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In July 2007, Edward Ayers assumed the presidency of the University of Richmond. Named National Professor of the Year in 2003, Ayers has written and edited 10 books. "The Promise of the New South: Life After Reconstruction" was a finalist for both the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize. "In the Presence of Mine Enemies: Civil War in the Heart of America" won the Bancroft Prize for distinguished writing in American history. Ayers also created "The Valley of the Shadow: Two Communities in the American Civil War," a Web site that has attracted millions of visitors.
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Ira Berlin, Distinguished University Professor in the Department of History, University of Maryland and the founder of the Freedmen and Southern Society Project is the author of four books on slavery, including, the multiple-prize winning "Many Thousands Gone: the First Two Centuries of Slavery in America."
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David W. Blight is Class of '54 Professor of American History and Director, the Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery and Abolition, Yale University. He is the author of "Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory," and the forthcoming "Fivescore Years Ago: Searching for America at the Civil War Centennial."
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Historian, author, curator and educator, Lonnie G. Bunch, III is the founding director of the Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture. He is working to set the museum's mission, coordinate its fund raising and develop its collections. In 2002, President George W. Bush appointed him to the Commission for the Preservation of the White House.
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Ken Burns is the director, producer, co-writer, chief cinematographer, music director and executive producer of the landmark television series The Civil War which garnered more than 40 film and television awards, including two Emmys, two Grammys and the prestigious Lincoln Prize. This film was the highest rated series in the history of American Public Television and attracted an audience of 40 million during its premiere in September 1990.
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Gary W. Gallagher, the John L. Nau III Professor in the History of the American Civil War at the University of Virginia, is the author or editor of more than 30 books. His publications include "The Union War" (forthcoming, Harvard University Press, 2011), "Causes Won," "Lost, and Forgotten: How Hollywood and Popular Art Shape What We Know about the Civil War" (University of North Carolina Press, 2008), "Lee and His Generals in War and Memory" (Louisiana State University Press, 1998), and "The Confederate War" (Harvard University Press). Active in the field of historic preservation, he was a founder and first president of the Association for the Preservation of Civil War Sites.
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Brent D. Glass, director of the Smithsonia'’s National Museum of American History, oversaw the renovation of the building in 2008 and and the addition of more than 20 exhibitions, including "Abraham Lincoln: An Extraordinary Life." Before joining the Smithsonian, Glass was executive director of the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission in Harrisburg, Pa., from 1987 to 2002.
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Robert Lee Hodge is a reenactor who played a major role in the best-selling book "Confederates in the Attic," by Tony Horwitz, and appears on the cover. He has organized battlefield preservation fund-raisers and serves on the board of directors of the Central Virginia Battlefields Trust, an organization that has protected hundreds of acres near Fredericksburg. He is an Emmy Award-winning filmmaker who has also appeared in many historical films and TV programs and was a principal researcher on Time-Life Books 18-volume series "Voices of the Civil War" and "The Illustrated History of the Civil War." He has written about war-related matters for various publications.
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Harold Holzer, a leading authority on Lincoln and the political culture of the Civil War era, is Chairman of the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Foundation, successor organization of the U. S. Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission, which he co-chaired for nine years. He is the author, co-author, or editor of 36 books, most recently "Lincoln President-Elect." Holzer has won many research, writing, and lifetime achievement awards, including the 2008 National Endowment Medal from the President of the United States. A former journalist, and political and government press secretary (for both Congresswoman Bella Abzug and Governor Mario Cuomo), Holzer serves as Senior Vice President for External Affairs at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.
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Chandra Manning teaches 19th century U.S. history, including classes on the Civil War era, at Georgetown University. Her first book, "What This Cruel War Was Over: Soldiers, Slavery, and the Civil War" won the Avery O. Craven Award given by the Organization of American Historians for best book on the Civil War Era, won Honorable Mention for both the Abraham Lincoln Prize and the Jefferson Davis Prize, and was a finalist for the Frederick Douglass Prize. She is currently working on a book about slaves who ran to the Union Army during the Civil War, and then moved North.
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John F. Marszalek is the Giles Distinguished Professor Emeritus of history at Mississippi State University and the executive director and managing editor of the Ulysses S. Grant Association. He is the author of seven books and co-editor of the "Encyclopedia of African-American Civil Rights."
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Kate Masur teaches U.S. history at Northwestern University. Her research and writing focus on race and politics in the Civil War era. She is the author of "An Example for All the Land: Emancipation and the Struggle over Equality in Washington, D.C." (2010). She has also published articles on the famed 1862 African American delegation to Abraham Lincoln and on what northerners meant when they called fugitives from slavery "contrabands."
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Stephanie McCurry, the undergraduate chair of the history department of the University of Pennsylvania, is a specialist in 19th century American history, with a focus on the American South and the Civil War era. She is the author of two books, including "Confederate Reckoning: Power and Politics in the Civil War South" (Harvard UP 2010).
