Books about Abraham Lincoln, the Civil War and the Constitution for Adult Readers

Lincoln: The Constitution and the Civil War
Site Support Notebook

Amar, Akhil Reed. America’s Constitution: A Biography. Random House, 2005.

Anastaplo, George. Abraham Lincoln: A Constitutional Biography. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 1999.

Belz, Herman. Abraham Lincoln: Constitutionalism and Equal Rights in the Civil War Era. Fordham University Press, 1998.

Berlin, Ira, et al. Slaves No More: Three Essays on Emancipation and the Civil War. Cambridge University Press, 1992.

Blight, David W. Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory. Belknap Press, 2001.

Carwardine, Richard J. Lincoln: A Life of Purpose and Power. Alfred A. Knopf, 2006.

Cox, Lawanda C. Fenlason. Lincoln and Black Freedom: A Study in Presidential Leadership. University of South Carolina Press, 1994.

Donald, David Herbert. Lincoln. Touchstone Books, 1996.

Engs, Robert F. and Randall M. Miller. The Birth of the Grand Old Party. University of Pennsylvania Press, 2002.

Escott, Paul D. “What Shall We Do with the Negro?” Lincoln, White Racism, and Civil War America. University of Virginia Press, 2009.

Farber, Daniel A. Lincoln’s Constitution. University of Chicago Press, 2003.

Fehrenbacher, Don E., ed. Abraham Lincoln: Speeches and Writings, 2 vols. Library of America, 1989.

Fletcher, George P. Our Secret Constitution, How Lincoln Redefined American Democracy. Oxford University Press, 2001.

Foner, Eric. Free Soil, Free Labor, Free Men: The Ideology of the Republican Party Before the Civil War. Oxford University Press, 1995 (reprint).

Gallagher, Gary W., and Alan T. Nolan, eds. The Myth of the Lost Cause and Civil War History. Indiana University Press, 2000.

Goodwin, Doris Kearns. Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln. Simon & Schuster, 2005.

Guelzo Allen C. Abraham Lincoln: Redeemer President. Wm. B. Eerdmans Pub. Co., 1999.

———. Abraham Lincoln as a Man of Ideas.  Southern Illinois University Press, 2009.

———. Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation: The End of Slavery in America. Simon & Schuster, 2004.

Hartranft, John F., Edward Steers Jr., and Harold Holzer, eds. The Lincoln Conspirators.  Louisiana University Press, 2009.

Holzer, Harold. Lincoln on War. Algonquin Books, 2011.

Holzer, Harold. The Lincoln-Douglas Debates. Harper Collins, 1993.

Holzer, Harold, ed. The Lincoln Anthology: Great Writers on His Life and Legacy from 1860 to Now. Library of America, 2008.

Holzer, Harold and Mark Neely. The Lincoln Image. University of Illinois Press, 1984.

Holzer, Harold and Joshua Wolf Shenk, eds. In Lincoln’s Hand: His Original Manuscripts with Commentary by Distinguished Americans. Bantam, 2009.

Horrocks, Thomas, Harold Holzer, and Frank J. Williams, eds. The Living Lincoln. Southern Illinois University Press, 2011.

Jaffa, Harry V. A New Birth of Freedom: Abraham Lincoln and the Coming of the Civil War. Rowman & Littlefield, 2000.

Jones, Howard. Abraham Lincoln and a New Birth of Freedom: The Union and Slavery in the Diplomacy of the Civil War. University of Nebraska Press, 2002.

Klingaman, William K. Abraham Lincoln and the Road to Emancipation. Reissue edition, Penguin USA, 2002.

Lincoln, Abraham. Lincoln on the Civil War: Selected Speeches. Penguin, 2011.

Lowance, Mason I., Jr., ed. Against Slavery: An Abolitionist Reader. Penguin USA, 2000.

Maddex, Robert L., The U.S. Constitution A to Z. CQ Press, 2002.

McPherson James M. Abraham Lincoln: A Presidential Life. Oxford University Press, 2009.

———. Abraham Lincoln and the Second American Revolution. Oxford University Press, 1992 (reprint).

———. Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era (Oxford History of the United States). Oxford University Press, 1988.

Miller, William Lee. Arguing About Slavery: The Great Battle in the United States Congress. Knopf, 1996.

———. Lincoln’s Virtues: An Ethical Biography. Vintage Books, 2003.

Neely, Mark E., Jr. The Fate of Liberty: Abraham Lincoln and Civil Liberties. Oxford University Press, 1992. (reprint).

Oates, Stephen B. With Malice Toward None: The Life of Abraham Lincoln. Perennial, 1994 (reprint).

Paludan, Philip Shaw. The Presidency of Abraham Lincoln. University of Kansas Press, 1994.

Peterson, Merrill D. Lincoln in American Memory. Oxford University Press, 1994.

Potter, David Morris, and Don E. Fehrenbacher. The Impending Crisis. HarperCollins, 1976.

Rakove, Jack N. Original Meanings: Politics and Ideas in the Making of the Constitution. Vintage, 1997.

Rubenstein, Harry R. and The National Museum of American History.  Abraham Lincoln: An Extraordinary Life. Smithsonian Institution Press, 2009.

Shenk, Joshua Wolf. Lincoln’s Melancholy: How Depression Challenged a President and Fueled His Greatness. Houghton Mifflin Co., 2005.

Simon, James F. Lincoln and Chief Justice Taney: Slavery, Secession, and the President's War Powers. University of South Carolina Press, 2006.

Trefousse, Hans Louis. First Among Equals: Abraham Lincoln’s Reputation During His Administration. Fordham University Press, 2005.

White, Ronald C. A. Lincoln: A Biography. Random House, 2009.

———. The Eloquent President: A Portrait of Lincoln Through His Words. Random House, 2005.

———. Lincoln’s Greatest Speech: The Second Inaugural. Touchstone Books, 2003.