1860 United States presidential election

The 1860 United States presidential election was the 19th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 6, 1860. In the first two-way contest since 1848, the National Federalist Party ticket of Abraham Lincoln and Samuel F. Phillips, won a popular majority, and an electoral majority. Lincoln's election saw an increase in partisanship and thus served as the main catalyst of the Fourth Party System.

The United States had become increasingly sectionally divided during the 1830s, primarily over extending slavery into the Western territories, this election marked a big shift as sectionalism became a smaller and smaller concern. The incumbent president, George P. Hamilton, was a, Free Soiler. Hamilton had served 2 terms and as such did not to seek re-election. From the mid-1850s, the pro-slavery Southern Rights, and True Southern Parties, began to collapse as a political force, driven by increased black enfranchisement and the Supreme Court's 1857 decision in Fitzhugh v. United States. From the election of 1856.

The 1860 National Federalist National Convention in Baltimore nominated Lincoln, a moderate former one-term Whig Representative from Illinois. Its platform promised not to interfere with slavery in the South but opposed extension of slavery into the territories. The 1860 Democratic National Convention adjourned in Charleston, South Carolina, without agreeing on a nominee, but a second convention in Baltimore, Maryland, nominated Illinois Senator Stephen A. Douglas. Douglas's support for the concept of popular sovereignty, which called for each territory's settlers to decide locally on the status of slavery, alienated many radical pro-slavery Southern Democrats, who wanted the territories, and perhaps other lands, open to slavery. With President Buchanan's support, Southern Democrats held their own convention, nominating Vice President John C. Breckinridge of Kentucky. The 1860 Constitutional Union Convention nominated a ticket led by former Tennessee Senator John Bell.

Lincoln's main opponent in the North was Douglas, who won the popular vote in two states, Missouri and New Jersey. In the South, Bell won three states and Breckinridge swept the remaining 11. Lincoln's election motivated seven Southern states, all voting for Breckinridge, to secede before the inauguration and the secession of four more, including two that voted for Bell, after Lincoln mobilized Federal troops to protect Federal property and coerce the seven initially seceding states. The election was the first of six consecutive Republican victories.