Abraham Lincoln The American Civil War - 1756 Words

Abraham Lincoln is often regarded as a resilient individual who triumphed over adversity during one of the most turbulent times in Unites States history: the American Civil War. Traits that are often attributed to him are honesty, charisma, a silver tongue, and a sense of equality. Lincoln achieved notoriety not only with his exceptional delivery of famous speeches, such as the Lincoln-Douglas debates, but also with the lesser known interactions, conversations and daily activities with common people. Taken together, these speeches and activities culminate to reveal key qualities about Lincoln: his virtues. These virtues have assisted in defining who Lincoln is and how he is historically viewed in the eyes of Americans. His virtues include†¦show more content†¦Without this much-needed drive and ambition, it is unlikely that Lincoln would have accomplished what he during his life. What truly sparked Lincoln’s ambition was the passing of the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854. This act created the states of Kansas and Nebraska and essentially repealed the Missouri Compromise of 1820. The Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 is what almost single handedly got Lincoln back into politics and pushed him to become a much bigger activist in the abolitionist movement. â€Å"But then there came in 1854 an event that would pull his antislavery convictions to the center of his politics and ‘arouse’ the universalism and egalitarianism, and the moral concept of the nation, that they rested upon† (Miller 230). Lincoln would go on to condemn the â€Å"monstrous injustice of slavery itself’, naming it as a â€Å"vast moral evil†. Lincoln felt that slavery threatened the basic human rights of all Americans: personal liberty, self-government, and the enjoyment of the fruits of one’s labor. One of Lincoln’s most shining examples of his ambition would be during the Lincoln-Douglas debates. Lincoln was aiming for the Senate seat that w as currently held by Stephen Douglas. This was certainly no easy task as Douglas at the time was quite popular in Illinois and was considered one of the best debaters. Douglas was initially resistant to Lincoln’s offer to debate but he