Civil War History - Secession and PoliticsWas it Slavery, or was it States Rights? Perhaps it was the election of Lincoln? What were the real reasons for Southern Secession and what were the political issues in this time of war? Find your answers here in the Secession and Politics Disussion.
So where are we here? In what court and what jurisdiction could Davis be tried, if he was tried. Good points, eveyone, but we have no resolution.
ole
Treason, as a Federal Offense, would have had to be tried in a United States District Court. Venue laws have remained constant. Under 18 USC §3232 and Rule 18 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, an offence is tried in the District where the action took place.
Since Davis' acts of treason took place in Richmond, Virginia, that is where he would have to have been tried for treason. While it may be true that he was indicted in Washington, D.C., I would think that a good lawyer (and he would have had several ) could have quashed that indictment as improper.
In capital cases, the Court is required to hold the trial in the county where the offense was committed.
I spoke to my sister, a criminal district attorney and former criminal court judge and she assures me this is correct.
__________________ "There must be more historians of the Civil War than there were generals figthing in it... Of the two groups, the historians are the more belligerent." David Donald, Lincoln Reconsidered (1961)
A grand jury in Norfolk, VA handed down an indictment for Treason against Davis in June of 1865. A grand jury in Washington, DC brought another one in later in the year.
Tim
Great! Let's use that indictment and get on with it!
Treason, as a Federal Offense, would have had to be tried in a United States District Court. Venue laws have remained constant. Under 18 USC §3232 and Rule 18 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, an offence is tried in the District where the action took place.
Since Davis' acts of treason took place in Richmond, Virginia, that is where he would have to have been tried for treason. While it may be true that he was indicted in Washington, D.C., I would think that a good lawyer (and he would have had several ) could have quashed that indictment as improper.
In capital cases, the Court is required to hold the trial in the county where the offense was committed.
Treason, as a Federal Offense, would have had to be tried in a United States District Court. Venue laws have remained constant. Under 18 USC §3232 and Rule 18 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, an offence is tried in the District where the action took place.
Since Davis' acts of treason took place in Richmond, Virginia, that is where he would have to have been tried for treason. While it may be true that he was indicted in Washington, D.C., I would think that a good lawyer (and he would have had several ) could have quashed that indictment as improper.
In capital cases, the Court is required to hold the trial in the county where the offense was committed.
I spoke to my sister, a criminal district attorney and former criminal court judge and she assures me this is correct.
After he resigned from Congress in early 1861, Davis hung around Washington, reputedly hoping he would be indicted for Treason so he could argue his position in court. I have never been able to comprehend why he thought that way, since I have never seen any reference to anything he did up to that time that I thought would meet the Constitutional definition of Treason.
When he went home to Mississippi, Davis made many inflamatory speeches along the way. He was then appointed commander of the state Militia, and shocked the Governor by urging him to prepare for immediate war with the Federal government. Perhaps something there might meet the definition.
He was then appointed President of the new Confederacy. Actions he took after assuming office in Montgomery clearly do meet that standard for Treason (such as ordering the attack on Ft. Sumter or the internment of the Federal troops peacefully withdrawing from Texas under an agreement with that state.)
By Spring of 1861, Davis is in Richmond, and for the rest of the war leads the effort against the US. There are many clear violations here that would count as Treason. Other than this, Davis made a few trips and was in Georgia and Tennessee during the war, but probably well over 90% of all his Confederate activities took place in Virginia.
So, for choices of venue, those would be it. I remember hearing once that part of the reason the Federal government was reluctant to proceed with the case against Davis after the war was that the jury would be selected in Virginia, and seemed likely to be a volatile issue. Given the background, it would seem to me that any randomly selected jury in Virginia in 1865-66 would have contained many ex-Confederates who would be unwilling to convict. It also seems likely to me that pressures might be exerted on the families and friends of jury members in such a situation.
