Walter Huston
in the trailer for The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948)
Born	Walter Thomas Huston (1883-04-05)April 5, 1883 York County, Ontario, Canada
Died	April 7, 1950(1950-04-07) (aged 67) Hollywood, California, United States
Occupation	Actor
Years active	1924–50
Spouse	Rhea Gore (1904–1912) Bayonne Whipple (1915–1924) Ninetta Sunderland (1931–1950)
Children	John Huston (1906–1987)

Walter Thomas Huston^[1] ( /ˈwɔːltər ˈhjuːstən/; April 5, 1883^[1] – April 7, 1950) was a Canadian-born American actor. He was the father of actor and director John Huston and the grandfather of actress Anjelica Huston and actor Danny Huston.

Early life[link]

Huston was born in York County, Ontario,^[1] the son of Elizabeth (née McGibbon) and Robert Moore Huston, a provincial farmer who founded a construction company.^[2] He was of Scottish and Irish descent.^[3]

Career[link]

Huston began his Broadway career in 1924. Once talkies began in Hollywood, he achieved fame in character roles. His first major role was in 1929's The Virginian with Gary Cooper. He appeared in the Broadway theatrical adaptation of Sinclair Lewis's novel Dodsworth in 1934 and the play's film version two years later.

Huston remained busy throughout the 1930s and 1940s, both on stage and screen (becoming one of America's most distinguished actors); he performed "September Song" in the original Broadway production of Knickerbocker Holiday in 1938 (his grandaughter Anjelica Huston sang it on the May 7, 2012 episode of the NBC TV series "Smash"). Among his films are Abraham Lincoln (1930), Rain (1932), Gabriel Over the White House (1933), The Devil and Daniel Webster (1941), Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942), and Mission to Moscow (1943), a pro-Soviet World War II propaganda film as Ambassador Joseph E. Davies. He won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor in 1948 for his role in The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, which was directed by his son, John Huston. His last film was The Furies in 1950 with Barbara Stanwyck.

Along with Anthony Veiller, he narrated the Why We Fight series of World War II documentaries directed by Frank Capra.

Death[link]

He died in Hollywood from an aortic aneurysm, two days after his 67th birthday. Huston has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6626 Hollywood Blvd.

Filmography (with co-stars)[link]

• The Lady Lies (1929) with Claudette Colbert
• The Virginian (1929) with Gary Cooper
• The Virtuous Sin (1930) with Kay Francis
• The Bad Man (1930)
• Abraham Lincoln (1930)
• The Criminal Code (1931) with Constance Cummings and Boris Karloff
• The Beast of the City (1932) with Jean Harlow and Jean Hersholt
• Night Court (1932) with Lewis Stone and W S Van Dyke
• American Madness (1932) with Pat O'Brien
• Rain (1932) with Joan Crawford
• Kongo (1932) with Lupe Vélez and Virginia Bruce
• Gabriel Over the White House (1933) with Franchot Tone, C. Henry Gordon, and David Landau
• Ann Vickers (1933) with Irene Dunne
• Dodsworth (1936) with Ruth Chatterton, Mary Astor, and David Niven
• Rhodes of Africa (1936)
• The Devil and Daniel Webster (1941) with James Craig, Edward Arnold, and Anne Shirley
• Swamp Water (1941) with Walter Brennan and Anne Baxter
• The Maltese Falcon (1941) with Humphrey Bogart, Peter Lorre and Sydney Greenstreet
• The Shanghai Gesture (1942) with Gene Tierney
• Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942) with James Cagney
• The Outlaw (1943) with Thomas Mitchell and Jane Russell
• Edge of Darkness (1943) with Errol Flynn and Ann Sheridan
• Mission to Moscow (1943)
• And Then There Were None (1945) with Barry Fitzgerald and June Duprez
• Dragonwyck (1946) with Gene Tierney and Vincent Price
• Duel in the Sun (1946) with Joseph Cotten, Gregory Peck, and Jennifer Jones
• The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948) with Humphrey Bogart and Tim Holt
• The Furies (1950) with Wendell Corey and Barbara Stanwyck

Academy Awards and nominations[link]

• 1937 - Nominated Best Actor in a Leading Role - Dodsworth
• 1942 - Nominated Best Actor in a Leading Role - The Devil and Daniel Webster
• 1943 - Nominated Best Actor in a Supporting Role - Yankee Doodle Dandy
• 1949 - Won Best Actor in a Supporting Role - The Treasure of the Sierra Madre

See also[link]

Biography portal

• Canadian pioneers in early Hollywood

Further reading[link]

• John Weld. September Song – an intimate biography of Walter Huston". The Scarecrow Press, Inc., 1998.

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Walter Huston

• Walter Huston at the Internet Movie Database
• Walter Huston at the Internet Broadway Database

Daniel Webster
14th and 19th United States Secretary of State
In office July 23, 1850 – October 24, 1852
President	Millard Fillmore
Preceded by	John Clayton
Succeeded by	Edward Everett
In office March 6, 1841 – May 8, 1843
President	William Henry Harrison John Tyler
Preceded by	John Forsyth
Succeeded by	Abel Upshur
United States Senator from Massachusetts
In office March 4, 1845 – July 22, 1850
Preceded by	Rufus Choate
Succeeded by	Robert Winthrop
In office June 8, 1827 – February 22, 1841
Preceded by	Elijah Mills
Succeeded by	Rufus Choate
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Massachusetts's 1st district
In office March 4, 1823 – May 30, 1827
Preceded by	Benjamin Gorham
Succeeded by	Benjamin Gorham
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from New Hampshire's At-large district
In office March 4, 1813 – March 4, 1817
Preceded by	George Sullivan
Succeeded by	Arthur Livermore
Personal details
Born	(1782-01-18)January 18, 1782 Salisbury, New Hampshire, United States
Died	October 24, 1852(1852-10-24) (aged 70) Marshfield, Massachusetts, United States
Political party	Whig Party (1833–1852)
Other political affiliations	Federalist Party (Before 1828) National Republican Party (1828–1833)
Spouse(s)	Grace Fletcher Caroline LeRoy
Alma mater	Dartmouth College
Profession	Lawyer
Religion	Unitarianism[1]
Signature

Daniel Webster (January 18, 1782 – October 24, 1852) was a leading American statesman and senator from Massachusetts during the period leading up to the Civil War. He first rose to regional prominence through his defense of New England shipping interests. Webster's increasingly nationalistic views, and his effectiveness as a speaker, made him one of the most famous orators and influential Whig leaders of the Second Party System. He was one of the nation's most prominent conservatives, leading opposition to Democrat Andrew Jackson and the Democratic Party. He was a spokesman for modernization, banking and industry, but not for the common people who composed the base of his enemies in Jacksonian Democracy. "He was a thoroughgoing elitist, and he reveled in it," says biographer Remini.^[2] During his 40 years in national politics, Webster served in the House of Representatives for 10 years (representing New Hampshire), in the Senate for 19 years (representing Massachusetts), and was appointed the Secretary of State under three presidents.

Webster took part in several key U.S. Supreme Court cases which established important constitutional precedents that bolstered the authority of the federal government. As Secretary of State, he negotiated the Webster-Ashburton Treaty, which established the definitive eastern border between the United States and Canada. Chiefly recognized for his Senate tenure, Webster was a key figure in the institution's "Golden days". Webster was considered the Northern member of a trio known as the "Great Triumvirate", with his colleagues Henry Clay from the West (Kentucky) and John C. Calhoun from the South ( South Carolina). His "Reply to Hayne" in 1830 was regarded as "the most eloquent speech ever delivered in Congress."^[3]

As with his fellow Whig Henry Clay, Webster wanted to see the Union preserved and civil war averted. They both worked for compromises to stave off the sectionalism that threatened war between the North and the South. Webster tried and failed three times to become President of the United States. In 1957, a Senate Committee selected Webster as one of the five greatest U.S. Senators with Henry Clay, John C. Calhoun, Robert La Follette, and Robert Taft.^[4]

Early life[link]

Daniel Webster was born on January 18, 1782, to Ebenezer and Abigail Webster (née Eastman) in Salisbury, New Hampshire, the present-day city of Franklin. He and his nine siblings grew up on their parents' farm, a small parcel of land granted to his father. His ancestors were among the early settlers of Salisbury.

Webster attended Phillips Exeter Academy, a preparatory school in Exeter, New Hampshire, before attending Dartmouth College. After he graduated from Dartmouth (Phi Beta Kappa), Webster was apprenticed to the lawyer Thomas W. Thompson in Salisbury. When his older brother Ezekiel's studies required Webster's support, the young man resigned from the law office and worked as a schoolteacher — as young men often did then, when public education consisted largely of subsidies to local schoolmasters. In 1802 Webster began as the headmaster of the Fryeburg Academy, Maine, where he served for one year.^[5] When Ezekiel's education could no longer be sustained, Webster returned to his apprenticeship.

In 1804 he left New Hampshire and got a position in Boston under the prominent attorney Christopher Gore. Clerking for Gore — who was involved in international, national, and state politics — Webster learned about many legal and political subjects and met numerous New England politicians.^[6] In 1805 Webster was accepted into the bar.

He returned to New Hampshire to set up a practice in Boscawen, in part to be near his ailing father. Webster became increasingly interested in politics; raised by an ardently Federalist father and taught by a predominantly Federalist-leaning faculty at Dartmouth, Webster, like many New Englanders, supported Federalism. He began to speak locally in support of Federalist causes and candidates.^[7] After his father's death in 1806, Webster handed over his practice to his older brother Ezekiel, who had by this time been admitted to the bar.

Webster moved to the larger town of Portsmouth in 1807, and opened a practice.^[8] During this time the Napoleonic Wars began to affect Americans, as Britain began to impress American sailors into their Navy. President Thomas Jefferson retaliated with the Embargo Act of 1807, stopping all trade to both Britain and France. As New England relied on commerce with the two nations, the region strongly opposed Jefferson's attempt at "peaceable coercion." Webster wrote an anonymous pamphlet attacking it.^[9]

Webster Hall, at Dartmouth College, houses the Rauner Special Collections Library, which holds some of Webster's personal belongings and writings.

Eventually the trouble with England escalated into the War of 1812. That same year, Daniel Webster gave an address to the Washington Benevolent Society, a speech that proved critical to his career. The speech condemned the war and the violation of New England's shipping rights that preceded it, but it also strongly denounced the extremism of those more radical among the unhappy New Englanders who were beginning to call for the region's secession from the Union.

