Composition of Idaho State University

Abraham Lincoln Essays

Abraham Lincoln Essays Abraham Lincoln Essay Abraham Lincoln Essay Abraham Lincoln BY cbailey7262 Abraham Lincolns killer, John Wilkes Booth, was a Maryland native born in 1838 who remained in the North during the Civil War despite his Confederate sympathies. As the conflict entered its final stages, he and several associates hatched a plot to kidnap the president and take him to Richmond, the Confederate capital. However, on March 20, 1865, the day of the planned kidnapping, Lincoln failed to appear at the spot where Booth and his six fellow conspirators lay in wait. Two weeks later, Richmond fell to Union forces. In April, with Confederate armies near collapse across the South, Booth came up with a desperate plan to save the Confederacy. Learning that Lincoln was to attend Laura Keenes acclaimed performance of Our American Cousin at Fords Theatre in Washington, D. C. , on April 14, Booth†himself a well-known actor at the time†masterminded the simultaneous assassination of Lincoln, Vice President Andrew Johnson and Secretary of State William H. Seward. By urdering the president and two of his possible successors, Booth and his co- conspirators hoped to throw the U. S. government into disarray. Lincoln occupied a private box above the stage with his wife Mary, a young army officer named Henry Rathbone and Rathbones fianc? ©, Clara Harris, the daughter of New York Senator Ira Harris. The Lincolns arrived late for the comedy, but the president was reportedly in a fine mood and laughed heartily during the production. At 10:15, Booth slipped into the box and fired his . -caliber single-shot derringer into the back of Lincolns head. After stabbing Rathbone, who immediately rushed at him, in the shoulder, Booth leapt onto the stage and shouted, Sic semper tyrannis! (Thus ever to tyrants! -the Virginia state motto). At first, the crowd interpreted the unfolding drama as part of the production, but a scream from the first lady told them otherwise. Although Booth broke his leg in the fall, he managed to leave the theater and escape from W ashington on horseback.

Effects of Taiping rebellion Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Effects of Taiping rebellion - Research Paper Example In addition to actual deaths, the rebellion disrupted the lives of many Chinese people, especially the peasants. In the heightened euphoria of the war, they abandoned their farms and joined in the campaign against the ruling dynasty. Some got displaced from their farms as the revolt intensified. The Taipings also wreaked havoc wherever they went, destroying infrastructure and especially irrigation canals that were vital in sustaining agricultural production. As a result, famine struck the nation since neither labor nor agricultural infrastructure could sustain food production. Poverty, which had already affected the Chinese due to opium consumption and the Opium War some years, was accentuated by these conditions since the peasants had nothing to sell to earn income. Another immediate effect of the Taiping uprising was the fundamental change in the Chinese people’s way of thinking. This is because the Taipings adopted beliefs derived from a version of Christianity. The people were swept by the widespread propaganda of a heavenly kingdom. The Taipings made the Chinese people to discard their past beliefs in Confucianism and instead adopt beliefs from a derivative of Christianity. The Taiping rebellion also raised a nationalist force among large factions of China’s society. It fuelled the bitterness and animosity that many people had towards Manchu’s rule and the entire Qing dynasty. Therefore, the insurgence was instrumental in promoting nationalist spirit amongst Chinese people. Lastly, perpetrators and supporters of the Taiping uprising had political objectives that they intended to execute once they had established their utopian society. For instance, they aspired to bring exploitative practices characteristic of the Qing Dynasty to an end, by implementing military, political, social and economic reforms. They achieved this, albeit to a limited extent. The Taipings also altered the content of the exam that qualified candidates for the Mandarin gentry. The exam that was previously based on Confucian principles was changed to one founded in the Bible.6 The Taiping administration abolished the right to ownership of private property, declaring that all land would be allocated to the public by the government. The Taipings even replaced the lunar calendar with a solar one and granted women equal rights, making it possible for them to even take exams for admission to the gentry. The Taipings banned the Chinese custom of foot binding, in addition to gambling, opiu m, tobacco, prostitution, polygamy, alcohol consumption