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The Civil War Lawyers: Constitutional Questions, Courtroom Dramas, and the Men Behind Them

Arthur T. Downey; ABA Publishing

Ever wonder how an illiterate slave named Dred Scott prosecuted his fight for freedom in an 11-year legal marathon that reached the U.S. Supreme Court? In his new book The Civil War Lawyers, attorney Arthur T. Downey explains the constitutional issues, as well as the role that slavery and the high-profile case by Scott and his abolitionist lawyers played in bringing about the war.

Downey’s descriptions of the legal procedures during this divisive period are concise but very helpful. Readers will come away with a better understanding of how much the ultimate outcome—the Supreme Court’s 1857 decision that slaves were not U.S. citizens—affected the coming controversy.

The abolition of slavery was one of the greatest consequences of the war. But ending the idea of humans as personal property was not quite as simple as issuing Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation. Downey tours the history of the anti-slavery movement, culminating in the passage of the 13th Amendment in 1865. And there were other troublesome matters to be settled in the postwar years. In his final chapter, Downey looks at the trials of both the Lincoln conspirators and Andersonville’s notorious commandant Henry Wirz, as well as Jefferson Davis’ legal situation.

In highlighting the pivotal roles that attorneys and judges played both before and after the war, The Civil War Lawyers is a well-written, well-researched analysis of a subject too long neglected.

 

Originally published in the April 2012 issue of Civil War Times. To subscribe, click here.