Food for Thought

[wpbinzel]

I return not to debate whether the military tribunal was "legal" or "illegal" as I think we have whacked that poor beast to death. I have appreciated the debate and the spirit in which it has been conducted.

However, I did want to circle back to something I wrote about two weeks ago while traveling. I suggested that President Johnson had a reason to pardon the three conspirators in the waning days of his administration other than the speculation that it was to avoid a Supreme Court ruling on Ex parte Mudd (which I find interesting and worthy of consideration, but it is still speculation. I have not accepted or rejected the notion).

In my opinion, the reason was contained in Johnson's Christmas 1868 proclamation in which he granted "unconditionally and without reservation, to all and to every person [emphasis added] who, directly or indirectly, participated in the late insurrection or rebellion a full pardon and amnesty for the offense of treason against the United States or of adhering to their enemies during the late civil war." Because the Lincoln assassination conspirators were tried as enemy belligerents acting on behalf of a waring government (and regardless of whether you accept that today, that was the position of the US government in 1865), and because unlike earlier pardons, this one was unqualified and applied to "all and every person" who acted in any capacity on behalf of the Confederate government. Consequently, the December 25, 1868 proclamation had already pardoned Mudd, Arnold and Spangler. Since it was a done deal, was there a push to conclude the matter before what might have been an adverse Supreme Court ruling on Mudd? Again, it is not proven, but a notion worthy of consideration. But even if that was a motivating factor, it still does not overturn Boynton's ruling. It is likely that we will never know how the Court was going to rule on the case, and as I noted above, I see no point in further debate here.

The real irony is that because the conspirators were tried as enemy belligerents before a military tribunal, they were (or very likely would have been had the matter been litigated) included in Johnson's 1868 proclamation. Had they been tried and convicted by a civilian jury, Mudd and Arnold would have rotted their lives away in prison, as would have Spangler for another two years.