Abraham Lincoln Portrayed in the Collections of the Indiana Historical Society ed. by Harold Holzer (review)

BOOK REVIEWS military emancipation ( the extensive precedent will surprise most twentyfirst century observers) and the manner in which the Supreme Court reacted to two such instances ( once treating slaves as confiscatable enemy property,in United States v. Brown after the War of 1812, and later viewing emancipation as an unlawful t·aking of private property,in the 1851 case of Mitchell v.Harmony). At the time of southern secession, Lincoln had no guarantee as to which way ChiefJustice Roger Taney's bench would lean. According to Carnahan, the president had but two models to guide his thinking : George Washington' s mobilization against the Whiskey Rebellion and Andrew Jackson' s threats against nullification. lhe time for threats had clearly passed. Since Lincoln repeatedly maintained that the South could not legally secede and establish its own government,his inclination was to follow in Washington' s steps and treat Confederates as rebellious citizens. But that approach foreclosed the Union' s ability to seize insurgent ships,munitions, and slaves. Though unsure how far to press the enemy,military leaders applied the laws of war even as Lincoln hesitated. By 1864, Sherman pressed against traditional notions of property as he redefined the laws ofwan Many scholars, Allen Guelzo most recently,have raised the question, " If the war was about slavery,why didn' t Lincoln emancipate the slaves sooner than he did?" Carnahan agrees with Guelzo that holding on to Border States like Kentucky was a military necessity,and slaveholders there did not look kindly on emancipation. More relevant to Carnahan' s focus on the complex relationship between slavery and the law,he insists that Lincoln chose to protect his military officers from angry slaveholders and the inevitable rash oflawsuits resulting from emancipation. " The legal context in which he waged the war, rather than reluctance to strike at slavery, is a more likely explanation for why the president waited to issue his Emancipation Proclam· ation ( 141). While scholars will forever debate Lincoln' s motivations, they need no longer doubt the legal minefield behind his single most important act. R. Owen Williams Yale University Harold Holzer,ed. Abraham Lincoln Portrayed in tbe Collections oftbe Indiana Historical Society. Indianapolis: Indiana Historical Society,2006. 264 pp. ISBN 0871952017 ( cloth), $ 49.95. In 1959, Jack Smith began collecting prints, photographs, busts, and a variety of other items that depict the image of Abraham Lincoln. According to Harold Holzer, Smith amassed " one of the best and most comprehensive collections of 1 32V Lincoln iconography in existence" ( 3). With a $ 2.9 million 41..> Illi:# le grant from the Lilly : Endowment, the Indiana Historical Society ( IHS) was able to purchase Smith' s collection of over seven hundred and fifty objects in 2003. 1[ he grant also made it possible for the IHS to acquire the Daniel R. Weinberg Lincoln Conspirators Collection and the glass plate negative of Alexander Gardner's famous portrait of Lincoln that was taken just prior to Lincoln' s trip to Gettysburg,Pennsylvania, in November 1863. Staff at the IHS William Henry Smith Library organized and cataloged the Smith and Weinberg Collections and also compiled a comprehensive list of other Lincolnrelated items in the library. Edited and introduced by Holzer, Abraham Lincoln Portrayed in tbe WINTER 2007 75 BOOK REVIEWS Collections of the I, idiana Ilistorical Society presents itemby item descriptive inventories fi, r the Lincoln holdings at the IHS and reproduces images of approximately one hundred and fifty of these treasures. Holzer is a leading expert on Lincoln images and his introduction is a lively and wellinformed examinatic, n of the ways iii which artists and printmakers have attempted to cash in on Lincoln: s popularity ever since he received the Republican nomination fi, rthepresidency in 1860. ' llie expertixe that Ilolzer brings to the subject enhances one s appreciation fi, r the items that . irc reproduced in the volume.Lincoln was relatively unknown nationally when he received tlie nominatic,n , 111, 1 printmakers rushed to meet public demand for visual depictions of the Republican nominee ,while at the same time, they sought to keep their costs at a minimum. As a consequence , sonic publishers recycled prints by superimposing Lincoln' s head over the bodies of figures as diverse...