Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Historic Site

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Lincoln, Abraham (1809–65), 16th President of the U.S. (1861–65), was born in a log cabin in Kentucky, of a typically illiterate and shiftless frontier family. They soon migrated to another place in Kentucky, then to the Indiana woods, where the boy labored on the homestead, garnered a little learning in frontier schools, avoided church membership, and pursued his bent for reading in what books he could obtain. In 1830 the Lincolns moved to Illinois, where Abraham temporarily helped to build the new cabin, split fence rails, and otherwise assist in the tasks of homesteading. After navigating a flatboat to New Orleans, he returned to New Salem, Ill., where he spent six formative years (1831–37) working at odd jobs, studying, reading law, making a wide personal acquaintance, and serving as surveyor, postmaster, captain of volunteers in the Black Hawk War, and in the state legislature (1834–41). As a Clay Whig, he supported the Bank of the United States, opposed Jackson and Van Buren, and opposed the Abolitionists because he thought they tended to increase the evils of slavery. Meanwhile Lincoln courted Ann Rutledge, whose father kept the inn where he boarded. Her sudden death (1835), while Lincoln's suit was unsettled, has led to a great deal of sentimental conjecture. His peculiar courtship of and marriage to Mary Todd has also become part of the Lincoln legend.

He was a practicing attorney, beginning in 1836 at New Salem and then at Springfield, and served in Congress (1847–49), opposing the Mexican War as a Democratic‐fomented campaign for the extension of slave territory, and consequently becoming unpopular in his home state. In his legal practice he now had as a partner William H. Herndon, whose papers afford an important source of information on the future President. Not only as a circuit‐riding lawyer, but also in the higher courts, he was noted for his thoroughness, shrewdness, common sense, and ability to argue a case. He became a good stump speaker, known for his clear, pithy, and witty statements, brilliant by contrast with the trite verbosity then common.

After an unsuccessful campaign for the senatorship (1855), he became a Republican at the formation of the new party, and at the state convention (1856) was a leading figure because of his adroit and earnest dealing with the problem of slavery. As the Republican nominee for the U.S. Senate (1858), he delivered in the party convention his famous speech declaring, “A house divided against itself cannot stand.” He challenged his opponent, Stephen Douglas, to seven debates in which he showed the Democrat's inconsistency in favoring both popular sovereignty and the Dred Scott decision, and stressed a conservative attitude toward antislavery, thus winning many followers who disliked outright Abolitionism. Although Douglas won the election, Lincoln's fame was greatly enhanced. In his Cooper Union speech (Feb. 27, 1860), as a potential presidential candidate, he spoke against slavery in the territories, and through his conservative and dignified attitude increased his power in the East. He was elected to the presidency in 1860 by a considerable electoral majority over Douglas and Breckinridge, although he lacked the popular vote.

Prior to his inauguration, the secession movement grew rapidly in the South. While Lincoln was still new in the executive functions, and his power was being threatened by members of his own cabinet, he vacillated and for some time failed to take a clear stand in relation to the firing on Fort Sumter. From the outbreak of the Civil War until the convening of Congress (July 1861), he treated the conflict as a huge insurrection to be met by executive measures, summoning the militia, proclaiming a blockade, expanding the army beyond the legal limit, directing governmental expenditures, suspending habeas corpus, and launching many military measures. During the progress of the war, he so extended his executive powers that he became a virtual dictator. Although faced with dissension in his cabinet and his own party, with radical Abolitionism on one side and defeatist cries for peace on the other, and despite maladjusted governmental and military functions, he managed to steer a middle course, favoring a war policy that was as little vengeful as possible. In military affairs there was confusion, ignorance, personal ambition, political pressure, lack of morale, and experimentation, which brought the pressure of military duties directly upon him. He nevertheless remained tolerant, selfless, and moderate. His search for a winning commander in chief led him to try in turn McClellan, Pope, Burnside, Hooker, Meade, and Grant.

