The Tennessee Republican Party salutes and honors Abraham Lincoln on the celebration of his 200th birthday. An extraordinary leader in extraordinary times, Abraham Lincoln’s greatness was rooted in his principled leadership.

“I was born Feb. 12, 1809, in Hardin County, Kentucky. My parents were both born in Virginia, of undistinguished families—second families, perhaps I should say. My mother, who died in my tenth year, was of a family of the name of Hanks…. My father … removed from Kentucky to … Indiana, in my eighth year…. It was a wild region, with many bears and other wild animals still in the woods. There I grew up…. Of course when I came of age I did not know much. Still somehow, I could read, write, and cipher … but that was all,” Abraham Lincoln said in an introduction of himself.

Lincoln served as a captain in the Illinois militia during the Black Hawk War, served eight years in the state’s legislature and practiced law as a citizen legislator.

Abraham Lincoln unsuccessfully pursued the office of U.S. Senate in 1858 against Stephen A. Douglas. The failed campaign produced his national reputation from his debates with Douglas that ultimately won Lincoln the nomination in 1860 for President of the United States.

Lincoln ran as the first-ever Presidential nominee of the new Republican Party. His victory produced a strong national party that was very consistent in its Platform. The new party was clear in standing against slavery, advocating the rights of individuals to bear arms and to own property, to vote and run for elected office without “entanglements”, to assure freedom of speech, among many other Founding Principles referenced in the 1856 and 1860 Platforms.

Republican Party Platform of 1856

Republican Party Platform of 1860

Abraham Lincoln served as President during difficult, uncommon times in our nation. Yet, his commitment to the greatness of America was grounded in his strong faith and principled leadership. President Lincoln once remarked, “Character is like a tree and reputation like a shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing.”

His challenge of addressing a divided nation, not yet in its centennial, over states’ rights that revolved around the issue and expansion of slavery was truly monumental. Lincoln fought for an authentic United States to establish a good government based on freedom – Freedom for all. “America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves,” Lincoln declared.

President Lincoln felt his most enduring achievement was the Emancipation Proclamation, issued on January 1, 1863 that declared “free” those men, women, and children held in slavery. In his own words, Lincoln believed “the one thing that would make people remember that he had lived” was the Emancipation of this enslaved people.

Despite his prominence as President, Abraham Lincoln viewed himself as a common man of a less-than-average appearance serving his nation. Through humor, the President put his Ohio audience at ease: “I have stepped out upon this platform that I may see you and that you may see me, and in the arrangement I have the best of the bargain.”

Abraham Lincoln is honored by our state party today for his servant leadership and his stand on principle. “Stand with anybody that stands right. Stand with him while he is right and part with him when he goes wrong,” he remarked in a speech in Peoria, Illinois.

His closing line from his last public address on April 11, 1865 sums up the successful core of Abraham Lincoln’s leadership: “Important principles may, and must, be inflexible.”

A great man, a great cause for a great nation; Abraham Lincoln’s legacy lives today.