The fourth volume of Presidential Chronicles tells the life stories of the following five American Presidents who saw the country through Civil War and beyond in the second half of the 19th Century:
Abraham Lincoln
Andrew Johnson
Ulysses Grant
Rutherford Hayes
James Garfield
Fisher delves deeply into a nation divided over slavery and states’ rights, beginning with the most extensive contribution of the biographical series with his focus on the nation’s 16th President, Abraham Lincoln. Fisher makes extensive use of Lincoln’s own words to understand the growth of his political ideology, the endless string of difficult choices he faced, his unwavering commitment to preserving the Union, and his transition from slavery opponent to outright abolitionist – all in the context of a Constitutional interpretation that stretched the bounds of the founding document. The Civil War is explored from the view of a President, a wartime Governor, a Commanding General, and a pair of colonels/brigadiers who fought the battles that helped preserve the Union. War and Its Aftermath further gives life to the nation’s struggles in the Reconstruction era as these leaders tried to balance the competing sectional interests on how to reunify despite the inherent divides that continued to persist.