We hanged Jeff Davis from a sour apple tree

Right-as opposed to the ghosts of Saints Robert E Lee and Nathan Bedford Forest who hovered over most proceedings South of the Mason-Dixon Line OTL.
As I said in the first quote, I'm not defending what happened in OTL. Personally, I think anybody who made the conscious decision to go to war for the right to own another human being is truly despicable, and deserves very little mercy. What I'm saying is that I'm unsure whether hanging Davis and the rest of the ringleaders of his nasty little rebellion would improve things. It might. It might be that doing that would allow a clean slate, for proper reconstruction, and clearing out the filth that ended up being the KKK, and all the other horrors of Southern segregation society post 1865. Or it might make things even worse than OTL. Because it could have been. As horrible as OTL was, it could have been even more-so for lots of people. Personally, I think adding an actual 'Martyr' to the pantheon of Lee and Forrest is one way to bring about that deterioration. Sorry if my previous post wasn't clear.
 
As long as the distinction is drawn that there is a big gulf between the Average Joe Southerner and the CSA elites that they put to trial and hang, I think it could go off without too much grief.

On the plus side, it may prevent what in OTL proved to be the saving grace of the planter elite and the doom of Southern blacks - that the previously tense relationship between the poor whites and the gentry reconciled. Here, the USA would preempt that, play off of that tension, and could well prevent it from every happening.

Ironically enough, by using one of the OTL Lost Causer's main tenants - "you folks were just fighting to defend your homes, you never would have had to if those bastards in Richmond hadn't forced you to fight their rebellion." Only this time, it would be used to see the proto-Lost Causers hung. Ain't AH grand :D

The thing about this seems like a big maybe. I doubt hanging the South's leaders would have any effect on the personal opinion of the populace that the blacks were subhuman, or the die hard Confederates who refused to accept Reconstruction.

If anything a surviving Lincoln and firm dedication to Reconstruction does the blacks much better, rather than uniting the Planter elite and poor whites in a continued hatred of blacks. You can't forcibly change their perception, but you can prevent them from becoming apartheid lite.
 
The thing about this seems like a big maybe. I doubt hanging the South's leaders would have any effect on the personal opinion of the populace that the blacks were subhuman, or the die hard Confederates who refused to accept Reconstruction.

If anything a surviving Lincoln and firm dedication to Reconstruction does the blacks much better, rather than uniting the Planter elite and poor whites in a continued hatred of blacks. You can't forcibly change their perception, but you can prevent them from becoming apartheid lite.

No, but keeping the poor whites and the rich whites in the South separate allows for an opening for Reconstruction - divide and conquer.

One of the most destructive effects the planter elite had post-war was convincing the poor whites to side with their skin color rather than their self-interest. That same planter elite takes a plunge down the gallows tree, at the very least, the worst of post-War racism just got dealt a body blow.

Take the Freedman's Bureau/Homestead Act for example. Take the plantation owners lands, and divide them into lots, for both the poor whites and the former slaves, and send some to settle the West. The planter elite make a convenient scapegoat for the miseries of both, and free farmland goes a long way toward keeping even the most bigoted man quiet.

... and I just realized I'm advocating for class warfare. Only the Confederacy could make a lefty out of a capitalist like me :p
 
No, but keeping the poor whites and the rich whites in the South separate allows for an opening for Reconstruction - divide and conquer.

One of the most destructive effects the planter elite had post-war was convincing the poor whites to side with their skin color rather than their self-interest. That same planter elite takes a plunge down the gallows tree, at the very least, the worst of post-War racism just got dealt a body blow.

Was that really the fault of the planter elite or the entrenched sense of racism that the South had?

Really it's a legitimate question, I had always thought that the emerging racism was just a byproduct of the very racist Southern culture that persisted into the 20th century thanks to the rather sad attempt at carrying out Reconstruction in OTL.

Take the Freedman's Bureau/Homestead Act for example. Take the plantation owners lands, and divide them into lots, for both the poor whites and the former slaves, and send some to settle the West. The planter elite make a convenient scapegoat for the miseries of both, and free farmland goes a long way toward keeping even the most bigoted man quiet.

