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Why was Abraham Lincoln assassinated?The question has plagued historians for many years. Abraham Lincoln, one of the most memorable presidents of the United States of America, was shot in the back of the head with a .44 caliber Derringer revolver and later presumed dead. The assassin was John Wilkes Booth. This unforgettable crime took place on April 14, 1865, shortly after 10 p.m, in Fords Theatre in Washington D.C. John Wilkes Booth assassinated Abraham Lincoln because he had emotional instability, in relation to his status and political beliefs, which caused a tremendous impact on American Reconstruction after the Civil War.
Abraham Lincoln, also known as Honest Abe, the Rail-Splitter, or the Great Emancipator, was the 16th president of the United States. He was born on February 12, 1809, 3 miles south of Hodgenville, Kentucky, and served as president from the year 1861 to 1865. Throughout his presidency, he restored the Union during the American Civil War, and emancipated black people in the United States (Current). However, he distinguished between fundamental natural rights such as freedom from slavery, constitutional rights, and civil rights, which included the right to vote. He believed that the states should determine who should be allowed to exercise these rights ( Constitutional Rights Foundation ). Lincoln voluntarily served in Black Hawk War and held various responsibilities while doing so. In 1834, he was elected to the Illinois Legislature, and he was re-elected from 1836 to 1844. Abraham Lincoln was elected the 16th President of the United States, becoming the first Republican to do so, defeating a heavily split Democratic Party. While Lincoln won just 40% of the vote, he easily beat the three other candidates: Southern Democrat John C. Breckinridge, Constitutional Union nominee John Bell, and Northern Democrat Stephen Douglas, a U.S. representative for the state of Illinois ( Abraham Lincoln Elected President ). Fair justice and equal opportunities are central to Lincoln’s vision of American democracy. In mid-April of 1865, in Ford’s Theatre, he died a traumatic death, where he was gruesomely assassinated by John Wilkes Booth.
John Wilkes Booth was born on May 10, 1838, and passed on April 26th, 1865, 12 days after Lincolns assassination. He was a member of a large acting family, and was one of 10 children, born to Junius Brutus Booth, displaying extreme theatrical potential. Despite his acting capabilities, he had emotional differences, making him feel superior and envious of his brother, who was a famous actor at the time. He was a Radical Democrat, who supported slavery and white supremacy. As he became more involved with politics, he believed that his views should override top leaders of the United States. This meant that he would gather a group of co-conspirators to abduct the prime leaders of the United States.
Many conspiracies arose after John Wilkes Booth attacked and wounded the 16th president, Abraham Lincoln. The most probable conspiracy of them all was that in contrast to his status and values, he had mental inadequacies. Following Lincoln’s inauguration in November 1864, Booth proposed a scheme to abduct the president and transport him to Richmond, where he could be exchanged for any of the Confederate prisoners held in northern prisons. Booth enlisted the help of a group of Washington friends in his effort. That season, Booth and his associates devised two intricate schemes to kidnap Lincoln. The first involved encircling Lincoln in a box at Ford’s Theater and lowering him to the floor using ropes. Booth later quit acting so that he could spend more time looking into his devious plan for Lincoln. By doing this, he spends a tremendous amount of money in order to be prepared with the correct supplies to do the job. Both assassination attempts failedthe second, a ruse to catch Lincoln while riding in his carriage on March 17th, was foiled when the president changed his plansand the majority of the assassination attempts were unsuccessful. To pursue Lincolns dedication, on the late night of April 11, Lincoln voiced his opinion of reconstruction to a small group of people who had gathered closely next to the White House. The Army of Northern Virginia had surrendered two days before at Appomattox Court House, and it was clear that the Union movement would end the battle after four years of conflict. Lincoln gave a speech that evening detailing some of his plans for restoring the nation and reuniting the defeated Confederate states. Lincoln’s ideas that he talked about were empowering and impactful. He wanted African-Americans to be given the right to vote if they had served on the Union side of the Civil War. He also wanted to be lenient and kind to allow southern states to give educated and literate blacks the right to vote. Booth was in the crowd for Lincoln’s address, and this seems to have heightened his anger at the president. That means [African American] citizenship, he told one of his conspirators, Lewis Powell. Now, by God, I’m going to bring him through it. He’ll never give another speech after that ( Booths Reason for Assassination ). John Wilkes Booth would use such obscene language and preposterous claims to express his deranged feelings, especially about how his views differed from those of Abraham Lincoln. Booth followed up with his pledge three days later. Booth claims to have planned the assassinations in the hope that killing four high leaders at the same time will send the North and the Republican Party into anarchy, long enough for the Confederacy to reassemble. It is obvious that Booth’s visions and actions were largely affected by his mental incapacities.
