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A NEWSLETTER OF THE ABRAHAM ASSOCIATION

VOLUME 12 NUMBER 4 WINTER 2010 SPRINGFIELD, ILLINOIS

LINCOLN AND THE LEADERSHIP FOLLIES

Times…Pat Williams‟ Lincoln Speaks By Allen C. Guelzo to Leaders: 20 Powerful Lessons for Gettysburg College Today's Leaders from America’s 16th Let‟s say that you are responsible for President…Character Counts: Leader- hiring the president of a large but un- ship Qualities in Washington, Wilber- dercapitalized republic sometime after force, Lincoln, and Solzhenitsyn by Os the middle of the 19th century. Guinness…What Would Lincoln Do?: Lincoln’s Most Inspired Solutions to You hire two search firms. One meets Challenging Problems and Difficult with prospects in Chicago, the other in Situations by David Accord…Lincoln Baltimore. They come up with two can- on Leadership: Executive Strategies for didates. One of them is a former em- Tough Times… 's ployee, a certified genius, with the best Faith Based Leadership. But the sheer education. The other is a lawyer who‟s number of these books is a sign that no been with the republic for four years, one‟s really sure of the answer, or else and has been responsible for major op- we wouldn‟t need all of these books. erations over the last four years, but has General George Brinton McClellan On the theoretical level, discussions of little to show for it. Photograph by Mathew Brady, 1861 leadership tend to fall out along two Whom do you hire? It‟s one of the great truths of life, that lines: one is traits, and the other is tem- everybody wants to go to heaven, but perament. Traits are usually thought of If you chose the second candidate, con- nobody wants to die. Similarly, every- as teachable, like habits, and so we have gratulations: you‟ve just hired ABRA- body wants to be a leader, but nobody one tribe of leadership consultants who HAM LINCOLN. But you probably didn‟t, seems to have a very good handle on believes that leadership can be distilled because he doesn‟t really look like the what leadership is. Wander up and down into a series of learnable practices „leadership‟ types the latest „leadership‟ down the bookstalls at Borders or Bar- that you can pick up by dint of self- seminar taught you to look for. More nes & Noble devoted to business books, application. likely, you chose the first candidate. and count how many books are sitting Congratulations: you‟ve just hired there, struggling to explain leadership: Temperament leadership, on the other GEORGE BRINTON MCCLELLAN. Why? servant leadership, transformational hand, is not about you developing a Because it‟s the election year of 1864, leadership, effective leadership, leader- temperament. Temperament is not de- and Little Mac is the guy with the ship skills, leadership lessons from At- veloped. It is a mysterious asset which golden resume, the hire that every ex- tila the Hun. comes hard-wired with the person, and ecutive search firm dreams of finding the purpose of temperament leadership for their stable. It was inevitable that, in all of this out- training is to teach you how to recog- pouring on leadership, people would nize it in others, not how you can de- The other guy, however, turns out to be eventually turn to Abraham Lincoln. velop it in yourself. pure gold. He surmounts all the chal- And sure enough, there are no shortage lenges in the next fiscal year, restores of books on offer that promise to iden- The problem with a great deal of the everything to profitability, gets the sat- tify and package the aspects of Lin- leadership literature – from Howard ellite campuses back to the core mis- coln‟s „leadership‟ for use by „leaders‟ Gardner to Tom Peters – is that leader- sion, and frees up four million or so who wonder how they, like Ray Bolger, ship is rarely this tidy. You can incul- capital units. can be seen “thinkin‟ like Lincoln.” cate all the traits you like, but at the Donald Phillips‟ Lincoln on Leader- But you didn‟t hire him, did you? ship: Executive Strategies for Tough (Continued on page 2) Visit our website at www.abrahamlincolnassociation.org