Interesting, but can they legally be made scapegoats to support such an act?

... and I just realized I'm advocating for class warfare. Only the Confederacy could make a lefty out of a capitalist like me :p

Shhhh... you'll make me realize that I'm supporting the bourgeoisie :p
 

Lateknight

Banned
Interesting, but can they legally be made scapegoats to support such an act?

Whoever is used the term first scapegoat is wrong the planers where in no way needing to be framed or unfairly blamed they committed enough real crimes for such extralegal measures to be needed. And yes legally you can say this group of people where literally the worst group of criminals in American history . They didn't because sadly the north wasn't committed to ending the conditions that blacks suffered under what they wanted was the union back and got it as imperfect as it was.
 
Judah Benjamin managed to get away from Union troops and head to England, I believe. Would it end up with the South blaming him even further for the woes of the South?
 
Trying and/or executing a chunk of the Confederate leadership will not help the newly freed black population. Only a sustained and enforced postwar policy that prevented the transition from newly freed former slave to indentured servant/sharecropper by the north would do this, also enforcing voting rights & so forth.

While there was significant grumbling during the CW by southern troops about how rich plantation owners got exemptions from service for themselves and some employees (if you owned a certain number of slaves this exemption existed - my memory tells me was 40 so only very wealthy fit in this category), middle class and poor whites served and fought hard until the last 6+ months of the war when desertions became a real problem. This was because of Union troops were penetrating well in to the south & troops deserted to take care of families, simultaneously there was increasing hardship with regard to food, clothing etc throughout the south.
 
Right. Racist democrats fighting racist fascists-aint life grand.


Indeed, but what has that to do with the OP?

Racism was endemic in those days, in north and south alike, and there's no reason why hanging Jefferson Davis should have had the slightest effect on it one way or the other.
 
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Would that affect the attitude of respectable northern whites toward him.

Respectable West Point etc classmates were never going to be executed - dog did not eat dog - but the likes of Wirz were fair game.
Not that the Southerners were any better about Germans, given how their was a murder of one or two of them in Texas at time of secession for their suspected pro-union sympathies. Not that they killed the governor of course. Might have helped that Houston stepped aside so a man who only moved to Texas a year after independence could take charge, ignoring how Texas's entire history as an independent state was them attempting to become a State.

Also, Wirz was probably easier game because he was in uniform, was caught at the scene of the crime (though I admit he probably did the best that he could), and because places like Fort Pillow were not photographed. Unlike this.

andresn.jpg
 
Trying and/or executing a chunk of the Confederate leadership will not help the newly freed black population. Only a sustained and enforced postwar policy that prevented the transition from newly freed former slave to indentured servant/sharecropper by the north would do this, also enforcing voting rights & so forth.

While there was significant grumbling during the CW by southern troops about how rich plantation owners got exemptions from service for themselves and some employees (if you owned a certain number of slaves this exemption existed - my memory tells me was 40 so only very wealthy fit in this category), middle class and poor whites served and fought hard until the last 6+ months of the war when desertions became a real problem. This was because of Union troops were penetrating well in to the south & troops deserted to take care of families, simultaneously there was increasing hardship with regard to food, clothing etc throughout the south.

It was 20.
 
A question is if anybody could actually be found guilty of treason.

No person shall be convicted of treason unless on the testimony of two witnesses to the same overt act, or on confession in open court.
What counts as an overt act and who counts as witnesses?

That needs to be figured out, since I doubt anybody would be stupid enough to confess in court.
 
What charges could be levied against Davis that could not also be levied against the entire Cabinet, Congress, and every governor and state legislator of the Confederate States? Shall they also swing?

Only those who were members of the US government before the war. So members of the US congress and members of Buchanon's Cabinet and the US military. I don't think prewar state officials would be covered.

So a confederate congressman who was a Georgia state senator before the war wouldn't count.
 
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