<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>

<lincoln>
  <scene id="0" bg="intro_bg.swf" fg="null.swf" />
  <scene id="1" bg="lin_01_bg.swf" fg="lin_01_fg.swf" />
  <scene id="2" bg="lin_02_bg.swf" fg="lin_02_fg.swf" />
  <scene id="3" bg="lin_03_bg.swf" fg="null.swf" />
  <scene id="4" bg="lin_04_bg.swf" fg="null.swf" />
  <scene id="5" bg="lin_05_bg.swf" fg="null.swf" />
  <scene id="6" bg="lin_06_bg.swf" fg="null.swf" />
  <scene id="7" bg="lin_07_bg.swf" fg="null.swf" />
  <scene id="8" bg="lin_08_bg.swf" fg="null.swf" />
  <scene id="9" bg="lin_09_bg.swf" fg="null.swf" />
  <scene id="10" bg="lin_10_bg.swf" fg="null.swf" />
  <scene id="11" bg="lin_11_bg.swf" fg="null.swf" />
  <scene id="12" bg="lin_12_bg.swf" fg="null.swf" />
  <scene id="13" bg="lin_13_bg.swf" fg="null.swf" />
  <scene id="14" bg="conclusion_bg.swf" fg="null.swf" />
  <caption name="5238_01_01"><![CDATA[After serving one frustrating term in Congress, I return home to Springfield in 1849 where I soon become one of the most successful lawyers in Illinois.  But my appetite for politics never really disappears. Passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act in May 1854 soon pulls me back into the political arena.  This act overturns the Missouri Compromise of 1820, which had outlawed slavery in the area now being called the Nebraska Territory. In other words, slavery can now spread into the northern territories.  This is a stunning reversal that threatens to redraw the political map.  What should I do? Should I prove my opposition to the spread of slavery by once more seeking political office?]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_01_02"><![CDATA[So those are my choices:  Re-enter the political arena to oppose Douglas and the extension of slavery into the territories, or keep silent about the Nebraska bill and rely on others to take up the political fight.  The stakes couldn’t be higher.  What should I do?]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_01_03"><![CDATA[Yes, that’s what I did.  I took to the political stump and spoke out against slavery and “the great wrong and injustice of the repeal of the Missouri Compromise.”  I won a seat in the Illinois state legislature, which I quickly resigned in order to run for the U.S. Senate. And although I narrowly lost the Senate contest in 1855, my efforts helped secure victory for another anti-Douglas, anti-Nebraska candidate.  My hard work helped lay the foundations for the creation of the Republican Party in Illinois. I was back in the political fray.]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_01_04"><![CDATA[Yes, I could have continued in private life as a successful lawyer and devoted father, but the Nebraska bill threatened to let slavery spread everywhere. So I took to the political stump and spoke out against slavery and “the great wrong and injustice of the repeal of the Missouri Compromise.”  I won a seat in the Illinois state legislature, which I quickly resigned in order to run for the U.S. Senate. And although I narrowly lost the Senate contest in 1855, my efforts helped secure victory for another anti-Douglas, anti-Nebraska candidate.  My hard work helped lay the foundations for the creation of the Republican Party in Illinois. I was back in the political fray.]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_02_01"><![CDATA[The political journey I resume in 1854 leads me in 1858 to my famous debates against Stephen Douglas for the U.S. Senate. Although the Democrats retained control of the Illinois legislature and returned Douglas to the Senate - in those days, it was legislatures and not people, that selected senators - I gained a national reputation.  Two short years I captured the Republican presidential nomination.  The Republican platform claims that it is the Congress’s duty to contain slavery, yet many southerners do not see it this way.  In the days since my election, they have threatened to break apart the Union.  Some moderates, led by a Kentucky senator named John Crittenden, are now trying to patch together a compromise that would permanently divide the nation and its territories between free and slave. Republican congressional leaders are nervously seeking my opinion about what to do.  Should I authorize them to make concessions to the South on the slavery issue in order to save the Union?]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_02_02"><![CDATA[So those are my choices: Agree to make major concessions to the South over the issue of slavery to preserve the peace, or stand firm in my opposition to the spread of slavery to the territories.  What should I do?]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_02_03"><![CDATA[Yes, I stood firm. I told Republican leaders, the tug has to come & better now than later. I would not have objected to more stringent enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Law, requiring the return of escaped slaves to their owners. I probably would not have opposed a constitutional amendment protecting slavery in the states where it already existed, but I absolutely refused to authorize any compromise that would allow slavery to spread into new territories. Republicans won office opposing slavery’s extension, and I would not surrender to those we defeated in a fair election.]