But Lincoln understood how the economy worked, and how to run a country.

And he was a Republican

But of course, if you're implying that the results of Obama's election will be the same as the results of Lincoln's election, then who would vote for him.

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"You are just stuck in a box."

--Zaro

I believe Lincoln won 39.8% of the vote.

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Order without liberty and liberty without order are equally destructive. - Theodore Roosevelt

Yeah, it was a sectional victory to say the least. The Democrats were divided between the North and South.

I'm also going to break political orthodoxy for a moment and enlighten you all to the fact that the Democratic party was the party of slavery.

__________________

"You are just stuck in a box."

--Zaro

Abraham Lincoln (Republican) 39.65%
John Breckenridge (Southern Democrat) 18.20%
John Bell (Constitutional Union) 12.62%
Stephen Douglas (Democrat ) 29.52%

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Where are we going? And why am I in this handbasket?

Woah woah woah. The political parties were pretty different back then. One of Lincoln's main achievements and goals was fighting for a BIG government and less states' rights and more central rights. As far as I am concerned, those aint GOP values.

The ideals are the same, the situations are different. In Lincoln's time, it was thought by many people that states could do what ever they thought was constitutional (witness Civil War and secession). The federal government was too weak, and the Republican ideal was stronger. Today, the federal government is too powerful and the states are left to write their own traffic laws, and the Republican ideal is weaker.

__________________

"You are just stuck in a box."

--Zaro

Man, I wonder sometimes how thouroughly different history would have been had you had prefferential voting from the outset. Would Lincholn have lost? Who would Bells' voters have prefferenced?