By Jay Winik
"The day after Abraham Lincoln's election, he assembled a gaggle of reporters and boisterously declared, "Well boys, your troubles are now over; mine have only just begun."
Little did he know just how prophetic his words would be. Between Election Day and his inauguration, seven Southern states seceded from the Union and the Fort Sumter crisis reached a dangerous flashpoint.
His own general-in-chief, Winfield Scott, strongly advised him to surrender the fort. William Seward, his secretary of state, ardently counseled negotiations with the South, and even privately assured the Confederates that Sumter would be evacuated. Most of his cabinet sided with Seward and voted to evacuate as well.
That was when Lincoln decided that he alone would have to decide. To the flicker of oil lamps, he stayed up all night on March 28. Shortly after dawn the next morning, he informed the cabinet that he would re-provision the besieged Fort Sumter -- a fateful move that all but ensured civil war."
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