Glen E. Thurow - Abraham Lincoln and American political religion
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State University of New York Press Albany, New York, 1976
Page iv
First Edition
Published by State University of New York Press 99 Washington Avenue, Albany, New York 12210
1976 State University of New York All rights reserved.
Printed in the United States of America
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Thurow, Glen E. Abraham Lincoln and American political religion.
Includes bibliographical references. 1. Lincoln, Abraham, Pres. U. S., 1809-1865Religion. I. Title. E457.2.T44 320.5'092'4 76-12596 ISBN 0-87395-334-7
Page v
Contents
Acknowledgements
vii
Preface
ix
I. Introduction: Religion and Politics
1
II. Reverence for the Laws
20
III. Equality and Justice
38
IV. The Gettysburg Address and Sacred Politics
63
V. The Second Inaugural and the Limits of Politics
88
VI. Conclusion: Transcending Politics
109
Notes
120
Selected Bibliography
127
Index
130
Page vii
Acknowledgements
I am indebted, above all, to Professor Harvey C. Mansfield, Jr. of Harvard University who guided the production of the original of this book. One could not have asked for more gentle nor more incisive guidance. How does one express his debt to a true teacher? This book would not exist without the encouragement and assistance of Professor Richard Cox of the State University of New York at Buffalo. A friend and former colleague, he has shown me in deed the meaning of those words.
Page ix
Preface
Several generations have passed since Woodrow Wilson wrote in 1885 that
... we of the present generation are in the first season of free, outspoken, unrestrained constitutional criticism. We are the first Americans to hear our own countrymen ask whether the Constitution is still adapted to serve the purposes for which it was intended....
An "undiscriminating and almost blind worship" of the Constitution had begun almost immediately after its adoption and continued until the Civil War. Even then, "... the most violent policies took care to make show of at least formal deference to the worshipful fundamental law." Almost all Americans were unshakably convinced that our institutions were the best in the world.
Wilson thought that the homage that had been rendered the Constitution was both good and bad. "Anyone," he said, "can see the reasons for it and the benefits of it without going far out of his way...." But neither the reasons nor the benefits detained him. Inspired by the conviction that such homage was unworthy of free men, Wilson proudly noted that men had freed themselves of this unquestioning obeisance. Men could now freely consider the possibility that their institutions might be inferior to those of Europe and could think of remodeling the Constitution itself. Men could bravely face the facts of their political life freed from the spell of the Founders' "theories".1
Wilson's call for unfettered criticism has been heeded. Now, more than ninety years later, the critical spirit has reached almost to the lowest citizen. In its progress through the Progressive historians and their descendants (both within and without the profession of history), this spirit has turned from criticizing to debunking men and institutions previously hallowed.2 So triumphant has been its
Page x
march that today one must go to the backwoods to discover a college freshman who does not believe some variant of the Beardian thesis that the Founders were wealthy men who created the Constitution to thwart democracy and aid the interests of their class. Yet it is now widely recognized that we have not gained the unclouded sight and better institutions Wilson sought in giving up those nameless benefits he thought obvious. While our fundamental institutions are no longer shielded from criticism, they are as effectively as ever shielded from clear-eyed examination. Worship does not breed inquiry, but neither does contempt.
Nowhere is this more evident than in the study of the speeches and writings of statesmen. Traditionally it was held that to understand a statesman one had above all to understand his public statements. The height of Jefferson's statescraft could be seen in the Declaration of Independence; Washington's magnanimity and prudence viewed in his Farewell Address; Madison's architectonic calculations recognized in the
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