Lincoln: The Greatest Communicator

New book by Douglas Wilson of the Lincoln Studies Center at Knox College

December 13, 2006

Abraham Lincoln is today regarded as one of America's greatest public communicators, but it was a different story when he was elected president, according to a new book, "Lincoln's Sword: The Presidency and the Power of Words," by Douglas Wilson, co-director of the Lincoln Studies Center at Knox College.

Lincoln's lack of formal schooling meant that the educated people of his day were not sure "whether he was a 'gentleman'," and some even characterized Lincoln as a "barbarian," Wilson writes in the book, his fourth on Lincoln. In addition, Wilson writes, "most Americans were too engrossed in the drama of a disintegrating Union and the sudden eruption of a civil war to take note of the special qualities of the president's writing."

Published this month by Alfred A. Knopf, the book has gained praise from leading historians, including Doris Kearns Goodwin, David Herbert Donald, Garry Wills and Richard Norton Smith.

While a number of recent studies have looked at Lincoln as a communicator, Wilson's book "takes the conversation to an even higher level," said former presidential speech writer Ted Widmer, in a review in The Los Angeles Times.

"Never has the craft of Lincoln's writing been more brilliantly revealed," Goodwin wrote in a pre-publication review. Donald called the book "the first close scholarly study of Lincoln's writing."

Wilson details the techniques that the largely self-educated Lincoln used to develop his writing. "Lincoln was a rewriter, who constantly revised his writing, and he was also a prewriter, who was always making notes on things he wanted to get across to the public," Wilson said.

For example, not only did Lincoln not compose the 1863 Gettysburg Address on an envelope while traveling to the ceremony, Wilson believes that Lincoln may have prepared parts of his most famous speech well in advance.

"I found lots of evidence that Lincoln often wrote things out in advance, then looked for an occasion to use what he had written," Wilson said.

"This was abundantly true for the Gettysburg Address," Wilson said. "Once we see the pattern, in conjunction with what Lincoln said at the time of the Union victory at Gettysburg in July 1863, we realize that he was actively looking for an occasion to suggest that human equality, as expressed in the Declaration of Independence, was what the war was all about. He seized upon the dedication of the cemetery at Gettysburg in November 1863 as an ideal occasion at which to do it."

According to Wilson, Lincoln almost certainly was making notes on this theme before he received the invitation to Gettysburg, and he may have already developed a "template" that included the famous opening and closing lines, which he later adapted to the dedication ceremony at Gettysburg.

Wilson focuses on Lincoln's opening statement at Gettysburg -- that, at its creation, the United States had been "dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal."

Wilson argues that the word "proposition" is a careful choice. By using "proposition," Lincoln is conceding that the ideal of equality, as expressed in the Declaration of Independence, "was not a universally accepted principle, but was instead something that had to be demonstrated," Wilson wrote.

In his Los Angeles Times review, Ted Widmer credits Wilson with uncovering the "surprising paint-by-numbers quality to [Lincoln's] speeches, unknown until now." Wilson, Widmer wrote, reveals Lincoln "scribbling thoughts on tiny scraps of paper as they occurred to him... then pulling the scraps out of his pockets and desk drawers, giving them numbers and assembling them into a single text."

Wilson, the George Appleton Lawrence Distinguished Professor Emeritus of English, taught at Knox College from 1961 to 1997. He and Rodney Davis, Szold Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus of History, co-direct the Lincoln Studies Center at Knox College.

Wilson's previous books on Lincoln include "Lincoln Before Washington" and "Honor's Voice," which won the 1999 Lincoln Prize. He also has edited books on Thomas Jefferson and George Santayana. Wilson and Davis co-edited "Herndon's Lincoln," and the award-winning "Herndon's Informants." Wilson, Davis and colleagues at the Lincoln Studies Center also have transcribed thousands of Lincoln-related documents for the Library of Congress.