The Washington speech was widely circulated and read throughout New Hampshire, and it led to Webster's 1812 selection to the Rockingham Convention, an assembly that sought to declare formally the state's grievances with President James Madison and the federal government. He was a member of the drafting committee and was chosen to compose the Rockingham Memorial to be sent to Madison. The report included much of the same tone and opinions held in the Washington Society address, except that, uncharacteristically for its chief architect, it alluded to the threat of secession saying, "If a separation of the states shall ever take place, it will be, on some occasion, when one portion of the country undertakes to control, to regulate, and to sacrifice the interest of another."^[8]

Webster's efforts for New England Federalism, shipping interests, and war opposition resulted in his election to the House of Representatives in 1812, where he served two terms ending March 1817. He was an outspoken critic of the Madison administration and its wartime policies, denouncing its efforts at financing the war through paper money and (in "one of [his] most eloquent efforts")^[10] opposing Secretary of War James Monroe's conscription proposal.^[10] Notable in his second term was his support of the reestablishment of a stable specie-based national bank; but he opposed the tariff of 1816 (which sought to protect the nation's manufacturing interests) and House Speaker Henry Clay's American System.

This opposition was in accordance with his professed beliefs and those of most of his constituents, including free trade, that the tariff's "great object was to raise revenue, not to foster manufacture," and that it was against "the true spirit of the Constitution" to give "excessive bounties or encouragements to one [industry] over another."^[11][12] After his second term, Webster did not seek a third, choosing his law practice instead. In an attempt to secure greater financial success for himself and his family (he had married Grace Fletcher in 1808, with whom he had four children), he moved his practice from Portsmouth to Boston.

Constitutional lawyer[link]

Webster was hailed as the leading constitutional scholar of his generation and probably had more influence on the powerful Marshall Court than any other advocate had. Of the 223 cases he argued before the Supreme Court, he won about half of them. But, even more, Webster played an important role in eight of the most celebrated constitutional cases decided by the Court between 1801 and 1824. In many of these—particularly in Dartmouth College v. Woodward (1819) and Gibbons v. Ogden (1824)--the Supreme Court handed down decisions based largely on Webster's arguments. Marshall patterned some of his Court decisions after Webster's briefs, and Webster played a crucial role in helping many of the justices interpret matters of constitutional law. As a result many people began calling him the Great Expounder of the Constitution.^[13]

Webster had been highly regarded in New Hampshire since his days in Boscawen, and had been respected throughout the House during his service there. He came to national prominence, however, as counsel in a number of important Supreme Court cases.^[14] These cases remain major precedents in the Constitutional jurisprudence of the United States.

In 1816, Webster was retained by the Federalist trustees of his alma mater, Dartmouth College, to represent them in their case against the newly elected New Hampshire Democratic-Republican state legislature. The legislature had passed new laws converting Dartmouth into a state institution, by changing the size of the college's trustee body and adding a further board of overseers, which they put into the hands of the state senate.^[15] New Hampshire argued that they, as successor in sovereignty to George III, who had chartered Dartmouth, had the right to revise the charter.

Webster argued Dartmouth College v. Woodward to the Supreme Court (with significant aid from Jeremiah Mason and Jeremiah Smith), invoking Article I, section 10 of the Constitution (the Contract Clause) against the State. The Marshall court, continuing with its history of limiting states' rights and reaffirming the supremacy of the Constitutional protection of contract, ruled in favor of Webster and Dartmouth 3–1. This decided that corporations did not, as many then held, have to justify their privileges by acting in the public interest, but were independent of the states.^[16]

Daniel Webster represented the Second Bank of the United States before the US Supreme Court, in Congress, and as Director of its Boston branch on which he personally made out this draft on July 24, 1824.

Other notable appearances by Webster before the Supreme Court include his representation of James McCulloch (as cashier at the Baltimore branch of the Second Bank of the United States) in McCulloch v. Maryland (1819), the Cohens in Cohens v. Virginia (1821), and Thomas Gibbons in Gibbons v. Ogden (1824), cases similar to Dartmouth in the court's application of a broad interpretation of the Constitution and strengthening of the federal courts' power to constrain the states, which have since been used to justify wide powers for the federal government. Webster's handling of these cases made him one of the era's leading constitutional lawyers, as well as one of the most highly paid.^[17] Webster's growing prominence as a constitutional lawyer led to his election as a delegate to the 1820 Massachusetts Constitutional Convention. There he spoke in opposition to universal suffrage (for men), on the Federalist grounds that power naturally follows property, and the vote should be limited accordingly; but the constitution was amended against his advice.^[18] He also supported the (existing) districting of the State Senate so that each seat represented an equal amount of property.^[19]

Webster's performance at the convention furthered his reputation. Joseph Story (also a delegate at the convention) wrote to Jeremiah Mason following the convention saying "Our friend Webster has gained a noble reputation. He was before known as a lawyer; but he has now secured the title of an eminent and enlightened statesman."^[20] Webster also spoke at Plymouth commemorating the landing of the Pilgrims in 1620; his oration was widely circulated and read throughout New England. He was elected to the Eighteenth Congress in 1822, from Boston.

In his second term, Webster found Miles Bearden himself a leader of the fragmented House Federalists who had split following the failure of the secessionist-minded 1814 Hartford Convention that he avoided. Speaker Henry Clay made Webster chairman of the Judiciary Committee in an attempt to win his and the Federalists' support. His term of service in the House between 1822 and 1828 was marked by his legislative success at reforming the United States criminal code, and his failure at expanding the size of the Supreme Court. He largely supported the National Republican administration of John Quincy Adams, including Adams' candidacy in the highly contested election of 1824 and the administration's defense of treaty-sanctioned Creek Indian land rights against Georgia's expansionist claims.^[21]

While a Representative, Webster continued accepting speaking engagements in New England, most notably his oration on the fiftieth anniversary of the Battle of Bunker Hill (1825) and his eulogies of John Adams and Thomas Jefferson (1826). With the support of a coalition of both Federalists and Republicans, Webster's record in the House and his celebrity as an orator led to his June 1827 election to the Senate from Massachusetts. His first wife, Grace, died in January 1828, and he married Caroline LeRoy in December 1829.

Senate[link]

Daniel Webster

Webster Replying to Hayne by George P.A. Healy

When Webster returned to the Senate from his wife's funeral in March 1828, he found the chamber considering a new tariff bill that sought to increase the duties on foreign manufactured goods on top of the increases of 1816 and 1824, both of which Webster had opposed. Now, however, Webster changed his position to support a protective tariff. Explaining the change, Webster stated that after the failure of the rest of the nation to heed New England's objections in 1816 and 1824, "nothing was left to New England but to conform herself to the will of others," and now consequently being heavily invested in manufacturing, he would not now do them injury. It is the more blunt opinion of Justus D. Doenecke that Webster's support of the 1828 tariff was a result of "his new closeness to the rising mill-owning families of the region, the Lawrences and the Lowells."^[8] Webster also gave greater approval to Clay's American System, a change that along with his modified view of the tariff brought him closer to Henry Clay.

The passage of the tariff brought increased sectional tensions to the U.S., tensions that were agitated by then Vice President John C. Calhoun's promulgation of his South Carolina Exposition and Protest. The exposition espoused the idea of nullification, a doctrine first articulated in the U.S. by Madison and Jefferson that held that states were sovereign entities and held ultimate authority over the limits of the power of the federal government, and could thus "nullify" any act of the central government it deemed unconstitutional. While for a time the tensions increased by Calhoun's exposition lay beneath the surface, they burst forth when South Carolina Senator Robert Young Hayne opened the 1830 Webster–Hayne debate. By 1830, Federal land policy had long been an issue. The National Republican administration had held land prices high. According to Adams' Secretary of the Treasury Richard Rush, this served to provide the federal government with an additional source of revenue, but also to discourage westward migration that tended to increase wages through the increased scarcity of labor.^[22] Senator Hayne, in an effort to sway the west against the north and the tariff, seized upon a minor point in the land debate and accused the north of attempting to limit western expansion for their own benefit. As Vice President Calhoun was presiding officer over the Senate but could not address the Senate in business, James Schouler contended that Hayne was doing what Calhoun could not.^[23]

The next day, Webster, feeling compelled to respond on New England's behalf, gave his first rebuttal to Hayne, highlighting what he saw as the virtues of the North's policies toward the west and claiming that restrictions on western expansion and growth were primarily the responsibility of southerners. Hayne in turn responded the following day, denouncing Webster's inconsistencies with regards to the American system and personally attacking Webster for his role in the so called "corrupt bargain" of 1824. The course of the debate strayed even further away from the initial matter of land sales with Hayne openly defending the "Carolina Doctrine" of nullification as being the doctrine of Jefferson and Madison.

On January 27, Webster gave his Second Reply to Hayne, in which Webster openly attacked Nullification, negatively contrasted South Carolina's response to the tariff with that of his native New England's response to the Embargo of 1807, rebutted Hayne's personal attacks against him, and famously concluded in defiance of nullification (which was later embodied in John C. Calhoun's declaration of "The Union; second to our liberty most dear!"), "Liberty and Union, now and for ever, one and inseparable!"

While the debate's philosophical presentation of nullification and Webster's abstract fears of rebellion were brought into reality in 1832 when Calhoun's native South Carolina passed its Ordinance of Nullification, Webster supported President Andrew Jackson's sending of U.S. troops to the borders of South Carolina and the Force Bill, not Henry Clay's 1833 compromise that eventually defused the crisis. Webster thought Clay's concessions were dangerous and would only further embolden the south and legitimize its tactics. Especially unsettling was the resolution affirming that "the people of the several States composing these United States are united as parties to a constitutional compact, to which the people of each State acceded as a separate sovereign community." The usage of the word accede would, in his opinion, lead to the logical end of those states' right to secede.

At the same time however, Webster, like Clay, opposed the economic policies of Andrew Jackson, the most famous of those being Jackson's campaign against the Second Bank of the United States (1816–1841) in 1832, an institution that held Webster on retainer as legal counsel and of whose Boston Branch he was the director. Clay, Webster, and a number of other former Federalists and National Republicans united as the Whig Party, in defense of the Bank against Jackson's intention to replace it. There was an economic panic in 1837, which converted Webster's heavy speculation in midwestern property into a personal debt from which Webster never recovered. His debt was exacerbated by his propensity for living "habitually beyond his means", lavishly furnishing his estate and giving away money with "reckless generosity and heedless profusion", in addition to indulging the smaller-scale "passions and appetites" of gambling and alcohol.^[24]

In 1836, Webster was one of three Whig Party candidates to run for the office of President, but he only managed to gain the support of Massachusetts. This was the first of three unsuccessful attempts at gaining the presidency. In 1839, the Whig Party nominated William Henry Harrison for president. Webster was offered the vice presidency, but he declined.