The most famous of his executive acts was the Emancipation Proclamation (1862), which freed slaves in rebellious territory, while those in loyal or conquered states were to be freed by later legislation. As it was naturally ineffective in Confederate‐controlled areas, the Proclamation was largely an announcement of Lincoln's aims and policies, and had a great moral effect. Foreign affairs and the threat of war with Great Britain were primarily handled by his secretary of state, Seward, although Lincoln aided in preserving a moderate policy. He made few public addresses, except for his inaugurals, the Gettysburg Address (1863), and the speech on Reconstruction (April 1865). To express his attitude, he depended greatly upon letters addressed to individuals or delegations, intended for public consumption.

In 1864, during an atmosphere of national depression, war weariness, low financial credit, and sniping from defeatists, radicals, and other dissatisfied elements, Lincoln was nevertheless reelected over McClellan. His second inaugural address loftily declared, “With malice toward none; with charity for all, let us strive on to finish the work we are in …to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace….” He advocated a fair restoration of the Southern states to the Union, pardoning Confederates who would swear allegiance and promoting loyal governments in the Southern states, and, though he insisted on reunion and the abolition of slavery, he was generous concerning collateral issues. He was shot by John Wilkes Booth (April 14, 1865) and died the following morning. Stanton's comment, “Now he belongs to the ages,” separates the real Lincoln, who encountered calumny, hatred, and misinterpretation of his plans, from the legendary Lincoln, who has been raised to the status of a symbol of American democracy and the Union.

The President's writing, in speeches and letters, is famous for its homespun dignity, lucidity of thought, trenchancy of expression, richness of idea, flexibility of style, adaptability to the audience, and peculiarly American flavor. He was close to the homely idiom of the common man, and his pungent provincialisms and native humor derive from his frontier education and account for his enthusiasm for such humorists as Artemus Ward. There are many collections of anecdotes attributed to him; his letters, speeches, and state papers have been frequently published; and his Complete Writings was edited by John Hay and J.G. Nicolay (2 vols., 1894, enlarged to 12 vols., 1905). But to this compilation have been added many others, such as New Letters and Papers of Lincoln (1930), edited by Paul Angle; The Lincoln Papers (2 vols., 1948), from family‐owned documents given to the Library of Congress; and the Collected Works (9 vols., 1953), edited by Roy P. Basler.

Biographies began with lives written for presidential campaigns, including one by William Dean Howells in 1860 and one by Henry Jarvis Raymond in 1864. Later lives include Herndon's Lincoln (1889); Nicolay and Hay's Abraham Lincoln: A History (10 vols., 1890), based on the papers of his secretaries and some of the President's; Ida Tarbell's Life (2 vols., 1900), using a wide variety of sources; Lord Charnwood's Abraham Lincoln (1916), a British interpretation; Sandburg's six‐volume study (1926, 1939); Beveridge's Life (2 vols., 1928), emphasizing the early career; Edgar Lee Master's Lincoln, the Man (1931), which attacks its subject as it praises Douglas; James G. Randall's scholarly account (4 vols., 1945–55); and compilations including an Autobiography (1926), drawn from various sources, and a day‐by‐day calendar.

Lincoln figures frequently in literature. Poems honoring him include Whitman's O Captain! My Captain! and When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd, Lowell's Commemoration Ode, Edwin Markham's Lincoln, Robinson's The Master, and Vachel Lindsay's Abraham Lincoln Walks at Midnight. The historical fiction in which he figures is less distinguished although it is plentiful, including Edward Eggleston's The Graysons (1888); Winston Churchill's The Crisis (1901); Upton Sinclair's Manassas (1904); Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews's The Perfect Tribute (1906); Irving Bacheller's A Man for the Ages (1919); Honoré Wilson Morrow's trilogy, Forever Free (1927), With Malice Toward None (1928), and The Last Full Measure (1930); and the more esteemed Lincoln: A Novel (1984) by Gore Vidal. The best known treatments in drama are John Drinkwater's Abraham Lincoln (1919) and Robert Sherwood's Abe Lincoln in Illinois (1938).

Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Historic Site 117 acres (47 hectares), central Ky., near Hodgenville; est. 1916. Abraham Lincoln was born in a log cabin in this area on Feb. 12, 1809. The exact location of the original cabin has not been conclusively established, but evidence seems to indicate that it was situated on top of the knoll where the memorial building stands. Inside the building is the log cabin traditionally accepted as Lincoln's birthplace. See National Parks and Monuments (table).

Lincoln Home National Historic Site see National Parks and Monuments (table).