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McClellan's War: The Failure of Moderation in the Struggle for the Union * Ethan S. Rafuse * Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2005 * xiv, 528 pp. * $35.00
The subtitle of Ethan Rafuse's new book, McClellan's War: The Failure of Moderation in the Struggle for the Union asserts a refreshing accusation about our Civil War, because Rafuse includes the Lincoln administration in his indictment. He also forwards George McClellan as the champion of that moderation, and his account of McClellan's public demise parallels the triumph of radical politics over the effort to save the Union as it was.
As much as the author intended his book as a tribute to the conservative, conciliationist viewpoint of 1861 and 1862, it amounts to a new biography of McClellan: the war itself does not begin until a quarter of the way through the text, and McClellan is the principal focus or foil throughout. The most salient...