Lincoln and His Cabinet

[Gene C]

by Clarence Edward Macartney, copyright 1931, with about 360 pages.

Interesting with the best chapters on Seward, Welles, Chase and Stanton. Seward had the longest chapter, followed by Chase and Stanton. The author does a good job pointing out their faults and talents. There were internal rivalries and a lot of then just didn't like each other.

Some quotes from the book.
- "What Welles has to say about the character of Seward must be discounted, for in almost every page of his diary there is a fling at Seward and an effort to depreciate him"
- "My young friend, said Seward, we are warned to keep to ourselves what we do not believe. It is well frequently to conceal what we do believe. There is apt to be public blame in both" Seward to Don Piatt
- This about Simon Cameron, "Although he served a longer time in the United States Senate than any man in the history of the country, he left no speech behind him. He talked much in private; in public, hardly at all."
- This about Edward Bates "Bates suffered, although not so seriously as some others, from the general Cabinet disease of depreciating and derogating their colleagues in the Cabinet. He states he has no confidence in Seward and very little in Stanton. The Blairs are men who get what they want by claiming everything. Welles is not strong or great, and Lincoln is personally unexceptionable, and so on down the list."

I was looking for a more recent book on the subject of Lincoln's Cabinet, short biographies of the men who served, and couldn't find one.
For a book that is almost 90 years old, it is a pretty good look at the men in Lincoln's Cabinet.

Mr. Macartney was a popular Presbyterian minister, who wrote mainly religious books, a few on Lincoln and the Civil War. His biography on Wikipedia includes an impressive list of his books.
I couldn't locate this book on Internet Archives, but they do have a few others that he has written. (after a quick look through that list, 'Lincoln and the Bible' looks interesting)

Available on Amazon
https://www.amazon.com/Lincoln-cabinet-C...is+cabinet
(I didn't pay that much)

[LincolnMan]

Thanks as always Gene.

[Steve]

If the book's copyright was renewed, then it won't become public domain for another 8 1/2 years and ineligible to be included on the Internet Archive until then.

Also, $900 for a "new" copy of the book and you still have to pay for shipping?

[L Verge]

How does it compare to Team of Rivals?

[Gene C]

(06-30-2018 02:30 PM)Steve Wrote:  If the book's copyright was renewed, then it won't become public domain for another 8 1/2 years and ineligible to be included on the Internet Archive until then.

Also, $900 for a "new" copy of the book and you still have to pay for shipping?

Thanks Steve, maybe that's what happened on the copyright. They haven't even reprinted the book as far as I can tell.
His book 'Lincoln and the Bible', published in 1949, has a copy in Internet Archives.

Two years ago I was fortunate to find a very good copy with the dust jacket for $5.50
Wish my other purchases did as well.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

How does it compare to Team of Rivals?
- It gives a brief biography of the cabinet members not mentioned much in TOR.
Cameron's chapter is 24 pages, Caleb Smith's is 11 pages, Edward Bates gets 23, and Montgomery Blair gets 20.
- At 358 pages compared to TOR's of 750, it's not as detailed and not focused on the election of 1860. Hers has, in addition to the 750 pages of text, over 100 pages of footnotes, in small print.
- I enjoyed Ms Goodwin's writing style a little better. She is a historian, Mr. Macartney was a conservative Presbyterian minister who enjoyed history.
- The subtitle of her book is "the Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln".
His book seemed to focus on each individual cabinet member, their strengths and weaknesses, their contribution and service to the Lincoln administration.

This from the front cover of Lincoln and His Cabinet
"This book has great value in a presentation of Lincoln in a new way. It reveals him indirectly by giving an account of each one of the members of his cabinet, and so shows, better than any other book did, the ways in which Lincoln worked. His whole character is illuminated in showing why he selected these cabinet members - a number of whom were hostile to him - and the ways in which he managed them singly and in combination. Apart from the interest of the book in this respect, it is the interest that comes from its very able accounts of highly representative figures of the time in these eight cabinet ministers. There lives are given from the beginning, and one gets a full picture of the American civilization of the day"

[L Verge]

(06-30-2018 06:16 PM)Gene C Wrote:  

(06-30-2018 02:30 PM)Steve Wrote:  If the book's copyright was renewed, then it won't become public domain for another 8 1/2 years and ineligible to be included on the Internet Archive until then.

Also, $900 for a "new" copy of the book and you still have to pay for shipping?

Thanks Steve, maybe that's what happened on the copyright. They haven't even reprinted the book as far as I can tell.
His book 'Lincoln and the Bible', published in 1949, has a copy in Internet Archives.

