A Team of Rivals

(ruminations on Doris K. Goodwin's book)

A wonderfully written piece of history about an extremely important and interesting time. The story is about the political ambitions of four men, Lincoln, Seward, Bates and Chase who came to adulthood just after the Revolutionary War and saw before them the boundless possibilities of their young country. This was not just the material possibilities in terms of westward expansion and free commerce, but also of political ideology, the firm belief that people could govern themselves.

Lincoln's generation did not have to fight the Revolutionary War, write the Constitution or build a government; they were handed a brand new country by their previous generation. The men who struggled to preserve the Union were very cognisant of this inheritance, the secession directly challenged them to preserve the gift that had been handed down. Furthermore, they had deep conviction in their inheritance, the manifest destiny of their nation. The rest under the fold. The most interesting points I think are the following:

1. [defending the Union] Historically, the Confederacy started the civil war by attacking Fort Sumter and Lincoln who had decided against "firing the first shot" had to respond. But in his mind the need to preserve the Union was something like preserving the inheritance bestowed by the founding generation. The South seceded from the Union as soon as Lincoln was elected, long before the inauguration. Lincoln realized that in a democracy there are elections, and if the loosing party can withdraw from the Union at will, democracy itself can not survive. Thus in my view Lincoln was not only preserving the Union for America, but democracy for all future generations. I will discuss the right to secede further below.

2. [machinery of war] The second point is the Emancipation Proclamation. Lincoln argued that southerners could go and fight the legitimate government (the Union) because the slaves were taking care of the domestic production. Thus slaves (being property) were a part of the southern machinery of war and could be confiscated (and then proclaimed to be emancipated) by the government, just like the police can confiscate the gun of a rogue gunman. Of course not a single slave was freed the day of the proclamation, but it laid down the principles which the Union would follow once it had the ability to do so.

But could slaves be legitimately considered a part of the machinery of war? In recent times Israel deliberately targets civilian infrastructure which is often of dual use, like bridges, power plants etc. since Hamas also uses them. Are they legitimate machinery of war? Hamas and Co. on the other hand considers Jewish settlers to be enablers of the occupation and therefore a part of the Israeli war machinery. Are they justified?

One possible answer to resolve the above is to postulate that only "property" can be considered a part of machinery, and slaves were "property". This is in line with Lincoln's argument, but nevertheless deeply unsatisfactory.

Right of Secession: The quarrel began with the induction of the new states (California, Nebraska etc.) into the Union. Lincoln demanded that abolition of slavery was a precondition, much like polygamy in Utah (many decades later). The southern states wanted a referendum in those states. This was because if all the new states were free, then the slave states would become an insignificant minority in the senate and hence loose all influence, and feared a majority support for an amendment (eventually the 13th) eventually abolishing slavery altogether. But did the south have a right to secede?

The comparison of secession with a divorce is incorrect. During a marriage the divorce laws are known in advance, the Constitution is silent on secession. States came together form the Union, so one can argue that they can choose to secede. But the Constitution introduces "we the people", not we the states, so it is the people who came together to form the states. This is further supported by the independence of Vermont, part of New York and New Hampshire seceded, so states are not fundamental units. So can a farmer secede from the state? Such a framework simply can not work. How about communist countries refusing passport to it's citizens, is that not like preventing secession? I would argue that the jurisdiction exists only over territories, and not people, for example a nation is defined by its borders and not any of its individual citizens.

Several other interesting points stand out, a few among them being:

1. A recurring theme in the book is the great story-telling genius of Abraham Lincoln. We know of the fireside chats of Roosevelt. What's the correlation between story-telling and leadership? Intuitively, people gather round the story-teller, and he assumes a leadership position, so this might make sense anthropologically, but historically bards have not been great leaders. On the other hand this might have assumed much greater significance since nations became democratic. How are Obama's story-telling abilities? The infomercial was rather tacky.

2. Lincoln's original platform consisted of national bank, higher import tariff and internal improvement, very similar to Obama's platform. Contrast this with Obama considering temporary nationalization of banks, his stance on NAFTA during the campaign and now infrastructure spending.

3. In his only term in the Senate, Lincoln opposed the Mexican War since the War was started on false pretences, and the president refused to submit any evidence behind the claim that the Mexican military had shot at Americans on American soil. Since the United States won, the war was very popular. Later Lincoln realized that no one in office can oppose a war and still get elected. Obama's opposition to the war in Iraq is similar, while Hillary took a lesson from this. The differentiating factor was not the legitimacy of the war but that the war in Iraq dragged on.

4. The Republican party was formed by disaffected Whigs (sons of the Enlightenment), and the Know Nothing Party (anti-immigration). Today Sarah Palin is still carrying the banner of the Know Nothings and the "real" Americans, but the Whig faction of the party has completely disappeared.

5. Lincoln's evolving positions on slavery, was this an evolution or simply recalibration to attain his ultimate goal of abolition. Is this similar to Obama's position on gay marriage?

6. Deportation of freed slaves, was this a bad idea for the Black community to reject this? One can think of Liberia to estimate the outcome, but I don't think that's a fair comparison since most of the black intellectuals decided against leaving the United States, thus probably Liberia was colonized only by a self selected group.

7. Lincoln was able to win over Seward. But not Chase. Will Hillary head for SCOTUS? Who'll challenge or be the most difficult to manage?