Here’s to the book that derailed my 2023 resolution to read over 10 books in the year, it ended up being six. This heavily researched tome about Lincoln and a few of his cabinet members is pretty amazing. Too bad Obama didn’t learn shit, if he actually read it, then he wouldn’t have been a total NeoLiberal pussy for eight years, or phony. The plug about it being a movie is utter crap too. Lincoln, starring Daniel Day Lewis, who is pretentious with his two last names like the author, only focused on the final couple of months of the War. Spoiler Alert! Lincoln goes to a play at Ford’s Theater in the last scene!
Was it worth reading? Given how successful the Neo-Confederate, Republican and White Power movement’s misinformation campaigns have been?
- When asking a person on the street or forcing Nimrata Haley to give a correct answer, HELL YES!
If I had a buck for every douchebag claiming “Federal overreach” (Libertarians) being the root of the Civil War or hearing the “Lost Cause” (usually Rednecks), I’d be surprisingly rich given that Travis County (Austin) voted against secession.
The focus isn’t necessarily how Lincoln whipped the South’s collective ass, nor is it a biography. It’s more about his style of leadership. I always knew he was the dark horse for the GOP nomination in 1860, I just wasn’t aware the convention played into his hands as he got it to happen in Chicago over friendlier Republican strongholds in the East. The Republican infighting was a factor too. If I were around, watching the events unfurling, I would’ve been with many thinking Seward was a lock. A powerful senator from New York with a strong base from the East, a decent legislative record and hellbent on constraining Slavery’s spread. I’m baffled on how Chase was ever a candidate for any office. He was a complete weasel despite his efforts to help Black Americans in Ohio. No matter, Lincoln was very cunning and locked in the Illinois delegates to back him, then played Seward’s and Case’s factions against each other.
With the general election, the Democrats running two candidates sure helped since Abe wasn’t on the 1860 POTUS ballot in nine of the 11 Confederate States. Thus he won with a plurality as per the horrible, undemocratic Electoral College with merely 40 percent of the popular vote. I still would demand a runoff between him and whoever came in second out of the four candidate field.
Winning quickly became his last concern. As soon as he was declared the winner, Southern states began seceding because we know they’ve always been gracious losers. Lincoln knew he’d have trouble regardless. Illinois was the boonies in 1860 compared to the developed and older states of New York or (ick) Ohio. Therefore, he reached out to the people he beat to be in his cabinet. This doesn’t sound novel or very radical nowadays. Biden took in two crappier competitors instead getting experts on transportation or legilsation. Lincoln was the opposite. He chose for their actual expertise in key fields in addition to soliciting for advice! Seward was adept at State, Chase was oddly competent running the Treasury and financing the War. Lincoln flubbed with War but corrected it via Stanton. He did hire a couple Democrats (pro-Union of course) and one was oddly a slave owner from Missouri. The Presidential Cabinets were quite small then and they all met at least weekly to debate with Lincoln on how to execute the war or other policies; there were foreign and domestic things conflict wasn’t going to wait on. Imagine now, the Postmaster General, Interior and the Attorney General giving suggestions on what do about Osama bin Laden, funding for NASA or bypassing SCOTUS with student-loan forgiveness.
Lincoln was pretty lucky to be in the time he lived in. Today’s media circus would’ve eaten him alive; the Beltway dildos mocking his high squeaky voice and ill-fitting clothes. A dick like David Brooks or Maureen Dowd would call him weak or indecisive for letting Seward punch up a speech.
Kearns’ tendency to constantly mention Lincoln’s incredible patience gets tiresome too. I bet his staffers had to calm him down frequently over Chase and General McLellan’s shit talk to friends, peers and the Media on how they could run the country better. He was only mortal and didn’t think twice about having all those First Nations’ resisters executed in Minnesota.
His wife Mary was another huge liability thanks to the Media getting wind of her shopping habits on par with Nancy Reagan. She came from a wealthier family than him and when New York stores offered her lines of credit, she went nuts after years of “austerity” in their marriage. If Booth didn’t murder him, the bills she ran up on clothes would’ve. Mary was also a grand, petty asshole in DC circles. She had some inferiority complex over the parties thrown by Chase’s daughter and got revenge by not inviting her to state dinners.
As for the gay angle. Kearns squelches this pretty early and I have to agree. People living on the frontier weren’t picky about their accommodations since they were flat broke. They were rather reserve with their affections anyway. Oh people boned, had affairs, visited hookers, etc. If they were homosexuals though. People knew. It’s why it’s generally agreed upon that Lincoln’s predecessor Buchanan was the first gay POTUS. He never married and his relationship with Senator King of Alabama was one of the worst kept secrets in DC. The point being, the super, stuck-up attitudes of Victorian England hadn’t quite come into full effect with American Anglophiles yet.
Do I recommend reading Rivals? Civil War buffs? Yes. People who can blast through 700+ pages faster than me? Yes. Something to counter the willful ignorance Nimrata Haley has? Maybe. There’s faster, shorter and more helpful books on this. More insight on who was Lincoln? No.