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Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln. By Doris Kearns Goodwin. NewYork: Simon and Schuster, 2005. 754 pages. $35.00. Reviewed by Colonel Leonard J. Fullenkamp, USA Ret., Professor of Military History and Strategy, US Army War College.
It was a badly divided nation that chose Abraham Lincoln as President in 1860. Sectional violence, long smoldering, was soon to ignite the flames of civil war. Lincoln, a compromise candidate for the newly minted Republican Party, gained the nomination after supporters of his powerful and better-known rivals split their votes. In similar fashion, Lincoln won the national election when the popular and electoral votes split along sectional lines.
Between his election in November 1860 and inauguration in March 1861, Lincoln set about selecting the men who as his cabinet would run the executive departments and serve as his advisors. Who Lincoln chose to serve in his cabinet and how that cabinet served him and the nation during the American Civil War are the subjects of Doris Kearns Goodwin's Team of Rivals. As the title of the book makes clear, Lincoln's official family was not always a happy family.
As with most Presidents, Lincoln selected men for his cabinet with political skills, strong minds, and with the apparent credentials necessary to run the various departments. Although several were political rivals, Lincoln wanted these men in his cabinet for the talents they possessed, believing that he could forge from among their strong egos and resolutely held political views a team of advisors with whom he could govern.
Senator William H. Seward and Ohio Governor Salmon Chase had coveted the office of the presidency, but had been forced to stand aside in favor of Lincoln. Seward accepted the post of Secretary of State, believing he could function as a prime minister of sorts, capable of manipulating Lincoln and his policies from below. Salmon Chase accepted the...