This book was very difficult to evaluate. Being a big fan of the two preceding books in the Oxford History of the Unites States, What Hath God Wrought, and Battle Cry of Freedom, The Republic for Which it Stands felt like a let down. However, in evaluating the authors choices and prose, I don’t have too many issues with the book. The structure could be jarring, but that was true of What Hath God Wrought and that was my favorite book of 2019. The author very much inserted himself into the text, but I agreed with his theses throughout the book. By and by, Richard White was correct, The Gilded Age was truly a period of contradictions and failed ideals. I think that reveals what made this such a difficult read: the period.
The Gilded Age is aptly named. The promise of a new republic re-founded by the crucible of the Civil War was apparent. Father Abraham was dead but his legacy lived on through “The Yankee Leviathan”. What proceeds to happen is a total failure to make good on the promises of the Great Emancipator. Free labor is perverted, meaningful political reconstruction is abandoned, and whats left of the Grand Army of the Republic commits genocide while declaring “Peace in the West.” U.S. Grant is a truly a tragic figure, he could have been plucked out of a Homeric epic due to the dramatic nature of his personal flaws. Most damning part in my view, particularly after reading What Hath God Wrought, is that The Whig Party of the 1830s and 40s seemingly had one a decades long ideological battle, via the ascendant Republican Party. However, what occurs next would have Henry Clay (and frankly Abraham Lincoln) turning in his grave.
Can I blame the book for dealing with a depressing period? Is it fair to be disappointed with reality? I’m not sure there was a way to write this book that didn’t end up making me sad and angry. Even the sections on labor history failed to bring this book up to my expectations, and I found myself just wishing to be done with it. I’ve already picked up a book on the Progressive Movement and intend to read a biography of Eugene Debs in an attempt to wash the taste of this book, and this very depressing period in our history out of my mouth.