" Abraham Lincoln " He was the first president from the Republican Party. His victory was entirely due to the strength of his support in the North and West; no ballots were cast for him in 10 of the 15 Southern slave states, and he won only two of 996 counties in all the Southern states. The Republican Party ticket of Abraham Lincoln and Hannibal Hamlin won a national popular plurality, a popular majority in the North, where the states had already abolished slavery, and a national electoral majority comprising only Northern electoral votes.At its core, Lincoln's First Inaugural Address is a please to prevent war. Lincoln was elected in 1860 and the reaction of the nation was swift and tragic. Southern states began to secceed, removing themselves from the Union and forming the confederate states of America.