Basking in Borrowed Glory

Nobody is profiting more in this bicentennial of Lincoln's birth than historians. An army of Lincoln scholars is turning out biographies or studies of the great man from every conceivable hypothesis. It seems as if a new book a day is coming out. Over the years I have contributed to the flood myself, with two books of my own, and another now in the works. There is no end to it. It has been said he is the most written about man in history this side of Jesus.

Some wag--I have in mind it was Mark Twain, but I may be wrong about that--defined a biography, in effect, as a book about a great figure written by a lesser figure. But we can't help ourselves. To some degree the biographers, in Lincoln's case, are being lionized this year about as much as their subject. It hasn't hurt this cottage industry that Barack Obama has made Lincoln the pardigm guiding his own presidency. A book mentioned by the President has nearly as much impact on sales as one mentioned by Oprah. He can send it through the best seller ceiling.

Lincoln writers this year are being turned to on a regular basis for opinions about the great man, on TV, in the newspapers--everywhere. We are having a busy time of it. Just the other day I received an e-mail from a newspaper journalist in Slovakia wanting to know if I thought our history would have been different if Lincoln's hadn't been president.

Just so you won't be left out, since you probably don't live in Pravda where his newspaper is, I will tell you what I said:

Yes, I answered. Our history would indeed be different. if Lincoln had
not won the election of 1860 and become President, we might not have
had--very likely would not have had--a president with his vision and
dogged determination to save the Union and Republican government--and
to somehow end slavery, which for so long had bitterly divided the
country. Any other Republican or Democrat on the scene would have
perhaps caved in and let the South go, with all kinds of ramifications
for a different future for the country. We had a whole series of
presidents from Andrew Jackson to Lincoln, who could not handle the
situation. Without a Lincoln, with his combination of humanity,
ability, steel, and vision, we might have had another Taylor or Pierce
or Buchanan. And everything would have been different.

We saw what happened in the country after Lincoln was assassinated. If
Lincoln had lived, Reconstruction would have been handled a good deal
differently and our history because of it might have been different.
Lincoln was a man wholly without any sense of vengeance in his heart
against the South, unlike many of the Radicals in his party. He would
have tried to bring the South back into the Union on the basis of true
brotherhood and equality for Southerners and Northerners, white and
black, alike. And I believe, unlike Andrew Johnson, he had the
political smarts and skill to pull it off. It would not have been
easy. The Radicals in Congress were out for blood and did not have the
humanity Liincoln had. But Lincoln was perhaps the most astute
politician in American history. He would have dealt with the Radicals
and the South in a very even-handed and effective way. He would not
have been impeached as Johnson was. It would have an entirely
different ballgame had Lincoln lived.