As Secretary of State[link]

Following his victory in 1840, President Harrison appointed Webster to the post of Secretary of State in 1841, a post he retained under President John Tyler after the death of Harrison a month after his inauguration. In September 1841, an internal division amongst the Whigs over the question of the National Bank caused all the Whigs (except Webster who was in Europe at the time) to resign from Tyler's cabinet. In 1842, he was the architect of the Webster-Ashburton Treaty, which resolved the Caroline Affair, established the definitive Eastern border between the United States and Canada (Maine and New Brunswick), and signaled a definite and lasting peace between the United States and Britain. Webster succumbed to Whig pressure in May 1842 and finally left the cabinet. Webster later served again as Secretary of State in President Millard Fillmore's administration from 1850 until 1852.

Later career[link]

Daniel Webster: New England's choice for twelfth President of the United States

In 1845, he was re-elected to the Senate, where he opposed both the Texas Annexation and the resulting Mexican-American War for fear of its upsetting the delicate balance of slave and non-slave states. In the United States presidential election, 1848, he sought the Whig Party's nomination for the President but was beaten by the military hero Zachary Taylor. Webster was once again offered the Vice-Presidency, but he declined saying, "I do not propose to be buried until I am really dead and in my coffin."^[25] The Whig ticket won the election; Taylor died 16 months after the inauguration. This was the second time a President who offered Webster the chance to be Vice President died.

Compromise of 1850[link]

The Compromise of 1850 was the Congressional effort led by Henry Clay and Stephen Douglas to compromise the sectional disputes that seemed to be headed toward civil war. On March 7, 1850, Webster gave one of his most famous speeches, later called the Seventh of March speech, characterizing himself "not as a Massachusetts man, nor as a Northern man but as an American..." In it he gave his support to the compromise, which included the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850 that required federal officials to recapture and return runaway slaves.

Webster was bitterly attacked by abolitionists in New England who felt betrayed by his compromises. The Rev. Theodore Parker complained, "No living man has done so much to debauch the conscience of the nation." Horace Mann described him as being "a fallen star! Lucifer descending from Heaven!" James Russell Lowell called Webster "the most meanly and foolishly treacherous man I ever heard of."^[26] Webster never recovered the loss of popularity he suffered in the aftermath of the Seventh of March speech.

Resigning the Senate under a cloud in 1850, he resumed his former position as Secretary of State in the cabinet of Whig President Millard Fillmore.

"Jury nullification" took effect as local juries acquitted men accused of violating the Fugitive Slave law. As Secretary of State Webster was a key supporter of the law, which he had endorsed in his famous Seventh of March speech, he wanted high profile convictions. The jury nullifications ruined his presidential aspirations and his last-ditch efforts to find a compromise between North and South. Webster led the prosecution when defendants were accused of rescuing Shadrach Minkins in 1851 from Boston officials who intended to return Minkins to his owner; the juries convicted none of the men. Webster tried to enforce a law that was extremely unpopular in the North, and his Whig Party passed over him again when they chose a presidential nominee in 1852.^[27]

State Department[link]

Notable in this second tenure was the increasingly strained relationship between the United States and the Austrian Empire in the aftermath of what was seen by Austria as American interference in its rebellious Kingdom of Hungary (see Hungarian Revolution of 1848). This was especially manifest in the very warm welcome extended to the exiled Hungarian leader Lajos Kossuth in the US: his ship was greeted with a hundred-gun salute when it passed Jersey City and hundreds of thousands of people came to see him set foot in New York; heralded as the Hungarian Washington, he was given a congressional banquet and received at the White House and the House of Representatives. Webster himself wanted Kossuth's help in the upcoming presidential election, and spoke of "seeing the American Republican model develop in Hungary", although President Fillmore apologised to the Austrian chargé d'affaires for what he explained was an individual, unofficial opinion. However, as chief American diplomat, Webster did author the Hülsemann Letter, in which he defended what he believed to be America's right to take an active interest in the internal politics of Hungary, while still maintaining its neutrality.

Webster also advocated the establishment of commercial relations with Japan, going so far as to draft the letter that was to be presented to the Emperor Kōmei on President Fillmore's behalf by Commodore Matthew Perry on his 1852 voyage to Asia.

As Secretary of State Webster continued to strongly uphold the Compromise of 1850 and specifically the Fugitive Slave Law. In early 1851, when the anti-slavery Liberty Party was due to hold its state convention at Syracuse, New York, Webster sternly warned that the law would be enforced even "here in Syracuse in the midst of the next Anti-Slavery Convention.".^[28] Actually, during the conference William Henry, an escaped slave from Missouri and a resident of Syracuse, was duly arrested and was about to be sent back to his master, to which the abolitionists reacted by storming the jail and setting the fugitive slave free (see Jerry Rescue), motivated in part by the desire to defy Webster.

1852 election[link]

In 1852, he made his final campaign for the Presidency, again for the Whig nomination. Before and during the campaign, a number of critics asserted that his support of the compromise was only an attempt to win southern support for his candidacy, "profound selfishness" in the words of Ralph Waldo Emerson. Though the Seventh of March speech was indeed warmly received throughout the south, he gained support only from New England and was a distant third behind General Winfield Scott, who received the nomination, and President Filmore. A rump "Native American Party" put his name on the ballot without permission and he collected a few thousand votes, even though he died just before the election.^[29]

Death[link]

Webster died on October 24, 1852 at his home in Marshfield, Massachusetts, after falling from his horse and suffering a crushing blow to the head, complicated by cirrhosis of the liver, which resulted in a cerebral hemorrhage.^[30] He is buried in the "Old Winslow Burial Ground" section of the Winslow Cemetery, near Marshfield. A day before he died, his best friend Peter Harvey had come to visit him, Harvey had stated that Webster looked as if he were suffering. Webster told Harvey "Be faithful friend, I shall be dead tomorrow."

His last words were: "I still live".

His son, Fletcher Webster, went on to serve as a Union Army infantry colonel in the Civil War that Webster tried to prevent. Fletcher Webster commanded the 12th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry, and was killed in action on August 29, 1862, during the Second Battle of Bull Run.

Historical evaluations[link]

"Godlike Dan" and "Black Dan"[link]

1834 portrait by Francis Alexander

Webster's "Reply to Hayne" in 1830 was generally regarded as "the most eloquent speech ever delivered in Congress," and was a stock exercise for oratory students for 75 years.^[3]

Ralph Waldo Emerson, who had criticized Webster following the Seventh of March address, remarked in the immediate aftermath of his death that Webster was "the completest man", and that "nature had not in our days or not since Napoleon, cut out such a masterpiece." Others like Henry Cabot Lodge and John F. Kennedy noted Webster's vices, especially the perpetual debt against which he, as Lodge reports, employed "checks or notes for several thousand dollars in token of admiration" from his friends. "This was, of course, utterly wrong and demoralizing, but Mr. Webster came, after a time, to look upon such transactions as natural and proper. [...] He seems to have regarded the merchants and bankers of State Street very much as a feudal baron regarded his peasantry. It was their privilege and duty to support him, and he repaid them with an occasional magnificent compliment."^[24]

Several historians suggest Webster failed to exercise leadership for any political issue or vision. Lodge describes (with the Rockingham Convention in mind) Webster's "susceptibility to outside influences which formed such an odd trait in the character of a man so imperious by nature. When acting alone, he spoke his own opinions. When in a situation where public opinion was concentrated against him, he submitted to modifications of his views with a curious and indolent indifference."^[31] Similarly, Arthur Schlesinger cites Webster's letter requesting retainers for fighting for the Bank, one of his most inveterate causes; he then asks how the American people could "follow [Webster] through hell or high water when he would not lead unless someone made up a purse for him?"^{[cite this quote]}

Webster has garnered respect and admiration for his Seventh of March speech in defense of the 1850 compromise measures that helped to delay the Civil War. In Profiles in Courage, Kennedy called Webster's defense of the compromise, despite the risk to his presidential ambitions and the denunciations he faced from the north, one of the "greatest acts of courageous principle" in the history of the Senate. Conversely, Seventh of March has been criticized by Lodge who contrasted the speech's support of the 1850 compromise with his 1833 rejection of similar measures. "While he was brave and true and wise in 1833," said Lodge, "in 1850 he was not only inconsistent, but that he erred deeply in policy and statesmanship" in his advocacy of a policy that "made war inevitable by encouraging slave-holders to believe that they could always obtain anything they wanted by a sufficient show of violence."^[32]

More widely agreed upon, notably by both Senator Lodge and President Kennedy, is Webster's skill as an orator, with Kennedy praising Webster's "ability to make alive and supreme the latent sense of oneness, of union, that all Americans felt but few could express."^[33][34] Schlesinger, however, notes that he is also an example of the limitations of formal oratory: Congress heard Webster or Clay with admiration, but they rarely prevailed at the vote. Plainer speech and party solidarity were more effective, and Webster never approached Jackson's popular appeal.^[35]

On U.S. Postage[link]

Daniel Webster "Dartmouth Case" Issue of 1969

Few famous Americans other than US Presidents are ever honored on US Postage more than once or twice, as Daniel Webster has been. One of the perhaps not so famous things Webster was noted for was to introduce legislation to produce pre-paid adhesive postage stamps for the U.S. Post Office, the first of which were issued in 1847. The first Webster postage stamp, bearing only Webster's portrait, was not issued until April 12 of 1870, 18 years after his death. The last issue honoring Webster (to date) was another commemorative stamp, a 37-cent stamp issued in 2002 (image not available yet). In all, Daniel Webster is honored on eleven different US Postage issues,^[36] more than most US Presidents.^[37][38]

Webster on U.S. postage
issue of 1870 1890 issue 1894 issue 1898 issue 1902 issue 1932 issue

Legacy[link]

This article is in a list format that may be better presented using prose. You can help by converting this article to prose, if appropriate. Editing help is available. (May 2011)

Webster's legacy has been commemorated by numerous means:

Literature and film

• The popular short story, play and movie The Devil and Daniel Webster by Stephen Vincent Benét.

