Neil Dahlstrom '98

MONMOUTH, Ill. — Neil Dahlstrom, a 1998 Monmouth College graduate, who gained critical praise for his 2005 biography of plowmakers John and Charles Deere, has co-authored another historical work that is receiving national attention.

“Lincoln’s Wrath: Fierce Mobs, Brilliant Scoundrels and a President’s Mission to Destroy the Press” is a 356-page book recently published by Sourcebooks.

“It’s about newspaper censorship during the Civil War,” said Dahlstrom, who wrote the book with Jeffrey Manber. “We have been getting good media attention lately. I made my debut on Book TV on C-SPAN on President’s Day, and the Chicago Tribune also wrote a review.”

In that piece, entitled “Authors Say Lincoln Was No. 1 Enemy of the Press,” Geoffrey R. Stone wrote, “What they have to say about civil liberties in wartime is significant and timely. At least three issues addressed in ‘Lincoln’s Wrath’ are worth highlighting, not only for our understanding of the Civil War but to guide us in our time as well.”

Those issues include the question “When may the government suppress allegedly disloyal speech?” as well as “the often-corrupt relationship between journalists and politicians” and “whether the president is above the Constitution.”

The review also said the authors “maintain that Lincoln was a skilled manipulator of the press whose Machiavellian machinations secretly encouraged and even directed the dismantling of the opposition press ... This is an original thesis.”

Dahlstrom, who lives in Moline, is the reference archivist for Deere & Co.

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