ABRAHAM LINCOLN AND THE PULPIT: 1/8 Righteous Strife: How Warring Religious Nationalists Forged Lincoln's Union Hardcover – by Richard Carwardine (Author)
The John Batchelor Show
John Batchelor
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🗓️ 28 June 2025
⏱️ 12 minutes
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Summary
1/8 Righteous Strife: How Warring Religious Nationalists Forged Lincoln's Union Hardcover – by Richard Carwardine (Author)
1799 KEEL BOAT ON THE OHIO
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 anti slavery religious nationalists butted heads with conservative religious nationalists over their visions 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.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is CBS Eye on the World. |
| 0:08.5 | Here's John Batchelor. |
| 0:11.7 | This is CBS, I on the world. |
| 0:14.5 | I'm John Batchelor. |
| 0:15.8 | I welcome Professor Richard Cowardine, |
| 0:18.6 | the author of Lincoln, |
| 0:19.9 | A Life of Purpose and Power, I look very much |
| 0:22.2 | forward to speaking to the professor someday about, but the new book is even more captivating. |
| 0:29.1 | This is a story of the battle within the battle of the civil war. It is entitled Righteous |
| 0:35.6 | Strife, how warring religious Nationalists forged Lincoln's Union. |
| 0:41.3 | I tell the professor that many years ago, reading about the Civil War, I puzzled across Horace |
| 0:48.4 | Greley's remark right after the passing of the Kansas Nebraska Act 1854, the driver for the birth of the Republican Party, |
| 0:59.1 | and Greeley wrote to the effect that the pulpits will not be silent at this calumny. |
| 1:06.5 | And I puzzled, what is he talking about? |
| 1:08.6 | What pulpits? |
| 1:09.5 | Well, here they are in Richard's book. |
| 1:12.5 | Richard, congratulations. Very, very good evening to you. Thank you very much for this |
| 1:17.3 | enormous amount of work. And we begin January 4th, 1861. The period between the election of 1860, Abraham Lincoln, coming through in a contested election with four different directions, and the leaving of office of James Buchanan, the president of the United States, James Buchanan names a fast day in the middle of December, and it's January 4, 1861. |
| 1:47.0 | By this time, South Carolina has left the Union and other states that will quickly be known as the Confederacy are contemplating leaving. |
| 1:56.2 | What was a fast day? Why did Buchanan call it? What did it hope to achieve? Good evening to you, |
| 2:02.6 | Professor. Good evening. And thank you very much for inviting me on to your program. |
| 2:08.8 | What is a fast day? Well, it was quite a contentious occasion. |
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