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_02_04"><![CDATA[Compromise cannot mean surrender. I told Republican leaders, “the tug has to come & better now than later.” I would not have objected to more stringent enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Law, requiring the return of escaped slaves to their owners.  I probably would not have opposed a constitutional amendment protecting slavery in the states where it already existed. But I absolutely refused to authorize any compromise that might allow slavery to spread into new territories. Republicans won office opposing slavery’s extension, and I would not surrender to those we defeated in a fair election.]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_03_01"><![CDATA[By the time I am sworn in as the nation’s sixteenth president on March 4, 1861, seven states in the Deep South have already voted to secede from the Union with the rest of the nation’s fifteen slave states at least considering the same.  The Union is falling apart.  In my inaugural, I said “there needs to be no bloodshed or violence.”  The Union would not invade the South, but I also vowed to do everything I could to hold onto all federal property.  This includes Fort Sumter in South Carolina, the hotbed of secession.  Then, just one day after taking office, I receive a letter from Robert Anderson, the commander of Union Forces at Fort Sumter, warning that supplies are running low.  Unless additional provisions arrive soon, the fort will have to be surrendered.  For advice on what to do, I call on my cabinet.]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_03_02"><![CDATA[So those are my choices: Re-supply Fort Sumter to show my administration’s resolve to preserve the Union and thereby risk war, or surrender the fort to avoid bloodshed and encourage support for the Union in the Upper South.  What should I do?]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_03_03"><![CDATA[Yes, that’s what I did.  I sent unarmed boats to re-supply Fort Sumter.  If the Confederates attacked, I reasoned, they would be seen as the aggressors, a fact that would damage them especially in the Upper South.  After Sumter, four more slave states did secede, but our approach to the crisis helped prevent four others from leaving the Union –a critical factor in our ultimate victory.]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_03_04"><![CDATA[I could have surrendered the fort, but handing over federal property to the South would have been giving up the fight before it began.  Not to mention the fact that the Constitution did not authorize me to just give away U.S. property. Instead, I sent unarmed boats to re-supply Fort Sumter. If the Confederates attacked, I reasoned, they would be seen as the aggressors, a fact that would damage them especially in the Upper South.  After Sumter, four more slave states did secede, but our approach to the crisis helped prevent four others from leaving the Union –a critical factor in our ultimate victory.]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_04_01"><![CDATA[By the morning of April 14, 1861, news of Fort Sumter’s surrender had reached Washington.  In the face of open insurrection, an immediate response is called for, but my options may be limited.  Although I am commander-in-chief of the armed forces, the Constitution gives Congress, not to the president, the power to declare war and raise armies. Congress, however, is not in session.  Must I wait for Congress to reconvene, or should I act now to meet the crisis?]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_04_02"><![CDATA[Those are my choices: wait for Congress to reconvene and thereby satisfy the letter of the Constitution, or do what I think is necessary to gain control of the situation.  What should I do?]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_04_03"><![CDATA[Yes, that’s what I did because in the end I could not afford to wait and did not want to delegate my authority as commander-in-chief. I called an emergency session of Congress for July 4, but for two crucial months until Congress met I used my best judgment to meet the crisis. I called up the militia. I declared a blockade of Confederate ports. I expanded the size of the army and navy and authorized the Treasury to expend $2 million to equip the troops. I even suspended the writ of habeas corpus to protect the transportation of Union troops. I believed that when Congress reconvened it would approve all of my actions, which it did.]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_04_04"><![CDATA[No, I couldn’t wait for Congress to act and did not want to delegate my authority as commander-in-chief. I called an emergency session of Congress for July 4, but for two crucial months until Congress met I used my best judgment to meet the crisis. I called up the militia. I imposed a blockade of Confederate ports. I expanded the size of the army and navy and authorized the Treasury to expend $2 million to equip the troops. I even suspended the write of habeas corpus to protect the transportation of Union troops. I believed that when Congress reconvened it would approve all of my actions, which it did.]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_05_01"><![CDATA[One week after the war begins, a pro-Confederate mob attacks Union regiments in Baltimore four soldiers and a dozen citizens die in the rioting.  The city’s unrest and secessionist sentiment coupled with its strategic location just north of Washington put the capital at risk.  