A brilliant and novel examination of how Abraham Lincoln mastered the art of leadership “Abraham Lincoln had less schooling than all but a couple of other presidents, and more wisdom than every one of them. In this original, insightful book, Michael Gerhardt explains how this came to be." –H.W. Brands, Wall Street Journal In 1849, when Abraham Lincoln returned to Springfield, Illinois, after two seemingly uninspiring years in the U.S. House of Representatives, his political career appeared all but finished. His sense of failure was so great that friends worried about his sanity. Yet within a decade, Lincoln would reenter politics, become a leader of the Republican Party, win the 1860 presidential election, and keep America together during its most perilous period. What accounted for the turnaround? As Michael J. Gerhardt reveals, Lincoln’s reemergence followed the same path he had taken before, in which he read voraciously and learned from the successes, failures, oratory, and political maneuvering of a surprisingly diverse handful of men, some of whom he had never met but others of whom he knew intimately—Henry Clay, Andrew Jackson, Zachary Taylor, John Todd Stuart, and Orville Browning. From their experiences and his own, Lincoln learned valuable lessons on leadership, mastering party politics, campaigning, conventions, understanding and using executive power, managing a cabinet, speechwriting and oratory, and—what would become his most enduring legacy—developing policies and rhetoric to match a constitutional vision that spoke to the monumental challenges of his time. Without these mentors, Abraham Lincoln would likely have remained a small-town lawyer—and without Lincoln, the United States as we know it may not have survived. This book tells the unique story of how Lincoln emerged from obscurity and learned how to lead.

Acclaimed by Einstein himself, this is among the clearest, most readable expositions of relativity theory. It explains the problems Einstein faced, the experiments that led to his theories, and what his findings reveal about the forces that govern the universe. 1957 edition.

In The Constitutional Legacy of Forgotten Presidents, eminent constitutional scholar Michael Gerhardt tells the stories of thirteen presidents whom most Americans do not remember and scholars think had no constitutional impact, among them Chester Arthur, Martin Van Buren, and William Howard Taft. As Gerhardt shows, our forgotten presidents played crucial roles in laying some of the groundwork followed by Lincoln and other modern presidents, as well as providing examples for future lawmakers of constitutional choices to avoid.

From the legendary basketball coach who inspired generations of athletes and businesspeople, an inspiring book about the power of mentoring and being mentored. After eight books, many of them bestsellers, A Game Plan for Life was the one closest to John Wooden's heart: a moving and inspirational guide to the power of mentorship. The first half focuses on the people who helped foster the values that carried Wooden through an incredibly successful and famously principled career, including his father, his college coach, his wife, Mahatma Gandhi, and Mother Teresa. The second half is built around interviews with some of the many people he mentored over the years, including Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Bill Walton. Their testimony takes readers inside the lessons Wooden taught to generations of players, bringing out the very best in them not just as athletes but as human beings. In all, this is an inspiring primer on how to achieve success without sacrificing principles and how to build one of the most productive and rewarding relationships available to any athlete, businessperson, teacher, or parent-that of mentor and protégé.

Abraham Lincoln's election was favorably influenced by the influx of German revolutionaries who fled Europe after the failed revolutions of 1848. Then, his agenda to establish a central government with unlimited political power caused the American Civil War. This fascinating book puts forth these arguments and also explores how, after the war, the legality of secession was viewed.

A New York Public Library Best Book of 2017 * A Chicago Public Library Best of the Best Book for Teens 2017 This first-ever LGBTQ history book of its kind for young adults will appeal to fans of fun, empowering pop-culture books like Rad American Women A-Z and Notorious RBG. Three starred reviews! World history has been made by countless lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer individuals—and you’ve never heard of many of them. Queer author and activist Sarah Prager delves deep into the lives of 23 people who fought, created, and loved on their own terms. From high-profile figures like Abraham Lincoln and Eleanor Roosevelt to the trailblazing gender-ambiguous Queen of Sweden and a bisexual blues singer who didn’t make it into your history books, these astonishing true stories uncover a rich queer heritage that encompasses every culture, in every era. By turns hilarious and inspiring, the beautifully illustrated Queer, There, and Everywhere is for anyone who wants the real story of the queer rights movement. A Junior Library Guild Selection

Originally published in 2005. Throughout the fractious years of the mid-nineteenth century, Abraham Lincoln's speeches imparted reason and guidance to a troubled nation. Lincoln's words were never universally praised. But they resonated with fellow legislators and the public, especially when he spoke on such volatile subjects as mob rule, temperance, the Mexican War, slavery and its expansion, and the justice of a war for freedom and union. In this close examination, John Channing Briggs reveals how the process of studying, writing, and delivering speeches helped Lincoln develop the ideas with which he would so profoundly change history. Briggs follows Lincoln's thought process through a careful chronological reading of his oratory, ranging from Lincoln's 1838 speech to the Springfield Lyceum to his second inaugural address. Recalling David Herbert Donald's celebrated revisionist essays (Lincoln Reconsidered, 1947), Briggs's study provides students of Lincoln with new insight into his words, intentions, and image.