Jeffersonian democracy persisted as an element of the Democratic Party into the early 20th century, as exemplified by William Jennings Bryan (1860â1925), and its themes continue to echo in the 21st century.
Abraham Lincoln. Abraham Lincoln became the United States' 16th President in 1861, issuing the Emancipation Proclamation that declared forever free those slaves within the Confederacy in 1863. Lincoln warned the South in his Inaugural Address: In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war.
Abraham Lincoln, a self-taught Illinois lawyer and legislator with a reputation as an eloquent opponent of slavery, shocked many when he overcame several more prominent contenders to win the Republican Partyâs nomination for president in 1860.