Allen C. Guelzo

Author of Our Ancient Faith: Lincoln, Democracy, and the American Experiment

Author Talks
Wednesday, Feb 7 2024 @ 7:30pm

Bundle Tickets

–Not Yet Members: $31 (includes general admission ticket + book at 30% discount!)
–Members: $26 (includes discounted general admission ticket + book at 30% discount!)
–Insiders: $21 (includes free general admission ticket + book at 30% discount!)

General Admission Tickets (book not included)

–Not Yet Members: $10
–Members: $5
–Insiders: Free

Online ticket sales will close at 5pm on the day of the event; however, tickets can still be purchased at the door via credit or debit card only.

Woodruff Auditorium is located inside McElreath Hall. Doors and cash bar will open at 6pm.


An intimate study of Abraham Lincoln’s powerful vision of democracy, which guided him through the Civil War and is still relevant today—by a best-selling historian and three-time winner of the Lincoln Prize

Abraham Lincoln grappled with the greatest crisis of democracy that has ever confronted the United States. While many books have been written about his temperament, judgment, and steady hand in guiding the country through the Civil War, we know less about Lincoln’s penetrating ideas and beliefs about democracy, which were every bit as important as his character in sustaining him through the crisis.

Allen C. Guelzo, one of America’s foremost experts on Lincoln, captures the president’s firmly held belief that democracy was the greatest political achievement in human history. He shows how Lincoln’s deep commitment to the balance between majority and minority rule enabled him to stand firm against secession while also committing the Union to reconciliation rather than recrimination in the aftermath of war. In bringing his subject to life as a rigorous and visionary thinker, Guelzo assesses Lincoln’s actions on civil liberties and his views on race, and explains why his vision for the role of government would have made him a pivotal president even if there had been no Civil War. Our Ancient Faith gives us a deeper understanding of this endlessly fascinating man and shows how his ideas are still sharp and relevant more than 150 years later.

Cover of A Right Worthy Woman

About the Author

Allen C. Guelzo is Senior Research Scholar at the Council of the Humanities at Princeton University. He is the author of several books about the Civil War and early-nineteenth-century American history. He is a recipient of the Guggenheim-Lehrman Prize for Military History and has been awarded the Gilder Lehrman Lincoln Prize three times. He lives in Pennsylvania.

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