Faced with this, I believe the Feds simply chose to avoid the whole mess. The chances for a bad trial, with all sorts of charges of unfairness by both sides and what would probably have been an early example of jury nullification, seem high to me. I also suspect that, if they could have moved the trial to someplace more convenient (i.e., pro-Union) like Massachusetts they would have been more willing to go ahead with it.
Personally, I have no doubt that Davis committed acts that would qualify as Treason under the Constitution. His only defense against them would be a claim that there was a "right of secession" and he was no longer a US citizen once Mississippi seceded -- which of course was a dubious legal claim. Given the high stakes and the small benefits from a trial, it is not surprising that the Federal government chose to let Davis languish in jail instead.
Tim
__________________ "Let us, then, consider all attempts to weaken this Union, by maintaining that each state is separately and individually independent, as a species of political heresy, which can never benefit us, but may bring on us the most serious distresses."
Charles Cotesworth Pinckney of South Carolina, 1740-1824, Revolutionary War soldier, one of the authors of the US Constitution in 1787, speaking at the South Carolina Ratifying Convention in 1788.
Due to a lack of interest, today has been cancelled.
ole
__________________ I never knew a man who wished to be himself a slave. Consider if you know any good thing that no man desires for himself. A. Lincoln
After he resigned from Congress in early 1861, Davis hung around Washington, reputedly hoping he would be indicted for Treason so he could argue his position in court. I have never been able to comprehend why he thought that way, since I have never seen any reference to anything he did up to that time that I thought would meet the Constitutional definition of Treason.
When he went home to Mississippi, Davis made many inflamatory speeches along the way. He was then appointed commander of the state Militia, and shocked the Governor by urging him to prepare for immediate war with the Federal government. Perhaps something there might meet the definition.
He was then appointed President of the new Confederacy. Actions he took after assuming office in Montgomery clearly do meet that standard for Treason (such as ordering the attack on Ft. Sumter or the internment of the Federal troops peacefully withdrawing from Texas under an agreement with that state.)
By Spring of 1861, Davis is in Richmond, and for the rest of the war leads the effort against the US. There are many clear violations here that would count as Treason. Other than this, Davis made a few trips and was in Georgia and Tennessee during the war, but probably well over 90% of all his Confederate activities took place in Virginia.
So, for choices of venue, those would be it. I remember hearing once that part of the reason the Federal government was reluctant to proceed with the case against Davis after the war was that the jury would be selected in Virginia, and seemed likely to be a volatile issue. Given the background, it would seem to me that any randomly selected jury in Virginia in 1865-66 would have contained many ex-Confederates who would be unwilling to convict. It also seems likely to me that pressures might be exerted on the families and friends of jury members in such a situation.
Faced with this, I believe the Feds simply chose to avoid the whole mess. The chances for a bad trial, with all sorts of charges of unfairness by both sides and what would probably have been an early example of jury nullification, seem high to me. I also suspect that, if they could have moved the trial to someplace more convenient (i.e., pro-Union) like Massachusetts they would have been more willing to go ahead with it.
Personally, I have no doubt that Davis committed acts that would qualify as Treason under the Constitution. His only defense against them would be a claim that there was a "right of secession" and he was no longer a US citizen once Mississippi seceded -- which of course was a dubious legal claim. Given the high stakes and the small benefits from a trial, it is not surprising that the Federal government chose to let Davis languish in jail instead.
Tim
So, then, what I hear from this, is... that Empire has just established itself in the United States (because the Secession and States Rights questions have both been destroyed by force), and yet because of a lack of public support (mainly in the cost of lives, geographic loyalties,
and the fact that they STILL insist they are 'different', somehow, from all other empires, in the world, and wish to cling to the idea that they, the people, are ruled, still, someway, by 'the consent of the governed'... that the founding fathers have been 'preserved' instead of annihilated...
