Rating: 
Summary: More whining about state's rights & the poor defeated south
Review: "The Real Lincoln" is a real bad book. Once again we are treated to another apologist crying over the cause of a valiant, but unjustly defeated, Dixie. All that is missing is a "Gone With The Wind" assertion that Blacks really liked it better under the slave system. No attacks on Lincoln can ignore the fact that he came to office promising to safeguard "state's rights," and protect the southern Peculiar Institution, and that it was the slave states who committed treason. The majority of southern states announced they were leaving the Union before Lincoln even set foot in Washington. They fired the first shot of the war. It was the southern states that tore this nation apart, and state's rights was only a rallying cry to protect slavery. Any book claiming a plot on Lincoln's part must adequately explain how he managed to manipulate the south so effectively. This book does not. Secondly, one reviewer has gone so far as to call Lincoln a dictator. Yes, he stretched the Constitution. And in hindsight historians can rightly criticize him for it. However, this "dictator" stood for election in the midst of the greatest crisis in American history, with the full expectation that he would lose. Hardly the action of a tyrant. Lincoln is one of the few true heroes in American history, holding our nation together during its greatest trial. This book can no more tarnish his reputation than confederate apologists can convince modern Americans that the Civil War had nothing to do with slavery.
Rating:
Summary: A Whole Lot of Clap-Trap
Review: This is simply a bit of revisionist history that is at odds with Lincoln's written record. If one reads Lincoln's own writings one easily sees through the overt agenda of Dilorenzo; one that should be denounced for the pitiful peace of clap-trap masquerading as research. There are too many records of the handwringing Lincoln went through over comitting to war and his committment to emancipation. Coupled with my own reading of Lincoln's writing, I cannot agree with this fantasy. It should be put in the fiction bin. This book has earned a place in my firewood bin.
Rating: 
Summary: Forewarned.
Review: Before evaluating this, or any other history book,
read "Lies My Teacher Told Me" by Loewen. Before accepting this book's point of view as fact,
do the intellectually and morally honest work of considering
the agenda, the scholarship, and the accuracy of any claims. I suspect that if you were to gather enough information on
any topic, you could find a way to tell any kind of story-
positive or negative- about anyone or anything. With this
book, I suspect "provocation" and not scholarship is the
real objective. Occam's Razor applies here. Would you rather believe the
elaborately constructed conspiracy theory, or the simple
truth?
Rating:
Summary: history on its head!
Review: first look at sequence........the arrogance of the south in insisting on their imperative right to expand slavery into new areas of the western u.s.............linked to their refusal to accept a constitutional amendment forever safeguarding slavery in the existing southern states.......gives lye to the fundamental premise of this book....don't let it insult your intelligence!
Rating: 
Summary: A corrupt tyrant
Review: According to the author economics played at least as large a role in catalyzing the Civil War as the moral dimensions of slavery. The author calls Lincoln "the political son of Alexander Hamilton" because for most of his career he was a Whig, an ardent promoter of their economic agenda: economic planning and protectionism. He wanted a high tariff. He wanted a central bank and so-called internal improvements: government-subsidized road building, canal building, and so forth. As of 1857, the average tariff rate was about 15 percent. The Southerners had been complaining since the "Tariff of Abominations" in 1828, that they were being plundered by the tariff. They were import-dependent. They were paying as much as 80 percent of the entire tariff in various years, and most of the money was being spent in the North. Lincoln and other key Republicans helped orchestrate the "Moral Tariff" that was passed by the Senate on May 2, 1861, two days before he was inaugurated, and signed into law by President Buchanan. This law raised the rate, to 37.5 percent, greatly expand the list of items that were covered, and would later expand the rate to 47 percent. Lincoln makes his first inaugural address on March 4th and he says, in effect, that as long as you collect this triple tariff rate, there will be no invasion; but if you refuse-if you do what the South Carolinians did to Andrew Jackson, and nullify it, that is, say we're not going to collect it-there will be an invasion. Interestingly, in the same speech, he suggested a possible alternative to the South. "Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing Government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it." It would seem Lincoln was setting up the conflict. Either the South could bend over and take it or go to war. Once the War began Lincoln became a little dictator. He launched a military invasion without consent of Congress. He suspended habeas corpus: at least 13,000 Northern citizens imprisoned without a warrant being issued. He censored all telegraph communication, nationalized railroads, and ordered federal troops to interfere at Northern elections. The Republican Party won New York State by 7,000 votes in 1864, "under the protection of Federal bayonets." Lincoln deported Ohio Congressman Clement Vallandigham for disagreeing with him. Ministers in the South were imprisoned for not praying for Abraham Lincoln. Secretary of State William Seward set up a secret police force, and he famously boasted to Lord Lyons, the British Ambassador, that he could ring a bell and have any man in America arrested. He imprisoned members of the federal legislative branch and wrote out an arrest warrant for the Chief Justice of the US Supreme Court, Roger Taney, after Taney wrote the opinion in Ex Parte Merryman (1861) rebuking Lincoln's illegitimate suspension of habeas corpus. US Army troops refused to release Merryman into the custody of a federal marshal sent by Taney pursuant to the court order that Merryman be freed.
