Libretto:: Nightstand

Abraham Lincoln is one of the most-written-about individuals in history. Sharing a birthday with the Great Emancipator, I have read countless books about Lincoln. As a result, it takes a lot to impress me and inform me beyond what I’ve already read and know on the subject; frankly, I didn’t think Doris Kearns Goodwin, for all her fame and TV face-time, would be up to the task. After all, Lincoln is not her forte. Her most notable works cover mid-20th-century figures such as FDR, the Kennedys, and LBJ. However, she succeeds because of the depth of her scholarship and her proven strength in tackling subjects both bound and buttressed by their relationships.

In Team of Rivals, Goodwin explores Lincoln’s surprising 1860 win over much better-known and qualified opponents and his even more surprising move to bring them into his Cabinet. In doing so, she teaches us much about key figures who are typically not that well fleshed out in Lincoln biographies, such as Secretary of State William Seward, Secretary of the Treasury Salmon Chase, and Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. With a combination of Solomonic wisdom, remarkable intuition, and extraordinary magnanimity, Lincoln not only gets these political and ideological rivals to work together, he gets their best thinking out of them and in the process quietly and through example proves to them that he is truly the greatest of them all.

While Goodwin calls this “political genius,” her book is really a treatise on leadership. Lincoln chose his Cabinet members purely for their talents and got them to buy into his vision. He shielded them from external criticism, kept them in line with his gentle humor and humanity, and managed ultimately to keep his house – and the nation – united. While I didn’t always enjoy Goodwin’s literary style, Team of Rivals is an important addition to the enormous Lincoln bookshelf.

Jason M. Rubin