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2012 Annual Symposium in May: "Creating an Army to Preserve the Nation" This May 3 and 4, nine distinguished scholars will examine various aspects of the military effort to preserve the Union during the Civil War. This year's symposium is the latest installment in the Society's ongoing series, The National Capital in a Nation Divided: Congress and the District of Columbia Confront Sectionalism and Slavery, directed by Paul Finkelman, the President William McKinley Distinguished Professor of Law and Public Policy at Albany Law School, and Donald R. Kennon, the Society's Chief Historian and Vice President of Scholarship and Education. The symposium will begin on the evening of Thursday, May 3, with an opening lecture and reception. The featured speaker, Catherine Clinton, is the Chair in U.S. History at Queen's University in Belfast, Northern Ireland. The distin- guished author of several books on the Civil War era, including a recent critically acclaimed biogra- phy of Mary Todd Lincoln, Clinton will discuss Mrs. Lincoln's attempts to be a political player during the war and her contentious relationship with Congress. The eight speakers during the full-day conference on Friday, May 4 will include Fergus Bordewich speaking on the role of the Joint Congressional Committee on the Conduct of the War. Bordewich is the author of several books on nineteenth-century American history, most recently America's Great Debate: Henry Clay, Stephen A. Douglas, and the Compromise that 18 THE CAPITOL DOME Soldiers of the District of Columbia militia drill on the Capitol grounds during the first months of the Civil War in 1861. The issues of creating an army to preserve the Union during the Civil War are the topic of this year's annual symposium. (Courtesy Library of Congress) Preserved the Union. Iver Bernstein, who teaches at Washington University in St. Louis, will speak on the politics of conscription and the draft riots. Bernstein is the author of the seminal book on the New York City draft riots. Three speakers will discuss the issue of African Americans and military policy during the war. Chandra M. Manning of Georgetown University will speak on Congress, the army, and the problem of what to do with fugitive slaves that came within Union Army lines. Nikki M. Taylor of the University of Cincinnati will focus attention on Harriet Tubman and her role in the war effort. L. Diane Barnes of Youngstown State University, who spoke at last year's symposium, will return this year to present another paper. Also returning from previous conferences are Brooks Simpson of Arizona State University, Mischa Honeck from Heidelburg, Germany, who is currently a research fellow at the German Historical Institute in Washington, D. C., and Jenny Bourne, who teaches economics at Carleton College. Honeck plans to focus on a tale of two fatherlands and the German American war for the Union. Bourne will discuss Congress, the financing of the war, and how paying for the war transformed the American financial system. As always, the symposium is free and open to the public. More details concerning the sympo- sium, including location, program, and preregistra- tion information will be made available later on the Society's web site and in a mailed program announcement. Contact the Society or visit our homepage to be placed on our mailing list. SPRING 2012