2 A NEWSLETTER OF THE ABRAHAM LINCOLN ASSOCIATION FOR THE PEOPLE

(Continued from page 1) himself to studying the details of cases. In No part of the drudgery of being president one of his greatest cases, Hurd v. Rock was more important than mastering the end of the day, you may be doing nothing Island Bridge Company in 1855, Lincoln organization of the government itself, and more than teaching a dog how to walk on defended the owners of the Rock Island it was on this point that Lincoln started its hind legs. The wonder, as Dr. Johnson Railroad from a suit filed by the owners of from well below the baseline. Lincoln said, is not that it‟s done badly, but that the sidewheel steamer Effie Afton, which himself admitted to Massachusetts senator anyone really thinks you should be doing it had been wrecked after striking one of the Henry Wilson that “when he first com- at all. bridge‟s piers. Lincoln took the trouble to menced doing the duties, he was entirely visit the site of the accident, measure dis- ignorant, not only of the duties, but of the Somewhere, there is a mix – temperament, tances and the volume of water flowing manner of doing the business.” Apart from traits – and we need to hold on to both in under the bridge, and get statements from one lackluster term in Congress, Lincoln understanding what leadership really is, witnesses the plaintiff had not bothered to had never served in any executive capac- whether we do the leading or whether look up, so that the boat‟s owners found ity, not even as mayor of Springfield, and we‟re responsible for identifying those themselves resting, too late, on “the testi- had never run any organization more com- who do it. There is no equation that solves mony of men who had made no experi- plex than his law-office. No wonder, then, it all and produces a leader. Maybe that‟s ment – only conjecture.” that William Henry Seward, Lincoln‟s pick the lesson the leadership gurus need to for secretary of state (and an old Washing- learn. History does not, after all, repeat Lincoln not only knew, but loved the ton hand), determined in the first month of itself, except in a way so generalized that knowing. Logan Pearsall Smith, the the Lincoln administration that Lincoln it‟s useless for anticipating day-to-day American-born British essayist, once said had better “devolve” foreign policy mat- situations. Yet there are certain aspects of that “The test of a vocation is the love of ters “on some member of his Cabinet.” Abraham Lincoln‟s character which really the drudgery it involves.” He might have did make him a great leader. Made him, been thinking of Lincoln in that regard, Seward quickly found out that Lincoln not for instance, the man whom James because Lincoln not only knew both law only had a very tight learning curve on Longstreet, who fought against him, de- and politics, but rejoiced in the nuts-and- political affairs, but also had a determina- scribed as “without doubt the greatest man bolts of it. “The leading rule for the law- tion to keep responsibility and accountabil- of rebellion times, the one matchless yer, as for the man of every other calling, ity in the same hands. “If this must be among forty millions for the peculiar diffi- is diligence,” Lincoln wrote in lecture to done, I must do it,” Lincoln replied to culties of the period”…the man about aspiring lawyers. There were no shortcuts Seward. And within a year, Lincoln had whom one of his allies, George Boutwell around the drudgery of the law, and if you asserted his mastery over both the Cabinet of Massachusetts, said “Under him and could not embrace that drudgery, you had and the rest of the government. largely through his acts and influence jus- better not plan on being a lawyer. Lincoln tice became the vital force of the Repub- warned: “If any one, upon his rare powers By 1863, John Hay thought that Lincoln lic”…the man whom one of the humblest of speaking, shall claim an exemption had become a “backwoods Jupiter” who of his fellow Americans, an old man only from the drudgery…his case is a failure in “sits here and wields...the bolts of war and newly-freed from slavery, could describe advance.” Lawyering, he said in 1860, “is the machinery of government with a hand as indescribable: “No man know Linkum. very simple, though laborious, and tedious. equally steady & equally firm…. He is Massa Linkum, he ebery whar; he know …Work, work, work, is the main thing.” managing this war...foreign relations, and ebery ting; he walk de earf like de Lord.” planning a reconstruction of the Union, all It‟s worth identifying the seven most sali- at once. I never knew with what tyrannous ent of these characteristics, not because authority he rules the Cabinet, til now. The they‟re guaranteed to turn someone into a most important things he decides and there „leader,‟ but because they do help us un- is no cavil.” And yet, Hay added, “there is derstand how Lincoln tackled the great no man in the country, so wise, so gentle problem of his day, which was emancipa- and so firm. I believe the hand of God tion. placed him where he is.”

