“Seward had all the money and Seward had all the bullies. Lincoln didn’t have money or bullies, but by God, he had the people.” — Jonathan Earle

Yesterday, Kurt Andersen fictionalized a 21st-century broken America without an Abe Lincoln as savior. Today we talk about the man himself with Jonathan Earle, author of He Has the People, a new history of the 1860 election that made Lincoln president and probably saved the then young Republic.

Earle’s mission is to bring Lincoln down from Mount Rushmore. He tells the story of a flesh-and-blood politician, a six-foot-four autodidact who, in 1859, was barely known outside Illinois. What changed everything was John Brown’s raid on Harpers Ferry in October 1859. Lincoln recognized as much, spending the winter in the archives of the State Library of Illinois, then delivering a speech at Cooper Union that won over the New York media. Then onto the Republican convention in Chicago where the wily Lincoln ran rings around the establishment candidate William Henry Seward.

In 1860, Abe Lincoln became Lincoln. The rest is history. He Has the People should be required reading for both obscure Republicans and Democrats planning to run for president in a fatally divided election. Earle suspects that 2028 might be as historic as 1860. Perhaps it will deliver another politician with the wit and wisdom to bring a broken America together. Somebody who, like Abe, has the people.

Five Takeaways

• Before Abe Was Lincoln. Off Mount Rushmore: a Kentucky autodidact, six-four, circuit-riding joke teller — barely known outside Illinois in 1859, the Jon Ossoff of his day. Every election is “the most important”? Hold on — it’s not 1860.

• The 9/11 Before the Election. John Brown’s raid detonated inside a presidential campaign — as if the Towers fell before the 2000 vote. After Harpers Ferry, compromise died and civil war was inevitable.

• Chicagoland. A winter in the archives became Cooper Union; Seward — the Hillary of 1860 — had the money and the bullies, but Lincoln’s smoky-backroom men had the convention, the venue, and “the people.”

• A Revolution, Reported from Paddy’s Run. Two simultaneous elections; 180 electoral votes on 39.8% of the vote at 81.8% turnout. Murat Halstead, the first campaign journalist, called it a revolution.

• Is There a Lincoln Out There? Greatness as growth — from denying equality to endorsing Black suffrage with Booth in the audience. A hard no to breakup. “I do think that there is a Lincoln out there. I do.”

About Keen On America

Nobody asks more awkward questions than the Anglo-American writer and filmmaker Andrew Keen.

Website: https://keenon.tv/ Substack: https://keenon.substack.com/ YouTube: https://youtube.com/@KeenOnShow

Buy He Has the People: global.oup.com

Chapters:

00:00:31 Introduction: from The Breakup’s Lincoln Memorial to 1860
00:02:29 Taking Lincoln off Mount Rushmore
00:03:08 Sui generis: log cabin, Euclid, and six feet four
00:05:03 The issue the parties buried: slavery and the compromises
00:06:28 The hated radicals who forced the question
00:07:12 Jackson and Trump, Lincoln and the Whigs
00:11:35 Henry Clay: the hero who never won
00:14:16 Harpers Ferry: the 9/11 before the election
00:17:37 “I worked for Kurt Andersen”: the Spy Magazine reveal
00:19:47 The Lincoln-Douglas debates: no cage matches
00:22:11 Cairo vs Chicago: two Illinois, two arguments
00:24:35 Kansas, “the Gaza of the day”
00:25:07 A winter in the archives: the Cooper Union gambit
00:30:53 Four candidates, two elections, 39.8 percent
00:32:59 Seward as Hillary: the frontrunner who fell
00:34:54 Chicagoland: the smoky backroom
00:36:18 “By God, he had the people”
00:36:49 The 81.8% turnout — and who could vote
00:41:13 Murat Halstead of Paddy’s Run: at all seven conventions
00:43:37 “We won”: the secession winter refusal
00:44:56 Counterfactuals: President Seward? President Douglas?
00:46:27 From white supremacist to Black suffrage: how Lincoln grew
00:49:31 The 1864 election Lincoln thought he’d lose
00:50:16 A hard no to the breakup: Mississippi, Wyoming & the DNA
00:54:44 “There is a Lincoln out there. I do.”