To Rescue the Republic; Ulysses S. Grant, The Fragile Union, and the Crisis of 1876
Daniel Swartz (Author photograph) New York: Custom House, 2021. First Edition [stated], Later printing. Hardcover. xvi, [2], 375, [3] pages. Illustrations. Notes. Index. DJ has slight wear and soiling. William Bret Baier (born August 4, 1970) is the host of Special Report with Bret Baier on the Fox News Channel and the chief political correspondent for Fox. He previously worked as the network's Chief White House Correspondent and Pentagon correspondent. Baier began his television career with a local station WJWJ TV16 on Hilton Head Island, South Carolina, before joining WRAL-TV, then CBS affiliate in Raleigh, North Carolina. He sent an audition tape to Fox News in 1998, and was hired as the network's Atlanta bureau chief. On September 11, 2001, he drove from Georgia to Arlington, Virginia, to cover the attack on the Pentagon. He never returned to the Atlanta bureau and was instead tapped as the network's Pentagon correspondent, remaining at the post for five years and taking 11 trips to Afghanistan and 13 trips to Iraq. He was named Fox News's White House correspondent in 2007, covering the administration of George W. Bush. In the fall of 2007, he began substituting for Brit Hume, then the anchor of Special Report, on Fridays. Catherine Whitney has written or collaborated on more than fifty books on legal, political, and social issues, including Where Have All the Leaders Gone? and The Weekend That Changed Wall Street. On December 23, 2008, Hume announced Baier would replace him as anchor of Special Report. He hosted his first show as permanent anchor on January 5, 2009. In October 2021, Baier promoted his new book To Rescue the Republic on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. Derived from a Publishers Weekly article: Fox News anchor Baier paints a flattering portrait of Ulysses S. Grant in this revisionist history. Drawing analogies to today’s partisan discord, Baier focuses on “Grant’s resolve and heroism in times of unparalleled turmoil,” including his command of the Union Army during the Civil War; his two-term presidency (1868–1876), which encompassed the most hard-fought years of Reconstruction; and his controversial brokering of a “grand bargain” in the contested 1876 election between Republican Rutherford B. Hayes and Democrat Samuel Tilden. Baier claims that “we are so accustomed to dwelling on the failures of Reconstruction that we often overlook its successes,” including the 15th Amendment, which Grant helped push through in 1870, the election of the first Black U.S. senators, and the passage of the Enforcement Act, which Grant argued was necessary to curb racist violence in the South. Baier also refutes critics who fault Grant for supporting the withdrawal of federal troops from the South by claiming that Democrats and Republicans “were ready to give the Southern states a chance to do the right thing on their own,” and that “it’s unclear what more could have been done... short of permanent military occupation.” Baier succeeds in humanizing Grant and clarifying the complex factors behind his decision-making. This is an accessible and nuanced introduction to an oft-misunderstood figure American history. Derived from a Kirkus review: The latest history from the chief political anchor for Fox News. The Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, which Baier witnessed in his capacity as a political reporter and anchor, gave new meaning to the turmoil surrounding the 1876 presidential election. In this biography of Ulysses S. Grant (1822-1885), the election occupies only 50 pages near the end. A West Point cadet, Grant achieved little glory in the Mexican-American War, resigned his commission, and struggled to earn a living. The beginning of the Civil War found him clerking in a leather goods shop and farming. The only West Point graduate in the area, he was chosen to lead local units; after six months of intense activity against Confederate posts and lobbying by his congressman, a friend of Lincoln, Grant became a general. He turned out to be the most aggressive and imaginative Union commander. A national idol after Appomattox in 1865, he easily won presidential elections in 1868 and 1872. Recent historians have upgraded his performance in office. His final months in office were preoccupied by the mess following the 1876 election, which saw a closely contested battle that the Republican candidate, Rutherford B. Hayes, barely won. Throughout, the author gets the facts right. Condition: Very good / Very good.
Keywords: Ulysses S. Grant, Reconstruction, Election of 1876, Civil War, Battle of Shiloh, Frederick Dent, Julia Dent Grant, Rutherford B. Hayes, Samuel Tilden, Mexican-American War, William Tecumseh Sherman, Slavery, Edwin Stanton, West Point, Military Academ
ISBN: 9780063039544
[Book #85331]
Price: $25.00