The American President: From Teddy Roosevelt to Bill Clinton, by William E. Leuchtenburg
| DOI | 10.1177/0020702017723560 |
| Author | Stephen J. Randall |
| Published date | 01 September 2017 |
| Date | 01 September 2017 |
| Subject Matter | Book Reviews |
The celebrated Canadian historian had many contradictions. He disliked the
United States, yet, early in his career, obtained research funds from the Rockefeller
Foundation and financial support from t he Carnegie Endowment. He also obtained a
Guggenheim Fellowship. Dominion of theNorth was written for Houghton Mifflin in
Boston (154). As a young man, he clung to the conventional wisdom of the Toronto
of his day, and he held to—until his fina l years—this stubborn belief in the import-
ance of Great Britain. In Don Wright’s words, Donald Creightonbelieved the imper-
ial connection was ‘‘essential to Canada’s survival on a continent dominated by the
United States’’ (7). He argued that the Liberals during their long rule from 1935 to
1957 had erodedCanadian independence. As Wrightsummarizes, Creighton believed
the Liberals were ‘‘bent on destroying Canada by wrecking whatever connections it
had to Great Britain and the Commonwealth’’ (237).
When the old British Canada of his early and mid-career lost its predominance in
the late 1960s andearly 1970s, marked by the emergence a new flag, bilingualism, and
then multiculturalism, Creighton’s mental equilibrium apparently crashed. In 1964,
he published oneadditional well-crafted volume, his richly documented and dramatic
account, The Road to Confederation: The Emergence of Canada, 1863–1867.His
argument that in the 1860s John A. Macdonald intended to create a strong central
government is developed calmly and coherently. After this,Donald Creighton turned
ever more to writing contemporary history. In 1976, hi s last major book, The Forked
Road: Canada 1939–1957, appeared. It proved disappointing, more a polemic than a
history, with his negative opinions of Quebec and the United States freely offered.
Don Wright describes it as ‘‘an awful book,’’ one in which the author ‘‘drew on a
reservoir of anger and disappointment, making i t little more than a barely researched
series of bitter laments for a nation that might have been’’ (324–325).
Donald Creighton firmly believed that popular historical writing must be access-
ible. In his words, he believed history ‘‘is essentially a story’’ (12). Whatever his
personal flaws and imperfections, his lasting gift remains his two-volume biography
of Canada’s first prime minister. The historian’s great contribution was his work on
the nineteenth century. Congratulations to Donald Wright for his biography of
Donald Creighton: a job well done, one which covers so honestly the strengths and
the weaknesses of his subject.
William E. Leuchtenburg
The American President: From Teddy Roosevelt to Bill Clinton
New York: Oxford University Press, 2015. 886 pp. $39.95 US (cloth)
ISBN: 978-0-19-517616-2
Reviewed by: Stephen J. Randall, University of Calgary
The American President is a striking example of the best of traditional political
history, written by one of its leading practitioners. Leuchtenburg in his 95th year
432 International Journal 72(3)
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