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Bibliography of Abraham Lincoln

This bibliography of Abraham Lincoln is a comprehensive list of written and published works about or by Abraham Lincoln, the 16th president of the United States. In terms of modern sources containing Lincoln's letters and writings, scholars rely on The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, edited by Roy Basler, and others. It only includes writings by Lincoln, and omits incoming correspondence. In the six decades since Basler completed his work, some new documents written by Lincoln have been discovered. Previously, a project was underway at the Papers of Abraham Lincoln to provide "a freely accessible comprehensive electronic edition of documents written by and to Abraham Lincoln". The Papers of Abraham Lincoln completed Series I of their project The Law Practice of Abraham Lincoln in 2000. They electronically launched The Law Practice of Abraham Lincoln, Second Edition in 2009, and published a selective print edition of this series. Attempts are still being made to transcribe documents for Series II (non-legal, pre-presidential materials) and Series III (presidential materials).

Sixteen thousand books and articles have been published on Lincoln—125 on the assassination alone—more than any on other American. This listing is therefore highly selective and is based on reviews in the scholarly journals and recommended readings compiled by scholars.

Bibliography

Biographies

  • Guelzo, Allen C. Abraham Lincoln: Redeemer President (1999) online edition Second edition, 2022.
  • Harris, William C. Lincoln's Rise to the Presidency (2007) conservative author argues Lincoln was basically conservative Excerpt
  • Holland, Josiah Gilbert (1866). Holland's Life of Abraham Lincoln. Springfield, Massachusetts: Gurdon Bill. Published in 1998 with introduction by Allen C. Guelzo. Lincoln, Nebraska, and London, UK: University of Nebraska Press.
  • Luthin, Reinhard H. The Real Abraham Lincoln (1960), emphasis on politics
  • McPherson, James M. Abraham Lincoln (2009) Short biography, Excerpt
  • , vol 3. of detailed biography
  • Miller, William Lee. Lincoln's Virtues: An Ethical Biography (2002). New York: Alfred A. Knopf.
  • Miller, William Lee. President Lincoln: The Duty of a Statesman (2008). New York: Alfred A. Knopf.
  • detailed articles on many men and movements associated with Lincoln.
  • Nicolay, Helen (1913). Personal Traits of Abraham Lincoln, New York: The Century Co. (based on material that the author's father John George Nicolay had collected but been unable to use in the biography of Lincoln that he wrote with John Hay)
  • Nicolay, John George and John Hay. ' (1890); online at Volume 1 and Volume 2 vol 6 10 volumes in all; highly detailed narrative of era written by Lincoln's top aides
  • Oates, Stephen B. (1977). With Malice Toward None: The Life of Abraham Lincoln. Excerpt
  • Randall, James G. Lincoln the President (4 vols., 1945–55; reprint 2000). Fourth volume: Randall, J. G. and Current, Richard N., Lincoln the President: Last Full Measure, New York: Dodd, Mead & Company (1955). Randall died in 1953 and Current completed the book.
  • Reynolds, David S. (2020). Abe: Abraham Lincoln in His Times. Penguin Press.
  • Sandburg, Carl. Abraham Lincoln: The Prairie Years (2 vols. 1926) vol. 1 online <small>(Subscription required.)</small> vol. 2 online <small>(Subscription required.)</small>; ' (4 vol 1939). Pulitzer Prize–winning biography by the famous poet
  • Smith, Harvey H. (1931). Lincoln and the Lincolns. Pioneer Publications, Inc.
  • Striner, Richard (2020). Summoned to Glory: The Audacious Life of Abraham Lincoln. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.
  • Tarbell, Ida. The Life of Abraham Lincoln
  • Thomas, Benjamin P. Abraham Lincoln: A Biography (1952; published with a new foreword by Michael Burlingame in 2008) online edition
  • White, Ronald C. (2021). Lincoln in Private: What His Most Personal Reflections Tell Us About Our Greatest President. Random House.

