Americans were divided on how or whether to punish Davis. The government could prosecute Davis for alleged participation in the Lincoln assassination, for the mistreatment of Union prisoners of war, or for leading a rebellion against the United States. U.S. president Andrew Johnson favored murder charges. Many abolitionists and lawmakers opposed punishing Davis, and instead preferred a Reconstruction plan that would punish the former Confederacy. Yet many civilians wrote the president asking for Davis to be hanged; some even volunteered to construct the gallows. The Davis issue remained prominent in public discussion in 1865 until it gave way to other Reconstruction issues, such as the rights of black freedmen. When the Lincoln conspirators' trial failed to establish a connection to Davis, Johnson settled on treason charges.
After enduring two years of imprisonment and nearly four years of uncertainty, Davis became a free man. The incomplete prosecution of his case and others' gave clear indication that the government intended Reconstruction to realign southern society rather than punish a select few leaders for causing the rebellion.
Time Line
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May 10, 1865 - Confederate president Jefferson Davis is captured by Union forces near Irwinville, Georgia.
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May 22, 1865–May 13, 1867 - Former Confederate president Jefferson Davis is incarcerated at Fort Monroe following the Civil War. Part of his bail is posted by the abolitionist Horace Greeley.
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October 1865 - While incarcerated at Fort Monroe, former Confederate president Jefferson Davis is transferred from a small room called a casemate to more spacious quarters in the officers' hall.
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May 1866 - Varina Howell Davis takes up residence at Fort Monroe, where her husband, former Confederate president Jefferson Davis, is imprisoned.
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May 13, 1867 - A bail bond of $100,000 for Jefferson Davis is posted and accepted; among those signing the bond are Cornelius Vanderbilt, Horace Greeley, and Gerrit Smith, the radical abolitionist who helped to fund John Brown in 1859. Davis is released and the indictments for treason are dismissed.
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March 4, 1868 - The U.S. government files in federal court its final indictment against former Confederate president Jefferson Davis on charges of treason. The trial is further delayed because of the impeachment of President Andrew Johnson.
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July 9, 1868 - The Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution is ratified. It grants citizenship to all African Americans and bars former Confederate officials from holding state or federal political office. A two-thirds vote by both houses will override that limitation in the cases of Robert E. Lee (1975) and Jefferson Davis (1978).
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December 3, 1868 - During his treason trial, former Confederate president Jefferson Davis claims that, should he be found guilty, the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution would punish him a second time by restricting his citizenship rights. He claims that the government is violating the Fifth Amendment's double jeopardy restriction.
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December 25, 1868 - President Andrew Johnson's Fourth Amnesty Proclamation absolves former Confederate president Jefferson Davis of any guilt for participation in the Civil War.
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February 15, 1869 - U.S. Attorney enters "nolle prosequi" into the record for United States v. Jefferson Davis, thus ending the case.
References
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First published: March 9, 2010 | Last modified: May 14, 2015
Contributed by Daniel James "Jim" Flook, a seasonal Park Ranger at Gettysburg National Military Park and a PhD candidate at the University of Florida. He specializes in legal and constitutional history and the American Civil War era. His dissertation concerns the use of constitutional rhetoric in public policy debates in the North during the Civil War.