Steven Spielberg's Lincoln - Study Guide
We enthusiastically recommend the new motion picture, Lincoln,
directed by Steven Spielberg.
The film-making is suburb
with great direction by Spielberg and Academy-award worthy performances from
Daniel Day-Lewis as Abraham Lincoln, Sally Field as Mary Todd Lincoln, and
Tommy Lee Jones as Republican Representative Thaddeus Stevens. The film is
based on Doris Kearns Goodwin's biography of Lincoln, Team of Rivals: The
Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln.
The movie concerns efforts
made by the Lincoln Administration to gather enough votes in the House of
Representatives to pass the resolution on the 13th Amendment abolishing
slavery. The resolution has already been approved by the Senate, but must be
approved by the House before it can be presented to the States for
ratification. The back-room campaign to gain votes from the Northern War
Democrat minority becomes the focus of this political thriller.
Unfortunately, the viewer
may not get the full appreciation of the movie without a guide and
identification. The following guide is offered in the hope of
clarifying the events and characters and thus increasing the understanding
if the drama.
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The Story
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The story begins in
January 1865. Lincoln has just defeated George B. McClellan in the
November 1864 election. Lincoln did felt
he had little chance of being re-elected. Confederate forces had triumphed
at the
Battle of Mansfield,
the
Battle of the Crater,
and the
Battle of Cold Harbor.
In addition, the war was continuing to take a very high toll. The prospect
of a long and bloody war started to make the idea of "peace at all cost"
offered by the
Copperheads look more
desirable. Because of this, McClellan was thought to be a heavy favorite to
win the election. The Copperheads were Northern Democrats who
opposed the War and wanted an immediate peace with the
Confederates. Republicans started calling antiwar Democrats "Copperheads",
likening them to the venomous snake. The Peace Democrats accepted the label,
but for them the copper "head" was the likeness of Liberty, which they cut
from copper pennies and proudly wore as badges. Lincoln won the
election with 55% of the popular vote and 212 electoral votes (117 needed to
win). Lincoln viewed the victory as a mandate by the country to defeat
the Rebels.
In December 14, 1863, a bill to support an amendment to
abolish slavery throughout the entire United States was introduced by
Representative
James Mitchell Ashley (Republican,
Ohio). This was soon followed
by a similar proposal made by Representative
James F. Wilson
(Republican, Iowa).
Eventually the Congress and the public began to take notice
and a number of additional legislative proposals were brought forward. On
January 11, 1864,
Senator
John B. Henderson of
Missouri submitted a
joint resolution for a
constitutional amendment abolishing slavery. The abolition of slavery had
historically been associated with Republicans, but Henderson was one of the
War Democrats. The
Senate Judiciary Committee,
chaired by
Lyman Trumbull
(Republican, Illinois),
became involved in merging different proposals for an amendment. On February
8, 1864, Senator
Charles Sumner (Radical
Republican, Massachusetts),
submitted a constitutional amendment to abolish slavery as well as guarantee
equality. As the number of proposals and the extent of their scope began to
grow, the Senate Judiciary Committee presented the Senate with an amendment
proposal combining the drafts of Ashley, Wilson and Henderson.
The Senate passed the resolution on April 8, 1864, by a vote
of 38 to 6. However, the House rejected the proposal. After it was
reintroduced by Representative Ashley, President Lincoln took an active role
in working for its passage through the House by ensuring the amendment was
added to the Republican Party platform for the upcoming Presidential
elections.
Lincoln also viewed his victory as approval for the party
plank to abolish slavery. He had to act fast to get the House to
ratify the 13th Amendment resolution. The Emancipation
Proclamation, which "freed" slaves in those parts of Confederate
states not under control by the Union was passed as a military measure based
on Lincoln's war powers. When the war ended, the legality of slavery would
return to the states. While most Republicans would vote for the measure, it
would not pass unless the Administration could convince some War Democrats
to join them.
