Böcker av Richard Carwardine

"The first major account of the American Civil War to give full weight to the central role played by religion, reframing the conflict through Abraham Lincoln's contentious appeals to faith-based nationalism. How did slavery figure in God's plan? Was it the providential role of government to abolish this sin and build a righteous nation? Or did such a mission amount to "religious tyranny" and "pulpit politics," in an effort to strip the Southern states of their God-given rights? In 1861, in an already fracturing nation, the tensions surrounding this moral quandary cracked the United States in half, and even formed rifts within the North itself, where antislavery religious nationalists butted heads with conservative religious nationalists over their vision for America's future. At the center of this melee stood Abraham Lincoln, who would turn to his own faith for guidance, proclaiming more days of national fasting and thanksgiving than any other president before or since. These pauses for spiritual reflection provided the inspirational rhetoric and ideological fuel that sustained the war. In Righteous Strife, Richard Carwardine gives renewed attention to this crucible of contending religious nationalisms, out of which was forged emancipation, Lincoln's re-election, and his Second Inaugural Address. No understanding of the American Civil War is complete without accounting for this complex dance between church and state-one that continues to define our nation"--

The focus of this book is on English and American evangelicals during the early and mid-19th century, examining the effect of aggressive conversion techniques used by American evangelicals upon the English revival movement.

Leader of the anti-slavery Republican coalition and the wartime Union, Abraham Lincoln has become a model of a particular kind of democratic politician who led rather than followed. Richard J. Carwardine examines Lincoln's rise to power and his achievements as US president.