That was the definition of treason, under the dictator Lincoln. Are you familiar with the plight of Francis Key Howard, grandson of Francis Scott Key?
"It would be impossible, without extending this work far beyond the limits designed, to give a separate history of each one of the many cases of gentlemen of Baltimore, and from different parts of the State of Maryland, who were arrested and imprisoned."
"It will be remembered that the Mayor of the city of Baltimore, the Police Commissioners, the Marshal of Police, members of the State Legislature, and private citizens, not only from that city, but from all parts of the State, were arrested and thrown into prison, by the edict of Abraham Lincoln, and kept there for months, without any warrant of law whatever."
"The prerogative exercised by Mr. Lincoln in Maryland, as elsewhere, exhibits an assumption of power unparalleled in the history of any country, at any time. For, be it remembered, Maryland was not in a state of revolution or rebellion. Mob law may have existed at times in the city of Baltimore, but did it not exist, at times, in the city of Philadelphia?..."
"[I]n order to embrace the history of many of the cases of citizens in Baltimore—because they are not dissimilar—in one narrative, we present a most interesting and readable one, from the pen of Frank Key Howard, Esq., a member of the Baltimore Bar."
"On the morning of the 13th of September, 1861, at my residence, in the city of Baltimore, I was awakened, about half-past twelve or one o'clock, by the ringing of the bell… In answer to my demand that he should produce the warrant or order under which he was acting, he declined to do so, but said he had instructions from Mr. Seward, the Secretary of State."
"I replied that I could recognize no such authority, when he stated that he intended to execute his orders, and that resistance would be idle, as he had a force with him sufficient to render it unavailing. As he spoke, several men entered the house, more than one of whom were armed with revolvers, which I saw m their belts. There was no one in the house, when it was thus invaded, except my wife, children, and servants; and, under such circumstances, I, of course, abandoned all idea of resistance…"
[Howard was taken away, while the thugs continued to ransack his home until 3:00AM.]
"I reached Fort McHenry about two o'clock in the morning. There I found several of my friends, and others were brought in a few minutes afterward. One or two were brought in later in the day, making fifteen in all. Among them were most of the members of the Legislature from Baltimore, Mr. Brown, the Mayor of the city, and one of our Representatives in Congress, Mr. May. They were all gentlemen of high social position, and of unimpeachable character, and each of them had been arrested, as has been said, solely on account of his political opinions, no definite charge having been then or afterward preferred against them…"
"When I looked out in the morning, I could not help being struck by an odd and not pleasant coincidence. On that day, forty-seven years before, my grandfather, Mr. F. S. Key, then a prisoner on a British ship, had witnessed the bombardment of Fort McHenry. When, on the following morning, the hostile fleet drew off, defeated, he wrote the song so long popular throughout the country, the "Star-spangled Banner." As I stood upon the very scene of that conflict, I could not but contrast my position with his, forty-seven years before. The flag which he had then so proudly hailed, I saw waving, at the same place, over the victims of as vulgar and brutal a despotism as modern times have witnessed…
"We left our prison for our homes on the morning of the 27th. There were, at the time of our release, no other prisoners in Fort Warren than those named, except one, who was a native of Massachusetts, and who had been arrested in that State, a few weeks previously. The gentlemen above named had, with a single exception, been my companions in Fort Lafayette, and of course in Fort Warren. All but one had been imprisoned over a year, and Mr. Gatchell, Colonel Kane, and my father for nearly eighteen months. Each of them had determined at the outset to resist, to the uttermost, the dictatorship of Abraham Lincoln; and having done so, each had the satisfaction of feeling, as he left Fort Warren, that he had faithfully, and not unsuccessfully, discharged a grave public duty. We came out of prison as we had gone in, holding in the same just scorn and detestation the despotism under which the country was prostrate, and with a stronger resolution than ever to oppose it by every means to which, as American freemen, we had the right to resort.
In summary, Francis Key Howard was imprisoned for more than a year, being moved to several military prisons, before being released from Fort Warren on November 27, 1982. His "crime?"
"From the moment of my arrest down to this hour, no charge of any sort has been preferred against me, and none can be alleged or established, for I have not violated any law whatever, State or Federal. I was, as you may perhaps be aware, one of the Editors of the 'Daily Exchange,' a morning journal published in Baltimore. In that paper I had expressed my political opinions without reserve. I had, a year ago, advocated the adoption of some compromise by Congress which should stay the then threatened rupture between the North and South. I had subsequently deprecated any attempt to coerce the South, on the ground that it would only render the separation of the two sections inevitable and final. I asserted that war would leave the country in a worse condition than it found it; and, as it would entail upon us an enormous debt, I felt it to be my duty to resist, and I did resist its initiation. I was unable to see how the Union could be preserved if a large majority of the Southern people were bent upon a separation, and I said so. I was unable to comprehend how the President could, from the injunction which commanded him to see that the laws were faithfully executed, derive authority to supersede and violate the fundamental laws of the land, and I said so. I was equally unable to see how. upon the theory of upholding the Constitution, I was under an obligation to support those who were daily manifesting their contempt for all its provisions— nor could I conceive how this Government had any existence whatever outside of the charter which established it. All these political opinions I had the absolute right to entertain and promulgate. I choose to refer to them here, because they constitute the offences for which I am undergoing punishment. Notwithstanding the fact that many thousands of persons in the Northern States had entertained and expressed these views within a twelvemonth, the Administration determined that it was criminal in me to continue to hold and utter them, and has, therefore, arbitrarily inflicted upon me the indignities and wrongs which I have mentioned."
[John A. Marshall, "American Bastille: a history of the illegal arrests and imprisonment of American citizens during the late Civil War." Thomas W. Hartley, 1871, pp.642ff]
Mr. Kalamata
The calculus is this: They must exonerate anything done by their state or their ancestors, and therefore nothing Lincoln did can be accepted as wrong.
His doings were "necessary" evils.