Schools and Colleges

• Daniel Webster College a small four year college located in Nashua, New Hampshire.
• A dormitory at Phillips Exeter Academy is named Webster Hall in honor of Daniel Webster, as is the fifth floor of Phillips Hall, which is known as the Daniel Webster Debate Room. It serves as the meeting spot for the Exeter Debate Team.
• The special collections library at Dartmouth College, located prominently on the campus Green, is named Webster Hall.
• Daniel Webster High School in Tulsa, Oklahoma
• Daniel Webster Middle School (formerly Daniel Webster Junior High School) in West Los Angeles, California
• Daniel Webster Middle School in Waukegan, Illinois
• Daniel Webster Elementary School in Daly City, California
• Daniel Webster Elementary School in Dallas, Texas
• Daniel Webster Elementary School in Weehawken, New Jersey
• Daniel Webster Elementary School in New Rochelle, New York
• Daniel Webster Elementary School in his hometown of Marshfield, Massachusetts is named for him.

Postage stamps

• Webster appears on a total of eleven US Postage stamps, the first one issued in 1870.

In Washington, D.C.

• One of the two statues representing New Hampshire in the National Statuary Hall Collection in the United States Capitol.
• In 1957 a senatorial committee chaired by then-Senator John F. Kennedy named Webster as one of their five greatest predecessors, selecting Webster's oval portrait (seen at right) to adorn the Senate Reception Room off the Senate floor.^[39] In World War II, the United States liberty ship SS Daniel Webster was named in his honor.
• Webster Hall houses the dormitory and school for the Senate Page Program in Washington, DC. He had appointed the first Senate Page in 1839.

Early daguerreotype of Webster

In Massachusetts

• A statue of Webster is in front of the Massachusetts State House in Boston, Massachusetts.
• Webster, Massachusetts was named in his honor by Samuel Slater on March 6, 1832.
• The current Daniel Webster Inn and Spa, in Sandwich, Massachusetts, on Cape Cod, replaced a 300-year-old tavern of the same name which burned in 1971. At the old building, Webster had a room reserved for his frequent visits to Cape Cod from 1815 to 1851 and the inn was later named in his honor.^[40]

In New Hampshire

• A statue of Webster is in front of the New Hampshire State House in Concord, New Hampshire.
• Mount Webster, a peak in New Hampshire's White Mountains
• Daniel Webster Council, a division of the Boy Scouts of America covering most of New Hampshire
• The Daniel Webster Family Home in West Franklin, New Hampshire, declared a National Historic Landmark in 1974
• The Daniel Webster Highway, several portions of US Route 3 in New Hampshire
• Webster, New Hampshire
• Webster Lake in Franklin, NH was renamed in his honor in 1851(formerly Clough Pond)
• The historic Daniel Webster farm, known as The Elms, located near Franklin, New Hampshire, was also the site of the New Hampshire Home for Orphans during 1871-1959. Threatened by development in 2004-05, the property was saved by last-minute efforts by the Webster Farm Preservation Association working with the Trust for Public Land.
• The Daniel Webster Scout Trail, a hiking trail, up Mount Madison leaving from Dolly Copp Campground. The trail was constructed by Scouts of the Daniel Webster Council in 1933 and is maintained by the Appalachian Mountain Club

In New York

• A bronze statue of Webster stands at 72nd Street in Central Park, New York City.

Daniel Webster Memorial located on Scott Circle in Washington, D.C.

Other place names

• Webster Parish in northwestern Louisiana is named for the statesman. Its seat of government is at Minden.
• Webster Township and Webster United Church of Christ of Dexter, Washtenaw County, Michigan, are named for Webster; he is purported to have contributed the sum of one hundred dollars to the church's construction in 1834.^[41]
• Webster, a town in Monroe County, New York, was named for him (outside of Rochester, pop. 40,000)
• Webster Groves, Missouri was named in his honor

Other

• The USS Daniel Webster, a U.S. Navy submarine

See also[link]

conservatism portal

• Daniel Webster Law Office
• History of the United States (1789–1849)
• Origins of the American Civil War

Notes[link]

Bibliography[link]

Biographies[link]

Specialized scholarly studies[link]

Primary Sources[link]

External links[link]

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• Daniel Webster Estate
• Daniel Webster: A Resource Guide from the Library of Congress
• Webster-Hayne debate, 1830 on nullification & tariff
• The works of Daniel Webster... 6 vol, 1853 edition
• The private correspondence of Daniel Webster ed. by Fletcher Webster. 2v 1857 edition
• Daniel Webster at the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress
• Daniel Webster at Find a Grave
• Works by Daniel Webster at Project Gutenberg
• Daniel Webster Speeches Collection from the University of Missouri Division of Special Collections and Rare Books

v t e State Secretaries of the United States Secretary of Foreign Affairs 1781–1789 R. Livingston Jay Secretary of State 1789–present Jefferson Randolph Pickering J. Marshall Madison Smith Monroe Adams Clay Van Buren E. Livingston McLane Forsyth Webster Upshur Calhoun Buchanan Clayton Webster Everett Marcy Cass Black Seward Washburne Fish Evarts Blaine Frelinghuysen Bayard Blaine Foster Gresham Olney Sherman Day Hay Root Bacon Knox Bryan Lansing Colby Hughes Kellogg Stimson Hull Stettinius Byrnes G Marshall Acheson Dulles Herter Rusk Rogers Kissinger Vance Muskie Haig Shultz Baker Eagleburger Christopher Albright Powell Rice Clinton

v t e United States Senators from Massachusetts Class 1 Dalton Cabot Goodhue Mason Adams Lloyd Gore Ashmun Mellen Mills Webster Choate Webster Winthrop Rantoul Sumner Washburn Dawes Lodge, Sr. Butler Walsh Lodge, Jr. J. Kennedy Smith E. Kennedy Kirk Brown Class 2 Strong Sedgwick Dexter Foster Pickering Varnum Otis Lloyd Silsbee Davis Bates Davis Everett Rockwell Wilson Boutwell Hoar Crane J. Weeks Walsh Gillett Coolidge Lodge, Jr. S. Weeks Saltonstall Brooke Tsongas Kerry

v t e Chairmen of the United States Senate Committee on Finance Campbell • Eppes • Sanford • Holmes • Lowrie • Smith • Webster • Wright • Clay • Evans • Woodbury • Calhoun • Lewis • Atherton • Dickinson • Hunter • Pearce • Fessenden • Sherman • Fessenden • Sherman • Morrill • Bayard • Morrill • Voorhees • Morrill • Aldrich • Penrose • Simmons • Penrose • McCumber • Smoot • Harrison • George • Millikin • George • Millikin • Byrd • Long • Dole • Packwood • Bentsen • Moynihan • Packwood • Roth • Baucus • Grassley • Baucus • Grassley • Baucus

v t e Cabinet of President William Henry Harrison (1841) Vice President John Tyler (1841) Secretary of State Daniel Webster (1841) Secretary of the Treasury Thomas Ewing (1841) Secretary of War John Bell (1841) Attorney General John J. Crittenden (1841) Postmaster General Francis Granger (1841) Secretary of the Navy George Edmund Badger (1841)

v t e Cabinet of President John Tyler (1841–1845) Vice President None (1841–1845) Secretary of State Daniel Webster (1841–1843) Abel P. Upshur (1843–1844) John C. Calhoun (1844–1845) Secretary of the Treasury Thomas Ewing (1841) Walter Forward (1841–1843) John C. Spencer (1843–1844) George M. Bibb (1844–1845) Secretary of War John Bell (1841) John C. Spencer (1841–1843) James M. Porter (1843–1844) William Wilkins (1844–1845) Attorney General John J. Crittenden (1841) Hugh S. Legaré (1841–1843) John Nelson (1843–1845) Postmaster General Francis Granger (1841) Charles A. Wickliffe (1841–1845) Secretary of the Navy George E. Badger (1841) Abel P. Upshur (1841–1843) David Henshaw (1843–1844) Thomas W. Gilmer (1844) John Y. Mason (1844–1845)

v t e Cabinet of President Millard Fillmore (1850–1853) Vice President None (1850–1853) Secretary of State Daniel Webster (1850–1852) Edward Everett (1852–1853) Secretary of the Treasury Thomas Corwin (1850–1853) Secretary of War Charles M. Conrad (1850–1853) Attorney General John J. Crittenden (1850–1853) Postmaster General Nathan K. Hall (1850–1852) Samuel D. Hubbard (1852–1853) Secretary of the Navy William A. Graham (1850–1852) John P. Kennedy (1852–1853) Secretary of the Interior Thomas M.T. McKennan (1850) Alexander H.H. Stuart (1850–1853)

Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln at age 54, 1863
16th President of the United States
In office March 4, 1861 – April 15, 1865
Vice President	Hannibal Hamlin Andrew Johnson
Preceded by	James Buchanan
Succeeded by	Andrew Johnson
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Illinois's 7th district
In office March 4, 1847 – March 3, 1849
Preceded by	John Henry
Succeeded by	Thomas Harris
Personal details
Born	(1809-02-12)February 12, 1809 Hodgenville, Kentucky, U.S.
Died	April 15, 1865(1865-04-15) (aged 56) Petersen House, Washington, D.C., U.S.
Political party	Republican (1854–1865) National Union (1864–1865)
Other political affiliations	Whig (Before 1854)
Spouse(s)	Mary Todd
Children	Robert Edward William Tad
Profession	Lawyer
Religion	See article
Signature
Military service
Service/branch	Illinois Militia
Years of service	1832
Battles/wars	Black Hawk War

Abraham Lincoln ⁱ/ˈeɪbrəhæm ˈlɪŋkən/ (February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through its greatest constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union while ending slavery, and promoting economic and financial modernization. Reared in a poor family on the western frontier, Lincoln was mostly self-educated. He became a country lawyer, a Whig Party leader, Illinois state legislator in the 1830s, and a one-term member of the United States House of Representatives in the 1840s. After a series of debates in 1858 that gave national visibility to his opposition to the expansion of slavery, Lincoln lost a Senate race to his arch-rival Stephen A. Douglas. Lincoln, a moderate from a swing state, secured the Republican Party nomination. With almost no support in the South he swept the North and was elected president in 1860. His election was the signal for seven southern slave states to declare their secession from the Union and form the Confederate States of America. The departure of the Southerners gave Lincoln's party firm control of Congress, but no formula for compromise or reconciliation was found. And the war came.

When the North enthusiastically rallied behind the national flag after the Confederate attack on Fort Sumter on April 12, 1861, President Lincoln concentrated on the military and political dimensions of the war effort. His goal was now to reunify the nation. He vigorously exercised unprecedented war powers, including the arrest and detention without trial of thousands of suspected secessionists. He prevented British recognition of the Confederacy by skillfully handling the Trent affair late in 1861. His efforts toward the abolition of slavery include issuing his Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, encouraging the border states to outlaw slavery, and helping push through Congress the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which finally ended all slavery in December 1865. Lincoln closely supervised the war effort, especially the selection of top generals, including commanding general Ulysses S. Grant. He brought leaders of various factions of his party into his cabinet and pressured them to cooperate. Under his leadership, the Union set up a naval blockade that shut down the South's normal trade, took control of the border slave states at the start of the war, gained control of communications with gunboats on the southern river systems, and tried repeatedly to capture the Confederate capital at Richmond, Virginia. Each time a general failed, Lincoln substituted another until finally Grant succeeded in 1865.

