Abraham Lincoln, the 16th President

The Civil War, the war "testing whether that nation, or any nation, so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure", which Lincoln both birthed and guided the nation through, has established himself, as if sculpted into Black Hills granite, into national rememberance. His championing the absolution of slavery has endeared him to our memory, launched him to the White House, and divided a nation.

He was a native Kentuckian, turned lawyer, then Illinois politician. Somewhere he became a gifted orator, though lost to Stephen Douglas. Yet that loss, like Reagan's to Ford, established himself on the national scene.

Lincoln was moral, and morally-guided. It helps that I agree with those morals, but it helps that his side won, else I might have altogether different views. And the victory, his ensuring that the union survived, is as important as his adherence to the prohibition of slavery. Had the union failed it is very likely that rivals would have viewed each other warily and hostily across the Potomac, the Mason-Dixon line, and however else the continent would then be divided up. Lastly, his effort at reconciliation in the post-bellum period was equally important as he did not seek to exact revenge on the ceded states.

All that said, I'm not sure if I would have prosecuted a war to maintain the union. That is a moral dilemma: to kill to abolish slavery. To shackle a man to the grave in order to unshackle his slave. Aye, there's the rub. Yet Lincoln was resolved and was able to resolve men to kill their brothers, fathers, and sons.

And he was a very capable commander-in-chief. He fired generals who weren't performing. He stayed the course with Scott's Anaconda Plan.