Specialty topics

  • Achorn, Edward. Every Drop of Blood: The Momentous Second Inauguration of Abraham Lincoln (2020)
  • Achorn, Edward. The Lincoln Miracle: Inside the Republican Convention that Changed History (2023) (on the 1860 convention)
  • Published as a book titled The Trent Affair: An Historical Retrospective, with "A few changes in language ... and a paragraph added." Boston, 1912
  • Angle, Paul M., Here I Have Lived: A History of Lincoln's Springfield, 1821–1865, (1935) online edition
  • Belz, Herman. Abraham Lincoln, Constitutionalism, and Equal Rights in the Civil War Era (1998)
  • Boritt, Gabor S. Lincoln and the Economics of the American Dream (1994). Lincoln's economic theory and policies
  • Boritt, Gabor S., ed. Lincoln the War President (1994)
  • Bruce, Robert V. Lincoln and the Tools of War (1956) on weapons development during the war online edition
  • Bush, Bryan S. Lincoln and the Speeds: The Untold Story of a Devoted and Enduring Friendship (2008)
  • Chittenden, Lucius E. Recollections of President Lincoln and His Administration, (1891). – Google Books
  • Donald, David Herbert. Lincoln Reconsidered: Essays on the Civil War Era (1960)
  • Donald, David Herbert. We Are Lincoln Men: Abraham Lincoln and His Friends Simon & Schuster, (2003).
  • Emerson, James (2007). The Madness of Mary Lincoln. Southern Illinois University Press. .
  • Foner, Eric. The Fiery Trial: Abraham Lincoln and American Slavery (2011); Pulitzer Prize excerpt and text search
  • Gerleman, David J. Representative Lincoln at Work: Reconstructing a Legislative Career from Original Archival Documents (2017) Lincoln's congressional career The Capitol Dome - 2017 Dome 54.2
  • Guelzo, Allen C. Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation: The End of Slavery in America, Simon & Schuster (2004).
  • Guelzo, Allen C. Lincoln and Douglas: The Debates that Defined America, Simon & Schuster (2008).
  • Harris, William C. With Charity for All: Lincoln and the Restoration of the Union (1997). AL's plans for Reconstruction
  • Hendrick, Burton J. Lincoln's War Cabinet (1946) online edition
  • Hofstadter, Richard. The American Political Tradition: And the Men Who Made It (1948) ch. 5: "Abraham Lincoln and the Self-Made Myth."
  • Howe, Daniel Walker. Why Abraham Lincoln Was a Whig. Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association 16.1 (1995)
  • Kashatus, William C. Abraham Lincoln, the Quakers and the Civil War: A Trial of Principle and Faith. Praeger, 2014. .
  • Kunhardt Jr., Phillip B., Kunhardt III, Phillip, and Kunhardt, Peter W. Lincoln: An Illustrated Biography. Gramercy Books, New York, 1992.
  • Laxner, James, Staking Claims to a Continent: John A. Macdonald, Abraham Lincoln, Jefferson Davis, and the Making of North America (2016). Anansi Press
  • Lind, Michael. What Lincoln Believed. The Values and Convictions of America's Greatest President (2004). Anchor Books, a division of Random House, Inc. New York
  • McGinty, Brian. The Body of John Merryman: Abraham Lincoln and the Suspension of Habeas Corpus. Harvard University Press, 2011.
  • McPherson, James M. ' (1988). Pulitzer Prize-winning book surveys all aspects of the war
  • Neely, Mark E. The Fate of Liberty: Abraham Lincoln and Civil Liberties (1992). Pulitzer Prize winner. online version
  • Neely, Mark E. Lincoln and the Triumph of the Nation: Constitutional Conflict and the American Civil War (2011)
  • Oakes, James. The Radical and the Republican: Frederick Douglass, Abraham Lincoln, and the Triumph of Antislavery Politics. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc. 2007. . review
  • Ostendorf, Lloyd, and Hamilton, Charles. Lincoln in Photographs: An Album of Every Known Pose, Morningside House Inc., 1963, .
  • Paludan, Phillip S. The Presidency of Abraham Lincoln (1994), thorough treatment of Lincoln's administration
  • Pinsker, Matthew. Boss Lincoln: The Partisan Life of Abraham Lincoln. New York: W. W. Norton & Company. Review by Harold Holzer
  • Polsky, Andrew J. "'Mr. Lincoln's Army' Revisited: Partisanship, Institutional Position, and Union Army Command, 1861–1865." Studies in American Political Development (2002), 16: 176–207
  • Randall, James G. Lincoln the Liberal Statesman (1947)
  • Richardson, Heather Cox. The Greatest Nation of the Earth: Republican Economic Policies during the Civil War (1997)
  • Schroeder-Lein, Glenna R. Lincoln and Medicine. Carbondale and Edwardsville, Illinois: Southern Illinois University Press, 2012. (Concise Lincoln Library)
  • Shenk, Joshua Wolf. Lincoln's Melancholy: How Depression Challenged a President and Fueled His Greatness (2005)
  • , a survey of contemporary criticism and polemic directed at Lincoln
  • White, Jonathan W. Abraham Lincoln and Treason in the Civil War: The Trials of John Merryman (2011). review
  • White, Jonathan W. Emancipation, the Union Army, and the Reelection of Abraham Lincoln (2014)
  • White, Jonathan W. Lincoln on Law, Leadership, and Life (2015). review
  • White, Jonathan W. My Day with Abe Lincoln (2024) Children's book based on facts of Lincoln's childhood.
  • Williams, T. Harry. Lincoln and His Generals (1967).
  • Wilson, Douglas L. Lincoln's Sword: The Presidency and the Power of Words (2006) .

