He was busy at useful labor, was picking up
scraps of schooling, was making friends and learning to prize
them at their true worth; was, in short, developing rapidly from
a youth into a young man. Already he began to feel stirrings of
ambition which prompted him to look beyond his own daily needs
toward the larger interests of his county and his State. An
election for members of the Illinois legislature was to take
place in August, 1832. Sangamon County was entitled to four
representatives. Residents of the county over twenty-one years of
age were eligible to election, and audacious as it might appear,
Lincoln determined to be a candidate.
The people of New Salem, like those of all other Western towns,
took a keen interest in politics; "politics" meaning, in that
time and place, not only who was to be President or governor, but
concerning itself with questions which came much closer home to
dwellers on the frontier. "Internal improvements," as they were
called--the building of roads and clearing out of streams so that
men and women who lived in remote places might be able to travel
back and forth and carry on trade with the rest of the world--
became a burning question in Illinois. There was great need of
such improvements; and in this need young Lincoln saw his
opportunity.
It was by way of the Sangamon River that he entered politics.
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