Political History Commons^™

The Political War, Allen C. Guelzo

Civil War Era Studies Faculty Publications

Pity Abraham Lincoln. Everything that should have gone right for the Union cause in the spring of 1864 had, in just a few weeks, gone defiantly and disastrously wrong.

For two years, the 16th president had toiled uphill against the secession of the Confederate states, against the incompetence of his luckless generals and against his howling critics from both sides of the congressional aisle. Finally, in the summer and fall of 1863, the course of the war had begun to turn his way. Two great victories at Gettysburg and Vicksburg staggered the Confederates, and those were followed by a knockdown …

Abraham Lincoln And The Development Of The "War Powers" Of The Presidency, Allen C. Guelzo

Civil War Era Studies Faculty Publications

By conferring on the President the title of "commander in chief," the Constitution created an awkward and undefined area of presidential prerogative. The first President to have to confront this ambiguity was Abraham Lincoln, who developed a presidential "war powers" doctrine based on his presidential oath, the Constitution's "republican guarantee," and the necessity imposed by the novelty of a civil war. This doctrine was seriously contested in Lincoln's time by both Congress and the judiciary, and it continues to be an unresolved constitutional question in the present. But Lincoln's use of such war powers is one demonstration of how a …