2024 the best american president of all time review

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America's greatest president, who rose to power in the country's greatest hour of need and whose vision saw the United States through the Civil War

Abraham Lincoln towers above the others who have held the office of president—the icon of greatness, the pillar of strength whose words bound up the nation's wounds. His presidency is the hinge on which American history pivots, the time when the young republic collapsed of its own contradictions and a new birth of freedom, sanctified by blood, created the United States we know today. His story has been told many times, but never by a man who himself sought the office of president and contemplated the awesome responsibilities that come with it.

George S. McGovern—a Midwesterner, former U.S. senator, presidential candidate, veteran, and historian by training—offers his unique insight into our sixteenth president. He shows how Lincoln sometimes went astray, particularly in his restrictions on civil liberties, but also how he adjusted his sights and transformed the Civil War from a political dispute to a moral crusade. McGovern's account reminds us why we hold Lincoln in such esteem and why he remains the standard by which all of his successors are measured.

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B001FA0QG2
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Times Books (December 23, 2008)
Publication date ‏ : ‎ December 23, 2008
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 646 KB
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Print length ‏ : ‎ 206 pages
Reviewer: Ricardo Mio
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Compelling account of Lincoln as our greatest president and literary giant
Review: George McGovern, who ran unsuccessfully for president against Richard Nixon, in1972, is a terrific writer. In this relatively short (155 pages) book, McGovern offers his insights, which are considerable, into our 16th president--as a politician and as a compelling speech writer. The over-riding issue in Lincoln's life was slavery; the over-riding issue of the book is Lincoln's sterling character in dealing with slavery and the Civil War. Also addressed near the end of the book is Lincoln's masterful use of language and his gift for writing compelling speeches.On the surface, Lincoln was born into a life that was not promising. He had little prospects for success in life. Being a sensitive and unusually bright child, the fact that he suffered from depression throughout much of his life should not be surprising. His father, Thomas, a particularly hard man, was a dirt-poor farmer who neither appreciated nor understood his son. Young Abraham was ambitious as well as bright--and yearned for success. He had no interest in farming. What gave him joy and hope was reading books.When Abraham was nine, his mother died of milk sickness. Thomas quickly remarried a widow named Sarah Bush Johnson, who had three children of her own. Sarah brought a sense of order to the Lincoln household. Right away, she recognized Abraham was unusually bright; she encouraged him to develop his intellect, and to attend school whenever possible. She gave him several of her books, books that would broaden his mind and influence his writing ability, particularly as a lawyer and politician (more about that later). Among them were: "Aesop's Fables," "The Pilgrim's Progress," "Robinson Crusoe," and "Webster's Speller." She came to love him as much or more than her own children. Many years later she said: "Abe was the best boy I ever saw. He never gave me a cross word . . ." He said of her that she had been "his best friend in the world and that no Son could love a Mother more than he loved her."Meanwhile, the gulf between Abraham and his father widened. Thomas accepted that his son wanted to expand his mind, but he didn't like it. Abe said of his father, "he never learned me to love him." From Kentucky where Abraham was born, his father moved the family to Indiana (where he buried his first wife and married Sarah); from there he moved them to New Salem, Illinois, where Lincoln grew into manhood and discovered he had a gift for telling stories and reciting jokes. At the same time he found himself at the center of wherever people gathered, such was his charisma. People saw a special quality in this rough-hewn young man: he was quick witted, honest and funny, and eager to learn. New Salem had a debating society which Abraham joined. He made friends, polished his elocution, borrowed books, and spent much of his time reading. What did he read? He favored the plays of William Shakespeare and the poetry of Robert Burns. A local justice of the peace lent him books on the law, in particular "Revised Laws of Illinois." Lincoln also purchased a tattered volume of Blackstone's "Commentaries." Around this time Lincoln began appearing in court informally, taking it all in. At some point he traveled back to Indiana to hear an acclaimed attorney named John Brackinbridge argue a case. Of the experience, Lincoln said, "I felt that if I could ever make speeches as good as that my soul would be satisfied." He began to think seriously of becoming a lawyer. His next step was to run for office as a representative in the state legislature for Sangamon County. He won.Of this period in Lincoln's life the author writes: "(Lincoln) somehow recognized significant capabilities within himself and nurtured a determination to succeed."At some point he moved to Springfield, the state capital, studied law, passed the bar, and took up law as a profession. He rode circuit throughout the state, where he learned to speak to juries and win a number of cases. It was in Springfield where he met and wooed Mary Todd, whom, after a stormy courtship, he married.She recognized his potential and encouraged him to run for a seat in the U. S. Congress, which he won. In Washington, he met and grew to admire Henry Clay of Kentucky, who would shape Lincoln's views on several of the important issues of the day, and encouraged him to join the Whig party. By now, Lincoln was decidedly against slavery which "sickened" him. In his second year in office, he sought to put