Book Review: Boutwell: Radical Republican and Champion of Democracy

Boutwell: Radical Republican and Champion of Democracy. By Jeffrey Boutwell. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2025.  Hardcover. 368 pp. $35.70.

Reviewed by Robin Friedman

Many people, both well-known and obscure, have made valuable contributions to our country. Counted among those less-known is George Sewall Boutwell (1818 –1905), who enjoyed a seven-decade career of public service yet remains little remembered today. Jeffrey Boutwell, a writer, historian, and science policy specialist (as well as distant relation of his subject) has written the first major biography of Boutwell titled, Boutwell: Radical Republican and Champion of Democracy. In it he tries to show why George Boutwell is important and deserves wider remembrance.

The author states that his interest in his subject stemmed from reading a book about the Reconstruction Era and becoming fascinated by the courage George Boutwell showed while serving in the US Senate. While Reconstruction was nearing its end, Boutwell traveled to Jackson and Aberdeen, Mississippi to document white supremacist violence and efforts there to deny Black voting rights during elections in 1875. Boutwell and his committee collected extensive evidence about the extent and nature of the intimidation inflicted upon Black Americans.

Learning this information moved the author to explore George Boutwell’s career in depth, including his service in the Lincoln and Grant administrations and his role in the impeachment of Andrew Johnson. This moving and thorough biography is the result. The book consists of an Introduction and Epilogue and five chapters discussing Boutwell’s early life, his service during the Lincoln administration, his role during the Johnson presidency, his long-term relationship with Ulysses Grant, and his later years.

Boutwell was born into a farming family in Massachusetts of modest means and was largely self- taught. As a young man, he became active in business, law, and politics and served two terms as a Democratic governor of Massachusetts while still in his early 30s. Strongly opposed to slavery, Boutwell left the Democratic Party in 1854 and participated in the formation of the Republican Party in Massachusetts. He participated in drafting the 1860 Republican platform leading to the election of Abraham Lincoln. Boutwell distinguished himself during Lincoln’s administration as the first Commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service, responsible for raising the funds necessary for the prosecution of the Civil War. Boutwell then served as a member of the House of Representatives from Massachusetts where he helped draw up the Articles of Impeachment against Andrew Johnson, participated in drafting the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments, and began a long friendship with Ulysses S. Grant.

During Grant’s first term, Boutwell served as the Secretary of the Treasury where he foiled an attempt by speculators to capture the gold market and worked to put the United States on sound financial footing by retiring the large Civil War debt. Throughout, he was a strong supporter of equal political and civil rights for African Americans. Boutwell served in the Senate during Grant’s second term and urged him to remain firm on Reconstruction.

Denied a second term in the Senate, Boutwell remained active in politics and had another important moment in the public eye late in his life. He strongly opposed imperialism and the United States conquest of the Philippines following the Spanish American War. Boutwell became leader of the opposition to annex the Philippines and spoke out eloquently against it. Although a staunch Republican since 1854, Boutwell felt so strongly about the Philippine Annexation that he changed his political affiliation again and returned to the Democratic Party.

Jeffrey Boutwell writes well with knowledge of and admiration for his subject. The book weaves together Boutwell’s life and activities with complex, momentous events across several periods of American history. The author stresses Boutwell’s lifelong commitment and activism in the areas of equal rights for African Americans and his careful, detail-oriented service as Commissioner of the IRS and as Secretary of the Treasury. The author also shows impressive insight into American history during Boutwell’s long years of service. The book occasionally loses its focus on Boutwell in its discussion of the broader history. And while the author discusses Boutwell’s accomplishments in detail, Boutwell himself remains an enigma. The book shows Boutwell’s public life but much less of the private man. This may be due to the reticence of the nineteenth century on private matters and to Boutwell’s tendency to work behind the scenes and in part out of public view.

The author in fact points to Boutwell’s reticence as a reason for his relative historical neglect. He also suggests that Boutwell has suffered inattention due to his role in the Johnson impeachment, his affiliation with the Grant presidency and its taints of corruption, his strong support of Radical Reconstruction, and his opposition to annexation of the Philippines. Historians have revised and revisited their views of each of these matters in recent years.

Boutwell: Radical Republican and Champion of Democracy tells the story of a dedicated and thoughtful public servant, something of an unsung hero, who made important contributions to the United States. Jeffrey Boutwell has performed a service in writing this book which will be of interest and benefit to students of the Civil War and Reconstruction.

Robin Friedman retired from a career as an attorney with the United States Department of the Interior in 2010. In retirement, he pursues his passion for American studies, including literature, history, philosophy, and the Civil War.