As President-Elect Donald Trump prepares to enter office, the individuals he’s nominated to serve in key positions in his administration are being vetted by the United States Senate. With the consent of the Senate, each newly elected president gets to choose the members of their cabinet to implement their policies and vision for the country. It seems to be a tough task in a country so clearly divided. Then again, Abraham Lincoln faced a much deeper division. But as Doris Kearns Goodwin shows in Team of Rivals, he put together an outstanding cabinet.
Perhaps no president had more at stake in selecting his cabinet than Abraham Lincoln. The very survival of the United States was on the line when Lincoln took office. Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln is an incredible work that tells the remarkable story of Lincoln, his cabinet, and his uncanny ability to find the best people for the job and then bring the best out of them.
I read the book after seeing the movie Lincoln. I loved Lincoln and consider it one of the best historically based movies ever made. Daniel Day Lewis’ portrayal of Mr. Lincoln was absolutely incredible. In fact, it is hard for me to read speeches or quotes from Abraham Lincoln, without hearing Lewis’ voice as Lincoln in my head.
Wanting to dig more into the subject matter covered in Lincoln, I read Team of Rivals to learn more about what went into the political maneuvering that led to the passage of the 13th Amendment. To my surprise, and to the credit of screenwriter Tony Kushner, there was very little in the book about that event.
Team of Rivals focuses on Lincoln and his cabinet; specifically William Seward, Salmon Chase, and Edward Bates. Each of these men sought the Republican nomination in 1860. Each was bested at the convention in Chicago by Abraham Lincoln. They had all underestimated him as a candidate, and they all underestimated him as a president; especially one facing the Constitutional crisis of secession as slave holding states left the Union.
Lincoln, on the other hand, understood the strength of his one time opponents. While they all had their own political ambitions and each had designs on winning the White House, he did not allow that to disqualify them from his cabinet. He knew they each had a talent and an intellect he needed to guide the country through the Civil War and preserve the United States of America.
As president, Lincoln appointed Seward as Secretary of State, Chase as Secretary of the Treasury, and Gates as Attorney General. Lincoln chose these men for their abilities to help him govern and also to politically keep both the fledgling Republican Party and the remaining states in the Union together. Seward initially thought he could become the power behind the throne. However, he soon learned Lincoln was his own man. He came to both trust and respect the president.
Lincolns’ team of rivals even extended to members of the Democratic Party. He appointed Edwin Stanton as his Secretary of War. Like Seward, Stanton had his doubts about Lincoln, yet he would become a staunch ally of the president. He played a pivotal role in the success of the Unions’ war efforts. On the morning of April 15, 1865 when Lincoln was pronounced dead from an assassin’s bullet, Stanton proclaimed at the president’s bedside, “Now he belongs to the ages.”
Indeed, Lincoln does belong to the ages. There is much to be learned from his life; not the least was his ability to surround himself with qualified individuals for the sake of the country, despite whatever rivalry and ambition may have existed in the past. Team of Rivals isn’t just fantastic history or biography, it’s a record of leadership and perseverance in the midst of the greatest division that any country or people can ever face.