Sec 3 of the 14th Amendment did exactly that, But Congress lifted these disqualifications in 1872.
Not that it made much difference anyway. VA, NC, GA and TN had already been "redeemed" even while the disqualifications were still in force.
How would you punish the rebel leadership after the American Civil War
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Not that it made much difference anyway. VA, NC, GA and TN had already been "redeemed" even while the disqualifications were still in force.
They, genuinely believed the US was waging an illegal war against them. To put it bluntly, if the president and the dominant party are a bunch of traitors, well, do you owe them loyalty.
Secondly, if your country is your state, say Virginia rather than the United States, it makes sense that you would side with the state. If the US saying 'you can't leave' is more like the EU saying Britian can't Brexit and backing it with guns, a navy and invasion plans, a Brit on principle would oppose it even if they voted 'stay' during the referendum.
That is much closer to how the Confederates saw themselves.
Optical_Illusion
Banned
On a firm legal basis and no further. The minute you step into "We're going to write up a new legal rulebook to really put these guys in the stocks and humiliate and publicly subjugate them", then the USA goes down an absolutely dark direction. The minute you start going "Well, actually we need new laws to punish people, in order to socially engineer things to control peoples ideas about things in the long term", then you'd quickly be on the road to The Terror. (That sort of idea comes from a totalitarian ethic that is at odds, profoundly, with the US democratic experiment.)
1: Bar from office all Political and Military leaders of the Confederate South.
2: Bar the naming of government complexes and erection of public monuments in honour of said Southern leadership.
3: Redistribution of Planter class land and the implementation of the 40 acres and mule program.
4: Any person caught terrorising freed slaves shall face the death penalty.
2: Bar the naming of government complexes and erection of public monuments in honour of said Southern leadership.
3: Redistribution of Planter class land and the implementation of the 40 acres and mule program.
4: Any person caught terrorising freed slaves shall face the death penalty.
Northerners were illegally occupying their land. They started the war 🙂 😉
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Um... Like Nuremberg but far more thorough because you don't need confederate military men for the cold war?
Due process jury trial. Invite foreign representatives to apply/extend international law in such a way as to criminalise slavery.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg_trials#Nuremberg_principles
Then anyone guilty of participating in crimes against humanity, defined by an international commission - cough slavery cough - dances at the end of a rope.
Also confiscate the land and property of those convicted and distribute it to former slaves as reparations.
Due process jury trial. Invite foreign representatives to apply/extend international law in such a way as to criminalise slavery.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg_trials#Nuremberg_principles
Then anyone guilty of participating in crimes against humanity, defined by an international commission - cough slavery cough - dances at the end of a rope.
Also confiscate the land and property of those convicted and distribute it to former slaves as reparations.
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You cant have a federal property outside of the federation
So, if the South won they would be evicting illegal occupants, but as they lost, it is the Union that wrotethe history.
As a matter of Law if the Confederate states had left the UNION they were conquered Provinces. The US Government could do whatever it wanted.
If they were part of the Union then they committed treason, anything short of hanging every single confederate soldier could be argued as mercy
If they were part of the Union then they committed treason, anything short of hanging every single confederate soldier could be argued as mercy
Let's be honest - anything remotely similar to tolitarian ideas would probably not work in Anno Domini 1865 and anyone thinking otherwise is kidding themselves, misinformed, or both.
If 40 acres and a mule is to be done, it has to be done quickly and through legal avenues and it has to benefit poor white and black alike - otherwise it's not happening.
It'd be highly inadvisable to behave in way that would generate martyrs.
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SpaceOrbisGaming
Banned
Again at the time, your home state may as well be your nation. While I'm sure they felt bad about fighting their classmates this idea that they decided to turn against their home nation isn't really a thing. The people of the south didn't fight for the Union but their home state. It would be like if a New Yorker or a Pennsylvanian joined the fight. They may have had people in their class that they ended up facing in battle but that in no way means they turned their backs on their nation nor that their old classmates did the same. They happened to be from states that were in the north and south.
Had the US lost their war for freedom in 1776-1783 would the UK do the same thing? No, because we weren't trying to replace the government in the United Kingdom. We were trying to form a new nation made by people who we voted for.
The south lost their war. That is bad enough. No reason to give them cause to try again later on.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't the mere existence of the CSA* an act of treason against the US?
*and subsequently losing, of course. If they won, and the US government acknowledged them as a legitimate country, then it wouldn't be treason.
*and subsequently losing, of course. If they won, and the US government acknowledged them as a legitimate country, then it wouldn't be treason.
Optical_Illusion
Banned
I think that this sort of international law, in an intra national dispute, at this time, is anachronistic, and anyway would require acknowledging the people you're prosecuting as separate nationals ("international law").
Nuremberg trials - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
This totally lead to The Terror, huh?
SpaceOrbisGaming
Banned
That fort is in the south. Now I haven't looked to see if that state had left yet but I'm going to say it had. The troops in that fort would be there illegally. They were asked to leave and they didn't. What would you do in their place? If somebody is in your house and will not go you have to use force. Otherwise, they may take more of your stuff.
The United States is the land of the free or so it is said. But the second people choose to leave it turns out you don't have that right. I can't help but find this kind of funny. But the point still stands that the Union had troops in the Confederacy illegally. Firing on it was going to happen if for no other reason than that it was made necessary.
As a West Virginia man myself I agree that slavery is and was an evil unbecoming of any nation. But let us not forget that most people fighting for the south had no slaves nor held any love for keeping it alive. Most joined because it sounded fun and would allow them to see more of the world. This kind of thing is still a big reason why people join the armed forces.
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I think the international community was sufficiently hostile to slavery that they could have been persuaded to sanction this if such a thing was asked and wanted and lawyers would have found a way.
Certainly in exchange for appropriate concessions. Britain and France would have jumped at the chance to assert their voice in the affairs of the western hemisphere.
The legal waffle is irrelevant. The voice of The Great Powers granting legitimacy is what matters.
OTL the North cared more about its Imperial Project, and making South America US rather than British sphere of influence than about dealing with slavery and its legacy. I am imagining if the inverse were the case.
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Nothing in the Constitution says so, not that that should matter, but I assume this means you hate Arlington National Cemetery and want it destroyed?
Oh god no, "victors write the history books" is a trite rhetorical device that makes no sense in the context of modern history and is almost always patently untrue, Americans have been force-fed propaganda from the losing side of the Civil War for 150 years.
Deleted member 109224
I recall that the North was worried about trying Jefferson Davis because they feared he'd win on the legal argument that states had a right to secede. It wasn't a settled legal question until after the Civil War.
I don't think a jury of freedmen would end well, as far as social repercussions go. The Democratic and Conservative Republican press would have a field day.
Besides, the OP specifically said we could be anachronistic.