I. Select a book which explores some aspect of the secession or Fort Sumter crisis.

You may look for suggestions in the bibliography of McPherson's Ordeal By Fire, in the bibliography of the Crisis at Fort Sumter program, in the holdings of Howard-Hilton Library, or elsewhere. Possible topics include secession in a state; unionism and anti-secession sentiment in the South; compromise efforts; southern radicals ("fire-eaters"); biographies of significant political figures appearing in the Crisis at Fort Sumter program; the organization of the Confederacy; and the position of groups such as women, free blacks, or non-slaveholding southern whites toward secession.

Book selections and topics must be approved by me.

II. Write an essay of no more than five pages (ca. 1,250 words) in which you explain what your book contributes to our understanding of the disruption of the Union and the coming of the Civil War.

Make sure all quotations or paraphrases are appropriately cited, either in footnotes or endnotes.

III. Due Date: Thursday April 24.