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The Radical and the Republican: Frederick Douglass, Abraham Lincoln, and the Triumph of Antislavery Politics

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Abraham Lincoln (1809 --1865) and Frederick Douglass (1818 -- 1895)are American heroes with each exemplifying a unique aspect of the American spirit. In his recent study, "The Radical and the Republican: Frederick Douglass, Abraham Lincoln, and the Triumph of Antislavery Politics" (2007), Professor James Oakes traces the intersecting careers of both men, pointing out their initial differences and how their goals and visions ultimately converged. Oakes is Graduate School Humanities Professor and Professor of History at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. He has written extensively on the history of slavery in the Old South.

Oakes reminds the reader of how much Lincoln and Douglass originally shared. Lincoln and Douglass were self-made, self-educated, and ambitious, and each rose to success from humble backgrounds. Douglass, of course, was an escaped slave. Douglass certainly and Lincoln most likely detested slavery from his youngest days. But Lincoln from his young manhood was a consummate politican devoted to compromise, consensus-building, moderation and indirection. Douglass was a reformer who spoke and wrote eloquently and with passion for the abolition of slavery and for equal rights for African Americans.

Much of Oakes's book explores the difficult subject of Lincoln's attitude towards civil rights -- as opposed simply to the ending of slavery -- and of how Lincoln's views developed during the Civil War. Oakes uses Douglass as a foil for Lincoln beginning with the Lincoln -- Stephen Douglas debates in Illinois in 1858. Steven Douglas tried hard to link Lincoln to Frederick Douglass and to abolitionism. He claimed that Lincoln favored equal rights for Negroes and raised the spectre of intermarriage between white women and black men. Portions of Lincoln's responses to Stephen Douglas were almost as distressing, as Lincoln carefully avoided supporting civil equality between the races and stressed instead the evil of slavery and the need to stop its expansion. It is not surprising that Douglass the abolitionist was ambivalent and mistrustful of Lincoln in the early years, doubting his committment to the cause of ending slavery.

Douglass continued to distrust President Lincoln. Douglass found the President too quick to temporize and too slow to act towards freeing the slaves. In widely publicized actions, Lincoln had rebuked two of his generals, Freemont and Hunter, who had tried to take aggressive action to free slaves. Lincoln had acted in order to keep on good terms with the border states whose support he deemed necessary to a successful war effort. But Douglass saw Lincoln's actions as weak and waffling.

Douglass's attitude gradually changed with the Emancipation Proclamation and with three meetings between the two men in 1863, 1864, and 1865. Douglass was won over by the President. Lincoln, for his part, seemed to view Douglass with genuine affection and friendship. Douglass gave masterful orations summarizing Lincoln's accomplishments following Lincoln's assassination, in 1876 at the unveiling of the Emancipation Monument in Lincoln Park, Washington, D.C., and throughout the rest of his life. Lincoln had fought slavery with every means at his command, Douglass came to believe, given the difficult political and military situation with which he had to deal.

Douglass' career moved in an opposite direction from that of Lincoln. He began as a reformer and a follower of the abolitionist William Garrison and he initially shared Garrison's contempt for the American political process. Gradually, Douglass found his own voice, and he became convinced the the United States Constitution did not support slavery. He came to conclude that it was possible to work for change through the political process, and this belief eventually allowed a convergence between him and Lincoln. With the conclusion of the Civil War, Douglass became a party man and a stalwart Republican -- perhaps giving up more than he should have of the passion of his early years. While he ultimately saw the failure of Reconstruction, Douglass remained for the rest of his long life firmly within the American political process.

Oakes does an excellent job of comparing and contrasting the work of Lincoln and Douglass. His accounts of the complex events leading to the issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation are particuarly lucid. Oakes argues that Lincoln had surreptitiously delivered the death blow to slavery by the end of 1861. As to Douglass, I learned a great deal from Oakes's discussion of his three autobiographies, written in 1845, 1855, and 1881 (editied, 1891) and of how these works document the change of Douglass from reformer to an instance of the American success story. Oakes also describes well and detail a chilling meeting between Douglass and other African American leaders and President Andrew Johnson in which Douglass unsuccessfully tried to persuade Johnson to extend the right to vote to African Americans.