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Edna Greene Medford is a professor and chairperson of the Department of History at Howard University, where for the last 23 years she has specialized in 19th century U.S. history. She sits on the advisory boards of the Knox College Lincoln Studies Center (Galesburg, Illinois), the Ulysses S. Grant Papers (Mississippi State University), President Lincoln's Cottage (Washington, D.C.) and the Abraham Lincoln Foundation. She is also a member of the Executive Committee of the Lincoln Forum, a national organization dedicated to the study of President Lincoln and the Civil War era.
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Mike Musick is retired from the National Archives in Washington, D.C., as Subject Area Expert for the U.S. Civil War, after 35 years with the agency.
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Jim Campi, director of policy and communications for the Civil War Preservation Trust, is also a board member of the Journey Through Hallowed Ground and Franklin's Charge. He edited "Civil War Sites: A Guide to the Civil War Discovery Trail," and wrote "Civil War Battlefields Then and Now."
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Waite Rawls has been the Executive Director of the Museum of the Confederacy since January 2004. He is a member of the Board of Visitors of the Virginia Military Institute, a Trustee of the Camp Foundation and a former Trustee of the Civil War Preservation Trust. A native of Franklin, Virginia, he joined the Franklin Civil War Roundtable at age 9. He has a BA from the Virginia Military Institute and his MBA and JD from the University of Virginia.
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Carol Sheriff is the Class of 2013 Professor of History at the College of William and Mary. Her publications include "A People at War: Civilians and Soldiers in America's Civil War, 1854-1877," co-authored with Scott Reynolds Nelson.
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Dana B. Shoaf is the editor of Civil War Times magazine and executive editor of Civil War Titles for the Weider History Group, the largest publisher of history magazines in the world. He has consulted on state and national Civil War projects and is a frequent speaker on Civil War topics.
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John Stauffer is Chair of the History of American Civilization and Professor of English and African and African American Studies at Harvard University. Among the leading scholars of the Civil War era, antislavery in particular, he is the author or editor of eight books and more than 50 articles. His most recent book is "Giants: The Parallel Lives of Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln."
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Dr. Craig L. Symonds, Professor Emeritus at the United States Naval Academy, was the history department chair from 1988 to 1992 and served as Professor of Strategy at the U.S. Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island from 1971 to 1974. He is author or editor of twenty-four books, including his 2008 book, "Lincoln and His Admirals: Abraham Lincoln, the U.S. Navy, and the Civil War," that won the Lincoln Prize and the Abraham Lincoln Institute Book Award.
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Professor Joan Waugh of the UCLA History Department researches and writes about nineteenth-century America, specializing in the Civil War, Reconstruction, and Gilded Age eras. Waugh has published many essays on Civil War topics, and her newest book "U. S. Grant: American Hero, American Myth" (University of North Carolina Press, 2009), was awarded the Jefferson Davis Book Prize from the Museum of the Confederacy and the William Henry Seward Award for Excellence in Civil War Biography from the Civil War Forum of Metropolitan New York.
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Scott Hartwig. D. Scott Hartwig is a 31-year veteran of the National Park Service and has served as Gettysburg National Military Park's supervisory historian for the past 17 years. He won the regional Freeman Tilden Award for excellence in interpretation in 1993, and has been fundamental in the growth of Gettysburg's on-site interpretation and living history programming, distance and satellite education efforts, and a key player for the design of all aspects of the new Gettysburg museum/visitor center which opened in 2008. Additionally, he has authored numerous articles, essays and books on Civil War subjects, and has appeared on the History Channel, Discovery Channel and Pennsylvania Cable Network.
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Dr. William Blair is Liberal Arts Research Professor of U.S. History, Director of the Richards Civil War Era Center, and editor of The Journal of the Civil War Era. He also edits The Brose Lecture Series with the University of North Carolina Press. He serves as a Distinguished Lecturer for the Organization of American Historians. In addition to other publications, Blair has written "Virginia's Private War: Feeding Body and Soul in the Confederacy, 1861-1865" (1998), and "Cities of the Dead: Contesting the Memory of the Civil War in the South, 1865-1914" (2004). He is working on "With Malice toward Some," a study of the use of treason during the Civil War era.
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Frank J. Williams, a retired Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Rhode Island, is one of the country's most renowned experts on Abraham Lincoln and the author or editor of 14 books on the 16th President. He has a private library and archive that ranks among the nation's largest and finest Lincoln collections. In 2000, he was appointed to the United States Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission created by Congress. Williams has served as chairman of The Lincoln Forum since it was founded in 1996.
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Brag Bowling is director of the Stephen D. Lee Institute and past Commander of the Army of Northern Virginia, Sons of Confederate Veterans and past President of the Richmond Civil War Roundtable.
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Dennis E. Frye, the Chief Historian at Harpers Ferry National Historical Park, has appeared on PBS, The History Channel, The Discovery Channel and A&E as a guest historian. He helped produce prize-winning television features on the Battle of Antietam and abolitionist John Brown and was an Associate Producer for the Civil War movie Gods and Generals, during which he recruited and coordinated nearly 3,000 re-enactors for the film. He is co-founder and first president of the Save Historic Antietam Foundation co-founder and a former president of what is today's Civil War Trust. His latest book is entitled "Antietam Revealed."
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About This Blog

