| Abstract | Reviews W. Fitzhugh Brundage's 'The Southern Past: A Clash of Race and Memory' (2005) and Harry S. Stout's 'Upon the Altar of the Nation: A Moral History of the Civil War' (2006). Together, these works represent the increased interest in the study of the public memory and cultural legacy of the Civil War during the early 21st century. While this article covers each book on its own terms, it also utilizes these works to navigate the relationship between scholarly history, public memory, and moral engagement. While Brundage's work succeeds as a scholarly monograph, it fails to reveal the moral lessons or public policy needed to change contemporary Southern society. In contrast, Stout's work fails as scholarly history but succeeds in providing the direction that historical scholarship needs to follow if it is to provide morally engaged research and alternate approaches to history beyond the current scholarly and public perceptions.
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