Oakes has written a readable, informed account of the achievements of two great American leaders. The attitudes which they represent -- the politican and the reformer -- and the issues with which they struggled remain with Americans today.

Robin Friedman

Author James Oakes tells us this: in 1860 Frederick Douglass wrote of the upcoming presidential election "I cannot support Lincoln." But in 1888, Douglass said he had met no man "possessing a more godlike nature than did Abraham Lincoln." What had happened?

Oakes gives us a quick glance at his hypothesis within the subtitle of his book: the triumph of antislavery politics. As he explains, this doesn't apply to Lincoln. Lincoln was always an anti-slavery politician, although his thinking on how and how fast slavery should be destroyed changed over time. But with regards to the use of politics as the means to abolish slavery, the man whose thinking moved more was Frederick Douglass. And although the two men share the billing in Oakes' title, this is far more a book about Douglass than Lincoln. It is a book about the evolution of the reasoning of Frederick Douglass.

That evolution, as Oakes paints it, began for Douglass from the belief that the issue of slavery transcended politics and the compromises that came with it. Oakes traces how Douglass the reformer began to be drawn into the political arena, alienating the abolitionists who had first supported his career. But still he carried with him that insistence on absolutism. He brooked no delays, no strategic maneuverings. Lincoln and the Republicans were gradualists, and therefore were deemed irresolute and untrustworthy.

After the Civil War began, Douglass found even more reasons for outrage. Lincoln refused to immediately emancipate the slaves. The President even countermanded the Union generals who issued proclamations freeing the slaves in the territories they conquered. Lincoln had not yet issued a retaliation policy against confederates who captured and often executed southern blacks who had joined the Union army. Oakes gives us deft insights into Lincoln's thinking on all these issues. Douglass, who apparently was not himself an acolyte of consistency, bounced back and forth in his electoral attitudes. But he never let up in his pressure on Lincoln nor in his condemnation of the President's lack of strong steps against slave-holding interests.

Then, first in 1863, Lincoln meets with Douglass. About a year later, at Lincoln's request, they meet a second time and Lincoln asks Douglass to draw up a plan to get as many slaves freed under the Emancipation Proclamation as possible. Over that span Douglass' thinking with regards to Lincoln undergoes a dramatic shift. Afterwards, his criticism of Lincoln essentially stops.

Oakes describes these meetings, including a third just after Lincoln's second inaugural address, in as much detail as consistent with the small format of the book. He relies largely on Douglass' own recollections. Oakes also gives us dramatic retellings of other events in Douglass' career that illustrate the development of his thinking, but also the refinement of his skills as a political strategist.

We are still left wondering what exactly was the effect of those meetings with Lincoln. Was Douglass simply overwhelmed, as others were, by the force of Lincoln's understated humaneness and thereby convinced of the President's genuine concern for blacks? Or did Lincoln persuade Douglass that his political methods were the best possible under the evolving circumstances? Or did Lincoln flatter Douglass into acquiescence, especially in enlisting his help during that second meeting?

These possibilities are not mutually exclusive. Oakes in no way downplays the significance of these meetings. But I believe he wants us to see that what happened was entirely consistent with the evolution of Douglass' thinking with regards to politics. As a reformer, he saw it his job to always keep the pressure on. But where and how best to apply that pressure --- that changed in his meetings with Lincoln. And, near the end of Douglass' life, when he raised Lincoln to sainthood, he was still putting the pressure on. But he was using Lincoln's reputation to apply that pressure against the backsliding that the post-Reconstruction era had brought. Douglass had found a way to combine the duties of a reformer with a sophisticated instinct for politics.

"The Radical and the Republican" is not a dramatic retelling of events. It is certainly not a co-biography of its two principals. But it does have drama. That drama comes from taking Douglass' thinking seriously and mapping out its development and growing political sophistication. To do this, it uses comparisons with Lincoln's thinking and the interplay of the two men's principles and actions. But it's not by accident that Douglass comes first in the book's title and its cover. There are many books about Lincoln. This is a book about Frederick Douglass.

