The Long Pursuit: Abraham Lincoln's Thirty-Year Struggle with Stephen Douglas for the Heart and Soul of America - Hardcover

Morris Jr., Roy

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0060852097 ISBN 13: 9780060852092

Publisher: Smithsonian, 2008

Synopsis

In this compelling narrative, renowned historian Roy Morris, Jr., expertly offers a new angle on two of America's most towering politicians and the intense personal rivalry that transformed both them and the nation they sought to lead in the dark days leading up to the Civil War.

For the better part of two decades, Stephen Douglas was the most famous and controversial politician in the United States, a veritable "steam engine in britches." Abraham Lincoln was merely Douglas's most persistent rival within their adopted home state of Illinois, known mainly for his droll sense of humor, bad jokes, and slightly nutty wife.

But from the time they first set foot in the Prairie State in the early 1830s, Lincoln and Douglas were fated to be political competitors. The Long Pursuit tells the dramatic story of how these two radically different individuals rose to the top rung of American politics, and how their personal rivalry shaped and altered the future of the nation during its most convulsive era. Indeed, had it not been for Douglas, who served as Lincoln's personal goad, pace horse, and measuring stick, there would have been no Lincoln-Douglas debates in 1858, no Lincoln presidency in 1860, and perhaps no Civil War six months later. For both men—and for the nation itself—the stakes were that high.

Not merely a detailed political study, The Long Pursuit is also a compelling look at the personal side of politics on the rough-and-tumble western frontier. It shows us a more human Lincoln, a bare-knuckles politician who was not above trading on his wildly inaccurate image as a humble "rail-splitter," when he was, in fact, one of the nation's most successful railroad attorneys. And as the first extensive biographical study of Stephen Douglas in more than three decades, the book presents a long-overdue reassessment of one of the nineteenth century's more compelling and ultimately tragic figures, the one-time "Little Giant" of American politics.

About this title

About the Author

Roy Morris Jr., is the editor of Military Heritage magazine and the author of four books on the Civil War and post-Civil War eras, including Fraud of the Century: Rutherford B. Hayes, Samuel Tilden, and the Stolen Election of 1876, which the Wall Street Journal hailed as "bravely nonconformist and greatly entertaining"; The Better Angel: Walt Whitman in the Civil War, which the New York Times praised as "a thrilling narrative told with empathy and vast learning"; and Ambrose Bierce: Alone in Bad Company, which the Washington Post called "a rousingly good life." Roy Morris lives in Chattanooga, Tennessee.

Review

“Morris offers a juicy look at Lincoln the brawling, calculating politician. It is an immensely personal, profoundly readable insight of how even our most august Presidents assume and inflict ample bruises on their way to Pennsylvania Avenue.”—Justin Bachman, Business Week (Justin Bachman Business Week)

“Offers insights into both the political and human sides of the struggle between these two key players. It’s academic but accessible to the general reader.”—Reference & Research Book News (Reference & Research Book News)

"The Long Pursuit takes its reader to an original place in history—not merely to the famous 1858 Lincoln-Douglas debates or the familiar 1960 presidential election but into the lives, the failures and successes, and the chases and confrontations of the two greatest men of their age."—Jason Emerson, The Historian (Jason Emerson The Historian)

About this edition

• Publisher: Smithsonian
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0060852097
• ISBN 13: 9780060852092
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 272