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United States presidential election, 1860

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File:BreckTT.jpg Nominee Abraham Lincoln John C. Breckinridge Party Republican Democratic Home state Illinois Kentucky Running mate Hannibal Hamlin Joseph Lane Electoral vote 180 72 States carried 18 11 Popular vote 1,865,908 848,019 Percentage 39.8% 18.1%   Nominee John Bell Stephen A. Douglas Party Constitutional Union Democratic Home state Tennessee Illinois Running mate Edward Everett Herschel Vespasian Johnson Electoral vote 39 12 States carried 3 1 Popular vote 590,901 1,380,201 Percentage 12.6% 29.5%

Presidential election results map. Red denotes states won by Lincoln/Hamlin, spring green denotes those won by Breckinridge/Lane, orange denotes those won by Bell/Everett, and blue denotes those won by Douglas/Johnson. Numbers indicate the number of electoral votes allotted to each state.

President before election James Buchanan Democratic Elected President Abraham Lincoln Republican

The United States presidential election of 1860 set the stage for the American Civil War. The nation had been divided throughout most of the 1850s on questions of states' rights and slavery in the territories. In 1860 this issue finally came to a head, fracturing the formerly dominant Democratic Party into Southern and Northern factions and bringing Abraham Lincoln and the Republican Party to power without the support of a single Southern state.

The immediate result of Lincoln's victory was declarations of secession by South Carolina and other states, which were rejected as illegal by the then-current President, James Buchanan and President-elect Abraham Lincoln.

Background

The origins of the American Civil War lay in the complex issues of slavery, competing understandings of federalism, party politics, expansionism, sectionalism, tariffs, economics, and modernization in the Antebellum Period.

After the Mexican-American War, the issue of slavery in the new territories led to the Compromise of 1850. While the compromise averted an immediate political crisis, it did not permanently resolve the issue of The Slave Power (the power of slaveholders to control the national government).

Amid the emergence of increasingly virulent and hostile sectional ideologies in national politics, the collapse of the old Second Party System in the 1850s hampered efforts of the politicians to reach yet one more compromise. The compromise that was reached (the Kansas-Nebraska Act) outraged many northerners. In the 1850s, with the rise of the Republican Party, the first major party with no appeal in the South, the industrializing North and agrarian Midwest became committed to the economic ethos of free-labor industrial capitalism.

Nominations

Republican Party nomination

Republican candidates:

• Abraham Lincoln, former U.S. representative from Illinois
• William H. Seward, U.S. senator from New York
• Simon Cameron, U.S. senator from Pennsylvania
• Salmon P. Chase, former U.S. governor of Ohio
• Edward Bates, former U.S. representative from Missouri

Candidates gallery

• Former Representative Abraham Lincoln of Illinois
• Senator William H. Seward of New York
• Senator Simon Cameron of Pennsylvania
• Former Governor of Ohio Salmon P. Chase
• Former Representative Edward Bates of Missouri

The Republican National Convention met in mid-May, after the Democrats had been forced to adjourn their convention in Charleston. With the Democrats in disarray and with a sweep of the Northern states possible, the Republicans were confident going into their convention in Chicago. William H. Seward of New York was considered the front runner, followed by Abraham Lincoln of Illinois, Salmon P. Chase of Ohio, and Missouri's Edward Bates.

As the convention developed, however, it was revealed that Seward, Chase, and Bates had each alienated factions of the Republican Party. Delegates were concerned that Seward was too closely identified with the radical wing of the party, and his moves toward the center had alienated the radicals. Chase, a former Democrat, had alienated many of the former Whigs by his coalition with the Democrats in the late 1840s, had opposed tariffs demanded by Pennsylvania, and critically, had opposition from his own delegation from Ohio. Bates outlined his positions on extension of slavery into the territories and equal constitutional rights for all citizens, positions that alienated his supporters in the border states and southern conservatives. German Americans in the party opposed Bates because of his past association with the Know Nothings.

Since it was essential to carry the West, and because Lincoln had a national reputation from his debates and speeches as the most articulate moderate, he won the party's nomination on the third ballot on May 16, 1860. Senator Hannibal Hamlin of Maine was nominated for vice president, defeating Cassius Clay of Missouri.