It’s not clear at all that Union troops can arrive here safely on the rail lines to defend us in Washington.  To restore order, I authorize General-in-Chief Scott to arrest hundreds of Maryland citizens because they were suspected of participating in the rebellion.  This included militia officer John Merryman, who was charged with directing acts of sabotage as well as recruiting and training Confederate sympathizers.  Merryman’s lawyer petitions for a writ of habeas corpus, requiring this military arrest to be justified in a civilian court.  On May 26, the presiding federal circuit judge, Chief Justice Roger B. Taney, issues the writ, arguing that the power to suspend civil liberties belongs to Congress, not the president.  Must I obey Taney’s order?]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_05_02"><![CDATA[Those are my choices – Obey Taney’s order and acknowledge the authority of the federal courts, or ignore the order at least temporarily and stand by my decision to suspend the writ until Congress reconvenes in emergency session.  What should I do?]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_05_03"><![CDATA[Yes, that’s what I did. I ignored Taney’s order and waited for events to justify my actions.  As I told Congress on July 4, 1861, my primary duty as president was to suppress the rebellion so that the laws of the United States could be enforced in the South. Suspension of the writ was a vital weapon against rebellion. Were all the laws except this one to go unexecuted?  The Congress later passed the Habeas Corpus Act, essentially endorsing my actions while providing a more limited framework for future suspensions.  The Supreme Court never addressed my showdown with Taney.]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_05_04"><![CDATA[Without power to suspend the writ, my hands are tied.  I ignored Taney’s order and waited for events to justify my actions.  As I told Congress on July 4, 1861, my primary duty as president was to suppress the rebellion so that the laws of the United States could be enforced in the South. Suspension of the writ was a vital weapon against rebellion. Were all the laws except this one to go unexecuted? The Congress later passed the Habeas Corpus Act, essentially endorsing my actions while providing a more limited framework for future suspensions.  The Supreme Court never addressed my showdown with Taney.]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_06_01"><![CDATA[It’s August 30, 1861. The war has been raging more than four months, but four slave states – Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri – have not yet joined the Confederacy. If they leave the Union and add their strength to the rebel cause, I think the war is lost. Today my western commander, John Fremont, makes a stunning proclamation. The war is not going well, and as a military matter he frees the slaves of all rebels in Missouri. The order thrills those who oppose slavery in the North, but it goes further than Congress’s new confiscation law allows and angers slaveholders in the loyal slave states, threatening to push them into the arms of the Confederacy.  The country awaits my reaction to this proclamation.]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_06_02"><![CDATA[So those are my choices: Endorse Fremont’s emancipation proclamation and risk losing Union loyalty in Missouri and the other Border States, or overrule it and risk losing the support of antislavery Republicans.  What should I do?]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_06_03"><![CDATA[That’s right.  I decide to overturn Fremont’s proclamation.  Freeing slaves in Missouri would make it more difficult to keep the Border States in the Union, especially Kentucky.  If Kentucky secedes, we can not hold Missouri, nor, as I think, Maryland.  With these all against us - the job on our hands is too difficult for us.  We would as well consent to separation at once, including the surrender of this capitol.”]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_06_04"><![CDATA[Fremont’s emancipation order does have the support of antislavery Republicans and many abolitionist newspapers, but I believe that to endorse it would make it more difficult to keep the Border States in the Union, especially Kentucky.  If Kentucky secedes, we can not hold Missouri, nor, as I think, Maryland.  With these all against us - the job on our hands is too large for us.  We would as well consent to separation at once, including the surrender of this capitol.”]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_07_01"><![CDATA[I have been doing everything in my power to maintain the allegiance of the slave states that remained loyal to the Union when the South seceded – Delaware, Kentucky, Maryland, and Missouri. If those states join the Confederacy, we might lose the war. It is the constitutional right of their citizens to own slaves.  I have tried to convince those states to voluntarily adopt plans to emancipate their slaves – gradually and with compensation to the owners.  Now in the summer of 1862, it’s becoming clear they will not go along.  As commander in chief, I believe I have the right to employ “all indispensable means” – including emancipation – to save the Union.  Emancipation would raise the morale of those who love freedom, both here and abroad, and would give the Union access to hundreds of thousands of black people who would now be free to help the North.  