Vindicating Lincoln: Defending the Politics of Our Greatest President | 
 enlarge | Author: Thomas L. Krannawitter
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
Category: Book
List Price: $24.95
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Avg. Customer Rating:  3 reviews
Sales Rank: 57219
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 376
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.4
Dimensions (in): 9 x 6 x 1.3
ISBN: 0742559726
Dewey Decimal Number: 973.7092
EAN: 9780742559721
ASIN: 0742559726
Publication Date: August 25, 2008 (New: This Week)
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Product Description
In this reasoned argument against the prevailing orthodoxies of the right, left, and center, Krannawitter takes on all of Lincoln's detractors and reasserts his contemporary relevance. A heady mix of narrative history and political insights, Vindicating Lincoln reveals a man whose political and moral example sets him apart as the greatest President of the United States of America.
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| Customer Reviews:
 The Statesman August 26, 2008
This is an extended argument by an academic historian against the various ideas of a few opinion leaders in modern America who have disparaged the reputation of our greatest president, Abraham Lincoln. Some of the detractors are modern Libertarians, with an axe to grind against any big government. Others detest Mr. Lincoln for what they see to have been his blatant and unwarranted abuses of civil liberties during the Civil War. Still others (FDR liberals) love Mr. Lincoln, but for the wrong reasons.
I found the strongest part of this book to be its explanation and refutation of the political and intellectual contortions made by Senator John C. Calhoun both in defending a state's "right of succession" and explaining why slavery was good for the slave.
This book falters when Professor Krannawitter brings too much of his argument into the realm of present day politics. (I do not think Senator Obama's thoughts on Lincoln would have been negatively cited, but for this being a presidential election year.) The author is obviously a small government, natural rights conservative, which is fine--but his unrelenting style will wear on readers who might buy this book looking for a more balanced defense of someone who, in reality, should need no defense.
 An eminently important book! Powerful, intelligent, and convincing! August 24, 2008
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."
These words from the Declaration of Independence are the heart and soul of Abraham Lincoln's political philosophy. Based on the idea of government as a social contract--a government of the people, by the people, and for the people--they express the concept of natural rights.
Thomas L. Krannawitter, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Hillsdale College (Michigan), writes: "Saving the Union of the Constitution, preserving free elections, and placing slavery in the course of ultimate extinction were the goals for which Lincoln fought the Civil War. Unifying and justifying all of them is the principle that all men are created equal."
Krannawitter's brilliant work of scholarship is a devastating critique of historicism, revisionism, libertarianism, multiculturalism, and postmodernism--modern theories of government and morality that embrace relativism and deny the principle of equal rights.
Again, Professor Krannawitter writes, "Lincoln was consistent and unswerving in his demand that freedom, choice, and self-government be understood within the moral and political framework of the 'laws of nature and of Nature's God,' first and foremost in the natural right principle of human equality."
Lincoln's admirable statesmanship is in grave danger in the 21st century. Dr. Krannawitter clearly shows not only the relevance and importance of Lincoln's commitment to human equality for his own day, during the desperate days of the Civil War when the very existence of the Union was in peril, but also for our nation and world today.
Great men and women become the targets of those of lesser intelligence and meaner spirits. The greater the person, the more vicious the attacks. This has been true in the case of Lincoln. In recent decades, misguided and/or disgruntled critics have disparaged Lincoln for being a "tyrant," a "dictator," a proponent of "big government," a "war criminal," and a power-hungry despot who sought to destroy the Constitution.
Vindicating Lincoln should go a long way in dispelling such "Lincoln myths" that disparage our greatest president.
Two thumbs up for this magnificent work. Bravo, Mr. Krannawitter!
Best of Its Kind August 3, 2008
15 out of 18 found this review helpful
The best book of its kind -- and for now the only one of its kind.
Vindicating Lincoln is a most necessary corrective to the raft of atrocious, mendacious, and vindictive anti-Lincoln scholarship that has cropped up over the last 25 years at least. A perverse alliance has been forged between, on the one hand, far right libertarians and neo-Confederates and, on the other hand, far left politically correct and anti-American ideologues. They may not agree on much, but they agree that they have found a villain for all seasons: Abraham Lincoln.
This is the book for you if you have ever been puzzled by the arguments that Lincoln was a "tyrant," a "racist," the "father of big government," or that Lincoln cared nothing about slavery but fought the Civil War only protect the economic interests of the ruling class. This is also the book for you if all you know of Lincoln is his grand monument and the afterglow of his once great reputation, and want an honest assessment of why generations considered him the greatest American of them all -- greater even than Washington or any of the Founding generation.
Every anti-Lincoln myth is carefully stated, and understood exactly as its proponents wish to be understood, and then patiently demolished.
This is also perhaps the best book in a generation on the Civil War -- its causes, its justice, its necessity. Krannawitter clearly describes every step in the long path that led to war, and elucidates every controversy. He does justice to both sides, knowing full well that doing full justice to the arguments of the Confederate side not only serves intellectual honesty, but better illuminates the truthfulness and righteousness of Lincoln's case.
The Civil War was a necessary war, and Abraham Lincoln was a great man. It has a taken many years and an unholly alliance of liars and cranks to muddy the waters. But this one book will clear them up again, for all those who have eyes to see and a brain to think.
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