The party platform clearly stated that slavery would not be allowed to spread any further, and it also promised that tariffs protecting industry would be imposed, a Homestead Act granting free farmland in the West to settlers, and the funding of a transcontinental railroad. All of these provisions were highly unpopular in the South.

Northern Democratic Party nomination

Northern Democratic candidates:

• Stephen A. Douglas, U.S. senator from Illinois
• James Guthrie, former U.S. Treasury Secretary from Kentucky
• Robert M. T. Hunter, U.S. senator from Virginia
• Joseph Lane, U.S. senator from Oregon
• Daniel S. Dickinson, former U.S. senator from New York
• Andrew Johnson, U.S. senator from Tennessee

Candidates gallery

• Senator Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois
• Former Treasury Secretary James Guthrie of Kentucky
• Senator Robert M. T. Hunter of Virginia
• Senator Joseph Lane of Oregon
• Former Senator Daniel S. Dickinson of New York Former Senator Daniel S. Dickinson of New York
• Senator Andrew Johnson of Tennessee

The Democratic Party was divided over the issue of slavery. At the convention in Charleston in April 1860, 51 Southern Democrats walked out over a platform dispute, led by William Lowndes Yancey. Yancey and the Alabama delegation left the hall and they were followed by the delegates of Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, Texas, three of the four delegates from Arkansas, and one of the three delegates from Delaware.

Six candidates were nominated: Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois, James Guthrie of Kentucky, Robert Mercer Taliaferro Hunter of Virginia, Joseph Lane of Oregon, Daniel S. Dickinson of New York, and Andrew Johnson of Tennessee. Douglas, a moderate on the slavery issue who favored "popular sovereignty", was ahead on the first ballot, needing 56.5 more votes. On the 57th ballot, Douglas was still ahead, but still 50.5 votes short of nomination. In desperation, on May 3 the delegates agreed to stop voting and adjourn the convention.

The Democrats convened again at the Front Street Theater in Baltimore, Maryland on June 18. This time 110 southern delegates (led by “Fire-Eaters”) walked out when the convention would not adopt a resolution supporting extending slavery into territories whose voters did not want it. After two ballots, the remaining Democrats nominated the ticket of Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois for President. Benjamin Fitzpatrick was nominated for vice president, but he refused the nomination. The nomination ultimately went to Herschel Vespasian Johnson of Georgia.

Southern Democratic Party nomination

Southern Democratic candidates:

• John C. Breckinridge, U.S. Vice President from Kentucky
• Daniel S. Dickinson, former U.S. senator from New York

Candidates gallery

• Vice President John C. Breckinridge of Kentucky Vice President John C. Breckinridge of Kentucky
• Former Senator Daniel S. Dickinson of New York Former Senator Daniel S. Dickinson of New York

The Southern Democrats, led by Yancey, reconvened in Richmond, Virginia, and on June 28 nominated the pro-slavery incumbent Vice President, John Cabell Breckinridge of Kentucky, for President, and Joseph Lane of Oregon for Vice President at the Maryland Institute, in Baltimore.

Constitutional Union Party nomination

Constitutional Union candidates:

• John Bell, former U.S. senator from Tennessee
• Sam Houston, U.S. governor of Texas
• John J. Crittenden, U.S. senator from Kentucky
• Edward Everett, former U.S. senator from Massachusetts
• William A. Graham, former U.S. senator from North Carolina
• John McLean, U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice from Ohio

Candidates gallery

• Former Senator John Bell of Tennessee
• Former Governor Sam Houston of Texas
• Senator John J. Crittenden of Kentucky
• Former Senator Edward Everett of Massachusetts
• Former Senator William A. Graham of North Carolina
• Supreme Court Justice John McLean of Ohio

Die-hard former Whigs and Know Nothings who felt they could support neither the Democratic Party nor the Republican Party formed the Constitutional Union Party, nominating John Bell of Tennessee for president over Governor Sam Houston of Texas on the second ballot. Edward Everett was nominated for vice president at the convention in Baltimore on May 9, 1860 (one week before Lincoln was nominated).

John Bell was a former Whig who had opposed the Kansas-Nebraska Act and the Lecompton Constitution. Edward Everett had been president of Harvard University and Secretary of State in the Fillmore administration. The party platform advocated compromise to save the Union, with the slogan "the Union as it is, and the Constitution as it is."

