Why was Lincoln "great?"

[J. Beckert]

I've always been a student of the assassination, Lincoln the man, his family and his times. I've never really looked too deeply into his politics. I just finished Bill Richter's "Sic Semper Tyrannis: Why John Wilkes Booth Shot Abraham Lincoln". I have to say, Bill did a great job of stripping off Old Abe's varnish - it showed how Booth would have viewed him in the context of the times. It really does put a different spin on things. I think it's important that we look at history that way.

Just like some of today's politicians, Lincoln was put on a pedestal. Closer inspection and attention to the mores of different time give an entirely different view of a man who is now an American God in the public's minds.

I do, however, believe Lincoln was the right man at the right time, given his lenient views on binding up the nation's wounds. How the wounds were inflicted is another story in itself.