Assassination of Abraham Lincoln in the context of "Andrew Johnson"

Abraham Lincoln (February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was the 16th president of the United States, serving from 1861 until his assassination in 1865. He led the United States through the American Civil War, defeating the Confederate States and playing a major role in the abolition of slavery.

Lincoln was born into poverty in Kentucky and raised on the frontier. He was self-educated and became a lawyer, Illinois state legislator, and U.S. representative. Angered by the Kansas–Nebraska Act of 1854, which opened the territories to slavery, he became a leader of the new Republican Party. He reached a national audience in the 1858 Senate campaign debates against Stephen A. Douglas. Lincoln won the 1860 presidential election, prompting a majority of slave states to begin to secede and form the Confederate States. A month after Lincoln assumed the presidency, Confederate forces attacked Fort Sumter, starting the Civil War.

The Reconstruction era was a period in US history that followed the American Civil War (1861–1865) and was dominated by the legal, social, and political challenges of the abolition of slavery and reintegration of the former Confederate States into the United States. Three amendments were added to the United States Constitution to grant citizenship and equal civil rights to the newly freed slaves. To circumvent these, former Confederate states imposed poll taxes and literacy tests and engaged in terrorism to intimidate and control African Americans and discourage or prevent them from voting.

Throughout the war, the Union was confronted with the issue of how to administer captured areas and handle slaves escaping to Union lines. The United States Army played a vital role in establishing a free labor economy in the South, protecting freedmen's rights, and creating educational and religious institutions. Despite its reluctance to interfere with slavery, Congress passed the Confiscation Acts to seize Confederates' slaves, providing a precedent for President Abraham Lincoln to issue the Emancipation Proclamation. Congress established a Freedmen's Bureau to provide much-needed food and shelter to the newly freed slaves. As it became clear the Union would win, Congress debated the process for readmission of seceded states. Radical and moderate Republicans disagreed over the nature of secession, conditions for readmission, and desirability of social reforms. Lincoln favored the "ten percent plan" and vetoed the Wade–Davis Bill, which proposed strict conditions for readmission. Lincoln was assassinated in 1865, just as fighting was drawing to a close. He was replaced by Andrew Johnson, who vetoed Radical Republican bills, pardoned Confederate leaders, and allowed Southern states to enact draconian Black Codes that restricted the rights of freedmen. His actions outraged many Northerners and stoked fears the Southern elite would regain power. Radical Republicans swept to power in the 1866 midterm elections, gaining majorities in both houses of Congress.

Assassination is the willful killing, by a sudden or secret attack, of a person—especially a prominent or important one—typically for political or ideological reasons.

Assassinations may be ordered by both individuals and organizations and carried out by their accomplices. Acts of assassination have been performed since ancient times. A person who carries out an assassination is called an assassin.

Abraham Lincoln's tenure as the 16th president of the United States began on March 4, 1861, and ended upon his death on April 15, 1865, 42 days into his second term. Lincoln, the first Republican president, successfully presided over the Union victory in the American Civil War, which dominated his presidency and resulted in the end of slavery in the United States. He was succeeded by Vice President Andrew Johnson.

Lincoln took office following the 1860 presidential election, in which he won a plurality of the popular vote in a four-candidate field. Almost all of Lincoln's votes came from the Northern United States, as the Republicans held little appeal to voters in the Southern United States. A former Whig, Lincoln ran on a political platform opposed to the expansion of slavery in the territories. His election served as the immediate impetus for the outbreak of the Civil War. After being sworn in as president, Lincoln refused to accept any resolution that would result in Southern secession from the Union. The Civil War began weeks into Lincoln's presidency with the Confederate attack on Fort Sumter, a federal installation located within the boundaries of the Confederacy.

The conclusion of the American Civil War commenced with the articles of surrender agreement of the Army of Northern Virginia on April 9, at Appomattox Court House, by General Robert E. Lee and concluded with the surrender of CSS Shenandoah on November 6, 1865, bringing the hostilities of the American Civil War to a close. Legally, the war did not end until a proclamation by President Andrew Johnson on August 20, 1866, when he declared "that the said insurrection is at an end and that peace, order, tranquillity, and civil authority now exist in and throughout the whole of the United States of America." The Confederate government being in the final stages of collapse, the war ended by debellatio, with no definitive capitulation from the rapidly disintegrating Confederacy; rather, Lee's surrender marked the effective end of Confederate military operations. The Confederate cabinet held its final meeting on May 5, at which point it declared the Confederacy dissolved, ending its substantive existence; despite this, some remnant Confederate units did not surrender for another month.

Lee's defeat on April 9 began the effective end of the war, after which there was no substantial resistance, but the news of his surrender took time to spread and some fighting continued, though only small skirmishes. President Abraham Lincoln lived to see Lee's surrender after four bloody years of war, but he was assassinated just five days later. The Battle of Columbus, Georgia, was fought on April 16, the day after Lincoln died. For the most part though, news of Lee's defeat led to a wave of Confederate surrenders. Gen. Joseph E. Johnston surrendered his large Army of Tennessee and the Southeastern Department on April 26. The Confederate cabinet was dissolved on May 5, and Confederate president Jefferson Davis was captured by Union soldiers on May 10, one day after Lincoln's successor, Andrew Johnson, declared that the belligerent rights of the Confederacy were at an end, with the rebellion effectively over.

John Wilkes Booth (May 10, 1838 – April 26, 1865) was an American stage actor who assassinated United States president Abraham Lincoln at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C., on April 14, 1865. A member of the prominent 19th-century Booth theatrical family from Maryland, he was a noted actor who was also a Confederate sympathizer; denouncing Lincoln, he lamented the then-recent abolition of slavery in the United States.

Originally, Booth and his small group of conspirators had plotted to kidnap Lincoln to aid the Confederate cause. They later decided to murder him, as well as Vice President Andrew Johnson and Secretary of State William H. Seward. Although the Army of Northern Virginia, commanded by General Robert E. Lee, had surrendered to the Union Army four days earlier, Booth believed that the American Civil War remained unresolved because the Army of Tennessee of General Joseph E. Johnston continued fighting.

Mary Ann Todd Lincoln (December 13, 1818 – July 16, 1882) was First Lady of the United States from 1861 until the assassination of her husband, President Abraham Lincoln, in 1865. Mary Todd was born into a large and wealthy slave-owning family in Kentucky, although Mary never owned slaves and in her adulthood came to oppose slavery. Well educated, after finishing-school in her late teens, she moved to Springfield, the capital of Illinois. She lived there with her married sister Elizabeth Todd Edwards, the wife of an Illinois congressman. Before she married Abraham Lincoln, Mary was courted by his long-time political opponent Stephen A. Douglas.

Mary Lincoln staunchly supported her husband's career and political ambitions, and throughout his presidency, she was active in keeping national morale high during the American Civil War. She acted as the White House social coordinator, throwing lavish balls and redecorating the White House at great expense; her spending was the source of much consternation. She was seated next to Abraham when he was assassinated in the President's Box at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C., on April 14, 1865.

Clara Hamilton Harris (September 9, 1834 – December 24, 1883) was an American socialite. She and her then fiancé, and future husband, Henry Rathbone, were the guests of President Abraham Lincoln the night he was shot at Ford's Theatre. Rathbone's mental state deteriorated after the assassination, and in 1883, Harris was murdered by him.