The first of these seven was knowledge. Lincoln certainly hoped so. But he also No one ever became a great leader because wanted to be certain that he had the people they were ignorant, or couldn‟t remember on his side, too, and it was out of the need things. Lincoln, despite having only the to persuade the people that Lincoln‟s most meagre education, loved to learn. greatest gifts emerged, as a public advo- Anyone who could lend him a book was Henry Wilson cate for his own policies. He understood, his friend. “A capacity, and taste, for read- 1812-1875 in other words, the need to be visible to ing,” he said in 1859, “gives access to And it was advice which Lincoln took the people. The sheer size of the republic whatever has already been discovered by himself. Charles Dana, an under-secretary prevented him from actually taking to the others. It is the key, or one of the keys, to in the War Department during the Civil hustings to explain the directions he the already solved problems. And not only War, remarked that “night after night he wanted to go, but it did not prevent him so. It gives a relish, and facility, for suc- would work late and hard without being from resorting to print to do so. In 1863, cessfully pursuing the unsolved ones.” As wilted by it, and he always seemed as Lincoln composed four so-called “public a lawyer, he taught himself by reading law ready for the next day‟s work as though he books. As a practicing attorney, he devoted had done nothing the day before.” (Continued on page 4)

FOR THE PEOPLE A NEWSLETTER OF THE ABRAHAM LINCOLN ASSOCIATION 3

The Abraham Lincoln Association PRESIDENT’S GREETING

Robert J. Lenz President Dear ALA Members: Robert A. Stuart, Jr. Vice President We are pleased to give you further details about the Lincoln Sym- Thomas F. Schwartz posium, the Annual Birthday Banquet and the many excellent Secretary events scheduled for the celebration of Abraham Lincoln‟s two- Douglas M. Barringer Treasurer hundred and second birthday in his hometown of Springfield, Illi- nois. Richard E. Hart Immediate Past-President I also want to thank the Lincoln Boyhood National Memorial in Mary F. Shepherd th Executive Manager Lincoln City, Indiana for sponsoring the 25 annual Lincoln Col-

loquium in September. I attended this event with several other Board of Directors ALA members, and we all enjoyed the two days of speakers and Kenneth L. Anderson activities very much. The ALA is pleased to be a co-sponsor of the J. Steven Beckett Roger D. Billings, Jr. Lincoln Colloquium. If you have not yet had a chance to visit the Justin A. Blandford Boyhood Home Memorial I highly recommend it. Roger D. Bridges Michael Burlingame Nancy L. Chapin We are pleased to have Dr. Allen Guelzo as our featured banquet speaker this year. Dr. Guelzo is not Brooks Davis Robert J. Davis only a professor at Gettysburg College, but is a member of the Board of Directors of the Abraham Rodney O. Davis Lincoln Association. He will be the first speaker of our five year sesquicentennial series and will talk Robert S. Eckley about Lincoln becoming president. Guy C. Fraker Joseph E. Garrera Donald R. Graham I hope to see many of you at the February birthday events. Allen C. Guelzo Kathryn M. Harris Robert J. Lenz Earl W. Henderson, Jr. Fred B. Hoffmann President Barbara Hughett David Joens Thomas S. Johnson Ron J. Keller Richard W. Maroc A CONVERGENCE OF PURPOSE Myron Marty Richard Mills Lucas E. Morel James W. Patton III Mark A. Plummer Shirley J. Portwood William G. Shepherd Brooks D. Simpson Ronald D. Spears Daniel W. Stowell Louise Taper Timothy P. Townsend Donald R. Tracy Andy Van Meter Daniel R. Weinberg Robert S. Willard Stewart L. Winger Kenneth J. Winkle

Honorary Directors

President Barack Obama Governor Pat Quinn Senator Richard Durbin Senator Mark Kirk Congressman Aaron Schock Congressman John Shimkus Chief Justice Thomas Kilbride Mayor Timothy J. Davlin

Emeritus Directors

Molly M. Becker Cullom Davis A Convergence of Purpose. This unique bronze sculpture by Andrew Jumonville of Bloom- Georgia Northrup ington, Illinois, depicts Abraham Lincoln and two of his closest friends, Jesse Fell of Normal

Distinguished Directors and David Davis of Bloomington The setting is an 1858 Bloomington street with Fell and Davis in animated conversation urging Lincoln to run for President. Fell and Davis were key Mario M. Cuomo Harry V. Jaffa leaders in Lincoln's winning the 1860 nomination and the subsequent election. The statue Robert W. Johannsen stands in Bloomington‟s and was dedicated on October 23, 2010. Photograph Garry Wills by Pat Schley.

