James M. Mcpherson's Abraham Lincoln And The Second American Revolution

James M. McPherson’s book, “Abraham Lincoln and the Second American Revolution,” explores this simple, yet difficult question on whether or not the Civil War was indeed a second American Revolution. McPherson is able to defend his opinion through his own documented lectures and published papers that the Civil War was indeed a second revolution by exploring various definitions of the word “revolution” and investigating data related to African-Americans in an antebellum and postwar America. The author additionally outlines President Lincoln’s opinion of the war, while adding some remarkable facts about Lincoln himself, the importance of the familiar stories and comparisons Lincoln used to communicate to the public, and the differences in Lincoln’s …show more content…
The overthrow of slavery was an economic revolution due to the fact that most southern planters source of income and labor was created by the enslavement of blacks and the way that they were able to overwork them without any payment due to slaves being seen as property instead of human beings brought them a high amount of profit making very wealthy in the country. The Civil war was indeed a capitalist revolution because the abolition of slavery was a step to closer industrialism and a step further from agriculture because once slavery was abolished most of the former slaves moved into the city in search of labor. McPherson demonstrates how Abraham Lincoln moved from a conservative to a radical position during the war when he issued the Emancipation Proclamation declaring that all slaves were freed from their slave owners. Despite Abraham Lincoln being from the beginning anti-slavery he was consider conservative because he was not using his own moral judgment to guide him in ruling over the Union because he