Illegal Lincoln? Abraham Lincoln and Habeas Corpus

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Lincoln, who in our collective memory resounds as a strong, certain and triumphant leader, was forced to make incredibly difficult decisions throughout the Civil War, and some of these decisions have not always been applauded.  Lincoln may have, as some scholars have put it, a “dark side.”  His actions were not always approved of at the time; in fact, Lincoln decried as a tyrant in many quarters.  In the spring of 1861, President Lincoln suspended the writ of habeas corpus in Maryland—allowing American citizens to be locked up indefinitely without the opportunity of a trial.  Lincoln’s suspension of the writ stands as one of the strongest uses of presidential power in United States’ history.  This post examines not only the crisis in Maryland that led to such drastic (or draconian?) legal steps, but also explores the current academic debate on Lincoln’s actions.  Three simple questions are then raised and considered:  Were Abraham Lincoln’s actions legal?  What were his constitutional views that would permit such a bold use of presidential power?  Lastly, were his actions justified?

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Memorable Days: The Costs of War through the Eyes of a Free Black Woman

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Memorable Days: The Costs of War through the Eyes of a Free Black Woman

1863, as we have noted, was a memorable year for Emilie Davis. A free black woman living in Philadelphia, Emilie celebrated the Emancipation Proclamation, twin Union victories at Gettysburg and Vicksburg, and steps toward lasting change as northern states like Maryland chose to end slavery voluntarily. But 1863 was also a year of devastation for Emilie, one in which she would witness the deterioration of her family as a direct result of the new rights that came along with the Emancipation Proclamation.

This is the third installment of Memorable Days: the Civil War through the eyes of a free black woman. To read an introduction of Emilie, click here. To read her take on the Battle of Gettysburg, click here.

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Not Who, But How: Civil War Loyalty

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Not Who, But How: Civil War Loyalty

At the root of any civil war lays loyalty. Internal conflicts, fought over everything from politics to religion, produce deep divisions amongst a nation’s populace. America’s Civil War was no exception, as it witnessed divisions along geographic, social, political, and racial lines. Not only did the war divide former countrymen, but these divisions were something that Americans talked extensively about throughout the war. As historian William Blair recently noted, in the Civil War North it is almost impossible to find a newspaper that did not discuss treason or loyalty in nearly every issue. Along with extensive discussion about loyalty and treason in local newspapers, these conversations carried over into the personal correspondences of contemporary men and women. I, like many other historians, have studied the issue of wartime loyalty, yet my research takes that subject in a different direction.

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Sesquicentennial Spotlight: The 13th Amendment Passes the House

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Sesquicentennial Spotlight: The 13th Amendment Passes the House

The United States did not enter the Civil War with the intent to destroy slavery.  However, by the end of the war in 1865 slavery had been dealt its death blow.  Today marks the 150th anniversary of the 13th Amendment passing Congress, and moving on to the states for ratification.  While the Emancipation Proclamation is more famous, it was the 13th Amendment that gave emancipation meaning and solidified the end of the war as the end of slavery in America.

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“To think of the subject unmans me:” Grief and Soldiering Through the Experience of Henry Livermore Abbott

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“To think of the subject unmans me:” Grief and Soldiering Through the Experience of Henry Livermore Abbott

On August 9, 1862, twenty year old Henry Livermore Abbott suffered a great personal tragedy; the death of his beloved older brother, Ned. Writing to his father weeks later, Abbott admitted, “I have had a good many letters about Ned but I can’t answer them. To think of the subject unmans me. I have to keep it from my thoughts.” He struggled to come to terms with this loss, as this was more than the death of a sibling. It was the loss of a comrade killed in battle.

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Schoolhouse Rock and Executive Powers

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Schoolhouse Rock and Executive Powers

On several occasions during his tenure in office, President Obama has made statements and comments describing his stance on whether or not to shield illegal immigrants in America from deportation.  The problem seemed to come to a new head this past November, when the President seemingly turned from this statement to take executive action to shield four million illegal immigrants facing deportation. The issues and questions surrounding the President’s actions are numerous. Is his use of “executive action” legal? How does this affect us? How does this affect the economy? How does this action apply to? Is there anyway Congress could prevent this action? How is this different than an “executive order”? And the list continues. Thankfully, Max Ehrenfreund at the Washington Post compiled a fantastic article detailing these questions. When my students began asking similar questions I thought to myself, “I wonder if people realize President Obama is not our first President to use executive power to make a move on an issue pressing our country?”

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Memorable Days: The Battle of Gettysburg through the Eyes of a Free Black Woman

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Memorable Days: The Battle of Gettysburg through the Eyes of a Free Black Woman

Gettysburg. If someone can name a single Civil War battle, it is most likely the only major battle that occurred north of the Mason-Dixon Line. Many argue that this three day ordeal in 1863 was the culminating point of America’s most destructive war, the moment that turned the tide against Robert E. Lee’s legendary Army of Northern Virginia and began the uphill struggle towards reunion and a new birth of freedom. But Emilie Davis, a free African-American woman living in Philadelphia during the war, never names this small Pennsylvania town in her diary chronicling the monumental year of 1863.