Visit our website at www.abrahamlincolnassociation.org

4 A NEWSLETTER OF THE ABRAHAM LINCOLN ASSOCIATION FOR THE PEOPLE

(Continued from page 2) adversary could not quite prove what Lin- Persistence, though, is costly. No matter coln knew to be the truth, he would say he how determined you are, no matter how letters,” which though addressed to spe- „reckoned‟ it would be fair to admit the righteous your enterprise or compelling cific individuals, were intended to be pub- truth to be so & so.” And so Lincoln would your goal, no one is so thick-skinned that lished and read across the country as policy appear to be surrendering every point in they are proof against all the slings and statements. They were an immediate hit. the case – when in reality, “what he was so arrows of outrageous fortune. What saved To a convention of Democrats who criti- blandly giving away was simply what he Lincoln from consuming himself in resent- cized him for sanctioning “certain military couldnt get & Keep. By giving away 6 ment was his resilience, his willingness to arrests and proceedings” and other civil- points and carrying the 7th he carried his absorb punishment, and then walk away liberties violations, he simply asked: “Must case and the whole case hanging on the 7th from it. When he was slighted by George I shoot a simple-minded soldier boy who he traded away every thing which would McClellan in 1862, John Hay was amazed deserts, while I must not touch a hair of a give him the least and in carrying that. Any that Lincoln didn‟t pull his over-mighty wily agitator who induces him to desert?” man who took Lincoln for a simple minded general‟s chain: “I would hold McClellan‟s And in a letter sent to a mass Union meet- man would very soon wake [up] with his horse,” Lincoln replied, “if only he would ing in his hometown of Springfield, Illi- back in a ditch.” give us victories.” Nor did he nurse nois, Lincoln didn‟t mind embarrassing grudges. An amazed John Hay wrote in his half-hearted whites with the courage of People, however, kept on doing this; and diary, “It seems utterly impossible for the black soldiers in blue: “there will be some Lincoln, even as president, kept on flatten- President to conceive of the possibility of black men who can remember that, with ing their backs in ditches. His over- any good resulting from a rigorous and silent tongue, and clenched teeth, and ambitious Treasury secretary, Salmon exemplary course of punishing political steady eye, and well poised bayonet, they Chase, hatched a scheme in December, dereliction. His favorite expression is, „I have helped mankind on to this great con- 1862, to eliminate his chief rival in the am in favor of short statutes of limitations summation; while, I fear, there will be Cabinet, William Seward (and thus posi- in politics.‟” Ill-will was a luxury for moral some white ones, unable to forget that, tion himself to eliminate Lincoln for the spendthrifts, not leaders. “I shall do noth- with malignant heart, and deceitful speech, 1864 presidential nomination) by whisper- ing in malice,” Lincoln wrote in 1862, they have strove to hinder it.” ing in Congressional ears that Seward was “What I deal with is too vast for malicious manipulating Lincoln and lording it over dealing.” Lincoln‟s speeches got him admiring audi- the Cabinet. A congressional delegation ences; but Lincoln‟s public letters got him demanded an interview with Lincoln, and It was from these seven characteristics – visibility for his message. He could not he