Team of Rivals Book Summary

Book Summary

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Brief Summary

Throughout Team of Rivals, Goodwin details the mastermind of Abraham Lincoln as he rose to the challenges of overseeing a costly and complicated war while balancing strife at home. Despite tensions within his cabinet, along with the myriad of Union factions surrounding him, Lincoln adeptly held all of these together. In the process, he capitalized on the skills and talents of the best men available until he found the generals who could get the job done and end the Civil War.

About the Author

Doris Kearns Goodwin is a renowned presidential historian, public speaker, and Pulitzer Prize-winning, New York Times #1 best-selling author. She earned a Doctor of Philosophy degree in Government from Harvard University, where she went on to become a professor teaching Government as well as a course on the American Presidency.

Topics

Biography & Memoir

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Key Insights

The Republican Party was born in the Spring of 1860. Four men vied for the Presidential nomination of this new political entity. After winning the Republican nomination and then the election to become the 16th President of the United States, Lincoln assembled the most remarkable cabinet ever seen. He knew the difficulties ahead and built a powerhouse around him, astonishingly made up of the very three men who ran against him in the primaries. Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin is a 900-page in-depth exploration into the formation and interaction of these adversaries-turned-allies.

Meet the Team

The most likely candidate to win the Republican nomination was New York Governor William H. Seward who had the strongest presence and reputation. He was progressive, supporting African-American rights. Ohio Governor Salmon P. Chase was deemed the second-best candidate and was also anti-slavery. Presidential hopeful Edward Bates came from a prominent family in Maryland while wood-chopping Abraham Lincoln was the dark horse. Having left politics after serving just one term in Congress in 1840, Lincoln was not predicted to win against his more practiced opponents, but Lincoln’s genius shined as he outmaneuvered all three.

As he prepared to take office in 1861, Lincoln broke ground by making William Seward Secretary of State, Salmon Chase, Treasury Secretary, and Edward Bates, Attorney General. Seward, initially humiliated by his defeat, stepped up to become one of Lincoln’s closest supporters and confidants. It is said that Lincoln spent more time with Seward in the first year of his term than anyone else, his own family included. Notably, Chase had a difficult assignment with the Treasury Department as he undertook the challenge of financing the Civil War while the government was deeply in debt.

Emancipation Ambitions

The cabinet was divided by Lincoln’s intention to free the slaves. While preserving the Union was Lincoln’s central priority, he agreed that slavery was “amoral, a social and a political wrong.” He also wanted to benefit from the manpower that freed slaves would bring to the war effort. As both a moral and “military necessity,” Lincoln asserted emancipation as both an objective and a solution.

Bates was a stout supporter, believing it would shorten the war. Seward worried that it would lead to further anarchy in the South, but his loyalty to Lincoln prevented him from publicly criticizing the proclamation. Chase, who had been the strongest opponent of slavery, recommended an approach that was more gradual. In the book, Goodwin suggests this was probably because he still held his own presidential ambitions and felt this could be more of a liability than a help to his agenda.

When the Emancipation Proclamation was made official, it led to the formation of a regiment of 180,000 black soldiers.

The Cabinet Under Attack

The mortifying defeat in Fredericksburg had antislavery Republican Congressmen up in arms, wanting change. Knowing they couldn’t attack the President, they put their sights on Seward, incorrectly believing he was the one actually driving the war. To this end, a “Committee of Nine” was formed to assert a no-confidence vote against...