General election

Campaign

The contest in the North was between Lincoln and Douglas, but only the latter took to the stump and gave speeches and interviews. In the South, John C. Breckinridge and John Bell were the main rivals, but Douglas had an important presence in southern cities, especially among Irish Americans. Fusion tickets of the non-Republicans developed in New York and Rhode Island, and partially in New Jersey and Pennsylvania (the northern state in which Breckenridge made the best showing).

Stephen A. Douglas was the first presidential candidate in history to undertake a nationwide speaking tour. He traveled to the South where he did not expect to win many electoral votes, but he spoke for the maintenance of the Union. The dispute over the Dred Scott case had helped the Republicans easily dominate the Northern states' congressional delegations, allowing that party, although a newcomer on the political scene, easily to spread its popular influence.

Throughout the general election, Lincoln did not campaign or give speeches. This was handled by the state and county Republican organizations, who used the latest techniques to sustain party enthusiasm and thus obtain high turnout. There was little effort to convert non-Republicans, and there was virtually no campaigning in the South except for a few border cities such as St. Louis, Missouri, and Wheeling, Virginia; indeed, the party did not even run a slate in most of the South. In the North, there were thousands of Republican speakers, tons of campaign posters and leaflets, and thousands of newspaper editorials. These focused first on the party platform, and second on Lincoln's life story, making the most of his boyhood poverty, his pioneer background, his native genius, and his rise from obscurity. His nicknames, "Honest Abe" and "the Rail-Splitter," were exploited to the full. The goal was to emphasize the superior power of "free labor," whereby a common farm boy could work his way to the top by his own efforts.

The 1860 campaign was less frenzied than 1856, when the Republicans had crusaded zealously, and their opponents counter-crusaded with warnings of civil war. In 1860 every observer calculated the Republicans had an almost unbeatable advantage in the electoral college, since they dominated almost every northern state. Republicans felt victory at hand, and used para-military campaign organizations like the Wide Awakes to rally their supporters (see American election campaigns in the 19th century for campaign techniques).

Results

The election was held on November 6. It was noteworthy for the exaggerated sectionalism of the vote, with Lincoln not even on the ballot in nine Southern states - and winning only two of 996 counties in the entire South (in the 1856 election, the Republican candidate for president had received no votes in 13 of the 15 slave states). In the six states still permitting slavery where he was on the ballot, he came in fourth in every state except Delaware (3rd). Breckinridge, who was the sitting Vice-President of the United States and the only candidate to later support secession, won all the states that would form the Confederacy except Virginia and Tennessee. Breckinridge also lost in the future border states of Missouri and Kentucky (his birth state), but won the states of Delaware and Maryland (both of which also still permitted slavery) by pluralities.

Lincoln won an electoral majority without an absolute majority of total popular votes. While Lincoln captured less than 40% of the popular vote, the divisions of the nation allowed him to capture 17 states plus four electoral votes in New Jersey, for a total of 180 electoral votes. Although the three-way split of the non-Republican vote confuses the issue, the vote split was irrelevant to Lincoln's victory because he would have won an outright majority in the electoral vote, 169-134, even if the 60% of voters who supported other candidates united behind a single candidate. Except for California, Oregon, and New Jersey, Lincoln won a popular majority in every state that cast its electoral votes for him. Only in California, Oregon, and Illinois was Lincoln's victory margin less than seven percent.

Stephen Douglas finished second in the popular vote, but because his support was relatively evenly distributed between both northern and southern states he garnered only Missouri's nine electoral votes and three of seven electoral votes in New Jersey, good for fourth place. Bell won Kentucky, Tennessee, and Virginia's electors, while Breckinridge won every other slave state except Missouri.

Contrary to popular myth, Lincoln was not a third party candidate. The Republicans had already established themselves as the second major party in the 1856 election by coming in second in that race.

The voter turnout rate in 1860 was the second-highest on record (81.2%, second only to 1876, with 81.8%). The Fusion ticket of non-Republicans drew 595,846 votes.

It is interesting to note that had roughly 26,000 New Yorkers voted for Douglas instead of Lincoln, then Lincoln would have failed to achieve the electoral majority, as he would have lost New York's 35 electoral votes and only received 145 total (152 was required to achieve the majority). In this instance, the vote would have gone to the United States House of Representatives, and some historians have speculated that the Southern-controlled House of Representatives would have cast their vote for the Southern Democratic nomination, John C. Breckinridge, under the urging of William Yancey.

