Abraham Lincoln and the secession of the Southern states

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Abraham Lincoln and the secession of the
Southern states
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The Life of Lincoln

• The child of uneducated farmers
• Never really fit in
• By adulthood, he was 64
• Mostly self-educated
• Refused to hunt because he believed killing any
  kind of animal was wrong
• Unsuccessfully ran for the Illinois General
  Assembly at the age of 23
• Two years later, he ran for the state legislature
  and won (four times in a row!)
• Began teaching himself law at age 25

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The Life of Lincoln

• Even without a formal education, Lincoln became
  one of the most successful lawyers in Illinois
• At age 28, he protested against slavery for the
  first time, not because he viewed African
  Americans as equals, but because it was founded
  on both injustice and bad policy
• Five years later, Lincoln married Mary Todd and
  fathered 4 children (though only one lived to see
  adulthood)

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Mary Todd
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The Life of Lincoln

• 1846 Successfully ran for the U.S. House of
  Representatives
• God of Heaven has forgotten to defend the weak
  and innocent, and permitted the strong band of
  murderers and demons from hell to kill men,
  women, and children, and lay waste and pillage
  the land of the just. - Lincoln
• His speech tarnished his reputation so he didnt
  run for reelection
• Practiced law for the next 12 years

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The Life of Lincoln

• In 1858, he lost against Stephen Douglas for a
  seat in the U.S. Senate
• Finally, in 1860, after 28 bumpy years in
  politics, Lincoln was elected as the 16th
  president of the United States of America

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Winner

• Winner of the Popular Vote Abraham Lincoln
• Runner up Stephen Douglas
• Winner of the Electoral College Abraham Lincoln
• Runner up John Breckinridge

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Lincoln Becomes President

• Southerners threatened to secede from the Union
• Secession The act of withdrawing a state from
  the Union
• Most Northerners viewed secession as illegal
• In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow
  countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous
  issue of civil war. The government will not
  assail you.... You have no oath registered in
  Heaven to destroy the government, while I shall
  have the most solemn one to preserve, protect and
  defend it. Abraham Lincoln
• Southerners viewed secession as legal through
  states rights (the belief that every state has
  rights that the federal government cannot
  overruleevery state chose to join the Union,
  therefore, they could leave it)

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Secession Begins

• Dec. 1860 South Carolina became the first state
  to secede from the Union
• Mississippi
• Florida
• Alabama
• Georgia
• Louisiana
• Texas
• By 1862, eleven states seceded from the Union

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Missouri, Kentucky, West Virginia, Delaware, and
Maryland were the five slave states that remained
part of the Union (United States).
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Confederate States of America

• Modeled after the United States of America with
  several exceptions
• Slavery was legal in any state or territory that
  wanted it to be legal
• States were given more rights
• Elected Jefferson Davis as president
• Mismanaged almost every aspect of the government
  and war effort

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The Final Straw

• The Crittenden Compromise An attempt to settle
  the differences between the North and the South
• The bill was defeated in the Senate
• Various other attempts to settle the dispute only
  succeeded in angering both sides
• Attack on Fort Sumter
• South Carolina attacked Fort Sumter to prevent
  the Union from shipping war supplies into the
  South
• Began the American Civil War

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Why attack?
Fort Sumter