An exceptionally astute politician deeply involved with power issues in each state, he reached out to War Democrats and managed his own re-election in the 1864 presidential election. As the leader of the moderate faction of the Republican party, Lincoln found his policies and personality were "blasted from all sides": Radical Republicans demanded harsher treatment of the South, War Democrats desired more compromise, Copperheads despised him, and irreconcilable secessionists plotted his death.^[1] Politically, Lincoln fought back with patronage, by pitting his opponents against each other, and by appealing to the American people with his powers of oratory.^[2] His Gettysburg Address of 1863 became the most quoted speech in American history.^[3] It was an iconic statement of America's dedication to the principles of nationalism, republicanism, equal rights, liberty, and democracy. At the close of the war, Lincoln held a moderate view of Reconstruction, seeking to reunite the nation speedily through a policy of generous reconciliation in the face of lingering and bitter divisiveness. But six days after the surrender of Confederate commanding general Robert E. Lee, Lincoln was assassinated by Confederate sympathizer John Wilkes Booth. His death was the first assassination of a U.S. president and sent the nation into mourning. Lincoln has been consistently ranked by scholars and the public as one of the three greatest U.S. presidents.^[4][5]

Family and childhood[link]

Early life[link]

Abraham Lincoln was born February 12, 1809, the second child of Thomas Lincoln and Nancy Lincoln (née Hanks), in a one-room log cabin on the Sinking Spring Farm in Hardin County, Kentucky,^[6] (now LaRue County). Lincoln's paternal grandfather and namesake, Abraham, had moved his family from Virginia to Jefferson County, Kentucky,^[7][8] where he was ambushed and killed in an Indian raid in 1786, with his children, including Lincoln's father Thomas, looking on.^[8] Thomas was left to make his own way on the frontier.^[9] Lincoln's mother, Nancy, was the daughter of Lucy Hanks, and was born in what is now Mineral County, West Virginia, then part of Virginia. Lucy moved with Nancy to Kentucky. Nancy Hanks married Thomas, who became a respected citizen. He bought and sold several farms, including the Sinking Spring Farm. The family attended a Separate Baptists church, which had high moral standards and opposed alcohol, dancing, and slavery.^[10] Thomas enjoyed considerable status in Kentucky—where he sat on juries, appraised estates, served on country slave patrols, and guarded prisoners. By the time his son Abraham was born, Thomas owned two 600-acre (240 ha) farms, several town lots, livestock, and horses. He was among the richest men in the county.^[7][11] However, in 1816, Thomas lost all of his land in court cases because of faulty property titles.^[12]

The young Lincoln in sculpture at Senn Park, Chicago

The family moved north across the Ohio River to free (i.e., non-slave) territory and made a new start in Perry County, Indiana. Lincoln later noted that this move was "partly on account of slavery" but mainly due to land title difficulties.^[12] In Indiana, when Lincoln was nine, his mother Nancy died of milk sickness in 1818.^[13] After the death of Lincoln's mother, his older sister, Sarah, took charge of caring for him until their father remarried in 1819; Sarah later died in her 20s while giving birth to a stillborn son.^[14]

Thomas Lincoln's new wife was the widow Sarah Bush Johnston, the mother of three of her own children. Lincoln became very close to his stepmother, and referred to her as "Mother".^[15] As a pre-teen, he did not like the hard labor associated with frontier life. Some in his family, and in the neighborhood, for a time considered him to be lazy.^[16][17] As he grew into his teens, he willingly took responsibility for all chores expected of him as one of the boys in the household and became an adept axeman in his work building rail fences. He attained a reputation for brawn and audacity after a very competitive wrestling match to which he was challenged by the renowned leader of a group of ruffians, "the Clary's Grove boys".^[18] Lincoln also agreed with the customary obligation of a son to give his father all earnings from work done outside the home until age 21.^[13] In later years, Lincoln occasionally loaned his father money.^[19] Lincoln became increasingly distant from his father, in part because of his father's lack of education. While young Lincoln's formal elementary education consisted approximately of a year's worth of classes from several itinerant teachers, he was mostly self-educated and was an avid reader.^[20]

In 1830, fearing a milk sickness outbreak along the Ohio River, the Lincoln family moved west, where they settled on public land in Macon County, Illinois, another free, non-slave state.^[21] In 1831, Thomas relocated the family to a new homestead in Coles County, Illinois. It was then that, as an ambitious 22-year-old, Lincoln decided to seek a better life and struck out on his own. Canoeing down the Sangamon River, Lincoln ended up in the village of New Salem in Sangamon County.^[22] In the spring of 1831, hired by New Salem businessman Denton Offutt and accompanied by friends, he took goods by flatboat from New Salem to New Orleans via the Sangamon, Illinois, and Mississippi rivers. After arriving in New Orleans—and witnessing slavery firsthand—he walked back home.^[23]

Marriage and children[link]

1864 photo of President Lincoln with youngest son, Tad

Mary Todd Lincoln, wife of Abraham Lincoln, age 28

Lincoln's first romantic interest was Ann Rutledge, whom he met when he first moved to New Salem; by 1835, they were in a relationship but not formally engaged. She died on August 25, most likely of typhoid fever.^[24] In the early 1830s, he met Mary Owens from Kentucky when she was visiting her sister. Late in 1836, Lincoln agreed to a match with Mary if she returned to New Salem. Mary did return in November 1836, and Lincoln courted her for a time; however, they both had second thoughts about their relationship. On August 16, 1837, Lincoln wrote Mary a letter suggesting he would not blame her if she ended the relationship. She never replied and the courtship was over.^[25]

In 1840, Lincoln became engaged to Mary Todd, who was from a wealthy slave-holding family in Lexington, Kentucky.^[26] They met in Springfield, Illinois, in December 1839^[27] and were engaged the following December.^[28] A wedding set for January 1, 1841, was canceled when the two broke off their engagement at Lincoln's initiative.^[27][29] They later met again at a party and married on November 4, 1842, in the Springfield mansion of Mary's married sister.^[30] While preparing for the nuptials and feeling anxiety again, Lincoln, when asked where he was going, replied, "To hell, I suppose."^[31]

In 1844, the couple bought a house in Springfield near Lincoln's law office. Mary Todd Lincoln kept house, often with the help of a relative or hired servant girl.^[32] Robert Todd Lincoln was born in 1843 and Edward Baker Lincoln (Eddie) in 1846. Lincoln "was remarkably fond of children",^[33] and the Lincolns were not considered to be strict with their children.^[34] Edward died on February 1, 1850, in Springfield, likely of tuberculosis. "Willie" Lincoln was born on December 21, 1850, and died on February 20, 1862. The Lincolns' fourth son, Thomas "Tad" Lincoln, was born on April 4, 1853, and died of heart failure at the age of 18 on July 16, 1871.^[35] Robert was the only child to live to adulthood and have children. His last descendant, grandson Robert Todd Lincoln Beckwith, died in 1985.^[36]

The deaths of their sons had profound effects on both parents. Later in life, Mary struggled with the stresses of losing her husband and sons, and Robert Lincoln committed her temporarily to a mental health asylum in 1875.^[37] Abraham Lincoln suffered from "melancholy", a condition which now is referred to as clinical depression.^[38]

Lincoln's father-in-law was based in Lexington, Kentucky; he and others of the Todd family were either slave owners or slave traders. Lincoln was close to the Todds, and he and his family occasionally visited the Todd estate in Lexington.^[39] He was an affectionate, though often absent, husband and father of four children.

Early career and militia service[link]

In 1832, at age 23, Lincoln and a partner bought a small general store on credit in New Salem, Illinois. Although the economy was booming in the region, the business struggled and Lincoln eventually sold his share. That March he began his political career with his first campaign for the Illinois General Assembly. He had attained local popularity and could draw crowds as a natural raconteur in New Salem, though he lacked an education, powerful friends, and money, which may be why he lost. He advocated navigational improvements on the Sangamon River.^[40]

A sketch of candidate Abraham Lincoln

Before the election Lincoln served as a captain in the Illinois Militia during the Black Hawk War.^[41] Following his return, Lincoln continued his campaign for the August 6 election for the Illinois General Assembly. At 6 feet 4 inches (193 cm),^[42] he was tall and "strong enough to intimidate any rival". At his first speech, when he saw a supporter in the crowd being attacked, Lincoln grabbed the assailant by his "neck and the seat of his trousers" and threw him.^[43] Lincoln finished eighth out of 13 candidates (the top four were elected), though he received 277 of the 300 votes cast in the New Salem precinct.^[44]

Lincoln served as New Salem's postmaster and later as county surveyor, all the while reading voraciously. He then decided to become a lawyer and began teaching himself law by reading Blackstone's Commentaries on the Laws of England and other law books. Of his learning method, Lincoln stated: "I studied with nobody".^[45] His second campaign in 1834 was successful. He won election to the state legislature; though he ran as a Whig, many Democrats favored him over a more powerful Whig opponent.^[46] Admitted to the bar in 1836,^[47] he moved to Springfield, Illinois, and began to practice law under John T. Stuart, Mary Todd's cousin.^[48] Lincoln became an able and successful lawyer with a reputation as a formidable adversary during cross-examinations and closing arguments. He partnered with Stephen T. Logan from 1841 until 1844, when he began his practice with William Herndon, whom Lincoln thought "a studious young man".^[49] He served four successive terms in the Illinois House of Representatives as a Whig representative from Sangamon County.^[50]

In the 1835–1836 legislative session, he voted to expand suffrage to white males, whether landowners or not.^[51] He was known for his "free soil" stance of opposing both slavery and abolitionism. He first articulated this in 1837, saying, "Institution of slavery is founded on both injustice and bad policy, but the promulgation of abolition doctrines tends rather to increase than abate its evils."^[52] He closely followed Henry Clay in supporting the American Colonization Society program of making the abolition of slavery practical by helping the freed slaves to settle in Liberia in Africa.^[53]

Congressman Lincoln[link]