“A House Divided” is a blog dedicated to news and issues of importance to Civil War enthusiasts across the country and around the world. Blogger Linda Wheeler and a panel of respected Civil War experts will debate and dissect historical issues and explore new concepts. Wheeler will also report on conferences and seminars, find little-known battlefields and sites to explore, keep track of local, national and international stories of interest to readers and provide advice on upcoming events.
About the Blogger

A House Divided: Views

Posted at 11:42 AM ET, 05/06/2011

Dennis Frye: What authority did Abraham Lincoln have to call up 75,000 troops to defend Washington and to blockade most Southern ports?

By Dennis Frye

”The proclamation of blockade by the President is, of itself, conclusive evidence that a state of war existed which demanded and authorized recourse to such measure.” Thus determined the United States Supreme Court in the Prize Cases, settled in 1862 in a split 5-4 decision.

By Dennis Frye | 11:42 AM ET, 05/06/2011 | Permalink | Comments ( 0)
Categories: 150th anniversary, Views, Views

Posted at 11:33 AM ET, 05/06/2011

William Blair: What legal authority did Abraham Lincoln have to call up 75,000 troops to defend Washington and to blockade most Southern ports?

By William Blair

To find the answer to this two-pronged question, forget about the Constitution. This fundamental law of the nation is surprisingly quiet about any war powers that the president might claim. In fact, the term “war powers” never appears under the the sections dealing with the executive.

By William Blair | 11:33 AM ET, 05/06/2011 | Permalink | Comments ( 0)
Categories: 150th anniversary, Views, Views

Posted at 08:00 AM ET, 04/27/2011

John Marszalek: What legal authority did President Lincoln have to call up 75,000 troops to defend Washington and to order the blockade of most Southern ports?

By Linda Wheeler

Lincoln had acted unilaterally because he did not want to ask Congress for a declaration of war, believing that such an act would give the Confederacy recognition as an independent nation...

By Linda Wheeler | 08:00 AM ET, 04/27/2011 | Permalink | Comments ( 0)
Categories: Views, Views, 150th anniversary, 150th anniversary

Posted at 08:00 AM ET, 04/27/2011

Harold Holzer: What legal authority did President Lincoln have to call up 75,000 troops to defend Washington and to order the blockade of most Southern ports?

By Harold Holzer

Established 18th century law arguably gave Abraham Lincoln adequate power to confront the gravest crisis in the 19th century by calling for volunteers after the attack on Fort Sumter....

