Abraham Lincoln American Dream Essay

Greyson Tillman

4/28/2014

Pd 3

Abraham Lincoln and the American Dream

If you have ever had a five dollar bill, or even a penny, then you know who President Abraham Lincoln is. Because of our changing and fast paced world, not a whole lot of people know what was so great about President Abraham Lincoln. But just how did this political thinker shape the concept of the American dream? Well he had many visions and goals for America during the civil war. A nickname given to him was "Honest Abe". His main accomplishments, uniting and maintaining the union, and also making sure people of different races were given equal opportunities which helped shape the concept of the American dream.

President Abraham Lincoln was born on February 12, 1809. He grew up on frontier farms in Kentucky and Indiana. Unlike most children now a days, as a kid President Lincoln was really wanted to have an education, and surprisingly his father discouraged that. His biological mother would however support President Lincoln's interest. She died when he was nine years old but his step mother supported President Lincoln and had him keep at studying. Because President Lincoln was like this as a child, it tells us as a reader that he is already preparing himself for something greater in the future, contributing to the American dream.

A year later, President Lincoln and his family moved to New Salem, Illinois, where he found work as a store clerk. With this he further educated him self by having access to even more books. Then Lincoln would serve in the Black Hawk War, a war caused by a disturbance of land loss and corruption. It was fought between the Sauk Indian tribe, teamed with Mesquakie, or Fox tribe as the french called versus the white settlers. Lincoln ...

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...dent Lincoln's famous speeches, the Gettysburg Address would effect everyone in the nation. This lead to the beginning of the American dream when he said, "Four score and seven years ago our forefathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal." This last part, "all men are created equal" would carry through America and all it's years.

President Abraham Lincoln was then able to preserve the union and brought both the northern and southern states together. By doing this, he had to lead his people through the Civil War, and inspired the whole nation with his Gettysburg address. People have to understand that by standing up for what he believed in, racial equality, he contributed to the American dream by spreading industrialism and making sure everyone had jobs of all races.