granted it – but he also invited all the understanding the issues, loving the drudg- speak everywhere, but his letters could. members of his Cabinet, and invited them ery, mastering the organization, promoting The New York politician Chauncey M. to inform the delegation whether or not visibility, persistence, and resilience – that Depew thought that Lincoln‟s “series of Seward was bullying them. They, of Lincoln rose to address the supreme chal- letters were remarkable documents. He had course, denied it, leaving Salmon Chase lenge of his presidency, the event he called the ear of the public; he commanded the cut neatly down to size – the size, that is, “the central act of my administration and front page of the press, and he defended his of a ditch. the great event of the nineteenth century,” administration and its acts and replied to the ending of slavery. There have been, his enemies with skill, tact, and extreme The sixth of Lincoln‟s characteristics was over the last generation, a growing chorus moderation.” The same thing holds true for persistence – not mere stubbornness, but a of critics who have taken particular aim at you: if you are not visible to your organiza- determination based on his ability to fore- Lincoln‟s Emancipation Proclamation, tion – if you cannot figure out how the see the likely long-term results of his deci- questioning whether Lincoln really lives up most effective way to be visible -- you are sions. “Lincoln's whole life was a calcula- to his fabled status as the „Great Emancipa- not leading it. tion of the law of forces, and ultimate re- tor.‟ sults,” said Leonard Swett, and he proved This is not to say that everything Lincoln it to Swett “whenever I would get nervous Why, they ask, did Lincoln take so long to touched turned to gold. But it is worth no- and think things were going wrong.” issue it? The Civil War broke out in 1861; ticing that, even there, Lincoln had the why does Lincoln wait until January 1st, ability to turn his liabilities into assets. He kept a kind of account book of 1863? Justice deferred, after all, is justice Start with his looks. One legal colleague how things were progressing for denied, and Martin Luther King jnr. taught said that he “had the appearance of a rough three, or four months, and he would us from his Birmingham jail cell in 1963 intelligent farmer: and his rough home- get out his estimates and show how about the injustice of making people wait made buggy & rawboned horse enforced everything on the great scale of ac- for justice. this belief.” Rather than take this as an tion ‑‑ the resolutions of Legisla- insult, Lincoln converted it into a strategy. tures, the instructions of delegates, Why is the language of the Proclamation He let people underestimate them, and and things of that character, was go- so dull? This is a man capable of giving us then, when they grew puffed-up and over- ing exactly – as he expected. …It was the and the Second confident, he led them neatly into traps of by ignoring men, and ignoring all Inaugural; but the Emancipation Proclama- his own devising. In opening a trial, said small causes, but by closely calculat- tion drones on with whereas-es and there- another legal associate, Leonard Swett, “he ing the tendencies of events and the fore-es like a probate inventory. The Proc- would say he „reckoned‟ it would be fair to great forces which were producing lamation, said the American historian let this in or that and sometimes, where his logical results. (Continued on page 5)

