DECEMBER 16, 1861:
Clement
Vallandigham (1820-1871), a Peace Democrat from Ohio, sponsors a bill to
commend Captain Charles Wilkes of the U.S.S. SAN JACINTO for seizing Messrs.
Slidell and Mason from the R.M.S. TRENT. This bill is totally out of character
for Vallandigham, who strenuously opposes the war, supports Confederate aims,
and despises Lincoln and the Radical Republicans as “abolitionists.”
Vallandigham uses his office as a bully pulpit to speak out
against the war, and by 1862 is recognized as the leader of the Copperheads
(pro-Southern Northerners). He is arrested, Court-Martialed, and convicted by
military authorities on May 5, 1863 for “the habit of declaring sympathies for
the enemy.” By far the most serious
charge against him was consorting with agents of the Confederacy for a negotiated
peace (true); though jailed, his case attracted much attention. The Copperhead
Press was outraged, and even most Republicans were troubled at this suppression
of free speech by a military court. Unwilling to create a martyr, President
Lincoln ordered Vallandigham released and escorted through the lines to the
South.
Afterward, Vallandigham ran for Governor of Ohio in absentia and conspired with the
Southern government to create unrest in Southern-leaning areas of the North
(“Butternut” counties). He crossed the border several times, finally returning
to Ohio, where he took up his old soapbox untroubled by the government. Named
the Supreme Commander of The Knights of The Golden Circle, he refused that
honor, but later founded the Sons of Liberty, a similar group. After the war,
he opposed Emancipation and Civil Rights. Clement Vallandigham died when,
demonstrating in court how a supposed murder victim might have actually been a
suicide, he accidentally shot himself to death in front of the jury with a gun
he thought to be unloaded.
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