They say America's greatest strength is its ability to compromise. But what happens when compromise fails—when Americans on opposite sides of a moral and political divide find no recourse except violence? In the 1850s and '60s, the debates between northern and southern states migrated from marble halls to virgin fields, where rhetoric gave way to rifles. Compendium Amazon Storefront  Support the show on Patreon Subscribe to the Compendium show newsletter To the Sound of Distant Guns Bibliography (so far)