Lincoln and Seward's task was very complicated. There
were many competing factions within both parties. The Democrats were
represented by
War Democrats (The War
Democrats demanded a more aggressive policy toward the Confederacy) and
Peace Democrats or
Copperheads (The
Copperheads opposed the war and wanted an immediate peace settlement with
the Confederates. Republicans started calling antiwar Democrats
"Copperheads", likening them to the
venomous snake. The Peace Democrats accepted the label, but for them
the copper "head" was the likeness of Liberty, which they cut from copper
pennies and proudly wore as badges.) The Republicans were likewise divided
into the
Radical Republicans
(Republicans who were opposed to Slave power in the South and wanted the
Rebels punished after the war. Lincoln's cabinet was composed of
Radicals like
Salmon P. Chase
[Secretary of the Treasury],
James Speed [Attorney
General] and
Edwin M. Stanton
[Secretary of War].) Another political faction was the Unconditional
Union Party which supported the preservation of the
Union at all costs.
Members included
Southern Democrats who
were loyal to the Union, as well as elements of the old
Whig Party and other
factions opposed to a separate
Southern Confederacy.
The obvious targets for persuasion were the those
Democrats who would soon be out of office. These lame-duck legislators quickly became candidates for
Lincoln's campaign. He reasoned that the defeated candidates had no
reason to be loyal to the desires of their constituency or their wing of the
party. Under the supervision of Secretary of State
William Seward, he initiated a campaign to win
their votes by granting patronage positions in the Lincoln government.
Lincoln refused to use more obvious bribes such as money.
 The
House of Representatives finally
passed the 13th Amendment on January 31, 1865, by a vote of 119 to 56. On
February 1, 1865, President Lincoln signed a Joint Resolution submitting the
proposed 13th Amendment to the states. [See John Nicolay telegram to Lincoln
- click on image to enlarge]
The Thirteenth Amendment outlawed slavery and gave Congress
the power to enforce the Amendment:
-
 Section
1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude,
except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly
convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to
their jurisdiction.
-
Section 2. Congress shall have
power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
See
Thirteenth Amendment for an explanation of the amendment. [See
resolution with Lincoln's signature - click on image to enlarge]
After the resolution was passed, Lincoln and
Seward met with Vice President
Alexander H. Stephens,
Senator
Robert M. T. Hunter,
and Assistant Secretary of War
John A. Campbell
representing the Confederate States of America. The Hampton Roads
Conference was held on February 3, 1865, near Fort Monroe in Newport
News, Virginia, aboard the
River Queen.
The conference lasted for four hours, but no agreements were produced.
President Lincoln dominated the proceedings. The three men who represented
the Confederacy made little or no impression on those who represented the
Union, and were not authorized to accept any offer other than independence.
The Confederate commissioners immediately returned to Richmond at the
conclusion of the conference. The war was to continue.
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The People
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Sally Field
as First Lady
Mary Todd Lincoln. Mary Lincoln suffered
from severe headaches, described as migraines, throughout her adult life
as well as protracted depression. During her White House years, she also
suffered a head injury in a carriage accident, after which her headaches
seemed to become more frequent. A history of mood swings, fierce temper,
public outbursts throughout Lincoln's presidency, as well as excessive
spending, has led some historians and psychologists to speculate that
Mary suffered from bipolar disorder.
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David Strathairn
as Secretary of State
William Seward.
According to John Hay, "The history of governments affords few instances
of an official connection hallowed by a friendship so absolute and
sincere as that which existed between these two magnanimous spirits",
namely Seward and Lincoln.
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Joseph Gordon-Levitt
as Lincoln's oldest son,
Robert Todd Lincoln. Robert Lincoln had
recently left his studies at Harvard Law School
and was newly named a Union Army captain
and personal attendant to General Grant. He returned to the White House on
April 14, 1865 to visit his family. His father was assassinated that
night.
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Hal Holbrook as
Francis Preston Blair. Blair was an influential Republican politician who tried to arrange a
peace agreement. Francis Blair was father of
Montgomery Blair, a member of President Lincoln's cabinet. The elder
Blair took it upon himself to advise Lincoln. On April 17, 1861, just
three days after the surrender of Fort Sumter, Lincoln asked Francis Blair
to convey his offer to Colonel
Robert E. Lee to command the Union Army. The next day, Lee visited
Blair across Lafayette Square from the White House. Lee blunted Blair’s
offer of the Union command by saying: “Mr. Blair, I look upon secession as
anarchy. If I owned the four millions of slaves at the South, I would
sacrifice them all to the Union; but how can I draw my sword upon
Virginia, my native State?” After Lincoln's re-election in 1864 Blair
thought that his former close personal relations with the Confederate
leaders might aid in bringing about a cessation of hostilities, and with
Lincoln's consent went unofficially to Richmond and induced President
Jefferson Davis to appoint commissioners to confer with
representatives of the United States. This resulted in the futile "Hampton
Roads Conference" of February 3, 1865. After the Civil War Blair
became a detractor of President
Andrew Johnson's reconstruction policy, and eventually rejoined the
Democratic Party.