On the evening of April 14, 1865, shortly after 10 p.m., President Abraham Lincoln was brutally murdered by John Wilkes Booth. It was brought to Booth’s attention in the early days of April that both Lincoln and his wife, Mary Todd Lincoln, would be attending the play, Our American Cousin, at Ford’s Theatre. Ulysses S. Grant, the commanding general, will also appear. Since Lincoln was the United States’ highest-ranking official, he reserved a private box for himself and a select group of his peers, with a spectacular view of the stage. Booth used his contacts as an actor to obtain access to the president’s box. Since a lot of more famous figures had ignored Lincolns invitation, Henry Rathbone was there in exchange for General Grant. Booth reached the president’s box, which was virtually unguarded, and barricaded the outside door from the inside. Booth then busted in through the box’s inner door at a point in the play that he knew would provoke a huge laugh. With a .44 caliber derringer, he shot Lincoln in the back of the head once and stabbed Rathbone in the arm with a knife. He fell and broke his left leg on the stage under him. There is some disagreement about what Booth said when committing the assault, as well as the reasoning as to why he said it. Before vanishing through a door at the side of the stage, where his horse was being carried for him, audience members recorded that he shouted: Sic Semper tyrannies ( Thus often to tyrants ). He kicked a child as he dashed out to the front of Ford’s Theatre, indicating that he was in a hurry to mount his horse and flee. Within 5 minutes of this instancing, news of the shooting had spread across the whole city of Washington, D.C. Rather than speeding away from Ford’s Theatre, people rushed to the theatre to see if the rumors were real. People in the audience started chanting that Booth must be apprehended and killed right away. Overall, this day was extremely significant to how Reconstruction would continue to repair the damages left by Civil War.
Because of Lincoln’s death, the American Reconstruction after the Civil War was drastically altered, and the United States was forever changed. President Abraham Lincoln’s murder was part of a broader conspiracy to kill the federal government of the United States following the Civil War. This proposal was never adopted because Lincoln died before it could be implemented. On April 15, 1865, he officially passed away, after unsuccessfully attempting an important surgery (JK and Laidlaw). His doctor, Doctor Leale, described that there was a blood clot under Lincoln’s dense head of hair, about the size of a man’s pinkie finger. It looked like a cork was being pulled from a bottle while the clot was being removed. Blood gushed freely from the cut, and Lincoln’s chest suddenly rose and fell as the strain on his head was relieved (O’Reilly 179). Unfortunately, this would mean that Lincoln’s death was complete, and he would not live to see another day. He couldn’t complete his plan to return the country to the state he imagined it to be after all he tried. Physically, Lincoln was in a lot of pain, but emotionally, the entire United States would be in a world of stress. Andrew Johnson took over as his successor and watched over Reconstruction. During the Reconstruction period, Johnson, a former slaveholder from Tennessee and the first Southern senator to remain loyal to the Union during the Civil War, advocated for lenient policies in readmitting Southern states to the Union. Johnson, a strong supporter of states’ rights, gave amnesty to the majority of former Confederates and permitted Southern states to elect new legislatures. As a result, black codes were enacted by new state legislatures throughout the South (‘How Presidential Assassinations Changed U.S. Politics’). These restrictions were put in place to keep the newly released slaves under control. Many African Americans soon found themselves with no alternative but to serve on Southern plantations. For many African Americans, this was a desperate struggle, as it was recently brought to their notice that they had been freed from slavery as a result of Lincoln’s judgment. Since President Johnson held different views than Lincoln, their perceptions had to be adjusted now that he was in power. He was clearly used to draw attention to the fact that there will be both a Republican and a Democrat-leaning candidate. In conclusion, the United States would be dramatically modified by the addition of the world’s conditions, and the absence of Republican President Abraham Lincoln, who will be forever remembered.
Because of his erratic behavior, in regard to his title and social stances, John Wilkes Booth assassinated Abraham Lincoln, which had a massive influence on post-Civil War American Reconstruction. It’s understandable that a single death can have a significant impact on the world. For example, the world will be forever changed as a result of American Reconstruction following the Civil War. Time would pass, and segregation would be implemented sooner or later. Many things can happen when a light is switched off abruptly, and these events can have a significant impact on the future. It was likely that, with Lincoln’s assistance, he might try to get everybody together, and future presidents may do the same. Anything can seem minor at first, but it may have a ‘domino effect.’ When the first domino falls, all remaining dominos in front of the primary one will respond accordingly. As author and poet, John S. Hall, once said, It was a domino effect… When you get one injury, thats when the others start coming .
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