An emancipation proclamation, however, would also risk sending the Border States right into the arms of the Confederacy.  I have received strong opinions from both sides.]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_07_02"><![CDATA[So those are my choices:  Stick with my Border State strategy even though it doesn’t seem to be working, and continue to press for voluntary emancipation in those four states, or adopt a new policy of military emancipation in the Rebel States that could lose the Border States to the Confederacy.  What should I do?]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_07_03"><![CDATA[Yes, that’s what I did.  On September 22, 1862, I issued the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation.  Unless southerners laid down their arms by the New Year, I warned, I would exercise my authority as commander-in-chief to emancipate all slaves in rebel-controlled areas of the country.  On January 1, 1863, that’s just what I did.  The war was now a struggle not only to save the Union, but for black freedom as well. ]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_07_04"><![CDATA[Border State hostility to emancipation was indeed a risk, but I believed it could be contained.   And so, on September 22, 1862, I issued the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation. Unless southerners laid down their arms by the New Year, I warned, I would exercise my authority as commander-in-chief to emancipate all slaves in rebel-controlled areas of the country. On January 1, 1863, that’s just what I did.  The war was now a struggle not only to save the Union, but for black freedom as well.]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_08_01"><![CDATA[As 1862 draws to a tumultuous close, I am considering including a provision in the Emancipation Proclamation allowing blacks to serve in the Union army.  This is something I have publicly opposed until now. Would northern voters and soldiers, many of whom have not yet embraced the idea of emancipation itself, be willing to accept black enlistments, too?  I fear not, though there is increasingly more to be said in its favor.  The many southern slaves escaping to Union lines could help strike a heavy blow against the rebellion.  And Military service will prepare them for the responsibilities of freedom. Besides, the Union army needs men. Repeated calls for volunteers have gone unanswered and the prospect of forced military service is unsettling the home front.]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_08_02"><![CDATA[So those are my choices: Include a provision in the Emancipation Proclamation that authorizes the use of black soldiers, even though it would alarm many whites, or continue to fight the war without the benefit of black troops.  What should I do?]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_08_03"><![CDATA[Yes, that’s what I did.  The Emancipation Proclamation included a provision authorizing the use of black troops to man the Army’s garrisons or forts and to serve in the naval forces. Before long, these black regiments were fighting as well. Nearly 200,000 fought with steely determination and valor.]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_08_04"><![CDATA[Although it carried political risks, I believed black soldiers could help win the war.  The Emancipation Proclamation included a provision authorizing the use of black troops to man the Army’s garrisons or forts and to serve in the naval forces. Before long, these black regiments were fighting as well. Nearly 200,000  fought with steely determination and valor.    ]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_09_01"><![CDATA[Although the emancipation order I announced in September has not yet taken effect, it has already stirred a firestorm of controversy. Even some members of my own Republican Party say the order is misguided and serves only to hand our Democratic opponents a political club with which to beat us. The Democrats have done well lately, capturing 35 new seats in Congress and several statehouses in the fall elections. Some Republicans blame our political defeats on military setbacks.  While others believe that my emancipation policy is the reason for our losses at the polls. Many white Northerners do not believe that freeing the slaves is essential at all to saving the Union. I am accused of exceeding my constitutional authority.  Shall I stand by the emancipation order and issue a final proclamation?  Or should I back down from the pledge and try to save my party?  There is no shortage of advice from either side.  ]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_09_02"><![CDATA[So those are my choices:  I can stand by my pledge to free the slaves as a matter of military necessity or revoke the emancipation order in the face of political opposition.  What should I do?]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_09_03"><![CDATA[Yes, that is what I did. On January 1, 1863, I signed the final Emancipation Proclamation. My hand was sore from shaking hands with hundreds of New Year’s guests. But steadying it, to sign the document firmly, I said, “If my name goes into history, it will be for this act.” From that day on wherever Union troops were victorious freedom for the slaves followed.]