The War That Forged a Nation: Why the Civil War Still Matters

Pulitzer Prize winning author and historian James McPherson delivers another sterling monograph on elements of Civil War history with this work. More than any other area of history, the American Civil War sparks more discussion and passionate argumentation when brought up in any forum. I have spent hours of time arguing with people about the Civil War and even more time in discussing the conflict, especially its causes than my favorite area of history, the American Revolution. My students pay more attention to the Civil War than any other area as well. The area in which I live has an interesting Civil War history which is often misunderstood by the descendants of the people who lived here in that time. Basically, the period of time still holds a great deal of interest for people. McPherson explores various topics of the period in this book. These chapters are essays McPherson has written over the years with the first essay being a new essay written for this book. The content of these essays can easily be found in other works by historians as well such as Lincoln’s evolving view of slavery, or the coming of the war, or the end of the conflict. McPherson notes that the Civil War resulted in a huge shift in the relationship of people with government as well as how people saw the direction of the nation, especially the concept of liberty. He notes that the concepts of positive and negative liberty are battled over today in our elections as people continue to seek to define what liberty means and to apply that definition to everyone. As a result, the Civil War is valid territory to explore as the people of that time period battled over the definitions of liberty to the point where some chose to reject the view of the majority and to seek to form a new country to sustain their idea of liberty. We have recently celebrated the 150th anniversary of the Civil War and it was a well attended celebration. Unlike the centennial celebration, the sesquicentennial focused on the role of slavery and liberty in fueling the conflict as well as its role during it. Now as we look at the Reconstruction period again, scholars and historians are looking at it with a new lens. McPherson notes how these differences have significantly impacted our understanding of the Civil War as well as how those explorations are made possible by the changing society we live in today. Yes, as McPherson notes, the Civil War still matters to a people seeking answers to their own world even 150 years later when many of the same points are being brought up again. McPherson is the author of Battle Cry of Freedom, a book which won the Pulitzer Prize for History and numerous other books on Civil War topics. He is the George Henry Davis ’86 Professor of History emeritus at Princeton University. He has won the Lincoln Prize and made the New York Times bestseller list several times. He studied under C. Vann Woodward at Johns Hopkins University where he earned his Ph.D in 1963. He was the first recipient of the Pritzker Military Library Literature Award in 2007 and is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. I liked this book quite a bit. McPherson is a very good writer. By the time he published Battle Cry of Freedom he had developed a very strong literary talent which was readable by a wide audience. That has helped him get his points across to many people. It also has led to some of his works being used as textbooks in Civil War courses, and they are also well cited in all levels of Civil War scholarship. This particular volume is interesting for being essays written over the course of his career. I highly recommend it to anyone interested in looking at multiple facets of the American Civil War.

James McPherson’s newest work is a concise collection of highly analytical essays over his career. He covers many topics in under 200 pages—this is not a survey history of the American Civil War; rather, it is an analytical one with insightful perspectives and strong research.In the first few chapters, McPherson comes across attacking other historians’ works and theses. He makes strong arguments and supports his points, but I was hoping he delved from this approach, which he does after the first three chapters.From then on, he largely supports others’ work and analyzes it through his own historical perspective. As a longtime McPherson fan, I admire his ability to write concisely without missing a beat. I really enjoyed this work—one reason is because I’ve read several of the works he consistently cites in these essays. The ones I did not read I readily ordered and will read soon. However, if you do not have the time to read those works, McPherson’s analysis should provide you with a thesis for each work at the very least.Some chapters of note:McPherson’s first chapter “Why the Civil War Still Matters” connects the Civil War and its ensuing three amendments to the US Constitution throughout history to the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s and to today.Chapters five and six focus on the much-ignored American navies and its two most overlooked admirals, David Dixon Porter and more so David Glasgow Farragut.Chapters seven through eleven involve Lincoln and McPherson takes a different angle on the president in each—these essays are impressive. McPherson analyzes Lincoln’s use of executive power and whether it was justified, Lincoln’s effectiveness as a military man and commander in chief, and Lincoln’s war strategy and how it changed throughout the war. He also focuses on Lincoln’s feud with McClelland and highlights McClellan’s private letters that shed light on his flawing character and military career.Lastly, his final chapter encapsulates the Reconstruction Era with concisely written research, including the rise of the KKK and the racial divide in Illinois even when it was an anti-slavery state.If you enjoyed this work I highly recommend reading another collection of his essays from a few years ago titled “This Mighty Scourge: Perspectives on the Civil War.” This one features shorter essays but covers much more content.

This is nothing against the book or McPherson - if you've read his other works you'll know he's a wonderful historian and anything he does on the Civil War is worth reading. This is a ding against what I saw as more an oversell by an overly ambitious publisher trying to get you to buy the book. The book is a compilation of McPherson's essays on various themes - some are more interesting likely depending on your personal predilections, others are repackaging of something you've probably read elsewhere by McPherson. But there's a tenuous tie here frequently between the essays and the epithet "why the Civil War still matters." I expected a great deal more focus on this question - as this would be some real additive value with McPherson's other writings. Instead you often get 20 pages of essay, and then a line or two "...and THAT's why the Civil War still matters!"Again a fine set of essays on the Civil War, just know going in you're not getting a golden answer to that larger question out of this book.

Really wonderful essays. I enjoyed, in particular, the one's on Lincoln and freedom, and the broad strokes look at Reconstruction.