Book Review: Team of Rivals
One of the things I did this weekend (mostly on the plane rides) was finish reading Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin. I enjoyed it for the most part, even though the book certainly has its weaknesses.
The book does an excellent job in describing the rise of Lincoln, Chase, Bates, and Seward, and the Republican Party. However, I wish Mrs. Goodwin had spent more time on Secretary of War Stanton before joining Lincoln's cabinet (despite him not being a titular 'rival') because it would have enhanced the relationships between him, Lincoln, Seward, and McClellan later.
Also getting the short stick are Jefferson Davis, Fort Sumter, Sharpsburg (Antietam), and Gettysburg, as well as the prominence of the American System in Whig thought. Normally I wouldn't complain, but the book is long. My paperback is about 750 pages of text, plus 200 or so of notes.
There should have been room here to cover a wide variety of topics extensively, but Mrs. Goodwin appears to have used the lens of the abolition of slavery to view this history. She focuses on the cause of abolition frequently, while noting that Lincoln favored compensating slaveholders in the South and then setting up a colony in Africa or South America for the freedmen.
Lincoln's primary motivation for fighting the War was to preserve the Union, and it seems Mrs. Goodwin has missed both that and the many causes of the War itself.
The book is worth a look however, and I will say it is well written and well sourced.
Recommended with reservations.
Labels: Book Review, History
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