Friday, September 18, 2009

Who were the other three candidates running against Lincoln in his first election?

Lincoln won the presidency in 1860 due to a split in the Democratic Party. The Northern Democrats selected Senator Stephen A. Douglas; his claim to fame was the popular sovereignty bill that created the bloody conflict between slaveholders and abolitionists in Kansas. Douglas only won his home state of Missouri in the 1860 election. Southern Democrats selected John Breckenridge as their candidate. The Lower South supported Breckenridge as a bloc because of his pro-slavery stance. The final candidate was John Bell of Tennessee, who ran on the Constitutional Union ticket. He was popular in Virginia, Tennessee, and Kentucky. His party was neutral on the slavery issue. Allcandidates won electoral votes — I am enclosing an electoral map. Lincoln ultimately won with less than fifty percent of the popular vote.  

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Thomas Jefferson's election in 1800 is sometimes called the Revolution of 1800. Why could it be described in this way?

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