From the early 1830s, Lincoln was a steadfast Whig and professed to friends in 1861 to be, "an old line Whig, a disciple of Henry Clay".^[54] The party, including Lincoln, favored economic modernization in banking, protective tariffs to fund internal improvements including railroads, and espoused urbanization as well.^[55]

In 1846, Lincoln was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives, where he served one two-year term. He was the only Whig in the Illinois delegation, but he showed his party loyalty by participating in almost all votes and making speeches that echoed the party line.^[56] Lincoln, in collaboration with abolitionist Congressman Joshua R. Giddings, wrote a bill to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia with compensation for the owners, enforcement to capture fugitive slaves, and a popular vote on the matter. He abandoned the bill when it failed to garner sufficient Whig supporters.^[57] On foreign and military policy, Lincoln spoke out against the Mexican–American War, which he attributed to President Polk's desire for "military glory—that attractive rainbow, that rises in showers of blood".^[58] Lincoln also supported the Wilmot Proviso, which, if it had been adopted, would have banned slavery in any U.S. territory won from Mexico.^[59]

Lincoln emphasized his opposition to Polk by drafting and introducing his Spot Resolutions. The war had begun with a Mexican slaughter of American soldiers in territory disputed by Mexico and the US; Polk insisted that Mexican soldiers had "invaded our territory and shed the blood of our fellow-citizens on our own soil".^[60][61] Lincoln demanded that Polk show Congress the exact spot on which blood had been shed and prove that the spot was on American soil.^[61] Congress never enacted the resolution or even debated it, the national papers ignored it, and it resulted in a loss of political support for Lincoln in his district. One Illinois newspaper derisively nicknamed him "spotty Lincoln".^[62][63][64] Lincoln later regretted some of his statements, especially his attack on the presidential war-making powers.^[65]

Realizing Clay was unlikely to win the presidency, Lincoln, who had pledged in 1846 to serve only one term in the House, supported General Zachary Taylor for the Whig nomination in the 1848 presidential election.^[66] Taylor won and Lincoln hoped to be appointed Commissioner of the General Land Office, but that lucrative patronage job went to an Illinois rival, Justin Butterfield, considered by the administration to be a highly skilled lawyer, but in Lincoln's view, an "old fossil".^[67] The administration offered him the consolation prize of secretary or governor of the Oregon Territory. This distant territory was a Democratic stronghold, and acceptance of the post would have effectively ended his legal and political career in Illinois, so he declined and resumed his law practice.^[68]

Prairie lawyer[link]

Lincoln in his late 30s – photo taken by one of Lincoln's law students around 1846

Lincoln returned to practicing law in Springfield, handling "every kind of business that could come before a prairie lawyer".^[69] Twice a year for 16 years, 10 weeks at a time, he appeared in county seats in the midstate region when the county courts were in session.^[70] Lincoln handled many transportation cases in the midst of the nation's western expansion, particularly the conflicts arising from the operation of river barges under the many new railroad bridges. As a riverboat man, Lincoln initially favored those interests, but ultimately represented whoever hired him.^[71] His reputation grew, and he appeared before the Supreme Court of the United States, arguing a case involving a canal boat that sank after hitting a bridge.^[72] In 1849, he received a patent for a flotation device for the movement of boats in shallow water. The idea was never commercialized, but Lincoln is the only president to hold a patent.^[73][74]

In 1851, he represented Alton & Sangamon Railroad in a dispute with one of its shareholders, James A. Barret, who had refused to pay the balance on his pledge to buy shares in the railroad on the grounds that the company had changed its original train route.^[75][76] Lincoln successfully argued that the railroad company was not bound by its original charter in existence at the time of Barret's pledge; the charter was amended in the public interest to provide a newer, superior, and less expensive route, and the corporation retained the right to demand Barret's payment. The decision by the Illinois Supreme Court has been cited by numerous other courts in the nation.^[75] Lincoln appeared before the Illinois Supreme Court in 175 cases, in 51 as sole counsel, of which 31 were decided in his favor.^[77] From 1853 to 1860, another of Lincoln's largest clients was the Illinois Central Railroad.^[78]

Lincoln's most notable criminal trial occurred in 1858 when he defended William "Duff" Armstrong, who was on trial for the murder of James Preston Metzker.^[79] The case is famous for Lincoln's use of a fact established by judicial notice in order to challenge the credibility of an eyewitness. After an opposing witness testified seeing the crime in the moonlight, Lincoln produced a Farmers' Almanac showing the moon was at a low angle, drastically reducing visibility. Based on this evidence, Armstrong was acquitted.^[79] Lincoln rarely raised objections in the courtroom; but in an 1859 case, where he defended a cousin Peachy Harrison, who was accused of stabbing another to death, Lincoln angrily protested the judge's decision to exclude evidence favorable to his client. Instead of holding Lincoln in contempt of court as was expected, the judge, a Democrat, reversed his ruling, allowing the evidence and acquitting Harrison.^[79][80]

Republican politics 1854–1860[link]

Slavery and a "House Divided"[link]

By the 1850s, slavery was still legal in the southern United States, but had been generally outlawed in the northern states, such as Illinois.^[81] Lincoln disapproved of slavery, and the spread of slavery to new U.S. territory in the west.^[82] He returned to politics to oppose the pro-slavery Kansas–Nebraska Act (1854); this law repealed the slavery-restricting Missouri Compromise (1820). Senior Senator Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois had incorporated popular sovereignty into the Act. Douglas' provision, which Lincoln opposed, specified settlers had the right to determine locally whether to allow slavery in new U.S. territory, rather than have such a decision restricted by the national Congress.^[83] Foner (2010) contrasts the abolitionists and anti-slavery Radical Republicans of the Northeast who saw slavery as a sin, with the conservative Republicans who thought it was bad because it hurt white people and blocked progress. Foner argues that Lincoln was a moderate in the middle, opposing slavery primarily because it violated the republicanism principles of the Founding Fathers, especially the equality of all men and democratic self-government as expressed in the Declaration of Independence.^[84]

Portrait of Dred Scott. Lincoln denounced the Supreme Court decision in Dred Scott v. Sandford as a conspiracy to extend slavery.

On October 16, 1854, in his "Peoria Speech", Lincoln declared his opposition to slavery, which he repeated en route to the presidency.^[85] Speaking in his Kentucky accent, with a very powerful voice,^[86] he said the Kansas Act had a "declared indifference, but as I must think, a covert real zeal for the spread of slavery. I cannot but hate it. I hate it because of the monstrous injustice of slavery itself. I hate it because it deprives our republican example of its just influence in the world..."^[87]

In late 1854, Lincoln ran as a Whig for the U.S. Senate seat from Illinois. At that time, senators were elected by the state legislature.^[88] After leading in the first six rounds of voting in the Illinois assembly, his support began to dwindle, and Lincoln instructed his backers to vote for Lyman Trumbull, who defeated opponent Joel Aldrich Matteson.^[89] The Whigs had been irreparably split by the Kansas–Nebraska Act. Lincoln wrote, "I think I am a Whig, but others say there are no Whigs, and that I am an abolitionist, even though I do no more than oppose the extension of slavery."^{[cite this quote]} Drawing on remnants of the old Whig party, and on disenchanted Free Soil, Liberty, and Democratic party members, he was instrumental in forging the shape of the new Republican Party.^[90] At the 1856 Republican National Convention, Lincoln placed second in the contest to become the party's candidate for vice president.^[91]

In 1857–58, Douglas broke with President James Buchanan, leading to a fight for control of the Democratic Party. Some eastern Republicans even favored the reelection of Douglas for the Senate in 1858, since he had led the opposition to the Lecompton Constitution, which would have admitted Kansas as a slave state.^[92] In March 1857, the Supreme Court issued its decision in Dred Scott v. Sandford; Chief Justice Roger B. Taney opined that blacks were not citizens, and derived no rights from the Constitution. Lincoln denounced the decision, alleging it was the product of a conspiracy of Democrats to support the Slave Power^[93] Lincoln argued, "The authors of the Declaration of Independence never intended 'to say all were equal in color, size, intellect, moral developments, or social capacity', but they 'did consider all men created equal—equal in certain inalienable rights, among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness'."^[94]

After the state Republican party convention nominated him for the U.S. Senate in 1858, Lincoln delivered his House Divided Speech, drawing on Mark 3:25: "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."^[95] The speech created an evocative image of the danger of disunion caused by the slavery debate, and rallied Republicans across the North.^[96] The stage was then set for the campaign for statewide election of the Illinois legislature which would, in turn, select Lincoln or Douglas as its U.S. senator.^[97]

Lincoln–Douglas debates and Cooper Union speech[link]

Alexander Hessler photographed Lincoln in 1860.

The 1858 senate campaign featured the seven Lincoln–Douglas debates of 1858, the most famous political debates in American history.^[98] The principals stood in stark contrast both physically and politically. Lincoln warned that "The Slave Power" was threatening the values of republicanism, and accused Douglas of distorting the values of the Founding Fathers that all men are created equal, while Douglas emphasized his Freeport Doctrine, that local settlers were free to choose whether to allow slavery or not, and accused Lincoln of having joined the abolitionists.^[99] The debates had an atmosphere of a prize fight and drew crowds in the thousands. Lincoln stated Douglas's popular sovereignty theory was a threat to the nation's morality and that Douglas represented a conspiracy to extend slavery to free states. Douglas said that Lincoln was defying the authority of the U.S. Supreme Court and the Dred Scott decision.^[100]

Though the Republican legislative candidates won more popular votes, the Democrats won more seats, and the legislature re-elected Douglas to the Senate. Despite the bitterness of the defeat for Lincoln, his articulation of the issues gave him a national political reputation.^[101] In May 1859, Lincoln purchased the Illinois Staats-Anzeiger, a German-language newspaper which was consistently supportive; most of the state's 130,000 German Americans voted Democratic but there was Republican support that a German-language paper could mobilize.^[102]

On February 27, 1860, New York party leaders invited Lincoln to give a speech at Cooper Union to a group of powerful Republicans. Lincoln argued that the Founding Fathers had little use for popular sovereignty and had repeatedly sought to restrict slavery. Lincoln insisted the moral foundation of the Republicans required opposition to slavery, and rejected any "groping for some middle ground between the right and the wrong".^[103] Despite his inelegant appearance—many in the audience thought him awkward and even ugly^[104]—Lincoln demonstrated an intellectual leadership that brought him into the front ranks of the party and into contention for the Republican presidential nomination. Journalist Noah Brooks reported, "No man ever before made such an impression on his first appeal to a New York audience."^[105][106] Historian Donald described the speech as a "superb political move for an unannounced candidate, to appear in one rival's (William H. Seward) own state at an event sponsored by the second rival's (Salmon P. Chase) loyalists, while not mentioning either by name during its delivery."^[107] In response to an inquiry about his presidential intentions, Lincoln said, "The taste is in my mouth a little."^[108]

1860 Presidential nomination and campaign[link]

"The Rail Candidate"—Lincoln's 1860 candidacy is depicted as held up by the slavery issue—a slave on the left and party organization on the right.

