John Bell

Tune in to hear all the obituaries from this week during Journal Gazette Obituaries Review Sundays at 12 p.m. and 6 p.m. and Mondays at 3 a.m. We will now read the weekender section from the Friday, November 6th Journal-Gazette, beginning with Today in History.

On November 6th, 1860, former Illinois Congressman Abraham Lincoln of the Republican Party was elected President of the United States as he defeated John Breckinridge, John Bell, and Stephen Douglas.

In 1861, an unopposed Jefferson Davis was elected to a six-year term as president of the Confederate States of America after serving much of the year as its provisional president.

In 1888, Republican presidential candidate Benjamin Harrison won the electoral vote over incumbent Democrat Grover Cleveland, despite Cleveland gaining 90,000 more total votes.

Lincoln won the presidency on November 6, 1860 in a four-way race.

He defeated Democrat Stephen Douglas, Southern Democrat John C. Breckinridge of Kentucky, and Constitutional Union candidate John Bell.

On November 8, 1955, Kentucky voters approved a state constitutional amendment to lower the voting age from 21 to 18.

16 years before a federal amendment did the same thing nationally.

1860.

OK. Abraham Lincoln versus Stephen Douglas versus John Breckinridge versus John Bell.

You write in the book that by the 1850s, the American experiment was in grave jeopardy, economic interests competing with moral beliefs.

What

He won 18 states, all the northern states.

John Breckinridge had 72 electoral votes.

John Bell, 39.

Stephen Douglas came in last with 12 electoral votes.

Southern Democrats nominated John C. Breckinridge, the current vice president, who demanded federal protection of slavery in all territories.

The Constitutional Union Party, desperately trying to avoid the slavery issue, nominated John Bell with the platform, the Constitution, the Union, and the enforcement of the laws.

It was the political equivalent of sticking your fingers in your ears and humming.

Lincoln and the Republicans ran on stopping slavery's expansion, not abolishing it where it existed, just preventing it from spreading into new territories.