QOTD

"While I felt almost no ideological kinship with these unreconstructed rebels, I'd come to recognize that in one sense they were right. The issues at stake in the Civil War -- race in particular -- remained raw and unresolved, as did the broad question the conflict posed: Would America remain one nation? In 1861, this was a regional dilemma, which it wasn't anymore.  But socially and culturally, there were ample signs of separatism and disunion along class, race, ethnic and gender lines.  The whole notion of a common people united by common principles -- even a common language -- seemed more open to question than at any period in my lifetime."  --  Tony Horwitz in "Confederates in the Attic," his highly- regarded 1998 book that looked at the "unfinished Civil War" in the American South.  Horwitz died unexpectedly on May 27.  Although it's been more than 20 years since these words were written, the book offers insights as fresh today as they were then about the South, and the complicated stories of white nationalism that echo even louder in today's politics (often told with great humor by Horwitz).  His latest book, "Spying on the South: An Odyssey Across the American Divide," is a more recent look at the same region two decades on.  The next read. (h/t FOB P.E.C.)