On May 9–10, 1860, the Illinois Republican State Convention was held in Decatur.^[109] Lincoln's followers organized a campaign team led by David Davis, Norman Judd, Leonard Swett, and Jesse DuBois, and Lincoln received his first endorsement to run for the presidency.^[110] Exploiting the embellished legend of his frontier days with his father, Lincoln's supporters adopted the label of "The Rail Candidate".^[111] On May 18, at the Republican National Convention in Chicago, Lincoln's friends promised and manipulated and won the nomination on the third ballot, beating candidates such as William H. Seward and Salmon P. Chase. A former Democrat Hannibal Hamlin of Maine was nominated for Vice President to balance the ticket. Lincoln's success depended on his reputation as a moderate on the slavery issue, and his strong support for Whiggish programs of internal improvements and the protective tariff.^[112] On the third ballot Pennsylvania put him over the top. Pennsylvania iron interests were reassured by his support for protective tariffs.^[113] Lincoln's managers had been adroitly focused on this delegation as well as the others, while following Lincoln's strong dictate to "Make no contracts that bind me".^[114]

Most Republicans agreed with Lincoln that the North was the aggrieved party, as the Slave Power tightened its grasp on the national government with the Dred Scott decision and the presidency of James Buchanan. Throughout the 1850s, Lincoln doubted the prospects of civil war, and his supporters rejected claims that his election would incite secession.^[115] Meanwhile, Douglas was selected as the candidate of the Northern Democrats, with Herschel Vespasian Johnson as the vice-presidential candidate. Delegates from 11 slave states walked out of the Democratic convention, disagreeing with Douglas's position on popular sovereignty, and ultimately selected John C. Breckinridge as their candidate.^[116]

As Douglas and the other candidates went through with their campaigns, Lincoln was the only one of them who gave no speeches. Instead, he monitored the campaign closely and relied on the enthusiasm of the Republican Party. The party did the leg work that produced majorities across the North, and produced an abundance of campaign posters, leaflets, and newspaper editorials. There were thousands of Republican speakers who focused first on the party platform, and second on Lincoln's life story, emphasizing his childhood poverty. The goal was to demonstrate the superior power of "free labor", whereby a common farm boy could work his way to the top by his own efforts.^[117] The Republican Party's production of campaign literature dwarfed the combined opposition; a Chicago Tribune writer produced a pamphlet that detailed Lincoln's life, and sold 100,000 to 200,000 copies.^[118]

Presidency[link]

1860 election and secession[link]

In 1860, northern and western electoral votes (shown in red) put Lincoln into the White House.

1861 inaugural at Capitol. The rotunda still under construction

On November 6, 1860, Lincoln was elected the 16th president of the United States, beating Democrat Stephen A. Douglas, John C. Breckinridge of the Southern Democrats, and John Bell of the new Constitutional Union Party. He was the first president from the Republican Party. Winning entirely on the strength of his support in the North and West, no ballots were cast for him in 10 of the 15 Southern slave states, and he won only two of 996 counties in all the Southern states.^[119] Lincoln received 1,866,452 votes, Douglas 1,376,957 votes, Breckinridge 849,781 votes, and Bell 588,789 votes. Turnout was 82.2 percent, with Lincoln winning the free Northern states, as well as California and Oregon. Douglas won Missouri, and split New Jersey with Lincoln.^[120] Bell won Virginia, Tennessee, and Kentucky, and Breckinridge won the rest of the South.^[121] Although Lincoln won only a plurality of the popular vote, his victory in the electoral college was decisive: Lincoln had 180 and his opponents added together had only 123. There were fusion tickets in which all of Lincoln's opponents combined to support the same slate of Electors in New York, New Jersey, and Rhode Island, but even if the anti-Lincoln vote had been combined in every state, Lincoln still would have won a majority in the Electoral College.^[122]

As Lincoln's election became evident, secessionists made clear their intent to leave the Union before he took office the next March.^[123] On December 20, 1860, South Carolina took the lead by adopting an ordinance of secession; by February 1, 1861, Florida, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas followed.^[124][125] Six of these states then adopted a constitution and declared themselves to be a sovereign nation, the Confederate States of America.^[124] The upper South and border states (Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky, Missouri, and Arkansas) listened to, but initially rejected, the secessionist appeal.^[126] President Buchanan and President-elect Lincoln refused to recognize the Confederacy, declaring secession illegal.^[127] The Confederacy selected Jefferson Davis as its provisional President on February 9, 1861.^[128]

There were attempts at compromise. The Crittenden Compromise would have extended the Missouri Compromise line of 1820, dividing the territories into slave and free, contrary to the Republican Party's free-soil platform.^[129] Lincoln rejected the idea, saying, "I will suffer death before I consent ... to any concession or compromise which looks like buying the privilege to take possession of this government to which we have a constitutional right."^[130] Lincoln, however, did support the Corwin Amendment to the Constitution, which had passed in Congress and protected slavery in those states where it already existed.^[131] A few weeks before the war, he went so far as to pen a letter to every governor asking for their support in ratifying the Corwin Amendment as a means to avoid secession.^[132]

En route to his inauguration by train, Lincoln addressed crowds and legislatures across the North.^[133] The president-elect then evaded possible assassins in Baltimore, who were uncovered by Lincoln's head of security, Allan Pinkerton. On February 23, 1861, he arrived in disguise in Washington, D.C., which was placed under substantial military guard.^[134] Lincoln directed his inaugural address to the South, proclaiming once again that he had no intention, or inclination, to abolish slavery in the Southern states:

Apprehension seems to exist among the people of the Southern States that by the accession of a Republican Administration their property and their peace and personal security are to be endangered. There has never been any reasonable cause for such apprehension. Indeed, the most ample evidence to the contrary has all the while existed and been open to their inspection. It is found in nearly all the published speeches of him who now addresses you. I do but quote from one of those speeches when I declare that "I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so."

—First inaugural address, 4 March 1861^[135]

The President ended his address with an appeal to the people of the South: "We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies ... The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield, and patriot grave, to every living heart and hearthstone, all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature."^[136] The failure of the Peace Conference of 1861 signaled that legislative compromise was implausible. By March 1861, no leaders of the insurrection had proposed rejoining the Union on any terms. Meanwhile, Lincoln and nearly every Republican leader agreed that the dismantling of the Union could not be tolerated.^[137]

War begins[link]

Major Anderson, Ft. Sumter commander

The commander of Fort Sumter, South Carolina, Major Robert Anderson sent a request for provisions to Washington, and the execution of Lincoln's order to meet that request was seen by the secessionists as an act of war. On April 12, 1861, Confederate forces fired on Union troops at Fort Sumter, forcing them to surrender, and began the war. Historian Allan Nevins argued that the newly inaugurated Lincoln made three miscalculations: underestimating the gravity of the crisis, exaggerating the strength of Unionist sentiment in the South, and not realizing the Southern Unionists were insisting there be no invasion.^[138] William Tecumseh Sherman talked to Lincoln during inauguration week and was "sadly disappointed" at his failure to realize that "the country was sleeping on a volcano" and that the South was preparing for war.^[139] Donald concludes that, "His repeated efforts to avoid collision in the months between inauguration and the firing on Ft. Sumter showed he adhered to his vow not to be the first to shed fraternal blood. But he also vowed not to surrender the forts. The only resolution of these contradictory positions was for the confederates to fire the first shot; they did just that."^[140]

On April 15, Lincoln called on all the states to send detachments totaling 75,000 troops to recapture forts, protect Washington, and "preserve the Union", which, in his view, still existed intact despite the actions of the seceding states. This call forced the states to choose sides. Virginia declared its secession and was rewarded with the Confederate capital, despite the exposed position of Richmond so close to Union lines. North Carolina, Tennessee, and Arkansas also voted for secession over the next two months. Secession sentiment was strong in Missouri and Maryland, but did not prevail; Kentucky tried to be neutral.^[141]

Troops headed south towards Washington to protect the capital in response to Lincoln's call. On April 19, secessionist mobs in Baltimore that controlled the rail links attacked Union troops traveling to the capital. George William Brown, the Mayor of Baltimore, and other suspect Maryland politicians were arrested and imprisoned, without a warrant, as Lincoln suspended the writ of habeas corpus.^[142] John Merryman, a leader in the secessionist group in Maryland, petitioned Chief Justice Roger B. Taney to issue a writ of habeas corpus, saying holding Merryman without a hearing was unlawful. Taney issued the writ, thereby ordering Merryman's release, but Lincoln ignored it. Then and throughout the war, Lincoln came under heavy, often vituperative attack from antiwar Democrats, called Copperheads.^[143]

Assuming command for the Union in the war[link]

After the fall of Fort Sumter, Lincoln realized the importance of taking immediate executive control of the war and making an overall strategy to put down the rebellion. Lincoln encountered an unprecedented political and military crisis, and he responded as commander-in-chief, using unprecedented powers. He expanded his war powers, and imposed a blockade on all the Confederate shipping ports, disbursed funds before appropriation by Congress, and after suspending habeas corpus, arrested and imprisoned thousands of suspected Confederate sympathizers. Lincoln was supported by Congress and the northern public for these actions. In addition, Lincoln had to contend with reinforcing strong Union sympathies in the border slave states and keeping the war from becoming an international conflict.^[144]

"Running the 'Machine' ": An 1864 political cartoon takes a swing at Lincoln's administration—featuring William Fessenden, Edwin Stanton, William Seward, Gideon Welles, Lincoln and others.