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Jackie Earle Haley as
Confederate States Vice President
Alexander H. Stephens. Stephens had served with Lincoln in Congress from 1847 to 1849. He met
with Abraham Lincoln on the steamboat
River Queen at the unsuccessful
Hampton Roads Conference on February 3, 1865.
Stephens served as a Representative from Georgia (both before
the Civil War and after Reconstruction) and as the 50th Governor of
Georgia from 1882 until his death in 1883.
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Lee Pace as
Democratic
Congressman
Fernando Wood. A former
Mayor of New York City, Wood became a
Copperhead
Democratic
Congressman sympathetic to the
Confederacy. Fernando Wood served a second mayoral term in 1860-1862. Wood
was one of many New York Democrats sympathetic to the Confederacy. During
his second mayoral term in January 1861, Wood suggested to the
New York City Council that
New York secede and declare
itself a free city, to continue its profitable cotton trade with the
Confederacy. Subsequent to serving his second mayoral term, Wood served
again in the House of Representatives from 1863 to 1865, then again from
1867 until his death in Hot
Springs, Arkansas.
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Peter McRobbie as Ohio representative
George H. Pendleton. Pendleton was a leader of the peace faction of
the Democratic party. He voted against the Thirteenth Amendment to the
United States Constitution, which outlawed slavery and involuntary
servitude. He ran in the 1864 U.S. presidential elections for Vice
President, together with George McClellan.
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Gulliver McGrath as
Tad
Lincoln. Tad was 12 years old, and toured Richmond, Virginia, with his father.
Thomas "Tad" Lincoln (April 4, 1853 – July 15, 1871) was the fourth
and youngest son of Abraham and Mary Lincoln. The nickname "Tad" was given
to him by his father who found Thomas "as wriggly as a tadpole" when he
was a baby. Tad was known to be impulsive and unrestrained, and did not
attend school. He had free run of the White House, and there are stories
of him interrupting Presidential meetings, collecting animals, and
charging visitors to see his father. Tad outlived his father, but died of
heart failure at the age of 18 on July 15, 1871, in Chicago.
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Gloria Reuben
as
Elizabeth Keckley. Keckley was a former slave who was
dressmaker and
confidant to Mary Todd Lincoln. Keckley published Behind the Scenes,
or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. She had
been born into slavery, purchased her freedom and that of her son, and
become a successful businesswoman in Washington, DC. Although this book
provides valuable insight into the character and life of Mary Todd
Lincoln, at the time the former First Lady (and much of the public and
press) regarded it as a breach of friendship and confidentiality. Keckley
was widely criticized for her book, especially as her editor had published
letters from Mary Lincoln to her.
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Jeremy Strong
as
John George Nicolay. Nicolay was secretary to Abraham Lincoln.
In 1861, Lincoln appointed Nicolay to be his private secretary, which was
the first official act of his new administration. Nicolay served in this
capacity until Lincoln's death in 1865. Nicolay and
John Hay, who had
worked alongside Nicolay as assistant secretary to Lincoln, collaborated
on the official biography of the 16th President. It appeared in
The Century Magazine
serially from 1886 to 1890 and was then issued (1890–94) in book form as
ten volumes, together with the two-volume Complete Works of Abraham
Lincoln. The resulting biography is a definitive resource on Lincoln
and his times. Nicolay and Hay also edited Lincoln's Works in
twelve volumes (1905). Finally, Personal Traits of Abraham Lincoln
was published by Helen Nicolay in 1912.
