The Election of 1860 ReconsideredA.James Fuller, Editor. Kent, OH: Kent State University Press, 2013.

Abstract

The Election of 1860 Reconsidered A. James Fuller, Editor. Kent, OH: Kent State University Press, 2013.One of the finest new works inspired by the ses qui - centennial of the Civil War is new volume of essays edited by A. James Fuller that explores the election of 1860. The fascinating essays in this book shine new light on some well-known issues and explore a number of previously unexamined aspects of the most important election in American history. The results leave the reader with a fresh understanding of a pivotal moment that has for too long been underexplored. While the book is essentially political history, there is much that scholars of cultural studies can gain from it.The book can be divided into two parts. The first contains four essays that examine each of the major candidates in refreshingly new ways. Michael Green's study of Abraham Lincoln presents the sixteenth president as a consummate politician who actively sought political office all his life. Lincoln carefully managed both his friends and potential rivals to positions advantageous to himself. The image of Lincoln as a humble rail-splitter was, Green notes, a carefully crafted persona. James L. Huston explores a facet of the Stephen Douglas campaign that historians have misunderstood-Douglas' forays into the South during the summer and fall of 1860. What Huston deftly shows is that Douglas was not simply campaigning for himself; he was, by the fall of 1860, campaigning for the Union. Douglas meticulously tailored his moderate message throughout the various slave states, yet he remained true to his belief that secession was unmerited and that any president was justified in resisting such actions.A. James Fuller wrote the next two essays, which focus on the two southern candidates, John C. Breckinridge and John Bell. Instead of viewing Breckinridge's campaign as irrational, as so many contemporaries and later historians have seen it, Fuller argues that his campaign should be viewed through the lens of Southern honor. Fuller's essay relies heavily on the work of historians such as Bertram Wyatt-Brown, who placed honor at the center of the Southern planter worldview. Breckinridge and his supporters believed that only they could restore honor and balance to a corrupt federal government that had veered away from its initial role as protector of property rights (i.e., the right to own slaves). Fuller instead views supporting Breckinridge as the only rational option for Southerners. …