page_title: Abraham Lincoln
section_title: Presidency
hierarchical_section_title: Abraham Lincoln / Presidency
caption_attribution_description: "Hon. Abraham Lincoln, Republican candidate for the presidency, 1860" - Lithograph by Leopold Grozelier, et al, showing the young Abraham Lincoln, before he grew his iconic beard. According to the Library of Congress, "Thomas Hicks painted a portrait of Lincoln at his office in Springfield specifically for this lithograph." This painting is in the collections of the Chicago Historical Society.
context_page_description: Abraham Lincoln was an American politician. He was the 16th President of the United States. He was president from 1861 to 1865, during the American Civil War. Just five days after most of the Confederate forces had surrendered and the war was ending, John Wilkes Booth assassinated Lincoln for being a tyrant. Lincoln was the first president of the United States to be assassinated. Lincoln has been remembered as the "Great Emancipator" because he worked to end slavery in the United States.
context_section_description: Lincoln was chosen as a candidate for the elections in 1860 for different reasons. Among these reasons were that his views on slavery were less extreme than those of other people who wanted to be candidates.  Lincoln was from what was then one of the Western states, and had a bigger chance of winning the election there. Other candidates that were older or more experienced than him had enemies inside the party.  Lincoln's family was poor, which added to the Republican position of free labor, the opposite of slave labor. Lincoln won the election in 1860, and was made the 16th President of the United States.  He won with almost no votes in the South. For the first time, a president had won the election because of the large support he got from the states in the North. During his presidency Lincoln became well-known because of his large stovepipe hat. He used his tall hat to store papers and documents when he was traveling.
caption: A sketch of candidate Abraham Lincoln
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