One of the easiest things to do, especially on the web, is to take a highly regarded leader of the past, say, Abraham Lincoln, pull a few of his quotes or actions out of their historical context, and supposedly "prove" how horrible that leader actually was. In contrast, author James Oakes explains Lincoln to us postmoderns the way an historian should - by reminding us of Lincoln's circumstances and explaining Lincoln's overarching purposes. Oakes does this without resorting to making Lincoln a saint. According to Oakes' compellingly-supported evidence, Lincoln refused to compromise two essential commitments - to antislavery and to the American political system. Lincoln would not compromise his antislavery position to get more votes, nor would he compromise his oaths to uphold the Constitution to undermine slavery. This dual commitment of Lincoln's goes very far in helping us understand why Lincoln limited his goal to preventing the spread of slavery before he became president, why he didn't just go ahead and free all the slaves when he became president, why he moved slowly towards emancipation during the war, etc. Furthermore, the author's discussion of Lincoln's overwhelming desire to change the hearts and minds of Americans about slavery instead of merely forcing through political change regardless of wider support was especially useful. As the "Republican" in the title, Lincoln wanted a government that represented the will of the people; therefore, the will of the people needed to be converted before the government could make radical change. The fact that Lincoln helped accomplish this more widespread change is quite a testament to his legacy of leadership.

The "Radical" in the title is another great American, Frederick Douglass. Unlike Lincoln's, Douglass' reputation typically is not in dispute. Most of us love Douglass, and for good reason. Oakes doesn't tarnish Douglass' reputation, but he does help us to understand how Douglass' singular commitment to antislavery/antiracism, as compared to Lincoln's dual commitment explained above, often put Douglass at odds with the political process AND caused Douglass to speak out so vehemently against politicians like Lincoln. From Douglass' perspective, only immediate emancipation and egalitarianism would serve justice. Thus, by necessity, Douglass would oppose and criticize Lincoln - that is, until the two men met.

One of the reviewers below critiques Oakes for supposedly overstating the relationship between the two men. I believe this critique is misplaced because Oakes never claimed to be writing primarily about the interpersonal relationship between the two. Instead, he's writing about the interplay of the radical ideology of one, and the antislavery politics of the other. Also, I think that Oakes analyzes the relationship between Brown and Douglass comprehensively, not simplistically, as a reviewer below seems to believe.

As a person who teaches history at the college level, and as a person who enjoys reading history for fun, I would recommend this book. I intend to make it one of my required texts for my survey American history course, alongside Frederick Douglass' autobiography.

On Douglass, Oakes looks at how he moved from radical to politician throughout his life, including wedding himself so much to the GOP in his last years that he apparently never entertained the idea of a "Free Vote Party" paralleling the Liberty Party of his younger days.

No, it's not a full bio, but it leads to further questions. Was this the "settling" of an old man? Was it an evolving pragmatism? Did getting a patronage job bank his inner fires?

On Lincoln, Oakes takes a careful look at the long-debated issue as to whether or not he had any racist bones, either before election to the presidency or even after.

On 126-29, Oakes tackles the pre-1860 politics of Lincoln re black-white relations beyond slavery with depth. He says Lincoln simply accepted white intransigence was so great that blacks never could have equality and that it was not a case of Lincoln himself rejecting racial equality. Nonetheless, Oakes believes "spineless" is a legitimate charge, as is "cynical."

More serious are some of the themes from a pro-colonization lecture, in essence, Lincoln gave to northern black leaders shortly before announcing the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation.

Oakes sees this as a more cynical version of Lincoln's 1850 stance on accepting white racism even though Lincoln didn't hold to it himself. After claiming in the past "racism" and "slavery" were different, Oakes says Lincoln now tried to conflate them with a cheap syllogism.

This level of analysis is what makes the book all of the things I said in my header.

No, again, this is not a complete dual bio. But Oakes' excellent "For Further Reading" appendix points to the best bios on both men, as well as takes on the Civil War militarily and socially, Reconstruction and more.

I enjoyed this book because it showed the civil rights struggle with all its complexities in a very clear and understandable way. The interaction of Douglas and Lincoln was especially interesting because it provided a very human picture of good men trying to deal with the thinking and forces operating during that time.

As the anti-slavery movement slowly grew two of it's leaders came from divergent backgrounds, went about things differently, and yet despite earlier animosity grew to be friends and respect each other. In his Lincoln Prize winning work James Oakes shows the intertwined yet different paths of Frederick Douglass, the radical, and Abraham Lincoln, the Republican.