FOR THE PEOPLE A NEWSLETTER OF THE ABRAHAM LINCOLN ASSOCIATION 5

(Continued from page 4) had he taken some form of unilateral action that the army was becoming, under as president against slavery, he would have McClellan, an increasingly unstable politi- Richard Hofstadter, had “all the moral awakened the following morning to find cal force. So, in September, Lincoln took grandeur of a bill of lading,” and from that slaveowners in Kentucky, Missouri, Mary- his political life in his own hands and is- Hofstadter and others have concluded that land and Delaware crowding the federal sued a preliminary Emancipation Proclama- in fact, Lincoln‟s heart really wasn‟t com- courts with demands for injunctions. These tion, following it with the full-dress Procla- mitted to emancipation, except as useful suits would, in turn, work their way up the mation on January 1, 1863. political window-dressing federal court system to the U.S. Supreme Court, where a Marylander, Roger B. It is precisely because he was on such con- Why are there so many exceptions in the Taney, sat as Chief Justice. Taney is notori- stitutional thin ice, that Lincoln wrote the Proclamation? The four slave states of the ous to us today as the author of the infa- proclamation in the most precise legalese upper South which had not joined the Con- mous Dred Scott decision of 1857, denying he could summon – which also happens to federacy – the so-called „border states‟ of that black people (much less slaves) could make for some deadly boring prose. But Kentucky, Missouri, Maryland and Dela- ever be citizens of the United States; and Lincoln could afford no flights of literary ware – were exempted; so were large Taney was already rumored to have an eloquence with the prospect of Chief Jus- chunks of Virginia and Louisiana which opinion pre-written to use against emanci- tice Taney hanging over the whole affair, were under Federal military occupation. pation if Lincoln ever tried it. so boring it is. This also explains the broad Doesn‟t that underscore the window- swath of exceptions: whatever martial-law dressing aspect of the Proclamation, since Lincoln, however, had two other strings to authority he might have under the Constitu- in the places where Lincoln is still in his anti-slavery bow. One was the state tion as „commander-in-chief,‟ it certainly charge, he leaves slavery alone, while free- legislatures of Kentucky, Missouri, Mary- had no application to areas which were no ing slaves in the Confederate states, where land and Delaware. If he could persuade longer, or never had been, at war with the he can‟t make anything happen? What kind them to adopt an emancipation plan, then United States. He had to make the Procla- of leadership is that? the elimination of slavery in those states mation air-tight to have any hope of making would remain a strictly state affair, and it stick, and that meant he had to jettison Actually, it turns out to have been very there would be no opportunity to appeal to the Border states and the occupied zones. good leadership, and this is why. the federal courts; and if an emancipation plan could be put into play there, it just Lincoln was as aware as anyone else that There is no reason to doubt Lincoln‟s long- might deflate the Confederate war effort this was imperfect, from the standpoint of standing and principled opposition to slav- and, once the Confederate states were justice. But he was also aware that a purely ery. “I am naturally anti slavery,” he said in brought back into the Union, become the emotional response to injustice was merely 1864, “If slavery is not wrong, nothing is template for emancipation there, too. Far to fly into a brick wall, and perhaps (if wrong. I can not remember when I did not from waiting in indifference, Lincoln was Chief Justice Taney got his way) to set so think, and feel.” Slavery cut across eve- already pressing an emancipation plan on back the cause of emancipation even fur- rything Lincoln held dear: slavery was a Delaware as early as November of 1861. ther into the future. Which is why, in the contradiction of the most basic principles of end, he kept working at perfecting emanci- liberty on which the American republic was Lincoln‟s other string was his constitutional pation, until finally he was able to persuade founded…slavery made working men role as „Commander in Chief of the Army Congress to adopt what he called “the ashamed of laboring with their hands, be- and Navy of the United States, and of the king‟s cure for the evil” in the form of the cause that was „slave work‟…slavery vio- Militia of the several States, when called 13th Amendment to the Constitution, which lated the natural rights to life, liberty and into the actual Service of the United put slavery beyond the reach of both the the pursuit of happiness which every crea- States.‟ It was presumed that this responsi- states and the courts forever. ture had hard-wired into their nature by bility carried with it the usual military au- their Creator…and slavery turned decent thority to declare martial law, as well as If there are any „leadership lessons‟ to be men into hypocrites, as they tried to explain other „war powers,‟ which might include had from Abraham Lincoln, they will begin why in a nation of liberty, four million of emancipating slaves if it could be shown with how much Lincoln was guided, not by its people could be held in forced labor, that slave emancipation would weaken an passion or vision or any of the buzz-words merely because of their race. enemy militarily. The problem here, we use to evade the much harder task of though, was that there were no precedents thinking, but by knowledge, by mastery of But Lincoln was keenly aware that, even as in American constitutional law spelling out the organization, by persistence, by resil- president of the United States, he had very these „war powers‟ or martial law. Tempt- ience. And if there really are such little real leverage over slavery. Slavery ing as the „war powers‟ were, it would be „lessons,‟ chief among them will be how was a product of state laws and state juris- judicially safer to appeal to the states to act. infrequently we find these tools in a single dictions; and in these days before the 14th personality like Lincoln‟s and how amazing and 15th amendments to the Constitution, a The hitch, of course, was that they refused. it was that, in the moment of what was un- jurisprudential firewall separated the And not only did they refuse, but his own questionably the nation‟s greatest leader- spheres of state and federal authority. He armies and generals – especially George ship crisis, that there was one American might hate slavery, “yet I have never under- Brinton McClellan – were indiscreetly loud who did have them all. stood that the Presidency conferred upon in their opposition to any notion of emanci- me an unrestricted right to act officially pation. By the fall of 1862, it had become And if we ever do get any others like this, upon this judgment and feeling.” In fact, apparent that the state plan had stalled, and do me a favor: hire them.

