[60] Lincoln finished eighth out of 13 candidates (the top four were elected), though he received 277 of the 300 votes cast in the New Salem precinct.[61]
Lincoln served as New Salem's postmaster and later as county surveyor, but continued his voracious reading and decided to become a lawyer.[62] Rather than studying in the office of an established attorney, as was the custom, Lincoln borrowed legal texts from attorneys John Todd Stuart and Thomas Drummond, purchased books including Blackstone's Commentaries and Chitty's Pleadings, and read law on his own.[62] He later said of his legal education that "I studied with nobody."[63]

Illinois state legislature (1834–1842)
Lincoln's home in Springfield, Illinois
Lincoln's second state house campaign in 1834, this time as a Whig, was a success over a powerful Whig opponent.[64] Then followed his four terms in the Illinois House of Representatives for Sangamon County.[65] He championed construction of the Illinois and Michigan Canal, and later was a Canal Commissioner.[66] He voted to expand suffrage beyond white landowners to all white males, but adopted a "free soil" stance opposing both slavery and abolition.