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_09_04"><![CDATA[The risk of continued political damage was a serious one, but a war that had taken such a heavy toll could only be redeemed by a new birth of freedom.  On January 1, 1863, I signed the final Emancipation Proclamation. My hand was sore from shaking hands with hundreds of New Year’s Day guests. But steadying it, to sign the document firmly, I said, “If my name goes into history, it will be for this act.” From that day on wherever Union troops were victorious freedom for the slaves followed.]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_10_01"><![CDATA[My military commanders are determined to stop interference with the draft, and so am I. But where do you draw the line? On April 13, 1863, General Ambrose Burnside issues an order in Ohio stating that anyone who commits “acts for the benefit of the enemies of our country,”, including declaring sympathies for them, will be arrested and tried as a spy or traitor.  On May 5, Clement Vallandingham, a former Ohio Congressman who is seeking the state’s Democratic nomination for governor, is arrested for a speech he gave a few days earlier denouncing the war as “wicked, cruel and unnecessary.”  A military commission soon finds Vallindigham guilty of “declaring disloyal sentiments and opinions” and sentences him to prison for the duration of the war.  I’ve read about this controversy in the newspapers and discussed it with my cabinet. We are facing widespread complaints. Critics are calling me a tyrant for suppressing free speech. Even friends are bemoaning the heavy-handed tactics. What should I do? Support General Burnside or repudiate his actions in the Vallandigham affair?]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_10_02"><![CDATA[So those are my choices. Support my general and uphold Vallandigham’s arrest as interference with the war effort, or bow to the avalanche of criticism and demonstrate that my administration supports free speech.  What should I do?]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_10_03"><![CDATA[Yes, that is what I did.  Burnside’s actions embarrassed me, but I decided not to repudiate him. So I told my critics that Vallandingham was arrested for trying to prevent the raising of troops and encouraging desertions. I asked, “Must I shoot a simple-minded soldier-boy who deserts, while I must not touch a hair of the wily agitator who induces him to desert?”  To contain the political damage, however, I changed Vallandigham’s sentence from imprisonment to banishment from the Union. He returned anyway, and campaigned against me in 1864.  This time, however, I ordered my generals to leave him alone.]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_10_04"><![CDATA[Although I was embarrassed by General Burnside’s actions, I thought it would be even more damaging to repudiate him. So I told my critics that Vallandingham was arrested for trying to prevent the raising of troops and encouraging desertions. I asked, “Must I shoot a simple-minded soldier-boy who deserts, while I must not touch a hair of the wily agitator who induces him to desert?”  To contain the political damage, however, I changed Vallandigham’s sentence from imprisonment to banishment from the Union. He returned anyway, and campaigned against me in 1864.  This time, however, I ordered my generals to leave him alone.  ]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_11_01"><![CDATA[The patriotic fervor and desire to serve in the army that marked the early days of the war has faded. Volunteers are in short supply and resistance to state drafts is mounting. To maintain the Union army’s strength, Congress in March 1863 imposes a national draft, the first in our nation’s history. Reaction is violent.  That July, in New York, a week of rioting claims more than 100 lives and destroys buildings and property.  Some of my Democratic opponents say conscription, forced military service, is unconstitutional, and the draft law is unfair. But how is the Union to be saved if we cannot maintain a capable fighting force?]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_11_02"><![CDATA[So I must decide – do I appease Seymour and wait for the Supreme Court to rule on the constitutionality of the Conscription Act, or do I press ahead in the face of resistance from the nation’s most populous and important state?  What should I do?]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_11_03"><![CDATA[Yes, that’s what I did.  I am certain that the draft is lawful.  The Constitution specifically gives Congress the power to raise and support armies, which is the whole scope of the Conscription Act.  There is nothing else in it.  Shall we shrink from the necessary means to maintain our free government?  Has the manhood of our race run out?]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_11_04"><![CDATA[I supported a Democrat dominated commission to investigate the draft riot in New York.  But I am certain that the draft is lawful. The Constitution specifically gives Congress the power to raise and support armies, which is the whole scope of the Conscription Act. There is nothing else in it. Shall we shrink from the necessary means to maintain our free government? Has the manhood of our race run out? ]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_12_01"><![CDATA[I issue the Emancipation Proclamation in January 1863 using my war powers as commander-in-chief. I believe that freeing the slaves will help win the war and that the Constitution gives me all the authority I need to issue that order. I also believe that once enslaved people taste freedom they can never be made slaves again. But what about the courts and Congress? When the war is over, will they see it that way? Might they overturn my emancipation policy, saying it was merely a wartime measure that now lacks legal force?  