we find it and tear it out.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="17.8">Who is so bold as to do it?</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="5.1">If it is not true, let us tear it out." - From the Lincoln-Douglas debates (1858)Views on RaceAlthough Lincoln is well known for his role in abolishing slavery in the United States, Canadian ethicist David Sztybel has collected many examples of racism in Lincoln's speeches and writings.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="5.2">For example: "Negro equality!</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="11.9">Fudge!</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="18.8">How long, in the government of a God, great enough to make and maintain this Universe, shall there continue knaves to vend, and <MPQA autoclass="negative">fools</MPQA> to gulp, so low a piece of demagougism [sic] as this".</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="0.3">- (Abraham Lincoln, The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, [New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 1953], v. 3, p. 399.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="33.9">Fragments: Notes for Speeches, Sept. 6, 1859) "I will <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">say</MPQA>, then, that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races--that I am not nor ever have been in <MPQA autoclass="negative">favor</MPQA> of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will <MPQA autoclass="speechDirectSubjective">say</MPQA> in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which will ever forbid the two races living together in terms of social and political equality.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="35.9">And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together, there must be the position of superior and <MPQA autoclass="negative">inferior</MPQA>.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="13.5">I am as much as any other man in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race." - op cit pp. 247-8.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="7.3">Sixth Debate with Steven A. Douglas at Quincy, <MPQA autoclass="negative">Ill</MPQA>., Oct. 13, 1858)Nevertheless, despite early hesitation due to campaign promises and the need to keep the slaveowning border states from joining the Confederacy, Lincoln did more than any of his predecessors to ensure the eventual <MPQA autoclass="negative">destruction</MPQA> of slavery.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="subj" certainty="10.3">He spoke about the <MPQA autoclass="negative">evils</MPQA> of slavery throughout his career, strongly backed the Thirteenth Amendment, and as president consulted with black leaders such as Frederick Douglass.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="18.7">In issuing the Emancipation Proclamation, Lincoln made the ending of slavery a key Union war aim.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="27.0">Related articlesU.S.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="26.8">presidential election, 1860U.S. presidential election, 1864Lincoln's second inaugural addressOrigins of the American Civil War Lincoln-Kennedy coincidencesFurther readingLincoln by David Herbert Donald.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="29.4">ISBN 068482535XLincoln Reconsidered: Essays on the Civil War Era by David Herbert Donald.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="31.7">ISBN 0375725326Abraham Lincoln: Redeemer President by Allen C. Guelzo.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="31.7">ISBN 0802842933External linksWikiquote has a collection of quotations by or about Abraham Lincoln.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="31.7">Lincoln Studies Center at Knox College (http://deptorg.knox.edu/lincolnstudies/)</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="32.0">Wikiquote - Quotes by Abraham Lincoln (http://quote.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Lincoln)</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="32.2">First Inaugural Address (http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/presiden/inaug/lincoln1.htm)</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="30.8">Second Inaugural Address (http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/presiden/inaug/lincoln2.htm)</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="27.4">Original 1860's Harper's Weekly Images and News on Abraham Lincoln (http://www.sonofthesouth.net/prod01.htm)</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="24.2">The Lincoln Log: A Daily Chronology of the Life of Abraham Lincoln (http://dev.stg.brown.edu/projects/lincoln/)</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="22.9">The Real Lincoln: An article by Walter E. Williams on Lincoln's suppression of the right to secede (http://www.gmu.edu/departments/economics/wew/articles/02/lincoln.html)</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="27.0">The Lincoln Museum (http://www.thelincolnmuseum.org)</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="31.3">Forced into Glory: Abraham Lincoln's White Dream.</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="30.3">(http://www.mises.org/misesreview_detail.asp?control=173&sortorder=issue)</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="27.6">Abraham Lincoln: Dark Side of a Liberator (http://sztybel.tripod.com/lincoln.html)</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="10.1">by David Sztybel, Ph.D.Early 1840s daguerrotype <MPQA autoclass="objectiveSpeech">thought</MPQA> to be oldest known portrait (http://www.lincolnportrait.com)</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="27.6">Abraham Lincoln quotes (http://en.thinkexist.com/quotes/abraham_lincoln/)at</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="31.7">ThinkExist.comQuotations (http://www.thinkexist.com)</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="31.3">John Summerfield Staples, President Lincoln's "Substitute" (http://www.lincolnherald.com/1970articleSubstitute.html)</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="28.5">Preceded by: James Buchanan President of the United States 18611865 Succeeded by: Andrew JohnsonPreceded by: John C. Fremont Republican Party Presidential candidates 1860 (won) - 1864 (won) Followed by: Ulysses S. GrantPresidents of the United States of AmericaWashington | J.Adams | Jefferson | Madison | Monroe | J.Q.Adams | Jackson | VanBuren | W.H.Harrison | Tyler | Polk | Taylor | Fillmore | Pierce | Buchanan | Lincoln | A.Johnson | Grant | Hayes | Garfield | Arthur | Cleveland | B.Harrison | Cleveland | McKinley | T.Roosevelt | Taft | Wilson | Harding | Coolidge | Hoover | F.D.Roosevelt | Truman | Eisenhower | Kennedy | L.B.Johnson | Nixon | Ford | Carter | Reagan | G.H.W.Bush | Clinton | G.W.BushRetrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Lincoln"</MPQA>
<MPQA autoclass="obj" certainty="28.0">Categories: Presidents of the U.S. | U.S. Republican Party presidential nominees | Members of the U.S. House of Representatives | U.S. Army officers | Assassinated people | American Civil War people | Illinois politicians | 1809 births | 1865 deaths</MPQA>