Lincoln began his political life as a devoted follower of Henry Clay and the Whig party. While Clay was against slavery he also believed that once freed they should be relocated to Africa. From this Lincoln's views developed and led him to a group that ultimately became the Republican party. Republican beliefs included the fact that while slavery was wrong it would be allowed to continue where it was and that the Fugitive Slave Act would be enforced. Slavery however would not be allowed to expand to any new territory. Slavery would eventually die out due to it's inefficient use of labor. Douglass on the other hand was born a slave and after escaping north became a devoted follower of noted abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison. Garrisonians were pacifists who believed that slavery degraded everything and everybody it touched. They worked through "Moral Persuasion" which in effect meant that they denounced anybody or thing that was not blatantly anti-slavery. In their mind this included the Constitution which they condemned as being pro-slavery. After returning from England Douglass began taking a more active interest in anti-slavery politics and after moving to Rochester, NY he began publishing The North Star, a newspaper with an anti-slavery bent. Here he also began to slowly convert to the views of Gerrit Smith who believed that the Constitution was actually not a pro-slavery document. He reasoned that the words of the document are what mattered and not what people felt the intent was. Seeing that slavery was not specifically mentioned clauses could not be assumed to apply to slavery itself. By 1851 he had converted to this view.

In October 1859 John Brown led his ill fated raid on the federal arsenal at Harper's Ferry, VA. This attempt to lead a slave uprising failed completely and ultimately cost Brown his life. Douglass considered Brown a hero and his relations with Brown led to Douglass going into exile for several months first to Canada and then to Great Britain. He would not be gone long however. Northern politicians, including Lincoln, were quick to distance themselves from the "madman". Lincoln was a believer in the rule of law in the attempt to end slavery. Actions like John Brown's raid were unacceptable and could actually work against the abolition movement.

As the 1850s came to a close the major difference between Douglass and Lincoln was in their views of the Constitution and what it allowed. Douglass, believing it to be an anti-slavery document thought that the federal government was obligated to work aggressively end slavery. Despite his personal views Lincoln believed that the Constitution recognized slavery where it already existed and thus the government could not interfere. It could prevent expansion but not eliminate it where it already existed. Here Oakes points out a key difference in the two men. Douglass demanded action and that by eliminating slavery racism could be eliminated. Douglass thought northern racism was the "spirit of slavery" making its way into other parts of the country. For Lincoln race and slavery were not the same; not having a black woman for a slave did not mean he wanted her for a wife. Lincoln felt that slavery was a dying institution and was being killed by southern states continuing to make a focal point of it. In addition, once states seceded from the Union Lincoln felt he was no longer obliged to keep his promises regarding the protection of slavery.

Lincoln and Douglass met on three occasions. A mutual respect was earned with Lincoln enrolling Douglass to help spread the word of the Emancipation Proclamation. Lincoln, the Republican, made a lasting impression on Douglass, the radical, in his sincerity toward ending slavery. Even after Lincoln's death Douglass continued to promote Lincoln and the ways he went about ending slavery.

This is an enjoyable book to read. It is accessible without being simple. Oakes has used the words of these great men as much as possible and has noted them well for further research if you are inclined. While certainly not a "Civil War" book this is one that should be read by anybody interested in the wars time frame, who has an interest in Lincoln or Douglass, or wishes to further understand the issues that brought our country to war.

This is a very fine biographical history by Professor of History, James Oakes. For the student of American slavery, race relations, and the history of African American emancipation, this is a captivating digest of two monumental characters. Frederick Douglass was a single-issue advocate for emancipation. Abraham Lincoln was the President who had to manage multiple crises, the most obvious being the challenge of restoring the Union. Douglass and Lincoln met three times. Lincoln called him "my friend, Douglass." Lincoln invited Douglass into his office ahead of others waiting to see the President. Lincoln insisted that Douglass be ushered into the White House at the second inaugural party. Of course he did. Douglass was the most popular black man in the African American community. Lincoln was as astute a politician as any, and faced difficult issues that lay ahead for shaping the civil rights of four million recently emancipated Americans of color in a defeated South. He would need Douglass as an ally. It may be a stretch, though, to make much more of their friendship or commonalities than that. Oakes tries.

