Some observers see Lincoln’s presidency and the outcome of the
Civil War as the point when America got off-kilter, sort of like
a national equivalent to the Fall of Man. At some point between
1860 and 1865, so this line of thinking goes, the country went
off the rails and abandoned the legacy of the Revolution and the
Constitution, leaving us with the centralized, interventionist,
and industrial nation in which we now live. There’s a nugget of
truth to all this, but it’s hidden among a lot of overstatement
and moralization. The Civil War did contribute to the creation
of a stronger and more vigorous central government, Lincoln’s
use of presidential authority was broader than many of his
predecessors, and the Union’s victory did accelerate the
creation of a more consolidated and economically modern America.
At the same time, though, you can’t attribute America’s
transformation entirely to the Civil War or to Lincoln’s
presidency. The war was a critical step down that road, but it
wasn’t the only one—and the ro