As we are drawing towards the close of the year, I wanted to take a look Civil War and Reconstruction books that have won awards in 2026. One of the most prestigious awards is the Gilder Lehrman Lincoln Prize awarded annually. The Gilder Lehrman Lincoln Prize “is awarded annually for the finest scholarly work in English on Abraham Lincoln, the American Civil War soldier, or the American Civil War era. The $50,000 prize was established in 1990 by Richard Gilder and Lewis E. Lehrman, in partnership with Gabor Boritt, founding director of the Civil War Institute at Gettysburg College,” according to the committee that awards the prize.
This year the book that was chosen was Righteous Strife: How Warring Religious Nationalists Forged Lincoln’s Union by Richard Carwardine. The work examines the different religious currents in the North both before the Civil War and during it. Lincoln used appeals to Christianity to support the eradication of slavery and to build a strong sense of nationalism. Critics attacked Lincoln for opening up America to nationalism which overrode individual states rights.
Robert Wilson in The American Scholar wrote that “At the heart of Righteous Strife is Lincoln’s deepening belief in the role of Providence in his presidency, and the way this belief steeled him on the difficult path to emancipation. The halls of Lincoln’s White House were famously filled with those seeking something from him, and Carwardine demonstrates in overwhelming detail the number of petitions, resolutions, memorials, and visits from church groups and officials who sought to influence and instruct him.”
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