Of course, Lincoln

Today I discovered what Cleveland Germans thought of Abraham Lincoln. They LOVED him. They were predominantly Republican, and the Wachter am Erie German newspaper heartily endorsed the Lincoln ticket. (When the Republican Party formed, it was a different political landscape than it is today. The Republicans were the progressive political party — against the spread of slavery into the territories, and pro a shorter, 5-year waiting period for immigrant naturalization, rather than the 21-year waiting period advocated by “Know-Nothing” Democrats.)

The pre-1848 German immigrants to Cleveland weren’t so sure about Lincoln. They were democratic to the core. If the German newspaper coverage is any indication, the newly-formed Republican party, among them radical Germans who arrived on the heels of the 1848 European revolutions for democracy, out-shouted the German Democrats 10 to 1.

Of course Lincoln was news. After his election, Abraham Lincoln made a stop in Cleveland in February of 1861, cheered by tens of thousands of Clevelanders and Ohioans on his way to his first inauguration. During his second election in 1864, my ancestor Michael Harm had reached the age of 21. I feel sure he voted for Abraham Lincoln. There was a German immigrant up-swelling of support for the man. Some German Americans of the time, such as Jacob Mueller, hinted that the German vote went a long way toward getting Lincoln elected and keeping him in office.

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