Lincoln at Cooper Union by Harold Holzer

Little could Lincoln know that he would emerge from his trip not only as a public speaker with an unexpectedly universal appeal for his party but also as a budding national icon.

But it was also an unplanned chance to make his face almost as familiar as Washington’s.

The man who would become the nation’s 16th president knew that his journey would fulfill or break his own White House dreams-which, legends of modesty notwithstanding, were surely in his mind on that wintry February 22.Īt the other end of the nation in New York City, an opportunity awaited for Lincoln to dazzle a fresh public with his oratory. Brass marching bands, children of Revolutionary War veterans and vivid banners converged to enthusiastically celebrate the nation’s first president. As he did, the annual patriotic parade was forming in the center of Springfield, Illinois. On Washington’s birthday in 1860, Abraham Lincoln quietly boarded a train in his hometown to begin a long trip to the East Coast. Mathew Brady’s Cooper Union portrait transformed a country lawyer into a national icon. It reaches its climax with the assurance that 'right makes might.' Long held, inaccurately, to be an appeal to the conservatives, Holzer presents Lincoln's speech as a masterly combination of scholarship, a brief for equality and democracy, and a rallying cry to the country and the Republican party.The Photograph that Made Lincoln President Close The Cooper Union speech, which was carefully researched by Lincoln and refers often to the Founders and authors of the Constitution, is an antislavery lecture, capped by a ringing warning to would-be secessionists in the South. Winner of The Award of Achievement of The Lincoln Group of New York, and The Civil War Round Table's Barondess Award.Īward-winning Lincoln scholar Harold Holzer places Lincoln and his speech in the context of the times - an era of racism, politicized journalism, and public oratory as entertainment - and shows how the candidate framed the speech as an opportunity to continue his famous 'debates' with his archrival Democrat Stephen A.

Lincoln at Cooper Union by Harold Holzer