{"product_id":"lincoln-and-the-abolitionists-john-quincy-adams-slavery-and-the-civil-war-isbn-9780062440006","title":"Lincoln and the Abolitionists: John Quincy Adams, Slavery, and the Civil War","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\"Anyone who wants to understand the United States' racial divisions will learn a lot from reading Kaplan's richly researched account of one of the worst periods in American history and its chilling effects today in our cities, legislative bodies, schools, and houses of worship.\" — \u003cem\u003eSt. Louis Post-Dispatch\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eThe acclaimed biographer Fred Kaplan returns with a controversial exploration of how Abraham Lincoln’s and John Quincy Adams’ experiences with slavery and race shaped their differing viewpoints, providing perceptive insights into these two great presidents and a revealing perspective on race relations in modern America\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThough the Emancipation Proclamation, limited as it was, ultimately defined his presidency, Lincoln was a man shaped by the values of the white America into which he was born. While he viewed slavery as a moral crime abhorrent to American principles, he disapproved of antislavery activists. Until the last year of his life, he advocated “voluntary deportation,” concerned that free blacks in a white society would result in centuries of conflict. In 1861, he reluctantly took the nation to war to save it. While this devastating struggle would preserve the Union, it would also abolish slavery—creating the biracial democracy Lincoln feared.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eYears earlier, John Quincy Adams had become convinced that slavery would eventually destroy the Union. Only through civil war, sparked by a slave insurrection or secession, would slavery end and the Union be preserved. Deeply sympathetic to abolitionists and abolitionism, Adams believed that a multiracial America was inevitable. \u003cem\u003eLincoln and the Abolitionists\u003c\/em\u003e, a frank look at Lincoln, “warts and all,” including his limitations as a wartime leader, provides an in-depth look at how these two presidents came to see the issues of slavery and race, and how that understanding shaped their perspectives.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIts supporting cast of characters is colorful, from the obscure to the famous: Dorcas Allen, Moses Parsons, Usher F. Linder, Elijah Lovejoy, William Channing, Wendell Phillips, Rufus King, Hannibal Hamlin, Andrew Johnson, Abigail Adams, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Henry Clay, Stephen A. Douglas, and Frederick Douglass, among scores of significant others. In a far-reaching historical narrative, Kaplan offers a nuanced appreciation of the great men—Lincoln as an antislavery moralist who believed in an exclusively white America, and Adams as an antislavery activist who had no doubt that the United States would become a multiracial nation—and the events that have characterized race relations in America for more than a century, a legacy that continues to haunt us all.\u003c\/p\u003e | \u003cp\u003ePraise for \u003cem\u003eJohn Quincy Adams: American Visionary\u003c\/em\u003e: “Kaplan has produced a full-length narrative of this remarkable life, rendered in lucid and loving prose. . . . Kaplan rightly portrays Adams as a man ahead of his time. . . . A valuable book about an important American figure.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eRobert W. Merry, New York Times Book Review\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“An engaging, well-crafted, and deeply researched biography that puts particular emphasis on John Quincy’s rich life of the mind.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eNew York Review of Books\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“In undertaking John Quincy Adams, Fred Kaplan. . . clearly is trying to do for the son what David McCullough did for the father. . . . It was a notable life, marked now by a notable biography.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eBoston Globe\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePraise for \u003cem\u003eLincoln: The Biography of a Writer\u003c\/em\u003e: “Fred Kaplan’s Lincoln offers penetrating insights on Lincoln’s ability to explain complex ideas in language accessible to a broad range of readers and listeners.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eJames M. McPherson, New York Review of Books\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“A fine, invaluable book. . . . Certain to become essential to our understanding of the 16th president. . . . Kaplan meticulously analyzes how Lincoln’s steadily maturing prose style enabled him to come to grips with slavery and, as his own views evolved, to express his deepening opposition to it.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eJonathan Yardley, Washington Post Book World\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFascinating. . . . persuasive [and] highly perceptive.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eMichiko Kakutani, New York Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“A fresh look at John Quincy Adams, Abraham Lincoln, the Civil War, abolitionism, and other related American history…In this insightful, often disturbing dual biography, he makes a convincing case that Adams, working decades before Lincoln, was the real hero…. eye-opening.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eKirkus (starred review)\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“In this elegantly written and thoroughly researched book … Kaplan presents a more complex Lincoln who 'presided over the creation of a new reality that neither he nor anyone could fully embrace, or embrace in a way that would eliminate racial conflict.'” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003ePublishers Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\"Anyone who wants to understand the United States' racial divisions will learn a lot from reading Kaplan's richly researched account of one of the worst periods in American history and its chilling effects today in our cities, legislative bodies, schools, and houses of worship.\" - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eSt. Louis Post-Dispatch\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Harper","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44888852267237,"sku":"NP9780062440006","price":28.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780062440006.jpg?v=1730229956","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/lincoln-and-the-abolitionists-john-quincy-adams-slavery-and-the-civil-war-isbn-9780062440006","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}