What should I do?]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_12_02"><![CDATA[Those are my choices: Continue to press the states for legislation securing emancipation, or move for adoption of a constitutional amendment to protect the Emancipation Proclamation from legal challenges after the war.  What should I do?]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_12_03"><![CDATA[Yes, that’s what I did. I saw to it that support for an emancipation amendment was included in the 1864 Union Party platform.  People who voted for my electors knew they were voting to end slavery forever. After my resounding re-election in November, I was then in position to lobby Congress to approve the measure and send it to the states for ratification. The vote was close, but on January 31, 1865, Congress proposed the 13th Amendment abolishing slavery forever in the United States. By December 1865, the states ratified it and slavery was finally destroyed.]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_12_04"><![CDATA[When the war became a struggle for black freedom, a permanent national solution to the problem of slavery was necessary. I saw to it that support for an emancipation amendment was included in the 1864 Union Party platform.  People who voted for my electors knew they were voting to end slavery forever. After my resounding re-election in November, I was then in position to lobby Congress to approve the measure and send it to the states for ratification. The vote was close, but on January 31, 1865, Congress proposed the 13th Amendment abolishing slavery forever in the United States. By December 1865, the states ratified it and slavery was finally destroyed.]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_13_01"><![CDATA[Battlefield setbacks are agitating the people. The Wilderness, Spotsylvania, Cold Harbor. The losses are staggering. General Grant’s army is stalled on the outskirts of Petersburg. Cries for peace talks to end the war are mounting. And it’s not just the usual Democrats howling for peace. Even Horace Greeley, the anti-slavery newspaper editor, and other members of my own Republican Party are urging a deal with Jefferson Davis that would re-unite the country, even if it means going back to slavery after the war. As recently as July 18, I have made my preconditions for peace talks perfectly clear: Union and an end to slavery. But perhaps I should re-consider. The war has ground on for more than three years now, longer than anyone expected. The people are weary. They dread a future stained with more rivers of blood.  I am weary. There is a tired spot within me that nothing can touch. Unless some great change takes place I know I might be beaten badly when I face the voters in November.  Perhaps I should agree to talks without any preconditions. What should I do?]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_13_02"><![CDATA[So those are my choices. Abandon emancipation and at least try to negotiate for peace, or stand by reunion and emancipation as non-negotiable demands to end the war. What do you think I should do?]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_13_03"><![CDATA[Yes, that’s what I did. I admit that I wavered briefly, and even drafted letters that changed my policy, but ultimately I rejected calls to abandon emancipation and negotiate for peace. Anything less would have been a dishonorable surrender of the cause of freedom for which the Union was now fighting and a breech of the promise I made to millions of enslaved women, men, and children.]]></caption>
  <caption name="5238_13_04"><![CDATA[Afraid that I would be defeated at the polls in November, I was sorely tempted to negotiate for peace. But in the end I rejected calls to abandon emancipation. To do so would have been a dishonorable surrender of the cause of freedom for which the Union was now fighting and a breech of the promise I made to millions of enslaved women, men, and children.]]></caption>
  <caption name="introduction"><![CDATA[My name is Abraham Lincoln.  I had a long career in politics.  But it was the years I spent as the 16th president of the United States that I faced some of the toughest decisions I ever had to make.  I will be taking you with me to those times when I had to make hard choices.  As we journey through these moments together, I’ll ask for your opinion on what I should do.  Then you will find out what I did and what happened next.  Let’s begin!]]></caption>
  <caption name="conclusion_a"><![CDATA[Congratulations! You and I see eye to eye on the issues. Perhaps you should think about a career in politics.]]></caption>
  <caption name="conclusion_b"><![CDATA[Good job. You and I agree on most of the issues.  It's okay to disagree sometimes as that assures a full and open discussion of different points of view.]]></caption>
  <caption name="conclusion_c"><![CDATA[Hmmm, you and I appear to see things very differently but that's okay because oftentimes there is no clearly correct answer to a problem. Keep on thinking for yourself!]]></caption>
</lincoln>