Historiography and memory

  • Barr, John M. "Holding Up a Flawed Mirror to the American Soul: Abraham Lincoln in the Writings of Lerone Bennett Jr.," Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association 35 (Winter 2014), 43–65.
  • Barr, John M. Loathing Lincoln: An American Tradition from the Civil War to the Present (LSU Press, 2014).
  • Boritt, Gabor S., ed. The Historian's Lincoln. University of Illinois Press, 1988 online
  • Burkhimer, Michael. One Hundred Essential Lincoln Books. Nashville, Tennessee: Cumberland House Publishing, 2003).
  • Diggins, John P. On hallowed ground: Abraham Lincoln and the foundations of American history (Yale University Press, 2000) online.
  • Egerton, Douglas R. A Measure Alike Military and Philanthropic': Historians and the Emancipation Proclamation." Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography 137, no. 1 (2013): 95–114 online
  • Fehrenbacher, Don E. "The Anti-Lincoln Tradition." Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association 4.1 (1982): 6-28. online
  • Foner, Eric, ed. Our Lincoln: New Perspectives on Lincoln and His World (2009), essays by scholars commentary
  • Guelzo, Allen C. "The not-so-grand review: Abraham Lincoln in the Journal of American History." Journal of American History 96.2 (2009): 400-416. online
  • Holt, Michael F. "Lincoln Reconsidered." Journal of American History 96.2 (2009): 451–455. online
  • Holzer, Harold and Craig L. Symonds, eds. Exploring Lincoln: Great Historians Reappraise Our Greatest President (2015), essays by 16 scholars online
  • Jensen, Richard J. "Historiography of American political history." Encyclopedia of American Political History: Studies of the Principal Movements and Ideas 1 (1984): 1+ online.
  • Kunhardt III, Philip B. et al. Looking for Lincoln: The Making of an American Icon (2012).
  • Manning, Chandra, "The Shifting Terrain of Attitudes toward Abraham Lincoln and Emancipation", Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association, 34 (Winter 2013), 18–39.
  • Neely, Mark E. "The Lincoln Theme Since Randall's Call: The Promises and Perils of Professionalism." Papers of the Abraham Lincoln Association 1 (1979): 10–70. in JSTOR
  • wide-ranging survey of how Lincoln was remembered after 1865.
  • Pinsker, Matthew. "Lincoln Studies at the Bicentennial: A Round Table: Lincoln Theme 2.0." Journal of American History 96.2 (2009): 417-440 online
  • Pizzetti, Jaie R. "Our National Reckoning: A Historiographical Approach to Emancipation and Lincoln." (2025) online
  • Randall, James G. "Has the Lincoln Theme Been Exhausted?" American Historical Review 41#2 (1936): 270–294. online classic older survey
  • Schwartz, Barry. Abraham Lincoln and the Forge of National Memory (2003) excerpt and text search
  • Schwartz, Barry. Abraham Lincoln in the Post-Heroic Era: History and Memory in Late Twentieth-Century America (University of Chicago Press, 2008) online.
  • Schwartz, Barry, and Howard Schuman. "History, Commemoration, and Belief: Abraham Lincoln in American Memory, 1945-2001." American Sociological Review 70.2 (2005): 183-203.online
  • Sinha, Manisha. "Architects of Their Own Liberation: African Americans, Emancipation, and the Civil War". OAH Magazine of History 27, no. 2 (2013): 5–10. online
  • Smith, Adam I. P. "The 'Cult' of Abraham Lincoln and the Strange Survival of Liberal England in the Era of the World Wars", Twentieth Century British History, (Dec 2010) 21#4 pp.&nbsp;486–509.
  • Spielberg, Steven; Goodwin, Doris Kearns; Kushner, Tony. "Mr. Lincoln Goes to Hollywood", Smithsonian (2012) 43#7 pp.&nbsp;46–53.
  • Winkle, Kenneth J. "Abraham Lincoln: self-made man." Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association 21.2 (2000): 1-16. online