Surely Abraham Lincoln was moved by the events of the war as much as anything. Once African Americans entered Union military service as United States Colored Troops, his position on the abolition of slavery became virtually non-negotiable. Could Lincoln have done more to alter the course of events in the South from 1865 to 1877? Maybe. Douglass thought so. As the years wore on Douglass burnished Lincoln's memory, calling him "the most Godlike person I have ever known." Douglass eventually forgot that in 1864 he was searching for another presidential candidate in lieu of Lincoln serving a second term. Lincoln was moving too slowly and Douglass feared a negotiated peace with slavery being preserved in the Confederate states. He wanted someone with "a studier anti-slavery backbone." On this score, his fears were utterly misplaced, as Professor James Oakes points out. A well-written narrative ending with a comprehensive historiography captioned FOR FURTHER READING.

Lincoln versus Douglas often conjures the legendary rivalry of our 16th president and his opponent for public office and fellow Illinoisan, Stephen Douglas. But Oakes' treatise on the evolution of Lincoln's political thought compared to that of Frederick Douglass makes a compelling case that the latter Douglass is the more important to the larger American narrative of abolition, emancipation, and civil rights. Oakes takes a unique approach to his subjects by comparing and contrasting their political positions vis-à-vis slavery along the same timeline.

It is often taken for granted that Lincoln was opposed to slavery and wanted it abolished. That may or may not be true, but he had to negotiate nearly impossible pragmatic and political obstacles in order to gain popular support for his policies. Oakes brings these political realities to life with a refreshing clarity.

Likewise, history tends to look at Douglass as a man who supported anything and anyone who opposed slavery in principle. As this book makes clear, it was more complicated than that--Douglass made friends and enemies every time he spoke of a slight change in his position. Oakes uses hundreds of primary documents, including a substantial amount of his subjects' own writings, to illuminate the those changes.

Lincoln and Douglass were at seeming odds much of the time, but as the years passed, their positions converged. The Radical and the Republican illustrates the convergences insightfully and cogently.

This book was a wonderful read.

This is a very good book about two great Americans. It is also a pretty good analysis of how politics works, and the very different roles played by activists and statesmen. It gives you some insight into how great a man Lincoln really was, but not as much as Doris Kearns Goodwin's magnificent Team of Rivals. And it gives you a great many insights into why Douglass was a more flawed but still impressive man.

In the end the book feels a tad "slight," not quite up to the large task Oakes set out to accomplish. As Douglass gains respect over time for Lincoln we see glimmers of why that might be, but Oakes seems to have more academic distance from what he really believes than he needs to have. It is as if he is not quite willing to accept that Douglass came to admire and even love Lincoln for his extraordinary qualities of decency and courage. Decency that Lincoln exhibited as he so often did by embracing Douglass despite the meanness of many of Douglass' comments towards him, because Lincoln had an almost other-worldly ability to see the world from another man's point of view.

There is something very beautiful about how these two men drew closer over the course of the nation's great struggle to end slavery.

Many other contemporaries missed the power and wisdom of Lincoln's Second Inaugural speech. Not Douglass, who was there in person and, despite many obstacles, made his way to the East Room of the White House to personally congratulate Lincoln. Lincoln made sure he was permitted to enter saying, "Here comes my friend Douglass." He then asked Douglass for his opinion, because he valued it. Douglass replied: "Mr. Lincoln, that was a sacred effort."

It was indeed a sacred effort. And that exchange between these two men of great character should be the centerpiece of this study. While Oakes carefully explains how they both arrived at that moment, he misses much of the drama. And that is a shame, because there are few moments in American life more full of meaning and symbolism.

I am reading this book now and am struck by the evolution of Douglass' ideas about politics. At first, he was angry and rejected all compromise, influenced by radical abolitionists like William Lloyd Garrison. Later, he began to see the value of politics and compromise and became a Republican in 1856 when John C Fremont was the nominee of the new party. Douglass accepted the necessity of compromise and a strategy of gradual starvation of the institution of slavery. From rejecting the Constitution as a "slaveowners' document", he became an enthusiastic supporter of the American system and sought citizenship for the freed slaves once the South collapsed, by war or economic forces they could not resist. I wish some Black Liberation advocates would read it. Douglass was a wise man and not as radical as the title suggests. An excellent book. Also a new look at Lincoln although I knew most of the story.