Rating:
Summary: Garbage
Review: I smell a rat: Leftist revisionist history at its worst, sloppiest, and most shameless. This nonsense should definitely raise your skeptical antennae. I won't write more: The second review says it best.
Rating:
Summary: An "uneccassary" war?
Review: If I recall I believe that it was the South that fired the first shot of the civil war at Fort Sumter, not the North. And as regards Lincoln's suspension of Habeus Corpus, and violation of the Constitution, I would reply as Julius Caesar did. "War does not allow for free speech." This is simply axiomatic. The United States violated this rule in Vietnam and paid a steep price for it. Luckily they learned it for the Gulf War. This whole book is ludicrous and filled with a bunch of crazy nonsense that any serious student of Lincoln should disregard. A more balanced study of Lincoln reveals that he was America's greatest president, a man of genius and massive erudition on Constitutional Law as well as having a deep compassion for mankind. Like Winston Churchill Lincoln can truly be said to have been "the man who saved the world."
Rating:
Summary: Southern Bias
Review: It seems that the author of the book has a strong hatred towards Lincoln and the North. The author seems to appease the southern view of the civil war quite well as the War of Northern Agression. The Author was also born and and raised in the south. He was probably brought up with a strong hatred against Lincoln and other great heros like General Sherman. The Author clearly left out Lincolns reconstruction policies that would bring back the south with open arms and his childhood being rasied in pro-southern society. It seems that most of the praise about this book comes from the readers from the south. Even after 137 years there is strong hatred to a great president and states that he represented. I strongly suggest read Lincoln: The Man Behind the myths if you truely want to know the real Lincoln.
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent Scholarship
Review: This book is an honest look at one of America's biggest transgressors of liberty. You will see how Lincoln laid the foundation for the massive centralization of government power we see today. Conservatives who admire Lincoln especially need to read this book. Very intelligent and well written.
Rating:
Summary: Important Book- Essential Reading for Liberty Lovers
Review: Before 1865 the concept of nullification was taken for granted. What is nullification- well in terms of the United States government it simply means that when the Federal Government passes a law that is UnConstitutional- the state's simply would not comply. So the Federal Government did very little that was unConstitutional because it would be nullified. It was also excepted that in terms of an agreement the states were the principals that set up a union to act in their interest. This was virtually unequestioned prior to 1865. The idea of holding the union together by political and military force was outside of the thinking of the founders. It was taken for granted that states could leave the union. In 1865 the issue was settled in favor of central government. At that point all hope of Liberty was lost. Imagine being married and your spouse could never seek a divorce, and no legal or physical force could be applied to you to restrain you. You could pretty much treat your spouse however you wished. That's how the Federal Government treats us, and this book goes into detail about why we truly have no recourse- and it was Lincoln, not FDR that gave us this situation. The national government was never meant to be the final arbiter of what is Constitutional. That right- that check belongs to the states. If you care about liberty, read this book. If you are one of the confused souls that believes there is no place for sucession in modern political discourse- then when you get done with this book, you must then read, "Northern editorals on Sucession" and continue to study until you are at the point where you can admit that it is high time to debate the topic again.
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