6 A NEWSLETTER OF THE ABRAHAM LINCOLN ASSOCIATION FOR THE PEOPLE

2011 BANQUET SPEAKER

ALLEN C. GUELZO

Dr. Allen C. Guelzo is the in America, which also won Times, The Wall Street Jour- Director of Civil War Era the Lincoln Prize and the nal, the Christian Science Studies and a Professor of Abraham Lincoln Institute Monitor, First Things, U.S. History at Gettysburg College Prize, for 2005; Lincoln and News & World Report, Na- in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. Douglas: The Debates That tional Review, the Claremont He was born in Yokohama, Defined America, which won Review of Books and Books Japan, in 1953, and grew up in the Abraham Lincoln Institute and Culture, and has been Delaware County, Pennsyl- Prize for the third time; a vol- featured on NPR's "Weekend vania. He holds the MA and ume of essays, Abraham Lin- Edition Sunday," The Daily PhD in history from the Uni- coln as a Man of Ideas, which Show with Jon Stewart, Brian versity of Pennsylvania. won a Certificate of Merit Lamb's "Booknotes," and Bill from the Illinois State Histori- Bennett's "Morning in Amer- He is the author of Abraham cal Association in 2010; and ica." Lincoln: Redeemer President, Lincoln: A Very Short Intro- which won both the Lincoln duction (in the Oxford Univer- He lives in Paoli and Gettys- Prize and the Abraham Lin- sity Press 'Very Short Intro- burg, Pennsylvania, with his coln Institute Prize in 2000; ductions' series). wife, Debra. Lincoln's Emancipation Proc- He has written for the Wash- lamation: The End of Slavery ington Post, the Los Angeles

FEBRUARY 12, 2011 RESERVATIONS Make your reservations now. Use the easy online reservation method or send your check. Luncheon: $25 per person. 1:00-2:00 p.m. Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library Endowment Reception: $75 per person. 5:00-6:30 p.m. Winter Garden Room 14th Floor Crowne Plaza Hotel Banquet Reception (6:00 p.m. Lobby ) and Dinner (7:00 Plaza Room): $85 per person. Crowne Plaza Hotel

Make your checks payable and mail to: On Line Reservations: Questions? Contact Mary Shepherd, The Abraham Lincoln Association www.abrahamlincolnassociation.org Executive Manager at: P.O. Box 729 Attention: 2011 Banquet Reservations [email protected] Bloomington, Illinois 61702 Or call toll free: 866-865-8500

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FOR THE PEOPLE A NEWSLETTER OF THE ABRAHAM LINCOLN ASSOCIATION 7

LINCOLN BECOMES PRESIDENT ABRAHAM LINCOLN AND THE CIVIL WAR

February 11 Michael F. Holt 6:30 p.m. Keynote Address Brookens Auditorium University of Illinois Springfield Michael F. Holt is the Langbourne M. Williams

Michael F. Holt , University of Virginia Professor of American History at the University of Lincoln's Mistakes as President-elect Virginia. He is a political historian with a particu- lar interest in political parties. He is the author of February 12 six books, including the award-winning The Rise and Fall of the American Whig Party and By One 8:30-10:30 a.m. George L. Painter Looking for Lincoln Lectures Vote: The Disputed Presidential Election of 1876. Visitor Center Lincoln Home National Historic Site Sponsored by the Lincoln Home National Historic Site and Jonathan Earle Looking for Lincoln Jonathan Earle is associate professor of American Guy Fraker, Abraham Lincoln and Bloomington, Il History at the University of Kansas, where he also Wayne Temple, Abraham Lincoln and Pittsfield, Il directs programming at the Robert J. Dole Institute Staff of Lincoln Log Cabin State Historic Site of Politics. He is author of the Routledge Atlas of Abraham Lincoln and Charleston African American History (2000); Jacksonian Anti-