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Boris McGiver
as
Alexander Coffroth. Alexander Hamilton Coffroth was a Democratic
member of the House of Representatives from Pennsylvania. He supported the
passage of the Thirteenth Amendment
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David Costabil
as
James Ashley. James Ashley was an active abolitionist who traveled
with
John Brown's widow on the date of Brown's execution and reported the
event in the
Toledo Blade newspaper. In 1858, he was elected to House of
Representatives as a Republican. He served as the chairman to the
Committee on Territories. He took an active role in supporting the
recruitment of troops for the Union Army during the war.
During his term, he wrote a bill to abolish slavery in the District of
Columbia, introduced the first bill for a constitutional amendment
abolishing slavery, and initiated impeachment proceedings against
President
Andrew Johnson in 1867. He was defeated for re-election in 1868.
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Walton Goggins as
Democratic
Congressman
Wells A. Hutchins. Hutchins broke with his party to cast a decisive vote in favor of the
Thirteenth Amendment.
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David Warshofsky
as William Hutton.
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David Oyelowo as Ira Clark
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Byron Jennings
as
Montgomery Blair. Blair was the son of Francis Preston Blair, was the former
Postmaster-General and was a political opponent of the
Radical Republicans. In 1860 Blair took an active part in the
Lincoln's presidential campaign. After his election, Lincoln invited Blair
to be part of his cabinet as Postmaster-General. Lincoln expected Blair,
who advocated taking a firm stance with the southern states, to help
balance more conciliatory members of his cabinet. Blair served as
Postmaster-General from 1861 until September 1864, when Lincoln accepted
an earlier offer by Blair to resign. Lincoln's action may have been a
response to the hostility of the
Radical Republican faction, who stipulated that Blair's retirement
should follow the withdrawal of
John C. Frémont's name as a candidate for the presidential nomination
in that year. Regarding Lincoln's action, Blair told his wife that the
president had acted "from the best motives" and that "it is for the best
all around." After he left the cabinet, Blair still campaigned for
Lincoln's re-election and Lincoln and the Blair family retained close
ties.
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Julie White as
Elizabeth Blair Lee. Lee was the daughter of Francis Preston Blair, and wrote hundreds of
letters documenting events during the Civil War.
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Richard Topol as
James Speed. Speed was
United States Attorney General and brother of
Joshua Speed, Lincoln's oldest personal friend. In December 1864,
Lincoln appointed Speed Attorney General. After the assassination of
Lincoln he became associated with the
Radical Republicans and advocated the vote for male African Americans.
Disillusioned with the increasingly conservative policies of President
Andrew Johnson, Speed resigned from the Cabinet in July 1866 and
resumed the practice of law.
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Wayne Duvall as
Radical Republican Senator
Benjamin "Bluff Ben" Wade.
Wade was highly critical of Lincoln; in a September 1861 letter, he
privately wrote that Lincoln's views on slavery "could only come of one
born of poor white trash and educated in a slave State." He was especially
angry when Lincoln was slow to recruit African-Americans into the armies,
and actively advocated for the bill that abolished slavery and had a
direct hand in the passing of the
Homestead Act of 1862
and the Morrill Land Grand Act of 1862. Wade was also critical of
Lincoln's
Reconstruction Plan;
in December 1863, he and
Henry Winter Davis
sponsored a bill that would run the South, when conquered, their way. The
Wade-Davis Bill
mandated that there be a fifty-percent White male Iron-Clad Loyalty Oath,
Black male suffrage, and Military Governors that were to be confirmed by
the U.S. Senate. It passed in the lower chamber on May 4, 1864 by a margin
of 73 ayes to 59 nays; in the upper chamber on July 2, 1864 it passed by a
similar percentage of 18 ayes to 14 nays and was brought to Lincoln's
desk. On July 4, 1864, Lincoln pocket-vetoed the bill by refusing to
sign it. This action drove Wade to sign, along with Davis, the Wade-Davis
Manifesto, which accused the president of seeking reelection by the
executive establishment of new state governments.
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Gregory Itzin as
John Archibald Campbell. Campbell was a former Supreme Court Justice who had resigned at the
start of war and then served as Assistant Secretary of War in the
Confederate government. He was also a member of the Confederate delegation
that met with Lincoln at the Hampton Roads Conference.
Revised
11/22/2012 |
