"Team of Rivals" Summary

"Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln" is a book whose main story centrals on the lives of President Abraham Lincoln and the three men who would be apart of his cabinet: William H. Seward, Salmon P. Chase, and Edward Bates. In 1860, all four men would be leading candidates to gain the Republican nomination. However, at the time Lincoln seemed like the most unlikely person to win the nomination and the other three men held a grudge at first because they thought to be better than Lincoln was, the 1860 Republican convention would be the beginning of an era. In this book, we get to see the lives of all four men from birth until Lincoln's death. It is a biography of four lives. We get to see how each man grows up and what each man grows up to do. We see what the contemporaries think of the four men and see how the world thinks about the four men. We see how Seward, Chase, and Bates first judge Lincoln but eventually come around to love Lincoln for the kind of leader and person he is. We see the close relationships that Lincoln begins to form with Seward, Chase, and Bates. The book goes through a lot of information. It starts on the day of the Republican Convention to choose the presidential nominee. We are able to see what each of the "four rivals" is doing as they wait to see who will be chosen. We learn about how each man got to where he is. All the studying that each person does. All the positions that each man takes. The moving away from each man's birthplace. How each man loses someone important in their lives at some point in time.

We learn much about how Lincoln is considered to not be the proper person to be nominee for the Republican Party. This resentment increases even after Lincoln becomes president. However, eventually, the three rivals who all become in some or fashion apart of Lincoln's cabinet grow to like and eventually love Lincoln as a leader and as a friend. We are able to see how Lincoln and his cabinet of rivals