To commemorate the 150th anniversary of Virginia’s participation in the Civil War, seventeen of the nation’s top public historians and scholars gathered to take part in an unscripted, open dialogue on the state of the nation just before the South seceded. The rich and surprising discussions that followed form the contents of this unique book. Limiting themselves to what would have been known or surmised in 1859, the roundtable participants engage in a stimulating series of discussions that bring the issues vibrantly into the present tense.
