Presidential Character in the Nineteenth Century

Burr, Hamilton, and Jefferson: A Study in Character. By Roger G. Kennedy. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000; pp. xv + 394. $30.00.

The Petticoat Affair: Manners, Mutiny, and Sex in Andrew Jackson's White House. By John F. Marszalek. New York: The Free Press, 1997; pp. v + 240. $25.00.

Abraham Lincoln: A Constitutional Biography. By George Anastaplo. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 1999; pp. 1 + 262. $35.00.

Rum, Romanism and Rebellion: The Making of a President, 1884. By Mark Wahlgren Summers. Chapel Hill, N.C.: The University of North Carolina Press, 2000; pp. xi + 315. Paper, $19.95.

A common conceit of Americans is the belief that their time in history is unique. Of course, on one level that statement is correct. Every historical period is different. But Americans tend to elevate their unique qualities, going so far as to believe that their experience has no equal. At the turn of the twenty-first century, for instance, some say that the political system is on the brink of bankruptcy, with money and special interests driving the electoral process. Others point to a spiritual malaise in society that leads to political cynicism and apathy. Yet another complaint is the perception that the political system no longer produces statesmen. Our elected officials are opportunistic politicians who possess human frailties and do not inspire the public mind. Their public speech is disappointing, and even worse, the words are not even theirs, but more likely a speechwriter's. Whatever happened to leaders like George Washington and Abraham Lincoln? Will we ever see another Gettysburg Address?

Perhaps it is not fair to hold the Gettysburg Address as the standard to maintain, but the practice of complaining about the allegedly catastrophic state of American politics is common. All of the books in this essay offer a good dose of reality for this condition. Each addresses a nineteenth-century presidency, and each demonstrates the manner in which similar political problems manifest themselves in different eras. The books span a period from 1800 to 1884, covering Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, Abraham Lincoln, and Grover Cleveland.

Viewed separately, each is important in acquainting us with (or reminding us of, as the case may be) the events in our past. This seems to be particularly necessary for Americans, given our bad sense of history. Since the United States is comparatively young, one would expect that history would be an easy task, but apparently it is not. Viewed collectively, the four books demonstrate the relevance of the past in addressing present and future problems. In addition, these books link the presidents between centuries by illustrating that, at some level, each president is simply an individual who is judged according to how well he deals with the circumstances in which he finds himself. Individuals of the nineteenth century are no better or worse than those of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. It is instructive to look at leaders who have, over time, achieved mythical status, in a context in which they reveal themselves as merely human.

A common theme among the four books is presidential character, as each focuses on the way a president deals with some critical event or episode. As the narratives demonstrate, a president's behavior in the face of adversity or crisis says much about his character. One recurring element of the character issue is the distinction between words and actions. Three authors choose to observe presidential action as the best test of character, while the fourth examines writings. All of them highlight the fact that words and deeds do not always reconcile easily.

The character issue has long been a topic of scholarly attention, since individual character is usually one of the characteristics by which a president is judged. Especially since Barber's book, The Presidential Character (1972), this is a familiar avenue of presidency research. Since such research often focuses on twentieth-century presidents, it is useful to examine four...