Lincoln's Rise to Power

Author: William Baringer
List Price: $49.00
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ISBN: 0403008530
Publisher: Scholarly Press (May, 1971)
Average Customer Rating: 4 out of 5

Customer Reviews

Rating: 4 out of 5
A good book on Lincoln's pre-presidential political career
This is a great book about Lincoln's political career in the years leading up to the Civil War. Baringer's focus in this book, as suggested by the title, is how Lincoln rose from relative obscurity as a prairie lawyer (and single-term Congressman) to President of the United States. Baringer does a wonderful job showing the importance of public perception, the press, and Lincoln's speeches, especially during the Lincoln-Douglas debates. These debates helped put Lincoln on the national stage. The one shortcoming of this book, in my opinion, is that it does not show how Lincoln reached the prominence in the Illinois Republican Party in the years from 1854 to 1858 to be put in that position of challenging Stephen A. Douglas for the Senate. In 1856, Lincoln was among those mentioned as a potential vice-presidential candidate at the Republican National Convention in Philadelphia, and he received the second highest number of votes. This must be taken into consideration when examining the emergence of Lincoln.

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