This is dedicated to Mrs.Groves

Once upon 160 years ago Abraham Lincoln was elected as the president. If you don’t know who Abraham Lincoln is he is on the 5 dollar bill. He was also apart of the Republican Party. Lincoln was running up against John Breckinridge, Lincoln got a total of 180 electoral votes and John got a total of 72 electoral votes.

The force of events moved very quickly after the election of Lincoln.  People weren’t seeing eye to eye about some situations. Southerners thought that is needed to keep slavery. The Union on the other side believed that slavery was wrong and white people could do things for themselves.

South Carolina acted first, calling for a deal to secede from the Union. State by state, conventions were held, and the southerners came up with the Confederacy. Within three months of Lincoln's election, seven states had moved away  from the Union. The states were Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, Texas, Arkansas, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Virgina.

The election of 1860 was a pivotal year in our history. Seven southern states seceded from the Union immediately after the election of Abraham Lincoln. South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Louisiana, and Texas were all known as those confederate states.   The South was convinced that President Lincoln was going to end slavery. President Lincoln did want to end slavery.

As America was moving to the 1860’s slavery was still dividing the nation. Lincoln believed it was prudent to administer a slow death to slavery through gradual emancipation and voluntary colonization rather than to follow the abolitionists he  demanded an immediate end to slavery without compensation to owners.

State and Confederate government authorities seized federal forts, arsenals, and other national property within their jurisdiction. When Abraham Lincoln was inaugurated on March 4, 1861, federal troops held only Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor, Fort Pickens off the Florida coast, and one or two other outposts in the South.