And There Was Light: Abraham Lincoln and the American Struggle

At the time of greatest tension in American history, the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln guided a turbulent, divided country toward a future that strengthened (imperfectly) equality amongst the races and fought for the unity of a singular democratic nation. Jon Meacham believes that we can use the experiences (and travails) of a figure like Lincoln, who looms so large in the American cultural imaginary, to reflect the tensions, imperfections, contradictions, and ideals of the present, when large swaths of the American public have felt the rising tide of political and cultural division. In the eyes of Meacham, and many others, recent threats to democracy and the overarching stability of the union are comparable to the threats in Lincoln’s time. Asked in a Today Show interview whether he sees parallels between the divisions emerging in pre-Civil War America and the divisiveness rampant in the 2020s, Meacham responded, “Tragically, yes” (“John Meacham Shares new complex view of Abraham Lincoln.” The Today Show, 19 Oct. 2022).

An important function of the study of history, for Meacham, is the light that it can shed on current affairs and political sentiments, and Meacham wrote a Lincoln biography for the contemporary historical and cultural moment using the national past as a tool for dissecting the national present. Implicitly, he views the historical study of complex figures as a heathy adaptogen for navigating disturbing political divisions and reaffirming dedication to democratic ideals. It’s because of this that he believes he can make a unique contribution to the literature on Lincoln, the most revered and thoroughly studied president in American history.

The biography suggests the parallels between Lincoln’s time and ours in subtle but significant ways. The prologue, for instance, compares the scene of Lincoln’s second inaugural address—which took place during the tumultuous Civil War—with the likewise tumultuous transfer of power following the 2020 election. Meacham uses the scene to comment on the fragility of democracy. Meacham focuses his account of Lincoln’s inauguration on the dome of the United States Capitol building, which was under construction at the time, and he describes its significance for Lincoln as a symbol of a united, democratic republic, the first of the modern world.

Framing his 2022 biography of Lincoln with a fraught inauguration and the dome’s symbolism has obvious resonances with recent events. In 2021, during a time of renewed democratic struggle and division, supporters of President Donald Trump stormed the United States Capitol building on January 6, 2021, not many days before the inauguration, challenging the rule of law and the standard processes for the transfer of executive authority.

At the time, there was pressure on Vice President Mike Pence not to verify the results of the election. Meacham notes a similar pressure was exerted on Vice President John C. Breckinridge in 1861 when Lincoln won his first election. In both cases, the vice president chose to uphold the Constitution despite political differences from the incumbent president’s constituency, thereby ensuring (to some degree) the stability of the union.

These parallels between the predominant issues and figures of the Civil War era and the contemporary era abound in And There Was Light. Though Meacham’s use of political commentary is sparse, his emphasis on Lincoln’s conscience, complexity, dedication to combatting an essential issue of racial bigotry, and overweening concern for the maintenance of democracy reveals that his motivation in writing a Lincoln biography (when so many are already in print) is to speak, as a historian, to a 21st century audience with 21st century political concerns and persuasions.

Meacham seeks to avoid two pitfalls common to complacent appraisals of Lincoln, both of which can coopt Lincoln for political purposes and mischaracterize his complexity. On one hand, Lincoln is sometimes lionized as a figure of saintly moral superiority who achieved the impossible and vied for racial equality. Meacham disagrees with this assessment. In that same conversation on The Today Show, he noted that Lincoln “was not Martin Luther King in a stove pipe hat” (The Today Show, 19 Oct. 2022). He did not truly believe that the races were naturally equal, nor would Lincoln seem like a progressive on such subjects in a 21st century context. At the same time, Meacham contends, Lincoln was a man of conscience, who believed in the principles of the Declaration of Independence and who consistently fought, on moral grounds, for the maintenance of the Union. We should, he believes, recognize him as a largely praiseworthy individual even as we temper this praise with sober reflection on his failures and limitations.

As opposed to those who would lionize Lincoln, there are those who take a cynical view, claiming that Lincoln was essentially corrupt, self-serving, and interested more in authoritative, centralized power than in any moral course of action, i.e., that he was simply a white man looking out for his own interests. Meacham believes this is also a foolish approach and that it does not grapple with the truth of Lincoln’s character. For Meacham, Lincoln is undoubtedly concerned with right moral conduct. However, he is also keen to show Lincoln’s limitations. Meacham consistently exposes that Lincoln frequently needed to be nudged by Black voices (and their white abolitionist allies) toward stronger action and less appeasement. The goal of Meacham’s biography, then, is to show the complexity and imperfection of an American president who none the less endeavored to follow his conscience in pursuit of an American ideal: liberty and justice for all. Lincoln is, then, an embodiment of the nation itself: imperfect and troubled but oriented toward a guiding ethical ideal. Such is Meacham’s belief, anyway, and such is the role that Lincoln can play as a useful historical (and mythical) figure in thinking about American identity.