How would you have treated confederate leaders?

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Different historians have different ideas about what caused the Civil War, and the consensus among historians has shifted over the years.

Consensus amongst historians? An interesting theory, but, frankly, the idea that there are faeries at the bottom of my garden is more believable.

[gorkay]

Different historians have different ideas about what caused the Civil War, and the consensus among historians has shifted over the years.

Consensus amongst historians? An interesting theory, but, frankly, the idea that there are faeries at the bottom of my garden is more believable.

I meant "consensus" only in the most relative sense. A consensus among historians is not the same as a consensus among most other groups. Maybe what I should have said was that in recent years, the prevailing opinions about the Civil War have changed. But they are likely to change again, and again, in subsequent years.

[Mechaman]

It's so fun to see that the talk of the post Civil War era gets so many people so excited and thrilled about abandoning human decency and engage in fantasies of barbarity that involves the killings of dozens, if not hundreds, of people all in the name of American Nationalism.

So fun.

As for how I would've treated the leaders?  A surrender would've been enough to satisfy my ego so I guess I would've just let things be.  I know that sounds crazy to some folks, but forgiveness has always made me feel better than policies of retribution.

[The Mikado]

Pardon with a ban on ever holding elected office again.

[Mikestone8]

Pardon with a ban on ever holding elected office again.

What's the point of the ban?

Is  anything much changed if, say, Alexander H Stephens' seat in Congress is held instead by some more obscure figure, not a leading Confederate but holding essentially the same views as Stephens?

[Rooney]

I would have followed the plan Lincoln outlined in his Final Speech and was willing to extend to Louisiana and Tennessee.

[Free Palestine]

It's so fun to see that the talk of the post Civil War era gets so many people so excited and thrilled about abandoning human decency and engage in fantasies of barbarity that involves the killings of dozens, if not hundreds, of people all in the name of American Nationalism.

So fun.

[Helenae]

I would have followed the plan Lincoln outlined in his Final Speech and was willing to extend to Louisiana and Tennessee.

I totally agree with you. If America had followed through with Lincoln's ideas after his assassination, then there wouldn't have been so much resentment and the birth of the KKK.

Also a lot of people in the civil war in the south were not just solely fighting for the right for slavery. Some, like Lee, were fighting because it was their home. Though, if you read the constitution of the Confederates... it kinda points out it was over slavery. But it doesn't mean the leaders were evil, they simply loved their states.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

The last thing the United States needed was more bloodshed. Pretty much freeing those who surrendered and pledged loyalty and imprisoning those who did not. I see no purpose of executing any of the confederate leaders other than appeasing radical mob.

Also, Lincoln's death was a tragedy, since Andrew Johnson and Radical Republicans were handling reconstruction in opposite, yet equally poor, fashions.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

If Lincoln not been assassinated, Reconstruction would likely have been less harsh on the Confederate leaders, I think it is also possible that it could have also led to a protracted guerrilla war in the South.  Lincoln's assassination ended any speculation that a guerrilla war might cause the North to give up trying to subdue the South.  While there was some bloodshed associated with those seeking to end Reconstruction, that bloodshed was about trying to regain power within each State, and not about also trying to gain independence for their States.

[Mikestone8]

If Lincoln not been assassinated, Reconstruction would likely have been less harsh on the Confederate leaders, I think it is also possible that it could have also led to a protracted guerrilla war in the South.  Lincoln's assassination ended any speculation that a guerrilla war might cause the North to give up trying to subdue the South.  While there was some bloodshed associated with those seeking to end Reconstruction, that bloodshed was about trying to regain power within each State, and not about also trying to gain independence for their States.

Guerilla warfare was already off the agenda. Lee had rejected it, and so had Johnston by opening talks with Sherman - already under way when Lincoln was shot.

The only danger of it was if the North had attempted some of the more vindictive things suggested on this thread. Thankfully, they had more sense.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Guerrilla warfare was already off the agenda. Lee had rejected it, and so had Johnston by opening talks with Sherman - already under way when Lincoln was shot.

The only danger of it was if the North had attempted some of the more vindictive things suggested on this thread. Thankfully, they had more sense.