an end to slavery in the District of Columbia, believing that slavery was a monstrous embarrassment to the nation's capital. He failed. He also failed to stop the Mexican War, which he believed was being fought to expand the Union and create new territory for the expansion of slavery. He returned to Springfield disillusioned and depressed. To a friend he wrote: "I neither expect, seek, or deserve" to return to Washington. Once home he dedicated himself to rebuilding his law practice. Taking cases in admiralty, commerce, criminal, and patent law, made Lincoln one of the most highly regarded and sought-after attorneys in Illinois, and returned him to Washington, this time to argue cases before the U.S. Supreme Court.The slavery issue was never far from his mind, and was making headlines across the nation, particularly when the Compromise of 1850 was repealed and replaced with the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Behind its passage was Illinois Senator Stephen Douglas. Lincoln feared slavery would spread, but he could not stand by and watch it happen. He had to speak out. In Peoria on October 16, 1854, Lincoln gave his first great speech; it revived his political career and paved the way for the Lincoln-Douglas debates. It also made Lincoln a candidate for the U.S. Senate and, as important, a national political figure. He lost the 1858 Senate race to Douglas, but two years later, he was nominated by the Republican party to be its candidate for President of the United States.On election day, Lincoln carried the Northeast and West, but failed to carry a single state below the Mason-Dixon line. In the end he tallied 180 electoral votes to 72 for Breckinridge, 39 for Bell, and only 12 for Douglas. But while those around him celebrated, Lincoln brooded. Though he held out hope that reason would prevail in the Deep South, he suspected the national divide over slavery was too great and that his years as president would be difficult ones. How difficult, he had no way of knowing--few suspected the onslaught of Southern states that would secede from the Union after Lincoln's election, and result in four years of bitter and brutal sectional fighting.Writes the author: "In ten tumultuous years Lincoln's star had risen improbably and remarkably. Only a few years earlier he had been certain that his political career was over, but the exploding issue of slavery gave Lincoln a platform to publicize his evolving, maturing views on the abomination of American society that threatened the very foundation of the republic . . . . Firmly believing that the principle of self-government was the essence of freedom, he fused a reverence for the Constitution with an admiring interpretation of the personal liberty that Thomas Jefferson had envisioned in the Declaration of Independence. Utilizing his skills for organization, preparation, and adherence to political principle, Lincoln had been transformed from attorney to candidate to statesman. Fate had brought him to lead the American people in the most calamitous crisis of our national history. No one could know the outcome of the perilous journey that now confronted the newly elected president."Lincoln knew nothing of the art of war, but as with everything else in his life he proved to be a fast learner. After a few missteps, in Ulysses S. Grant, he found a general at last who would fight. Grant fought some of the bloodiest battles of the Civil War, and in doing so defeated the one general no other Union general could whip--Robert E. Lee. Lee surrendered to Grant at Appomattox Court House, in April of 1865, which ended the Civil War. Within a month, Lincoln was assassinated at Ford's Theater in Washington. "Now he belongs to the ages," said William Seward, his friend and one-time political rival, whom Lincoln had appointed as Secretary of State."No one can understand the greatness of Lincoln in his own time and in his place in history without reading some of his great speeches," writes McGovern. "Most of the addresses were carefully constructed by Lincoln--sometimes over periods of days or weeks, even months. He drew on extensive reading of the works of men he admired--Henry Clay, Daniel Webster, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson. He kept on his writing desk copies of his own speeches that provided lines and ideas he might work into a speech at hand."Lincoln frequently pulled passages from out of the King James version of the Bible, from the Hebrew prophets of the Old Testament and from Christ and his disciples in the New Testament. He borrowed ideas from Shakespeare, Robert Burns, 'Aesop's Fables,' and John Bunyan's 'The Pilgrim's Progress.' He also drew from his experience growing up in Kentucky and Indiana and from his legislative and lawyer years in Illinois. His mind and his command of diction were sharpened in his debates with his able, experienced opponent Senator Stephen Douglas. . . ."Prior to the speech at Gettysburg, Lincoln had delivered four speeches that could be described as great: his speech against the Kansas-Nebraska Act in Peoria, Illinois on October 16, 1854; his acceptance of the Republican nomination for the U.S. Senate race against Stephen Douglas at Springfield, Illinois, on June 16, 1858 (the 'house divided' speech); his speech at New York's Cooper Union on February 27, 1860; and his first inaugural address, delivered March 4, 1861. His second inaugural address, delivered March 4, 1865, was also deserving of the description 'great'--some would say it was his greatest speech."But it is the Gettysburg Address, although brief, that has lived in history as an enduring political and literary treasure. I's fame places it alongside the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights . . . For it is in its 272 words that Lincoln redefined the meaning of the Union and of the sacrifice that had sanctified its preservation.McGovern sums up: "Lincoln was the most masterful speechwriter of any president in our national history. Much of his success in the American political arena derived from his superior ability to draft compelling public addresses. Likewise, his high place in history rests heavily on his beautiful prose. He was a literary giant."I recommend this book highly.

