"America's Great Debate"

America's Great Debate: Henry Clay, Stephen A. Douglas, and the Compromise That Preserved the Union (Fergus M. Bordewich)

First of all, I'm deducting half a letter grade for the book's title - I realize that this may be unfair and the publisher may have forced this on the author, but I can only grade the book that was presented to me.
Luckily, the rest of the book is pretty good. It's about the 1850 Compromise, which is one of those parts of history I enjoy reading about because they're usually fast-forwarded past. The main characters of the Civil War haven't appeared on stage yet, so you end up with heroes and villains you've probably never heard of - how many people now remember Tom Benton or the villainous Henry Foote? (Well, okay, turns out Benton was in Kennedy's "Profiles in Courage", so I guess a fair number of people remember him. Dang!)
In any case, I enjoyed this book a good deal. Bordewich doesn't waste time trying to justify, excuse, or apologize for anybody, which is a nice change, and even though the eventual outcome of the book described in the struggle is obvious, it's no less enjoyable for that. This is a good book to read as a prequel before a look at the civil war that's just over the horizon when the book finishes, and to that end I've been instructed to re-read the face-crushingly huge "Civil War" by Shelby Foote next, so look forward to that.

Grade: B+ (A- if re-titled)