ABBEVILLE INSTITUTE SCHOLARS’ CONFERENCE

TENTH ANNUAL ABBEVILLE INSTITUTE SCHOLARS’ CONFERENCE

“THE WAR BETWEEN THE STATES: OTHER VOICES, OTHER VIEWS"
Stone Mountain, Georgia
February, 23-26, 2012

TOPIC: Nationalist historians for 150 years have protected Americans from confronting the stark immorality of prosecuting what French philosopher Bertrand de Jouvenel called, “a war such as Europe had never yet seen” to force eleven States into a federation from which their people had voted to secede. Should eleven American States secede today and form a federation of their own, such a war would be judged criminal.

Northern opposition to the war was more extensive, complex and had more respectable adherents than the mainline account allows, e.g., Governor Seymour of New York, 1861: “Indeed, Can we so entirely forget the past history of our country, that we can stand upon the point of pride against states whose citizens battled with our fathers and poured out their blood upon the soil of our state. Upon whom are we to wage war? Our own countrymen….”

Lincoln and his party often acted as an embattled minority in the North. The Sesquicentennial offers an opportunity to explore the view point of the most neglected and misrepresented segment of American opinion on the great conflict at the center of our history.

Learn about the resistance of President Franklin Pierce and New York Governor Horatio Seymour. Midwestern “Copperheads.” Christian reaction to the bloodthirsty rhetoric of pro-war Republican preachers. Pro-Union opposition to the Republican Party. Resistance in the border States. Gradations and conflicts in Northern opinion, especially among ethnic groups. Treatment of black soldiers by the Union army during and after the war. And much more.

SPEAKERS. Douglas Bostick, Kent Masterson Brown , Richard Gamble, Marshall Derosa, Donald Livingston, Brion McClanahan, Allen Mendenhall, Joseph Stromberg, Richard Valentine, Jonathan White, Clyde Wilson,

PLACE. Beautiful Stone Mountain Park, built to commemorate the Confederacy. Visit the memorial to Lee, Jackson, and Davis which is the largest stone carving in the world. Much to see and do, so bring the family.

COST. Rooms: very special rate of $106 a day, single or double (rate ends February 1). Conference fee is $225 for Abbeville members and $275 for others. Make checks payable to Abbeville Institute, P.O.Box 10, McClellanville, S.C. 2945 (fee includes tuition, park entrance fee, reception, breakfast, continuous snacks and refreshments). Make room reservations at Evergreen Marriott Conference Resort 770-879-9900. SCHOLARSHIPS. A few scholarships are available for college and graduate students who are encouraged to apply.

INQUIRIES: contactus@abbevilleinstitute.org or 843-323-0690. For lecture titles and schedule see abbevilleinstitute.org.

Schedule:

Thursday, Feb. 23
4:30-6:00 Registration and Conviviality (Rotunda Room)
6:00-7:00 Supper Buffet (Waterside Restaurant)
7:00-8:00 “The War to Prevent Southern Independence: My Myth or Yours,” Clyde Wilson

Friday, Feb. 24
8:00-9:00 Breakfast (Rotunda Room)
9:00-10:00 “’To Maintain the Constitution as it is, and to Restore the Union as it Was,’” Doug Bostick
10:15-11:15 “The Civil War: Kentucky’s Mercurial Political Course,” Kent Masterson Brown
11:30-12:30 “The Midwestern ‘Copperheads,’” Jonathan White

12:30-4:30 Free time (lunch on your own)

4:30-5:30 “Behind Enemy Lines with President Pierce: Principles Over Politics,” Marshall Derosa
5:45-6:45 “‘Get Down you Damm Fool?’: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. on Lincoln, the Union, and the War,” Allen Mendenhall
6:45-7:45 Supper Buffet (Waterside Restaurant)
8:00-9:00 Round Table Discussion with Audience

Saturday, Feb. 25
8:00-9:00 Breakfast (Rotunda Room)
9:00-10:00 “The Avenger Without Mercy: Delaware Under the Federal Heel,” Brion McClanahan
10:15-11:15 “Yankees & Yonkers: Opposition to Lincoln’s Policies in Westchester County, New York and the Greater Hudson Valley,” Robert Valentine
11:30-12:30 “’Colored Troops for Work’: The Union Army’s Use and Treatment of Black Troops,” Doug Bostick

12:30-4:30 (Free time)

4:30-5:30 “Northern Clergymen, the Kingdom of God on Earth, and the Abolition of the South,” Joseph Stromberg
5:45-6:45 “Between God and Caesar: Northern Clergy and the Problem of a Politicized Pulpit,” Richard Gamble

7:00-8:00 Supper Buffet (Waterside Restaurant)
8:00-9:00 Round Table Discussion with Audience

Sunday, Feb. 26 (Departure)