Produced by Roberta Staehlin, David Garcia and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) Transcriber's note: Passages in italics are indicated by _underscores_. Small caps have been replaced by ALL CAPS. STUDIES IN AMERICAN HISTORY BEAUMARCHAIS, AND THE WAR OF AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE. Two volumes. Illustrated. _By Elizabeth S. Kite._ THE POLITICAL HISTORY OF THE PUBLIC LANDS, FROM 1840 TO 1862. FROM PRE-EMPTION TO HOMESTEAD. _By George M. Stephenson._ GEORGIA AS A PROPRIETARY PROVINCE--THE EXECUTION OF A TRUST. _By James Ross McCain._ LINCOLN, THE POLITICIAN. _By T. Aaron Levy._ THE AGRICULTURAL PAPERS OF GEORGE WASHINGTON. _Edited by Walter Edwin Brooke, Ph.B._ RICHARD G. BADGER, PUBLISHER, BOSTON LINCOLN THE POLITICIAN BY T. AARON LEVY BOSTON RICHARD G. BADGER THE GORHAM PRESS COPYRIGHT, 1918, BY RICHARD G. BADGER All Rights Reserved Made in the United States of America The Gorham Press, Boston. U.S.A. PREFACE Love of kind alone transcended Lincoln's political ambition. His career as President, Statesman, Emancipator is a mystery unless his preparation for leadership is demonstrated. He was no product of sudden elevation, no creature of opportunity. No American Statesman was better equipped to meet a national emergency. Lincoln the plain politician, the Illinois legislator, the congressman, and the prairie debater, was a child of the grocery store, of the pioneer gathering, of caucus and convention. It was this political training that determined the mode in which he breathed life into the momentous proclamation of the nineteenth century. The world that admires his charity is in equal need of his policy. Until the coming of the industrial movement following the Civil War, the Commonwealth commanded the best heart and intelligence of the Republic. Captains of industry had not usurped the places of power. A degraded conception of devotion to the general welfare is in itself a sign of degeneration. A corrupt political system is incompatible with a healthy national existence. When individual aggrandizement is often preferred to the common good, when private institutions frequently allure the genius of a people, it is an inspiration to return to a politician who in simplicity and sincerity believed that civil service and patriotism are better than gold. An abounding demand of the day is a practical political philosophy.