By Harold Holzer | 08:00 AM ET, 04/27/2011 | Permalink | Comments ( 0)
Categories: Views, 150th anniversary, 150th anniversary

Posted at 08:26 PM ET, 04/19/2011

Jim Campi: How do you explain the crazed, homicidal fury of city residents during the Baltimore Riots of April 19, 1861 in response to Massachusetts troops passing through that city; was that event an anomaly?

By Jim Campi

One day after the fall of Fort Sumter, President Lincoln issued a proclamation calling for 75,000 volunteers to put down the rebellion. The proclamation stoked passions already running at a fever pitch.

By Jim Campi | 08:26 PM ET, 04/19/2011 | Permalink | Comments ( 0)
Categories: 150th anniversary, Views, Views

Posted at 10:00 AM ET, 04/19/2011

William Blair: How do you explain the crazed, homicidal fury of city residents during the Baltimore Riots of April 19, 1861 in response to Massachusetts troops passing through that city? Was that event an anomaly?

By William Blair

The Baltimore Riot was significant and shocking to some extent, but it represented a rather unremarkable explosion of street violence.

By William Blair | 10:00 AM ET, 04/19/2011 | Permalink | Comments ( 0)
Categories: Views, 150th anniversary, 150th anniversary

Posted at 10:00 AM ET, 04/19/2011

Harold Holzer: How do you explain the crazed, homicidal fury of city residents during the Baltimore Riots of April 19, 1861 in response to Massachusetts troops passing through that city. Was that event an anomaly?

By Harold Holzer

Horrifically bloody as it was, the fury that a pro-secession mob unleashed against federal troops on the streets of Baltimore in April 1861 should have surprised no one--least of all President Abraham Lincoln.

By Harold Holzer | 10:00 AM ET, 04/19/2011 | Permalink | Comments ( 0)
Categories: 150th anniversary, Views, Views

Posted at 10:00 AM ET, 04/19/2011

Frank Williams:How do you explain the crazed, homicidal fury of city residents during the Baltimore Riots of April 19, 1861 in response to Massachusetts troops passing through that city. Was that event an anomaly?

By Frank Williams

Passions ran deep with the Baltimore “rowdies” prior to their attack on the Sixth Massachusetts Regiment. The plot to assassinate President-elect Lincoln on his passage through Baltimore on February 23, 1861 required the mobs to distract and incite the populace...

By Frank Williams | 10:00 AM ET, 04/19/2011 | Permalink | Comments ( 0)
Categories: Views, 150th anniversary, 150th anniversary

Posted at 10:00 AM ET, 04/19/2011

Dennis Frye: How do you explain the crazed, homicidal fury of city residents during the Baltimore Riots of April 19, 1861 in response to Massachusetts troops passing through that city. Was that event an anomaly?

By Linda Wheeler

Baltimore was a melting pot that was in regular meltdown during much of the 1850s. It was also the largest the largest city in the South....

By Linda Wheeler | 10:00 AM ET, 04/19/2011 | Permalink | Comments ( 0)
Categories: 150th anniversary, Views, Views

Posted at 10:00 AM ET, 04/19/2011

Dana Shoaf: How do you explain the crazed, homicidal fury of city residents during the Baltimore Riots of April 19, 1861 in response to Massachusetts troops passing through that city. Was that event an anomaly?

By Dana Shoaf

If other upper South cities were similarly tied to the plantation economy for their well-being, I believe violence would have occurred.

By Dana Shoaf | 10:00 AM ET, 04/19/2011 | Permalink | Comments ( 0)
Categories: 150th anniversary, Views, Views

Posted at 03:39 PM ET, 04/11/2011

Dennis Frye: By attempting to resupply Ft. Sumter, did President Lincoln purposely provoke the war?

By Dennis Frye

The provocation of civil war came with Lincoln’s election, not Lincoln’s selection. South Carolina seceded because the North acceded to Republican rule--perceived as abolitionist domination--in the Election of 1860.

By Dennis Frye | 03:39 PM ET, 04/11/2011 | Permalink | Comments ( 0)
Categories: Views, 150th anniversary

Posted at 03:35 PM ET, 04/11/2011

Craig Symonds: By attempting to resupply Ft. Sumter, did President Lincoln purposely provoke the war?

