Title

The last best hope of earth : Abraham Lincoln and the promise of America

Description

Mark R. Neely, Jr., provides for the general reader the first compact biography of Abraham Lincoln based on new scholarship. There is no comparable, succinct work on this nation's greatest president. "The Last Best Hope of Earth vividly recaptures the central place of politics in Lincoln's life. In Illinois, Lincoln was an established and prosperous lawyer, married to a refined and educated southern belle, and the father of four boys. Throughout his life, however, politics remained his first love. In Neely's depiction of Lincoln, power was never sought for its own sake. Having triumphed over the hardscrabble circumstances of his youth in Kentucky and Indiana, Lincoln, early in his political career, tied his ambition to the search for solutions to the economic underdevelopment of the American West. And in the last eleven years of his life, Lincoln's political ambitions became yoked to a fierce nationalism and a keen moral purpose - the preservation of the Union and the demise of slavery. Lincoln could not remember a time when he did not hate slavery, or revere the federal system. He made his position clear in the decade leading up to his presidential election campaign, and a civil war erupted." "Through Neely's eyes we see the growth of this president's advanced ideas about military strategy, despite their price in blood; his husbanding of the resources of the home front, regardless of its cost in national treasure; and his complex defense of the Constitution, notwithstanding a momentary loss of civil liberties. We also see Lincoln's steadfast dedication to the Emancipation Proclamation, while the fate of the republic and the future of four million black Americans hung in the balance." "Richly illustrated, nuanced and accessible, written with attention to the age in which Lincoln lived, yet ever alert to universal moral questions, this is a portrait of Lincoln as an extraordinary man in his own time and ours."--BOOK JACKET.

Identifier

483732

674511255

Creator

Neely, Mark E

Source

Brian Lamb Booknotes Collection

Gift of Brian Lamb, 2011.

Catalog record

Language

eng

Date

1993

Program air date: June 12, 1994.

Publisher

Harvard University Press

George Mason University. Libraries. Special Collections & Archives

Text

Transcription of Annotations
Notes on front endpapers: Kansas-Nebraska most explosive. 1854-Peoria speech 1st great speech. 1843-Robert, 1846Edward Baker, 1850 William Wallace, 1853-Thomas-Tad. 1809 . 23 1832 Ill. House Cand. 1832 Militia. 1833 Postmaster. 1834 House-he won. 1830 Ill home. 1838 re-elected. 1842 Mar. 1840 re-elected. 1846 U.S. House. 1860- Pres. 1865. Henry Clay-idol. Nationalism. Political parties-he liked them. Doctrine of Instruction p. 13. Doctrine of necessity. Left his father. Drink, Tobacco, Religion, Women. Ambitions. Elections-not standardized. Private life is not accessible. Lincoln and the duel-James Shields. Save the Union (first). Slavery (second) colonization. Legend-drafting of Emancipation Proclamation. General Sherman hated politics. General Grant. McClellan. Bull Run, Antietam, Vicksburg. Underlinings/notes: Underlinings: Inspiration for programs, speeches, dedication to preservation of Union, antislavery conviction/conflicts/racial equality, secession, assassination theories, Booth's views on race and his recruits. Notes: "Private life not accessible." Lamb highlights people of importance to Lincoln: Ann Rutledge, Mary Todd, his children and their birth/death years, Herndon, Dred Scott, John Brown, "Bobby Lee," Frederick Douglass. Also noted are important events/political/career: "Kansas-Nebraska," "popular sovereignty," "New York Riots 1864," "Legend of the drafting of the Emancipation, "dates of battles: "Union defeat Bull Run July 21, 1861," "2nd Bull Run Aug 62," and "Antietam Sept 17, 62," "Fredericksburg Dec, 62." "Lincoln 'no superior in American history,'" "1st assassination in America," "conspiracy to kill Lincoln, Johnson, Seward & U.S. Grant."

Subject

"Lincoln, Abraham, 1809-1865."

"Presidents--United States--Biography."

Relation

Original Booknotes interview

Rights

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