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Sesquicentennial Spotlight: The Fall of Fort Fisher and the Confederacy's Collapse

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Sesquicentennial Spotlight: The Fall of Fort Fisher and the Confederacy's Collapse

Dr. James A. Mowris surveyed the scene around him and could not help but be struck by its terrible grandeur.  The forty year-old surgeon, under whose care were the veteran soldiers of the 117th New York Infantry, watched enraptured as thousands of Union troops disembarked onto the North Carolina coast.  As the “downy web footed infantry” splashed ashore, a United States Navy fleet provided cover fire, bombarding Confederate-held Fort Fisher nearby.  Fort Fisher protected the port of Wilmington, North Carolina, where for four years sleek Confederate blockade runners had slipped past Union warships and returned laden with much needed provisions, war materials, medicine, and more.  By 1865, Wilmington was the Confederacy’s last remaining open port, a thin golden lifeline the connected the beleaguered South to the outside world and all its riches. Yet James A. Mowris and the nearly 9,000 other Union soldiers accompanying him had arrived to cut that invaluable lifeline.  It was Friday the 13th, January, 1865, and the last great coastal campaign of the Civil War was underway.

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Memorable Days: The Civil War through the Eyes of a Free Black Woman

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Memorable Days: The Civil War through the Eyes of a Free Black Woman

Emilie Davis was a young twenty-something black woman living in the city of Philadelphia during the Civil War. Like many her age, she worried about school, employment, family and friends. Her activities did not make headlines, and her name is unlikely to appear in a textbook. Yet her story is important because it is the story of a cross-section of society previously unexplored. Moreover, Emilie’s story is everyone’s story, a narrative of a woman on the rise, confronting the daily realities of a nation at war at a personal level defined by relationships, experiences, and often the seemingly mundane.

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18,000: A Comparison of May 3, 1863 and May 12, 1864

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On the morning of May 3, 1863, Confederate soldiers slunk through the thick foliage that dominated the Wilderness around the Orange Turnpike and the tiny hamlet of Chancellorsville, Virginia. Around 5:30am, Robert E. Lee and the Army of Northern Virginia, outnumbered, outgunned, and divided, unleashed a series of brutal frontal assaults on the Union positions around the Chancellor House. By the late morning, over a span of five hours, the Confederates had battered and broken the will of Joseph Hooker, commander of the Army of the Potomac, compelling him to abandon the intersection near Chancellorsville and retreat back towards the Rapidan and Rappahannock Rivers.

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"Coming to Terms with Civil War Military History": A Response

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"Coming to Terms with Civil War Military History": A Response

The December issue of the Journal of the Civil War Era questions the state and direction of military history as a field.  In their foreword to this special issue of the journal, historians Gary Gallagher and Kathryn Shively Meier offer their comments on military history and its important role in understanding and studying the Civil War.  Many of their points deserve close attention, for they offer good suggestions for the direction of the field; other comments pointedly object to a rising set of scholarship which I argue follows the cycle of historical interpretation.

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The Blue and Gray in Black and White: The Media’s Portrayal of Veterans during the 75th Anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg

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The Blue and Gray in Black and White: The Media’s Portrayal of Veterans during the 75th Anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg

“There’s Still Life in the Old Boys Yet!,” a newspaper article emphatically exclaimed. An accompanying photograph portrayed Union veteran Tim Flaherty, well into his nineties, dancing a jig for his comrades. The year was 1938, the July heat sweltering, and the final grand reunion of the blue and gray well underway. Seventy-five years after the battle of Gettysburg, 1,845 veterans were able to reach the rolling hills of southern Pennsylvania to once more commemorate the defining four years of their generation.

However, this reunion was different than the others.

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Welcome to Civil Discourse

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Welcome to Civil Discourse, a blog of the long Civil War era!

We are excited to announce the launch of Civil Discourse, coming January 2015.  Civil Discourse explores the complex history of the long Civil War by connecting academic and public audiences and engaging with traditional and new scholarship.  Considering its transformative nature, it is unsurprising that the Civil War remains one of the most deeply contested, debated, discussed, and researched eras in American history.  Yet despite decades of scholarship and interest, our understanding of the war and its legacy remain complex; plenty more continues to be discovered and discussed.  Civil Discourse creates a venue for these various conversations to come together; in particular, our blog seeks to bridge the gap between academic and popular interest in the war. 

Through Civil Discourse, our authors strive to offer compelling, well-written articles that explore various facets—both old and new—of the long Civil War era stretching from the early Republic through Reconstruction.  We embrace traditional military and political history, as well as exciting scholarship in the fields of social, cultural, gendered, racial, legal and economic, and memory history.  We hope to entertain, inform, and perhaps provoke both the academic and buff alike.

Look for our first articles to roll out after the New Year festivities in January, 2015.  In the meantime, poke around our site and get a sense of who we are and what you as a reader can expect.  Follow us on Facebook and Twitter (@CD_HistoryBlog) for updates on our progress and news about upcoming posts.  If you have scholarship to share or would like to suggest topics for articles, please contact the editors using the “Contact Us” page.

We look forward to seeing you in 2015!

            Zac Cowsert & Katie Thompson, Editors