Nellie Wilkerson to jmacusa: "I know how the Constitution defines treason.
Secession is not treason, not even close.
Confederates didn’t divide the nation.
They LEFT it — the states that remained in the union were still united.
Secession was partly over slavery, but secession is not war so the Constitutional definition of treason does not apply to secession."
In early 1861, Unionists like outgoing President Buchanan and incoming President-elect Lincoln did not consider Deep South declarations of secession themselves as acts of treason.
They were unconstitutional & unlawful, but not, of themselves, treasonous.
Nor was the formation of an independent Confederacy.
In March 1861, President Lincoln imagined a coexistence of Union & Confederacy, where the Federal Government would continue it's basic functions, such as mail and duties while the Confederacy otherwise governed the Deep South.
Of course, Confederates would have none of that, but point is: Lincoln did not declare secession treason.
However, the word "treason" quickly came into play -- whenever secessionists committed acts of war against the United States.
And those did begin immediately, often even before states made formal declarations of secession, with forceful seizures of dozens of major Federal properties -- forts, ships, arsenals, mints, etc. -- threats against Federal officials and firings on US ships.
They culminated in the Confederacy's military assault on Fort Sumter (April 12, 1861) soon followed by a declaration of war against the United States (May 6, 1861).
At that point, regardless of the Deep South's status, any pro-Confederate in a Union state (which still included Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee & Arkansas) met the Constitution's definition of treason.
So, it might still be argued whether treason became "not-treason" once those Upper South states declared their own secession, however, Border States like Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky & Missouri never did declare secession and so any pro-Confederates in those states certainly did meet the Constitution's definition of treason.
Further, there were large numbers in most Confederate states who supported the Union and so suffered from Confederate persecution for "treason" to the Confederacy.
Many were paid reparations by Congress after the war for their losses.
Bottom line: by the end of Andrew Johnson's administration (1868), the Federal Government had pardoned every Confederate of any charges related to treason, in an effort to help heal the war's wounds and reunite the Union.
Thanks for the reply, no matter the timing.
Poor Nellie - the lies she must tell herself to stay warm at night. It would seem to me that the amount of anger she displays would be unhealthy.