By Craig Symonds

No.From the first full day of his Presidency, Lincoln’s policy was to prevent a war with the seceded States, not to start one.

By Craig Symonds | 03:35 PM ET, 04/11/2011 | Permalink | Comments ( 0)
Categories: Views, 150th anniversary

Posted at 03:07 PM ET, 04/11/2011

Brag Bowling: By resupplying Ft. Sumter, did Lincoln purposely provoke war?

By Brag Bowling

By Brag Bowling | 03:07 PM ET, 04/11/2011 | Permalink | Comments ( 0)
Categories: Views, 150th anniversary

Posted at 02:52 PM ET, 04/11/2011

John Marszalek: By attempting to resupply Ft. Sumter, did President Lincoln purposely provoke the war?

By John Marszalek

When Abraham Lincoln took his oath of office, the last thing on his mind was starting a civil war that would consume his entire presidency.

By John Marszalek | 02:52 PM ET, 04/11/2011 | Permalink | Comments ( 0)
Categories: 150th anniversary, Views

Posted at 01:30 PM ET, 04/11/2011

Lonnie Bunch: By resupplying Ft. Sumter, did Lincoln purposely provoke war?

By

The notion that Abraham Lincoln purposely provoked the Civil War by attempting to resupply Fort Sumter in April 1861 became a cornerstone of the reinterpretation of the Civil War after the defeat of the Confederacy in 1865.

By | 01:30 PM ET, 04/11/2011 | Permalink | Comments ( 0)
Categories: Views, 150th anniversary

Posted at 04:51 PM ET, 03/31/2011

Dennis Frye: How pervasive was the abolitionist movement and did it influence any of the southern states to secede?

By Dennis Frye

The foundation of the nation was perched precariously atop the seismic fault line of slavery. Slavery shook the Union. Abolitionists applied the pressure that heaved the nation into civil war.

By Dennis Frye | 04:51 PM ET, 03/31/2011 | Permalink | Comments ( 0)
Categories: Views, 150th anniversary

Posted at 04:32 PM ET, 03/28/2011

John Marszalek: General-in-Chief Winfield Scott’s Anaconda Plan called for the early blockading of sea ports and the Mississippi River to strangle the rebellion; could that plan have worked?

By John Marszalek

Winfield Scott was one of the nation’s military legends. When he decided not to join secession, even though he was a Virginian, supporters of the Union breathed a collective sigh of relief.

By John Marszalek | 04:32 PM ET, 03/28/2011 | Permalink | Comments ( 0)
Categories: 150th anniversary, Views

Posted at 03:36 PM ET, 03/28/2011

Frank Williams: General-in-Chief Winfield Scott’s Anaconda Plan called for the early blockading of sea ports and the Mississippi River to strangle the rebellion; could that plan have worked?

By Frank Williams

Septuagenarian General Winfield Scott’s Anaconda Plan, although ridiculed at first, was proved to be sound but took years and many casualties to effectuate.

By Frank Williams | 03:36 PM ET, 03/28/2011 | Permalink | Comments ( 0)
Categories: Views, 150th anniversary

Posted at 03:27 PM ET, 03/28/2011

Lonnie Bunch: General-in-Chief Winfield Scott’s Anaconda Plan called for the early blockading of sea ports and the Mississippi River to strangle the rebellion; could that plan have worked?

By Lonnie Bunch

General Winfield Scott, the hero of the Mexican-American War, devised a strategy to defeat the recently seceding Southern states that became known as the Anaconda Plan because of the plan’s attempt to surround and strangle the nascent Confederacy.

By Lonnie Bunch | 03:27 PM ET, 03/28/2011 | Permalink | Comments ( 0)
Categories: 150th anniversary, Views

Posted at 03:23 PM ET, 03/28/2011

Scott Hartwig: General-in-Chief Winfild’s Anaconda Plan called for the early blockading of sea ports and the Mississippi River to strangle the rebellion; could that plan have worked?

By Scott Hartwig

In brief, General Scott’s plan called for “a complete blockade” of the Atlantic and Gulf ports to strangle the Confederacy, and a thrust down the Mississippi River with some 60,000 troops to cut the Confederacy in two.

By Scott Hartwig | 03:23 PM ET, 03/28/2011 | Permalink | Comments ( 0)
Categories: 150th anniversary, Views

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