Booth's Escape Route

[Jim Garrett]

The lines do seem to be blurred between military, quasi-military, and what we would now call black ops. The question is when does a politian become a justified target? Does a commander in chief who is ultimately responsible for the prosecution of a war off limits? Is the Secretary of State a legitimate target? Does Seward become a target because of his involvement or condoning the violent abolishonists (John Brown's reign of Terror)?

We did take the removal by assassination of foreign political targets off the table until fairly recently.

Would the outrage have been as great if Jefferson Davis and Judah Benjamin had been assassinated in the Dahlgren raid? Certainly not if the result was a speedy end to the conflict.