When voters asked about his beliefs, Lincoln liked to point them to his book. But it also reveals something about his heart and mind. Political Debates sold fifty thousand copies-the rough equivalent of half a million books in today’s market-and it reveals something about Lincoln’s presidential ambitions. Lincoln labored in secret to get his book ready for the 1860 election, tracking down newspaper transcripts, editing them carefully for fairness, and hunting for a printer who would meet his specifications. Yet few can name the work that helped him win the presidency: his published collection of speeches entitled Political Debates between Hon. Most Americans are familiar with Abraham Lincoln’s famous words in the Gettysburg Address and the Emancipation Proclamation. “One of the best books on the American presidency to appear in recent years” ( The Wall Street Journal) and based on a decade of research and reporting-a delightful new window into the public and private lives America’s presidents as authors.
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