The George Tyler Moore Center for the Study of the Civil War has awarded the 2007 Peter Seaborg Award to Bruce Levine for his book, Confederate Emancipation: Southern Plans to Free and Arm Slaves During the Civil War (Oxford University Press, 2007). It will come as no surprise to readers of this blog that I think this is an excellent choice. Levine’s work represents the most sophisticated analysis of the debates within the Confederacy to arm their slaves and why these stories continue to resonate in certain circles today.
Finalists include Civil War Petersburg: Confederate City in the Crucible of War by A. Wilson Greene and published by University of Virginia Press; Color-Blind Justice: Albion Tourgee and the Quest for Racial Equality from the Civil War to Plessy v. Ferguson by Mark Elliott and published by Oxford University Press; John M. Schofield and the Politics of Generalship by Donald B. Connelly and published by University of North Carolina Press; No Party Now: Politics in the Civil War North by Adam I.P. Smith and published by Oxford University Press.