Reviewer: Daniel Putman
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: One of the best biographies in the American Presidents Series
Review: Those over a certain age will remember George McGovern as the losing candidate in the 1972 election in which Richard Nixon was elected to a second term. McGovern lost heavily. I did not know that McGovern also had a doctorate in American History. Given what I did know about McGovern, I expected this book about Lincoln to be at least somewhat a political commentary about current events as are (at least in part) a couple earlier books in this series. But nothing could be further from what this book is. McGovern the professional historian completely submerges McGovern the politician. The result is as fine a short biography of Lincoln as there is on the market.McGovern shows Lincoln in his strengths and his flaws. He highlights Lincoln’s incredible speaking skills that inspired a nation and his acute awareness of his own strengths and weaknesses. Lincoln’s intelligence shines through his entire life. Despite a quarrelsome cabinet, Lincoln made his own decisions and learned from his mistakes. But McGovern also points out clearly some of the things Lincoln did during the war that were questionable and how he was, especially in the 1864 election, a political manipulator who took advantage of his office. In hindsight one can see the apparent necessity of Lincoln’s war actions like suspending habeas corpus and suppressing press freedoms. It was a war of Americans against Americans that had potential enemies in many places. It is harder to see a justification in the election of 1864 for some of the actions Lincoln, often through Stanton, allowed. But it was an extreme situation that called for extreme measures and it is difficult to distinguish what was necessary to finish the war effort from what was political. Lincoln was no saint but it is often not clear what options he had in order to justify the massive death toll in the fighting and win the war. What Lincoln was beyond doubt was a highly intelligent and reflective man who did everything he could to preserve the Union.McGovern does a great job in 155 pages of text in presenting Lincoln in all his aspects – the heroic and not-so-heroic. Like virtually all historians, he comes out at the end greatly admiring Abraham Lincoln. As part of the American President Series, this excellent short biography of Lincoln gives the reader a lucid and even-handed account of the man who led the nation through the Civil War.

Reviewer: Ms Oya Bell
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: Clean copy, arrived on time.Thank you.

Reviewer: Alexander T. Fraser
Rating: 3.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: I expected more from. MCGovern a serious political figure in his time and clearly a smart and sensitive historian. Perhaps Lincoln is too well known for a short history to tell us any thing new but this feels like a book cobbled together from magazine articles. It's pretty dully written too. Easily the worst of the seies that I have read to date.