Source (Popular Vote): Leip, David. "1860 Presidential Election Results". Dave Leip's Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections. Retrieved July 27, 2005. Source (Electoral Vote): "Electoral College Box Scores 1789–1996". National Archives and Records Administration. Retrieved July 31, 2005.

The popular vote figures exclude South Carolina where the Electors were chosen by the state legislature rather than by popular vote.

Results by state

See also

• American election campaigns in the 19th century
• Electoral history of Abraham Lincoln
• History of the United States (1849–1865)
• History of the United States Democratic Party
• History of the United States Republican Party
• Third Party System
• United States House of Representatives elections, 1860
• Wide Awakes

References

This section includes a list of references, related reading, or external links, but its sources remain unclear because it lacks inline citations. Please help improve this section by introducing more precise citations. (March 2008) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

• Daniel W. Crofts; Reluctant Confederates: Upper South Unionists in the Secession Crisis University of North Carolina Press, 1989
• David Herbert Donald. Lincoln (1999) ISBN 0-684-82535-X, standard biography
• Dwight Lowell Dumond, ed., Southern Editorials on Secession (1931), contains hundreds of well-chosen editorials from the 1860 presidential campaign and the secession crisis in both the upper and lower South
• Foner, Eric (1995). Free Soil, Free Labor, Free Men: The Ideology of the Republican Party before the Civil War., analyzes factions inside new party
• Holt, Michael F. (1978). The Political Crisis of the 1850s.
• Robert W Johannsen, Stephen A. Douglas Oxford University Press, 1973, standard biography
• Marc W. Kruman, Parties and Politics in North Carolina, 1836-1865 (Louisiana State University Press, 1983), pages 180-221
• Luebke, Frederick C. (1971). Ethnic Voters and the Election of Lincoln.
• Luthin, Reinhard H. The First Lincoln Campaign (1944), along with Nevins, the most detailed narrative of the election
• McPherson, James M. Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era (1988). Pulitzer Prize winner surveys all aspects of the era
• Nevins, Allan (1950). The Emergence of Lincoln. 2 vols. the most detailed narrative; covers 1857–61
• Roy Franklin Nichols. The Disruption of American Democracy (1948), pp 348-506, focused on the Democratic party
• H. Parks, John Bell of Tennessee (Louisiana State University Press, 1950), standard biography
• Howard Cecil Perkins, ed., Northern Editorials on Secession, 2 vols. (1942), reprints hundreds of editorials
• Potter, David (1976). Impending Crisis 1848–1861. ISBN 0-06-090524-7.
• Rhodes, James Ford (1920). History of the United States from the Compromise of 1850 to the McKinley-Bryan Campaign of 1896. vol. 2, ch. 11. highly detailed narrative covering 1856–60
• Stampp, Kenneth M. (1950). And the War Came: The North and the Secession Crisis, 1860–1861., focus on immediate aftermath of election

Footnotes

1. Getting the Message Out! Stephen A. Douglas
2. Thomas 1952, p. 216 harvnb error: no target: CITEREFThomas1952 (help) See also: Luthin, Reinhard H. (1987). The First Lincoln Campaign. Peter Smith Publishing. ISBN 0844612928. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help) and Nevins, Allan (1992-09-30). Ordeal of the Union Vol. 4. Charles Scribner's Sons. ISBN 0020354452.
3. St. Louis County, Missouri and Gasconade County, Missouri according to http://www.missouridivision-scv.org/election.htm
4. HarpWeek | Elections | 1860 Overview
5. 1860 election
6. Vshadow: Lincoln's Election

External links

• 1860 election: State-by-state Popular vote results
• 1860 popular vote by counties
• Wrong way elections table at the Center for Range Voting
• Election of 1860
• Electoral Map from 1860
• Lincoln's election - details
• Report on 1860 Republican convention
• Overview of Constitutional Union National Convention
• How close was the 1860 election? - Michael Sheppard, Michigan State University
• Abraham Lincoln: A Resource Guide from the Library of Congress

• History of the United States (1849–1865)
• Secession crisis of 1860-1861
• United States presidential election, 1860