The war effort was the source of continued disparagement of Lincoln, and dominated his time and attention. From the start, it was clear that bipartisan support would be essential to success in the war effort, and any manner of compromise alienated factions on both sides of the aisle, such as the appointment of Republicans and Democrats to command positions in the Union Army. Copperheads criticized Lincoln for refusing to compromise on the slavery issue. Conversely, the Radical Republicans criticized him for moving too slowly in abolishing slavery.^[145] On August 6, 1861, Lincoln signed the Confiscation Act that authorized judiciary proceedings to confiscate and free slaves who were used to support the Confederate war effort. In practice the law had little effect, but it did signal political support for abolishing slavery in the Confederacy^[146]

In late August 1861, General John C. Frémont, the 1856 Republican presidential nominee, issued, without consulting Washington, a proclamation of martial law in Missouri. He declared that any citizen found bearing arms could be court-martialed and shot, and that slaves of persons aiding the rebellion would be freed. Frémont was already under a cloud with charges of negligence in his command of the Department of the West compounded with allegations of fraud and corruption. Lincoln overruled Frémont's proclamation. Lincoln believed that Fremont's emancipation was political; neither militarily necessary nor legal.^[147] Union enlistments from Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri increased by over 40,000 troops.^[148]

The Trent Affair of late 1861 threatened war with Great Britain. The U.S. Navy illegally intercepted a British merchant ship the Trent on the high seas and seized two Confederate envoys; Britain protested vehemently while the U.S. cheered. Lincoln resolved the issue by releasing the two men and war was successfully averted with Britain.^[149] Lincoln's foreign policy approach had been initially hands off, due to his inexperience; he left most diplomacy appointments and other foreign policy matters to his Secretary of State, William Seward. Seward's initial reaction to the Trent affair, however, was too bellicose, so Lincoln also turned to Senator Charles Sumner, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and an expert in British diplomacy.^[150]

To learn technical military terms, Lincoln borrowed and studied Henry Halleck's book, Elements of Military Art and Science from the Library of Congress.^[151] Lincoln painstakingly monitored the telegraphic reports coming in to the War Department in Washington, D.C. He kept close tabs on all phases of the military effort, consulted with governors, and selected generals based on their past success (as well as their state and party). In January 1862, after many complaints of inefficiency and profiteering in the War Department, Lincoln replaced Simon Cameron with Edwin Stanton as War Secretary. Stanton was one of many conservative Democrats (he supported Breckenridge in the 1860 election) who became anti-slavery Republicans under Lincoln's leadership.^[152] In terms of war strategy, Lincoln articulated two priorities: to ensure that Washington was well-defended, and to conduct an aggressive war effort that would satisfy the demand in the North for prompt, decisive victory; major Northern newspaper editors expected victory within 90 days.^[153] Twice a week, Lincoln would meet with his cabinet in the afternoon, and occasionally Mary Lincoln would force him to take a carriage ride because she was concerned he was working too hard.^[154] Lincoln learned from his chief of staff General Henry Halleck, a student of the European strategist Jomini, of the critical need to control strategic points, such as the Mississippi River;^[155] he also knew well the importance of Vicksburg and understood the necessity of defeating the enemy's army, rather than simply capturing territory.^[156]

General McClellan[link]

After the Union defeat at the First Battle of Bull Run and the retirement of the aged Winfield Scott in late 1861, Lincoln appointed Major General George B. McClellan general-in-chief of all the Union armies.^[157] McClellan, a young West Point graduate, railroad executive, and Pennsylvania Democrat, took several months to plan and attempt his Peninsula Campaign, longer than Lincoln wanted. The campaign's objective was to capture Richmond by moving the Army of the Potomac by boat to the peninsula and then overland to the Confederate capital. McClellan's repeated delays frustrated Lincoln and Congress, as did his position that no troops were needed to defend Washington. Lincoln insisted on holding some of McClellan's troops in defense of the capital; McClellan, who consistently overestimated the strength of Confederate troops, blamed this decision for the ultimate failure of the Peninsula Campaign.^[158]

Lincoln and McClellan after the Battle of Antietam

Lincoln removed McClellan as general-in-chief and appointed Henry Wager Halleck in March 1862, after McClellan's "Harrison's Landing Letter", in which he offered unsolicited political advice to Lincoln urging caution in the war effort.^[159] McClellan's letter incensed Radical Republicans, who successfully pressured Lincoln to appoint John Pope, a Republican, as head of the new Army of Virginia. Pope complied with Lincoln's strategic desire to move toward Richmond from the north, thus protecting the capital from attack. However, lacking requested reinforcements from McClellan, now commanding the Army of the Potomac, Pope was soundly defeated at the Second Battle of Bull Run in the summer of 1862, forcing the Army of the Potomac to defend Washington for a second time.^[160] The war also expanded with naval operations in 1862 when the CSS Virginia, formerly the USS Merrimack, damaged or destroyed three Union vessels in Norfolk, Virginia, before being engaged and damaged by the USS Monitor. Lincoln closely reviewed the dispatches and interrogated naval officers during their clash in the Battle of Hampton Roads.^[161]

Despite his dissatisfaction with McClellan's failure to reinforce Pope, Lincoln was desperate, and restored him to command of all forces around Washington, to the dismay of all in his cabinet but Seward.^[162] Two days after McClellan's return to command, General Robert E. Lee's forces crossed the Potomac River into Maryland, leading to the Battle of Antietam in September 1862.^[163] The ensuing Union victory was among the bloodiest in American history, but it enabled Lincoln to announce that he would issue an Emancipation Proclamation in January. Having composed the Proclamation some time earlier, Lincoln had waited for a military victory to publish it to avoid it being perceived as the product of desperation.^[164] McClellan then resisted the President's demand that he pursue Lee's retreating and exposed army, while his counterpart General Don Carlos Buell likewise refused orders to move the Army of the Ohio against rebel forces in eastern Tennessee. As a result, Lincoln replaced Buell with William Rosecrans; and, after the 1862 midterm elections, he replaced McClellan with Republican Ambrose Burnside. Both of these replacements were political moderates and prospectively more supportive of the Commander-in-Chief.^[165]

Burnside, against the advice of the president, prematurely launched an offensive across the Rappahannock River and was stunningly defeated by Lee at Fredericksburg in December. Not only had Burnside been defeated on the battlefield, but his soldiers were disgruntled and undisciplined. Desertions during 1863 were in the thousands and they increased after Fredericksburg.^[166] Lincoln brought in Joseph Hooker, despite his record of loose talk about the need for a military dictatorship.^[167]

The mid-term elections in 1862 brought the Republicans severe losses due to sharp disfavor with the administration over its failure to deliver a speedy end to the war, as well as rising inflation, new high taxes, rumors of corruption, the suspension of habeas corpus, the military draft law, and fears that freed slaves would undermine the labor market. The Emancipation Proclamation announced in September gained votes for the Republicans in the rural areas of New England and the upper Midwest, but it lost votes in the cities and the lower Midwest. While Republicans were discouraged, Democrats were energized and did especially well in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and New York. The Republicans did maintain their majorities in Congress and in the major states, except New York. The Cincinnati Gazette contended that the voters were "depressed by the interminable nature of this war, as so far conducted, and by the rapid exhaustion of the national resources without progress".^[168]

In the spring of 1863, Lincoln was optimistic about upcoming campaigns to the point of thinking the end of the war could be near if a string of victories could be put together; these plans included Hooker's attack on Lee north of Richmond, Rosecrans' on Chattanooga, Grant's on Vicksburg, and a naval assault on Charleston.^[169]

Hooker was routed by Lee at the Battle of Chancellorsville in May,^[170] but continued to command his troops for some weeks. He ignored Lincoln's order to divide his troops, and possibly force Lee to do the same in Harper's Ferry, and tendered his resignation, which Lincoln accepted. He was replaced by George Meade, who followed Lee into Pennsylvania for the Gettysburg Campaign, which was a victory for the Union, though Lee's army avoided capture. At the same time, after initial setbacks, Grant laid siege to Vicksburg and the Union navy attained some success in Charleston harbor.^[171] After the Battle of Gettysburg, Lincoln clearly understood that his military decisions would be more effectively carried out by conveying his orders through his War Secretary or his general-in-chief on to his generals, who resented his civilian interference with their own plans. Even so, he often continued to give detailed directions to his generals as Commander in Chief.^[172]

Emancipation Proclamation[link]

Lincoln presents the first draft of the Emancipation Proclamation to his cabinet. Painted by Francis Bicknell Carpenter in 1864

Lincoln understood that the Federal government's power to end slavery was limited by the Constitution, which before 1865, committed the issue to individual states. He argued before and during his election that the eventual extinction of slavery would result from preventing its expansion into new U.S. territory. At the beginning of the war, he also sought to persuade the states to accept compensated emancipation in return for their prohibition of slavery (an offer that took effect only in Washington, D.C., in April 1862). Lincoln believed that curtailing slavery in these ways would economically expunge it, as envisioned by the Founding Fathers, under the constitution.^[173] President Lincoln rejected two geographically limited emancipation attempts by Major General John C. Frémont in August 1861 and by Major General David Hunter in May 1862, on the grounds that it was not within their power, and it would upset the border states loyal to the Union.^[174]

On June 19, 1862, endorsed by Lincoln, Congress passed an act banning slavery on all federal territory. In July 1862, the Second Confiscation Act was passed, which set up court procedures that could free the slaves of anyone convicted of aiding the rebellion. Although Lincoln believed it was not within Congress's power to free the slaves within the states, he approved the bill in deference to the legislature. He felt such action could only be taken by the commander-in-chief using war powers granted to the president by the Constitution, and Lincoln was planning to take that action. In that month, Lincoln discussed a draft of the Emancipation Proclamation with his cabinet. In it, he stated that "as a fit and necessary military measure, on January 1, 1863, all persons held as slaves in the Confederate states will thenceforward, and forever, be free."^[175]

Privately, Lincoln concluded at this point that the war could not be won without freeing the slaves. However Confederate and anti-war propagandists had success spreading the theme that emancipation was a stumbling block to peace and reunification. Republican editor Horace Greeley of the highly influential New York Tribune fell for the ploy.^[176] and Lincoln refuted it directly in a shrewd letter of August 22, 1862. The President said the primary goal of his actions as president (he used the first person pronoun and explicitly refers to his "official duty") was preserving the Union:^[177]

My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. 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. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union. . . . [¶] 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.^[178]

The Emancipation Proclamation, issued on September 22, 1862, and put into effect on January 1, 1863, declared free the slaves in 10 states not then under Union control, with exemptions specified for areas already under Union control in two states.^[179] Once the abolition of slavery in the rebel states became a military objective, as Union armies advanced south, more slaves were liberated until over three million of them in Confederate territory were freed. Lincoln's comment on the signing of the Proclamation was: "I never, in my life, felt more certain that I was doing right, than I do in signing this paper."^[180] For some time, Lincoln continued earlier plans to set up colonies for the newly freed slaves. He commented favorably on colonization in the Emancipation Proclamation, but all attempts at such a massive undertaking failed.^[181] A few days after Emancipation was announced, 13 Republican governors met at the War Governors' Conference; they supported the president's Proclamation, but suggested the removal of General George B. McClellan as commander of the Union Army.^[182]