Lincoln in art and popular culture

  • Ferguson, Andrew (2008). Land of Lincoln: Adventures in Abe's America. Grove Press. .

Primary sources

  • Angle, Paul McClelland; Earl Schenck Miers (1955). The Living Lincoln: The Man, His Mind, His Times, and the War He Fought, Reconstructed from His Own Writings. Rutgers University Press.
  • Angle, Paul McClelland; Earl Schenck Miers (1992). The Living Lincoln: The man and his times, in his own words. Barnes & Noble Publishing. .
  • Basler, Roy P. et al., eds. (1953). The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln. 9 vols. Rutgers University Press. .
  • Duyckinck, Evert A. (1873). "Abraham Lincoln", in Portrait Gallery of Eminent Men and Women of Europe and America. Embracing History, Statesmanship, Naval and Military Life, Philosophy, the Drama, Science, Literature and Art. With Biographies, vol. 2, pp. 399-410. New York: Johnson, Wilson and Company.
  • Fehrenbacher, Don E., ed. Abraham Lincoln: Speeches and Writings 1832–1858 (Library of America, ed. 1989)
  • Fehrenbacher, Don E., ed. Abraham Lincoln: Speeches and Writings 1859–1865 (Library of America, ed. 1989)
  • Lincoln, Abraham. The Poems of Abraham Lincoln. Bedford, Massachusetts: Applewood Books, 1991.
  • Rice, Allen Thorndike, ed. (1888). Reminiscences of Abraham Lincoln by Distinguished Men of His Time. New York: The North American Review Publishing Company.
  • Stowell, Daniel W., et al., eds. The Papers of Abraham Lincoln: Legal Documents and Cases. (4 vols.) University of Virginia Press, 2008

Attacks on Lincoln

  • Marshall, John A. American Bastile: A History of the Arbitrary Arrests and Imprisonment of American Citizens in the Northern and Border States, on Account of Their Political Opinions, During the Late Civil War (1883)
  • Masters, Edgar Lee. Lincoln: The Man (1931)

See also

References

External links