Davis certainly had not given up and whether the talks between Johnston and Sherman would have gone the way they did in the absence of Lincoln's assassination is doubtful.  While the Confederacy as an organized body was doomed, an unorganized rabble continuing on was still possible.  Lincoln's assassination had the beneficial effect that the bitter-enders of the South sought the obtainable goal of putting the Negro in his place, rather than continuing to seek an unobtainable independence.  By and large the attempt to secede had been a conservative revolution in the first place, which is why Lincoln's assassination was so shocking.

[LBJer]

I wouldn't have treated them very differently than how they were treated.  I abhor the very idea of slavery, and am very glad the Union prevailed, but I also think that a policy of vindictiveness toward the former Confederates could have resulted in the South becoming another Israel/Palestine or Northern Ireland.  Restoring America as a strong, unified country was more important than punishing the Confederates.  Moreover, as odious as the idea of seceding to preserve slavery is (and of course, the war was a result of the secession), the leaders of the South were sincere in their attitudes, however flawed and racist those attitudes were.  I don't see how punishing them more severely would have convinced anyone that this way of thinking was wrong who didn't feel it was wrong already.  In addition, if by "punishment" you mean legal punishment, what would they be punished for?  The former Confederates were hardly the Nazi leaders at the Nuremberg Trials (and the legality even of Nuremberg has been seriously questioned, although many who do so feel that even if it wasn't legal it was morally just).  Slavery had been legal, and the legality of secession was murky.  There was nothing that they did that you could point to as being clearly against the law, nothing like genocide (of course, many Confederates committed atrocities during the war, but many Unionists did as well).  This is probably why Jefferson Davis was never tried for treason.

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

[RogueBeaver]

[Mechaman]

It's so fun to see that the talk of the post Civil War era gets so many people so excited and thrilled about abandoning human decency and engage in fantasies of barbarity that involves the killings of dozens, if not hundreds, of people all in the name of American Nationalism.

[Hatman 🍁]

I would put them on trial and let modern justice take its course.

[Peter the Lefty]

Lee should've been offered a role in Reconstruction.  Life imprisonment for Jefferson Davis, Alexander Stephens, and the rest of the whole lot.  Land distributions for both freedmen and poor Southern whites, too, while we're at it. 

[TNF]

Trial by jury, of course. Juries composed of freed slaves and poor white sharecroppers drafted into the Confederate Army against their will.

And then of course, the hangman's noose.

[memphis]

Execution, without a doubt. The South got away with treason way too easily, and has had a chip on their shoulder ever since. Armed insurrection is not a silly little game, where you shake hands afterward. 

[Mechaman]

Execution, without a doubt. The South got away with treason way too easily, and has had a chip on their shoulder ever since. Armed insurrection is not a silly little game, where you shake hands afterward. 

Yeah killing their leaders would've prevented that. . . .

[Lief 🗽]

Execution, without a doubt. The South got away with treason way too easily, and has had a chip on their shoulder ever since. Armed insurrection is not a silly little game, where you shake hands afterward. 

Yeah killing their leaders would've prevented that. . . .

We killed Germany's leaders after WWII. That turned out fine.

[TNF]

Execution, without a doubt. The South got away with treason way too easily, and has had a chip on their shoulder ever since. Armed insurrection is not a silly little game, where you shake hands afterward. 

Yeah killing their leaders would've prevented that. . . .

Allowing them to live allowed them to organize and take back power in the South, thus undoing the entire Civil War for a ing century.

[Mechaman]

Execution, without a doubt. The South got away with treason way too easily, and has had a chip on their shoulder ever since. Armed insurrection is not a silly little game, where you shake hands afterward. 

Yeah killing their leaders would've prevented that. . . .

Allowing them to live allowed them to organize and take back power in the South, thus undoing the entire Civil War for a ing century.

Well then for finks sake imprison them for treason.  Don't resort to chopping their heads off or gallowing them.  That's something I would expect from barbaric slaveholders. . . . .

[politicus]

If Lincoln not been assassinated, Reconstruction would likely have been less harsh on the Confederate leaders, I think it is also possible that it could have also led to a protracted guerrilla war in the South.  Lincoln's assassination ended any speculation that a guerrilla war might cause the North to give up trying to subdue the South.  While there was some bloodshed associated with those seeking to end Reconstruction, that bloodshed was about trying to regain power within each State, and not about also trying to gain independence for their States.

Could you elaborate?

It seems to me that getting rid of Lincoln increased the power of radical Republicans giving the South more of a reason to fight on.