This morning's papers are full of the Clinton saga - the one which will never die - reborn. Beneath it, though, is a more interesting story, of Obama's reading habits, the renewed influence of authors in the Oval Office, and Obama's modelling himself on Abraham Lincoln.
President Bush occasionally let it be known that he was reading something; normally a religious text, or a neocon tract like Natan Sharansky's The Case for Democracy. Yet, even without getting sidetracked into Bush-knocking, its worth noting that Obama is an unusually studious politicians. His first book, Dreams of My Father, was lyrically written, and heavy with references. He also recently set tongues wagging amongst Washington wonks by referencing a few works that avoided the normal mix of populism and posturing common in political bedtime reading: Blair flicks through the Koran, George Osborne loves Nudge, and so on. Instead, Obama cited a difficult and interesting book by a political scientist at Princeton, Larry Bartels' new Unequal Democracy. And now, some might be surprised to learn, his decision to pick Clinton - barring unforeseen clangers from her husband's fundraising - has been substantially informed by a reading of Doris Kearns Goodwin's biography of Lincoln, Team of Rivals.
Wait up there, you might say, take it easy on the philosopher-king line. Bill Clinton read the library, little good it did him; his first term was a late-night scholarly mess, with book-wielding lackeys jostling for prominence. Gordon Brown weighs his aides down with wonky pamphlets on the red-eye to Cape Cod; people think him a dweeb, not the sort to have a pint with. David Cameron recently published an implausibly erudite reading list he wanted his Shadow Cabinet to digest on their summer hols; no one was taken in. Cameron's list was transparently put together by brainy henchmen, armed with nothing more sophisticated than the Amazon "people who like this, like that" tool. So might Obama's referencing Goodwin also be a cunning ruse: the dressing up of power politics in intellectual clothes, while playing to a liberal gallery, long-offended by Bush as their imbecile in chief. It might be. But I think not.
Obama has an intriguing relationship with Lincoln, for starters. They come from the same state: the "Land of Lincoln." Obama began his campaign in Springfield, Lincoln's home. Obama admires Lincoln's oratory, and may well be the best public speaker in the antebellum era. (Goodwin's book says this of Lincoln, with more than a ring of familiarity about it, "Lincoln's stirring oratory had earned the admiration of a far-flung audience who had either heard him speak or read his speeches in the paper.") Other clear parallels concerning race, national division, and American unity are easy to spot, not least because they crop up in Obama's public statements. But it goes deeper. Take Obama's 2005 Time article, 'What i See in Lincoln's Eyes', show an unusually thoughtful view of the 16th president. Amidst the praise and parallels, the most striking passage comes when he explains why he:
"cannot swallow whole the view of Lincoln as the Great Emancipator. As a law professor and civil rights lawyer and as an African American, I am fully aware of his limited views on race. Anyone who actually reads the Emancipation Proclamation knows it was more a military document than a clarion call for justice. Scholars tell us too that Lincoln wasn't immune from political considerations and that his temperament could be indecisive and morose."That seems nicely balanced; a trick Obama uses to great effect. It makes one take more seriously the parts of Lincoln's action he claims to admire.
Which brings us back to Goodwin, the "scholar" Obama is likely talking about in his Time article. If I'm right , and Obama has indeed taken Goodwin's book to heart, it will make for an interesting round of senior appointments to Obama's administration. Team of Rivals tells of the eponymous talented group of senior politicians Lincoln picked to staff his government. Indeed, Goodwin's story begins with Lincoln's back story Replace "Springfield" with "Chicago" and this sentence fits perfectly for Obama, too:
During his years in Springfield, Lincoln had forged an unusually loyal circle of friends. They had worked with him in the state legislature, helped him in his campaigns for Congress and the Senate, and now, at this very moment, were guiding his efforts at the Chicago convention, "moving heaven & Earth," they assured him, in an attempt to secure him the nomination.But, instead of relying on this group, Lincoln picked those who disliked him most, his rivals for his Presidential run. Noting that the "three other contenders for the nomination were household names", he went on to court William Henry Seward (a "celebrated senator from New York"), Salmon P Chase (senator, governor, founder of Republican Party) and Edward Bates (elder statesman). All were invited to the convention, and employed in his team. His philosophy mixed the need to keep them on the inside pissing out, with a genuine conviction that politics could be put aside to ensure the best people were able to serve.
What might this approach mean for Obama? For Seward, Chase and Bates read Clinton, Biden and Richardson. With Biden already recruited, it means Clinton gets the position at state, a move which seems cleverer the longer you look at it. But, taken a stage further, it also suggests Larry Summers at the Treasury - a big beast, intellectually and personally - rather than a functionary like Tim Geithner or Sheila Bair. And it surely gives more credence to the idea of a Richardson, or even a Kerry, in some other job, even if Clinton takes the big post. A government of all the talents, if you will.
If Obama goes for the team of rivals approach, he'll also be repeating an approach sometimes seen here in Britain. Attlee's government, the middle Wilson years, and parts of Thatcher all featured cabinets stacked with Big Beasts, always on the prowl. The Wilson years were especially poisonous, as the beasts bit each other's backs regularly, and claimed the rest weren't up to snuff. Obama better hope his are Lincoln than Wilsonian. It should be fun either way.
