Abraham Lincoln and the Second American Revolution

by James M. McPherson

Book Overview

James McPherson has emerged as one of America's finest historians. Battle Cry of Freedom, his Pulitzer Prize-winning account of the Civil War, was a national bestseller that Hugh Brogan, in The New... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 019505542X
• Release Date: February 1991
• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Length: 192 Pages
• Weight: 0.50 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.5" x 0.8" x 5.8"

Customer Reviews

McPherson Excels with A. Lincoln Again

James McPherson (Battle Cry of Freedom) is the preeminent Civil War author and scholar of our time. The Princeton University professor provides fresh insight into A. Lincoln in these seven essays. McPherson demonstrates conclusively that the Civil War was indeed the Second American Revolution - it abolished slavery and smashed the political, economic, and social status quo. Before the War, southerners dominated American politics - after the war it was decades before a son of the south could be elected President. The absence of the south from the national legislature during the war allowed the passage of the great progressive and modernizing legislation; the Homestead Act, enabled a continental railroad, and land-grant colleges. After the war, blacks made great (if far from complete) progress in education, politics, and economics. Unfortunately, the reactionary forces led a counter-revolution that attempted to turn back the massive changes in society with much success. That counter-revolution eventually yielded to a Second Reconstruction in the mid-20th century. McPherson repeatedly returns to Lincoln's political evolution as the War changed from a limited war for limited ends to a total war for revolutionary ends. In the end Lincoln insisted on unconditional surrender. I particularly enjoyed the essays entitled 'How Lincoln Won the War with Metaphors', which contrasts the communication abilities of Lincoln and Jefferson Davis, and 'The Hedgehog and the Foxes', in which McPherson favors us with a description of Lincoln as the single-minded hedgehog outlasting the multifarious foxes such as Horace Greeley and William Seward. My only small quibble is that similar points are made using the same quotes in multiple essays (perhaps unavoidable in a collection of previously published essays), but the quotes are so evocative of Lincoln's thinking that the repetition is not only forgiven, but enjoyed. Highly recommended for anyone interested in US history, Lincoln, or the Civil War era.

shrewd, wise, penetrating mind

ABRAHAM LINCOLN AND THE SECOND AMERICAN REVOLUTION by James M. McPherson has concise and crisp language and deep insights into Lincoln's mind. Each of six essays shows that it was Lincoln's reality anchored character and powerful intellect that transformed the United States to the country it is today. One essay shows how Lincoln's use of metaphor, culled from Aesop's Fables, the works of Shakespeare, and the Bible made him a consummate communicator. His metaphors resonated to the deepest layers of mind of the average American in way that instilled motivation and purpose to a war that seemed impossible to manage or win. Compare to Jefferson Davis who was so highly educated and abstract but was unable to connect with ordinary folk. But it is McPherson who too is able to convey to us this president's great powers with his own metaphors i.e. "barnyard philosophy," and his essay, "The hedgehog and the fox," which compares and contrasts Lincoln's abilities with the "smartest contemporaries." This book is a great distillate of the voluminous Civil War Literature.

How Lincoln Transformed America

Books on Abraham Lincoln and on the Civil War abound, but few books explore their significance with the eloquence and erudition of Professor McPherson's "Abraham Lincoln and the Second American Revolution." This book is a compilation of seven essays which discuss the transformations the Civil War brought to the character of the United States and the indespensable role Lincoln played in bringing these transformations about.In these essays, Professor McPherson explains that the changes the Civil War brought about can be summarized in two words: Nation and Liberty. First, The Civil War transformed a Union of States into a single Nation. This change is exemplified in Lincoln's Gettysburg Address. As Professor McPherson points out in the preface to his essays, in the Gettysburg Address Lincoln spoke of the American "nation" rather than of a "union" in order "to invoke a new birth of American Freedom and nationhood." (p. vii)Second, the change of America from a union of states to a nation was accompanied by a change in the concept of liberty on which the nation was founded. In a word, this change involved emancipation, the abolition of slavery, and the application to all people of the principle articulated in the Declaration of Independence that "all men are created equal". In several essays, Professor McPherson uses the work of the political philosopher Isaiah Berlin to develop a distinction between negative and positive liberty. Before the Civil War, liberty was understood primarily in a negative way whcih involved individual freedom from government regulation and freedome from interference with private property. With the Civil War, the concept of liberty changed to allow the Federal government to assume a positive role in promoting human freedom and human good. The most striking example, of course, is the abolition of slavery. But the concept of the government's role in creating a positive concept of liberty has continued.Professor McPherson's essays show how Lincoln unified the ideals of Nationhood and Liberty as the Civil War progressed and thus effected a revolution in the basic nature of the United States. The essays explore these basic themes masterfully as Professor McPherson discusses Lincoln's political skills, his insistence on the unconditional surrender of the South, the development of Lincoln's ideas on emancipation, the significance to the second American Revolution of Lincoln's eloquence as a speaker and a writer, and much else. Professor McPherson also discusses the Reconstruction period in a thoughtful way. He takes issue, in part with modern revisionsists who claim that the Civil War failed in its basic aims by the backtracking from Reconstruction and the reinstitution of Jim Crow that occurred following 1876. A "second reconstruction" proved necessary in the mid-20th Century to realize fully the aims of the first. But this does not derogate, Professor McPherson argues, the significance of the Revolution that was wrought

One of the best American history books I have ever read

This is an absolute must buy. It is incredibly well written and very persuasive. Using the back drop of Lincoln's administration, it describes the fundamental revolution that took place in the American political structure as a result of the Civil War. It forced me to completely reevaluate my feelings on everything from federalism to political liberty. You will not regret reading it.

Without a doubt, a complete revolution of American ideals.

As any Lincoln fan knows, the struggle that our 16th President endured during the Civil War was enourmous. This book offers more insights into the constitutional questions that dominated the Civil War. And makes it seem that, unlike any other man in our history save George Washington, Lincoln completely loved, admired, respected, and protected American democracy. Yet, the book also gives us an insight into the counterarguements of the time, something many reviews fail to provide. Over all, this book reinforces every notion of courage, intelligence, and sacrifice that Lincoln has recieved since his death. He truly did lead us through a second revolution.