In the end, though Lincoln’s role was not fully recognized at the time, he was the one who kept his fractious party together when an open rupture might easily have destroyed his administration before it could even begin. By privately endorsing Seward’s spirit of compromise while projecting an unyielding public image, President-elect Lincoln retaine

The editors of the Mercury would have been even more astonished if they had an inkling of the truth recognized by those closer to Lincoln: his political genius was not simply his ability to gather the best men of the country around him, but to impress upon them his own purpose, perception, and resolution at every juncture. With respect to Lincoln’s

Harper’s Weekly agreed. In an editorial endorsing the president’s reelection, it claimed that “among all the prominent men in our history from the beginning none have ever shown the power of understanding the popular mind so accurately as Mr. Lincoln.” In moving gradually toward emancipation, as he had done, the Harper’s editor observed, Lincoln un

Chase never did send a note requesting Lincoln to withdraw his name from further cabinet consideration. His desire for position and glory, as Lincoln shrewdly guessed, would allow Lincoln alone to determine

Worried that Lincoln’s adversaries were successfully eclipsing him by appealing to the “radical element,” Leonard Swett recommended that the president call for a constitutional amendment abolishing slavery. “I told him if he took that stand, it was an outside position and no one could maintain himself upon any measure more radical,” Swett recalled,

Of all the remarkable stage actors in this golden time, none surpassed Edwin Booth, son of the celebrated tragedian Junius Booth and elder brother to Lincoln’s future assassin, John Wilkes Booth. “Edwin Booth has done more for the stage in America than any other man,” wrote a drama critic in the 1860s. The soulful young actor captivated audiences e

While Lincoln may have deliberately chosen the word “communicated” to allow Bates the belief he was the first approached, he actually meant that Seward had not yet responded affirmatively to his letter.

All his life, Lincoln had exhibited an exceptionally sensitive grasp of the limits set by public opinion. As a politician, he had an intuitive sense of when to hold fast, when to wait, and when to lead. “It is my conviction,” Lincoln later said, “that, had the proclamation been issued even six months earlier than it was, public sentiment would not

Lincoln understood that the greatest challenge for a leader in a democratic society is to educate public opinion. “With public sentiment, nothing can fail; without it nothing can succeed,” he said. “Consequently he who moulds public sentiment, goes deeper than he who enacts statutes or pronounces decisions.