Two years ago I was fortunate to find a very good copy with the dust jacket for $5.50
Wish my other purchases did as well.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

How does it compare to Team of Rivals?
- It gives a brief biography of the cabinet members not mentioned much in TOR.
Cameron's chapter is 24 pages, Caleb Smith's is 11 pages, Edward Bates gets 23, and Montgomery Blair gets 20.
- At 358 pages compared to TOR's of 750, it's not as detailed and not focused on the election of 1860. Hers has, in addition to the 750 pages of text, over 100 pages of footnotes, in small print.
- I enjoyed Ms Goodwin's writing style a little better. She is a historian, Mr. Macartney was a conservative Presbyterian minister who enjoyed history.
- The subtitle of her book is "the Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln".
His book seemed to focus on each individual cabinet member, their strengths and weaknesses, their contribution and service to the Lincoln administration.

This from the front cover of Lincoln and His Cabinet
"This book has great value in a presentation of Lincoln in a new way. It reveals him indirectly by giving an account of each one of the members of his cabinet, and so shows, better than any other book did, the ways in which Lincoln worked. His whole character is illuminated in showing why he selected these cabinet members - a number of whom were hostile to him - and the ways in which he managed them singly and in combination. Apart from the interest of the book in this respect, it is the interest that comes from its very able accounts of highly representative figures of the time in these eight cabinet ministers. There lives are given from the beginning, and one gets a full picture of the American civilization of the day"

Honestly, TOR intimidated me just by size and extent of footnotes - not to mention that I don't care for politics. I am probably among the few who never read it.

[kerry]

Team of Rivals was well done - it's not too scholarly or political - it's pretty focused on human dynamics. For someone who doesn't have a lot of background on Lincoln and his cabinet, and who isn't looking for light beach reading, I think it's a great book. But it is long and a lot of it will be familiar to people who read about Lincoln. The stuff on the other cabinet members was enlightening to me, though, because I didn't know much about them.

I feel like people insist on a simplistic interpretation of the relationship that makes no sense. People often use "team of rivals" to mean "everyone overcomes their differences and becomes super civil to each other." That is *not* what it means, particularly in the sense of what Lincoln did. The intention was not to compromise and end up with some sort of middle-of-the-road cabinet. The point was to find the most able, intelligent, devoted men, and have them give their true opinions and fight for their causes. There's a lot of talk about whether Lincoln was "friends" with certain politicians, particularly Seward. To me, that's pretty irrelevant and hard to define. The members respected each other and were committed to a common cause, and inevitably grew close working together under such crazy circumstances, but they were all so strong and capable that there was inevitably conflict and it could never be reduced down to "being buddies." It was a deeper, more complex bond. And they sniped in their diaries and elsewhere just like people do today.

IMO, there's no reason to discount what Welles says. There's no such thing as an unbiased person, particularly in their own diary. He clearly does not have much respect for Seward and that should be taken into account, but it seems like the better tactic would be to discern what exactly he disliked so much about Seward and what that reveals about both of them. There seems to be some assumption by the media that most people did not criticize others/weren't criticized - in politics at that level in war time, everyone had something to say about somebody else. It's not a scandal. The average office environment has so much politics that we can only imagine what it's like in even crazier environments. The cabinet generally supported each other publicly, but of course they had resentments and the relationships went up and down. But they all had qualities that I think led to admiration of each other and cooperated to get the job done, and I think it's fascinating to read about their backgrounds and interactions.

While I repeatedly say I think they all respected each other, I will say maybe Welles did not respect Seward, which is interesting. I'd have to look at the fuller context of his remarks, but I remember he was summing up the cabinet and when he came to Seward, he said "Seward comforts him," meaning Lincoln. And when I thought about it, I realized that probably was the key to most of Seward's political success. While he really aggravated a minority of people, he was extremely likeable to most. He seems to have always been the most optimistic, fun-loving person around, who generally refused to quarrel (at least during the Lincoln administration). And that, combined with being smart enough and familiar enough with Washington to do it strategically, was an important enough role given the horror of the times. Seward certainly had a very impressive law career and extreme talents, but as a member of the cabinet, I can see why people who were turned off by a focus on appearances/what they perceived as phony cheerfulness did not respect him in that role. The standards of respect were very high at the time - I have a hard time coming up with anybody alive today who approaches the level of skill, principle and courage regularly displayed by politicians at this time. And so many of them were self-educated, physically awkward, and dealing with chronic health issues!

I will have to read "Lincoln and His Cabinet" - thanks for the rec!

A lot of Lincoln books that are not public domain are now on archive.org under the "borrow only, full-text disabled" option. There's a huge array - it's definitely work looking at. Check off the box that says "available to borrow/join waitlist."