And so, the trial which would have shown the US to be in the right for those "four years' - threatens to uncover their purposes completely, and since the winners were 'all in this together', and all share blame equally, then we'll just forget about it? Be content with our empire and our victory and stop trying to justify that which cannot be justified!
That's what all the yankee attorneys have alleged...
And I think they were right.
As to letting Davis languish in jail, that in itself was a crime against him, and the best example of a sour grapes victory I have ever seen.
Had the North been 'right' in what they did to the South, no one would have ever heard the end of it, and school children would have been forced to memorize each and every gory detail, up to and including someone's last words to Davis before he dropped through the gallows
trap!
Instead, all we hear about it, at all, is that there was a war, and any information released about it favors the North to such a degree that everyone 150 years later thinks the North was right by default.
I am not going to get my day in court, am I? I don't see anyone breaking with tradition and exposing the US government of 1865 to such a torment...
They weren't willing to let the South walk, but were forced to let Davis walk.
My contention? THE SOUTH walked, only there was no longer any South to walk. Thus, the North cannot prove its actions justified, in any measure of the word.
Reading your post, my guess would be you are deaf as a post. It is all your own invention.
Tim
__________________ "Let us, then, consider all attempts to weaken this Union, by maintaining that each state is separately and individually independent, as a species of political heresy, which can never benefit us, but may bring on us the most serious distresses."
Charles Cotesworth Pinckney of South Carolina, 1740-1824, Revolutionary War soldier, one of the authors of the US Constitution in 1787, speaking at the South Carolina Ratifying Convention in 1788.
After he resigned from Congress in early 1861, Davis hung around Washington, reputedly hoping he would be indicted for Treason so he could argue his position in court. I have never been able to comprehend why he thought that way, since I have never seen any reference to anything he did up to that time that I thought would meet the Constitutional definition of Treason.
When he went home to Mississippi, Davis made many inflamatory speeches along the way. He was then appointed commander of the state Militia, and shocked the Governor by urging him to prepare for immediate war with the Federal government. Perhaps something there might meet the definition.
He was then appointed President of the new Confederacy. Actions he took after assuming office in Montgomery clearly do meet that standard for Treason (such as ordering the attack on Ft. Sumter or the internment of the Federal troops peacefully withdrawing from Texas under an agreement with that state.)
By Spring of 1861, Davis is in Richmond, and for the rest of the war leads the effort against the US. There are many clear violations here that would count as Treason. Other than this, Davis made a few trips and was in Georgia and Tennessee during the war, but probably well over 90% of all his Confederate activities took place in Virginia.
So, for choices of venue, those would be it. I remember hearing once that part of the reason the Federal government was reluctant to proceed with the case against Davis after the war was that the jury would be selected in Virginia, and seemed likely to be a volatile issue. Given the background, it would seem to me that any randomly selected jury in Virginia in 1865-66 would have contained many ex-Confederates who would be unwilling to convict. It also seems likely to me that pressures might be exerted on the families and friends of jury members in such a situation.
Faced with this, I believe the Feds simply chose to avoid the whole mess. The chances for a bad trial, with all sorts of charges of unfairness by both sides and what would probably have been an early example of jury nullification, seem high to me. I also suspect that, if they could have moved the trial to someplace more convenient (i.e., pro-Union) like Massachusetts they would have been more willing to go ahead with it.
Personally, I have no doubt that Davis committed acts that would qualify as Treason under the Constitution. His only defense against them would be a claim that there was a "right of secession" and he was no longer a US citizen once Mississippi seceded -- which of course was a dubious legal claim. Given the high stakes and the small benefits from a trial, it is not surprising that the Federal government chose to let Davis languish in jail instead.
Tim
This is a balderdash lie.
__________________ POWER & MONEY
"Your New-York bankers and merchants are shrewd people, but I never gave them credit for so much sagacity as when they took the Government Loan. It was not merely patriotism, it was a high stroke of policy. It has saved the Government, and what they will regard as equally important, saved them from a great financial disaster."
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