The Fall of Richmond: The tidings received in the Northern Metropolis

Melville, Herman; Ryan, Robert C.; Hayford, Harrison; MacDougall, Alma A.; Tanselle, G. Thomas

doi:10.1093/oseo/instance.00214265

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“…In his 1872 treatise The Rise of the Republic of the United States, Frothingham rhapsodized about the positive benefits of defeating secession in the crucible of civil war. 72 An 1867 article in Harper's Weekly also celebrated the military triumph over secession, insisting that the battlefield resolution of this question was tantamount to a constitutional amendment, and would remain far more enduring than any mere court decision declaring the permanency of the Union. John C. Gray Jr. to John C. Gray Sr. May 14, 1865.…”

Section: Northern Commentators On Trial By Battlementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Upon hearing of the fall of Richmond in April 1865, Melville wrote: "But God is in Heaven, and Grant in the Town, / And Right through might is Law-/ God's way adore." 72 An 1867 article in Harper's Weekly also celebrated the military triumph over secession, insisting that the battlefield resolution of this question was tantamount to a constitutional amendment, and would remain far more enduring than any mere court decision declaring the permanency of the Union. Now that the war had established secession's illegality, the article argued, that principle "was not in the reversible decision of a court, but it is in the organic law as interpreted by the decision of the people."…”

Section: Northern Commentators On Trial By Battlementioning

confidence: 99%

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The American Civil War as a Trial by Battle

Nicoletti¹

2010

Law hist. rev.

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Confined alone in a cell in New York's Fort Lafayette in the heat of the summer of 1865, former Confederate naval secretary Stephen R. Mallory had little to do but reflect on the fate of the defeated Confederacy. Convinced that his life might be forfeit if the United States government made good on its threat to try him for treason, Mallory composed a lengthy letter to President Andrew Johnson petitioning for a pardon and seeking to explain his views on the demise of the Confederacy and the fate of the states' right to secede from the Union. While Mallory stressed his opposition to disunion in 1861, on the grounds of its inexpediency, he admitted that he had placed loyalty to his state above his duty as a citizen of the United States. He had “regarded the commands of my state as decisive of my path of duty; and I followed where she led.” Nonetheless, Mallory went on to disclaim his belief in the principle of secession in very striking terms, describing the death of secession in the crucible of the Civil War as the result of a trial by battle. Mallory never specifically denied secession's constitutionality; instead, he told Johnson that because he “recognize[ed] the death [of the Confederacy] as the will of Almighty God, I regard and accept His dispensation as decisive of the questions of slavery and secession.”

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Section: Northern Commentators On Trial By Battlementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Northern Commentators On Trial By Battlementioning

confidence: 99%