Lincoln and Black Freedom: A Study in Presidential Leadership (review)

BOOK REVIEWS73 probably unrepresentative sample, the standard of the First Party System is written in sand; any conclusion that Jacksonian judges were more, just as, or less "traditional" than their predecessors is worth little. Finally, there is the author's use of statistics to prove his points. Relying totally on percentages to illustrate similarities and differences has its pitfalls. Contemporary charges that territorial judges lacked the necessary previous experience to efficiently conduct court business are "not idle," in theauthor's view. While"fully 70 percent of the [territorial] nominees had never presided over a court," by contrast "43 percent of the district court . . . nominees had prior judicial experience" (p. 161). That is, only 30 percent of territorial nominees had previous judicial experience, while 43 percent of the district court nominees had such experience. But translated into people (which the author fails to do), that 13 percent difference is exactly four men; four more district court judges than territorial judges in a thirty-two-year period had previous judicial experience. What percent obscures, N can reveal. Neither should be used exclusively; both are required for accurate and meaningful analysis and conclusion. For a thorough airing of the events surrounding thepolitics of judicial patronage during the Second Party System, scholars are in the author's debt. The same, unfortunately, cannot be said for his social analysis of the Jacksonian judiciary. David E. Meerse State University College, Fredonia, N.Y. Lincoln and Black Freedom: A Study in Presidential Leadership. By LaWanda Cox. (Columbia, S.C: University of South Carolina Press, 1981. Pp. 265. $17.95.) Years ago, while travelling across the state of Virginia, one of my companions in the dining car queried: "And what do you think of Abraham Lincoln?" "Madam," I replied, "which Abraham Lincoln do you mean?" My attempt at subtlety and humor, which might have drawn a nod, smile, or chuckle in historical circles, failed. But the response , now as then, remains valid. In the interim, no consensus has emerged among historians regarding Lincoln's views on race or his motives in pursuing wartime policies related to emancipation and reconstruction. Yet, some historians familiar with the historiography of the Civil War era during the past fifteen years (especially with the work of Hans Trefousse, Harold Hyman, Stephen Oates, John and LaWanda Cox, Herman BeIz, Jacque Voegeli, David Donald, and Don Fehrenbacher , among others) could hardly have failed to recognize the potential for a major réévaluation of Lincoln's motives and policies. 74CIVIL WAR HISTORY LaWanda Cox's Lincoln and Black Freedom is precisely that—a thorough, probing, and often brilliant réévaluation based upon extended archival research, published records, and common sense. In Cox's account, Lincoln emerges as a man of principle and a shrewd political strategist who sought not only to achieve emancipation, but attempted to extend the sphere of black freedom in his Louisiana policies to include all the rights of citizenship for as many blacks as possible. In assessing Lincoln's role, Cox writes: "Itis essential to keep clearly in mind two facts obscured by the intervening century: the destruction of slavery was the first essential for equal citizenship and, at least until the fallelections of 1864, therewasno assurancethat slavery wouldbe totally destroyed." Historians who overlook these elemental facts tend either to castigate Lincoln and other Republicans for not being radical enough or to minimize the depth of their personal commitments. "Such a perspective," Cox writes, "distorts the historical record." That Lincoln compromised, dissembled, advanced or retreated as political exigencies permitted or required led to misunderstanding both by historians and contemporaries alike. Butthese wereprecisely the qualities that Lincoln, the realistic idealist, needed to deal effectively with opponents of emancipation and equal rights for blacks. Need we be reminded that in relative terms friends were few and enemies were legion? And even among friends serious differences inevitably emerged as major complicating factors. Cox's last chapter, "Reflections on the Limits of the Possible," is the most subjective and, in part, is an exercisein "if" history. In Cox's hands, however, it is more than the interesting but ahistorical game scholars often like to play. In the process, she manages to undermine or effectively challenge a...