Beware the People Weeping
Beware the People Weeping

Author: Thomas Reed Turner

Publisher: LSU Press

Published: 1991-09-01

Total Pages: 292

ISBN-13: 9780807117224

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The first killing of a president in American history, the assassination of Abraham Lincoln shook the nation to its foundations with grief and rage. With one bullet the brief period of good feeling at the end of the Civil War was over. By 1867 the initial belief that the Confederate leadership had engineered the assassination had given way to speculation that Andrew Johnson had been behind the conspiracy. This was followed by bitter attacks on the military trial and on the defense of its two most prominent “victims,” Mrs. Surratt and Dr. Mudd. Most recently, there have been attempts to show that it was the radical faction of Lincoln’s own party that arranged his death. In Beware the People Weeping, Thomas Reed Turner pushes away the elaborate conspiracy theories that have always surrounded Lincoln’s death and uncovers exactly what can be known about the murder and its aftermath. Finding that many historians have worked in ignorance of the context of the events, or distorted the evidence to suit their own ideas about political assassination, Turner looks instead to public opinion of the time—as reflected in newspapers, diaries, letters, sermons, and transcripts of the pretrial investigation and the trial itself—to understand how and why the public and the military reacted as they did. Probing the aftermath of the assassination, Turner tells of the spontaneous outpouring of rage and despair, the reaction in the defeated South, the almost universal conviction that the South was behind the plot, the actions of the authorities in tracking the conspirators, and the trials of the suspects, including that of John Surratt in 1867. A close look at these confused events and an untangling of the controversies that arose in their wake, Beware the People Weeping strips away more than a century of speculation to retell with hard facts the history of Abraham Lincoln’s death.

Judah P. Benjamin
Judah P. Benjamin

Author: Eli N. Evans

Publisher: Simon and Schuster

Published: 1989

Total Pages: 500

ISBN-13: 0029099110

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This biography was acclaimed by The New York Times as "deeply interesting" and "an absorbing account" of the life of the man called "the brains of the Confederacy". 16 pages of illustrations.

Secession on Trial
Secession on Trial

Author: Cynthia Nicoletti

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2017-10-13

Total Pages: 359

ISBN-13: 110824761X

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This book focuses on the post-Civil War treason prosecution of Confederate President Jefferson Davis, which was seen as a test case on the major question that animated the Civil War: the constitutionality of secession. The case never went to trial because it threatened to undercut the meaning and significance of Union victory. Cynthia Nicoletti describes the interactions of the lawyers who worked on both sides of the Davis case - who saw its potential to disrupt the verdict of the battlefield against secession. In the aftermath of the Civil War, Americans engaged in a wide-ranging debate over the legitimacy and effectiveness of war as a method of legal adjudication. Instead of risking the 'wrong' outcome in the highly volatile Davis case, the Supreme Court took the opportunity to pronounce secession unconstitutional in Texas v. White (1869).

Whose Right Is It? The Fourteenth Amendment and the Fight for Equality
Whose Right Is It? The Fourteenth Amendment and the Fight for Equality

Author: Hana Bajramovic

Publisher: Henry Holt and Company (BYR)

Published: 2024-06-25

Total Pages: 161

ISBN-13: 1250225280

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Discover the truth about the Fourteenth Amendment, civil rights, and the United States’ continued fight for equality in this singular nonfiction book for young readers. Since the ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment in 1868, Americans have been guaranteed equal protection under the law. But these protections haven’t always been inclusive. In 2022, we saw the Supreme Court overturn Roe v. Wade–a decision made in 1973 that guaranteed abortion as a fundamental right. Other critical Supreme Court decisions regarding affirmative action, immigration, and LGBTQ+ rights have been hotly debated as culture has shifted over the last several years. With the Supreme Court’s narrow interpretations of the “equality amendment”–disregarding what the drafters of the amendment said it was meant to do–the Fourteenth Amendment has shaped the conversation and legislation of civil rights and liberties in America for decades. Hana Bajramovic’s Whose Right Is It? The Fourteenth Amendment and the Fight for Equality explores how one amendment became the focus for many of today’s most important constitutional debates. Featuring historical photos and informative graphics, this book shows a new generation of aspiring activists what the fight for equality across race, sexuality, gender, and citizenship looks like.

The Clays of Alabama
The Clays of Alabama

Author: Ruth Ketring Nuermberger

Publisher: University Press of Kentucky

Published: 2021-12-14

Total Pages: 463

ISBN-13: 0813194903

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Of unique interest to the student of nineteenth century America is this account of the Alabama Clays, who in their private life were typical of the slaveholding aristocracy of the old South, but as lawyer-politicians played significant roles in state and national politics, in the development of the Democratic party, and in the affairs of the Confederacy. In the period from 1811 to 1915, the Clays were involved in many of the great problems confronting the South. This study of the Clay family includes accounts of the wartime legislation of the Confederate Congress and the activities of the Confederate Commission in Canada. Equally interesting to many readers will be the intimate view of social life in ante-bellum Washington and the story of the domestic struggles of a plantation family during and after the war, as revealed through the letters of Clement Claiborne Clay and his wife Virginia.

The Million-Dollar Man Who Helped Kill a President
The Million-Dollar Man Who Helped Kill a President

Author: Christopher McIlwain

Publisher: Casemate Publishers

Published: 2018-07-19

Total Pages: 344

ISBN-13: 1611213959

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George Washington Gayle is not a name known to history. But it soon will be. Forget what you thought you knew about why Abraham Lincoln was assassinated by John Wilkes Booth. No, it was not mere sectional hatred, Booth’s desire to become famous, Lincoln’s advocacy of black suffrage, or a plot masterminded by Jefferson Davis to win the war by crippling the Federal government. Christopher Lyle McIlwain, Sr.’s Untried and Unpunished: George Washington Gayle and the Assassination of Abraham Lincoln exposes the fallacies regarding each of those theories and reveals both the mastermind behind the plot, and its true motivation. The deadly scheme to kill Lincoln, Vice President Andrew Johnson, and Secretary of State William Seward was Gayle’s brainchild. The assassins were motivated by money Gayle raised. Lots of money. $20,000,000 in today’s value. Gayle, a prominent South Carolina-born Alabama lawyer, had been a Unionist and Jacksonian Democrat before walking the road of radicalization following the admission of California as a free state in 1850. Thereafter, he became Alabama’s most earnest secessionist, though he would never hold any position within the Confederate government or serve in its military. After the slaying of the president Gayle was arrested and taken to Washington, DC in chains to be tried by a military tribunal for conspiracy in connection with the horrendous crimes. The Northern press was satisfied Gayle was behind the deed—especially when it was discovered he had placed an advertisement in a newspaper the previous December soliciting donations to pay the assassins. There is little doubt that if Gayle had been tried, he would have been convicted and executed. However, he not only avoided trial, but ultimately escaped punishment of any kind for reasons that will surprise readers. Rather than rehashing what scores of books have already alleged, Untried and Unpunished offers a completely fresh premise, meticulous analysis, and stunning conclusions based upon years of firsthand research by an experienced attorney. This original, thought-provoking study will forever change the way you think of Lincoln’s assassination.