The grandest spin

Sometimes history glosses what actually happened.  People ignore the facts or align them favorably toward someone who was not well liked by most of the people.  How does that happen?

I'm talking about Abraham Lincoln.  Most people would put him in the top three American presidents that they like - Washington, Kennedy, and Lincoln.  The order of these three vary considerably, but consistently, these three presidents are named most often as their top three picks.

That's astounding to me, knowing what happened with Lincoln.  When he was president, he wasn't America's darling.  It's a miracle he was president at all.  In 1860 there were four candidates for the top job.  Each had to tell how they would handle the issue of slavery.  One said each new state that came into the union should decide.  People didn't like that because it had the potential to upset the balance of power in Congress.  Imagine that - people worrying about the  balance of power in Congress!  One said that states should enter the union on an every other state basis as a slave or free state.  One said people shouldn't care because the ways of life in both north and south were good for each other, both were good for the economy.  

And then there was Lincoln.  From the beginning, he said that the stance of the northern non-slave states were right.  No human being should be a slave.  If elected, he would move to abolish such a depraved institution as slavery.  That stance, of course, divided the nation in half.  As a result, 10 southern states refused to put Lincoln on the ballot for the 1860 election.  How did Lincoln still win the presidency?  

He took a divisive position before the election, and he became the most divisive president to that point in American history.  Southern legislatures vowed that if Lincoln won, they would secede from the union.  He was elected and a month later southern legislatures were true to their word.  Out of all the options available to a president, Lincoln chose war as his prime option to force the southern states to recognize the error of their ways, pitting family members against each other in the border states. Even among northern states, people and federal legislators didn't support the war option.

Tell me again why Lincoln is one of the most loved presidents in American history?  I tire of hearing disgruntled people today whining about current events of the current administration.  It's all happened before.  And I can't imagine that anyone short of a king would be more divisive than the one of the top three most beloved presidents in U.S. history.  Lincoln even has status enough to be depicted on currency we use everyday.  How did that happen?  It's called spin.