slavery and the Politics of Free Soil (2004), which 11:00 a.m.-12:30 p.m. ALA Symposium won the Byron Caldwell Smith Award and the Best House of Representatives, Old State Capitol First Book Prize from the Society for Historians of the Early American Republic; and John Brown's Jonathan Earle, University of Kansas Raid: A Brief History with Documents (2008). His The Election of 1860 research interests focus on the antislavery move- Jonathan White, University of Maryland ment and the political events leading up to the Lincoln, Civil Liberties, and Dissent Civil War.

1:00-2:00 p.m. Luncheon Russell McClintock Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library Russell McClintock earned his Ph.D. from Russell McClintock, Clark University. His graduate research won St. John's High School, Shrewsbury, Massachusetts Lincoln and the Coming of the War the Hay-Nicolay Dissertation Prize from the Luncheon reservations required: $25 Abraham Lincoln Institute and the Abraham For reservations go to abrahamlincolnassociation.org or Lincoln Association, and his recent book, Contact Mary Shepherd 866-865-8500. Lincoln and the Decision for War: The Northern Response to Secession, was a Main 2:30-4:00 p.m. Round Table: Lincoln Becomes President Selection of the History Book Club, whose Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library readers voted it the best Civil War book of Jonathan Earle, Michael Holt, Russell McClintock, and 2008. Dr. McClintock teaches history at St. Jonathan White John's High School in Shrewsbury, Massa- Moderator: Brooks D. Simpson chusetts. He is currently at work on a biogra-

phy of Stephen A. Douglas. Evening Events at Crowne Plaza Hotel Jonathan W. White 5:00-6:30 p.m. Endowment Reception Winter Garden Room 14th Floor Jonathan W. White is a visiting assistant pro- 6:00 p.m. Banquet Reception Lobby fessor of American Studies at Christopher 7:00 p.m. Banquet Plaza Room Newport University, in Newport News, Vir- All lectures free and open to the public, no reservations required. ginia. White has published articles in Civil War History, American Nineteenth Century Additional Sponsors of the ALA Symposium: History, The Pennsylvania Magazine of His- tory and Biography, Perspectives, and Pro- Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum logue. In 2007 he published A Philadelphia University of Illinois Springfield Perspective: The Civil War Diary of Sidney The Old State Capitol George Fisher. White‟s dissertation, “„To Illinois Historic Preservation Agency Aid Their Rebel Friends‟: Politics and Trea- son in the Civil War North,” was awarded the February 13 2010 Hay-Nicolay Dissertation Prize by the 10:30 a.m. First Presbyterian Church, Springfield Abraham Lincoln Institute and the Abraham Stewart Winger, Illinois State University Lincoln Association. for more information please go to http://lincolnschurch.org

8 A NEWSLETTER OF THE ABRAHAM LINCOLN ASSOCIATION FOR THE PEOPLE

Non-Profit Organization FOR THE PEOPLE U.S. Postage The Abraham Lincoln Association PAID

1 Old State Capitol Plaza Springfield, Illinois

Springfield, Illinois 62701-1512 Permit No. 263

Return Service Requested

150 YEARS AGO: A SIX MONTH TRANSFORMATION

Photograph taken on August 13, 1860 by Preston Butler. Photograph taken on February 9, 1861 by Christopher Smith German.

When one compares the photograph of Abraham Lincoln taken on August 13, 1860, with that taken 6 months later on February 9, 1861, it is apparent that Lincoln‟s appearance went through a remarkable transformation. His hair is longer and rather than being combed across the forehead is combed back making a higher forehead. There is hair showing below his right ear at the back of his neck. The beard he began to grow on about October 19, 1860, has begun to fill the lower part of his face, giving it a longer frame. He has become Father Abraham.

Richard E. Hart

For The People (ISSN 1527-2710) is published four times a year and is a benefit of membership of The Abraham Lincoln Association. Richard E. Hart, Editor. Visit our website at www.abrahamlincolnassociation.org