Page:American Historical Review vol. 6.djvu/829

 sparks : The jIen WJio Made the Nation 8 1 9 Lincoln he constructs an outline of American history by grouping around the names of men whom he chooses as typical of periods in our national development the principal events of such periods. This method of writing the connected history of a country presents two difficulties, neither of which has the author wholly escaped. One is the tendency to write a series of disconnected biographies, and the other, ignoring the hypothesis upon which this book is based, to use the names of the great personalities chosen simply as convenient pegs upon which to hang the events of the eras they represent. In some chapters the man is nearly lost sight of in the narrative of events. In the chapter on Lincoln the great events of the Civil War period receive scant attention in comparison with that be- stowed on the character, early life and environment of the man. There is a danger that a book of this character may lead the general reader into the error of supposing that a few individuals, rather than social, economic and political forces, occasionally directed but never created by single individuals, have made our country what it is. Dr. Sparks tries to guard against this danger by asserting, from time to time, the presence of forces more potent in nation-building than the men to whom he is assigning that great work. When treating of the acquisition of Louisiana in violation of the constitutional scruples of Jefferson he says (p. 239) : " Necessity was continuing to make the nation," and again he speaks (p. 277) of "the law of compulsion" as deciding the great con- stitutional question of the right to undertake internal improvements at federal expense. With {e^N exceptions excellent judgment has been shown in assigning to events and movements their proper relative position. Controversial questions have been fairly treated, although the author prefers to leave the question as to Webster's honesty of purpose in the Seventh of March speech unanswered. John C. Calhoun might well have been made the subject of a chapter in which the whole question of slavery in American politics could have received adequate treatment, which is lacking in the volume as it now stands. The method of treating men as exponents of particular phases of our national life occasionally leads the author to sup- press or ignore important facts. Henry Clay is considered as the father of public improvements. The chapter bearing his name does not men- tion the great compromises with which he is associated. No mention (pp. 274-275) is made of the United States Bank as an issue in the elec- tion of 1832. The reader is left to infer that the attitude of Clay upon the subject of internal improvements was the sufficient cause of his defeat. Accuracy in the statement of facts is the rule throughout the book. An exception may be mentioned (p. 288) where 1840 rather than 1831 is given as the date when the practice of nominations for the presidency by state legislatures began to give way to nominations in national conventions. The book seems to have been based, and legitimately so, upon secon- dary sources, except that the narrative is enlivened by many anecdotes, incidents, and specimens of contemporary verse that are taken from original sources. The author has included a large number of well-chosen