Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

To: Lurker
Which the SCOTUS promptly and correctly bitch slapped Lincoln for doing. Only Congress has the authority to suspend Habeus Corpus.

Unless somebody ignores the SCOTUS. As you well know, there is more to this story...

The military refused to follow the writ. Justice Taney, in Ex parte MERRYMAN, then ruled the suspension of habeas corpus unconstitutional because the writ could not be suspended without an Act of Congress. President Lincoln and the military ignored Justice Taney's ruling.

Finally, in 1866, after the war, the Supreme Court officially restored habeas corpus in Ex-parte Milligan, ruling that military trials in areas where the civil courts were capable of functioning were illegal.

So, fighting a Civil War without a definable end, coupled with civil unrest on the part of the Copperhead Democrats, Lincoln suspended habeas corpus. Surely, he had good reason -- as he saw it. And it stayed suspended until the war had, in fact, reached an end.

Proving once again: the courts are no place to fight a war.

54 posted on 06/24/2007 8:24:59 PM PDT by okie01 (The Mainstream Media: IGNORANCE ON PARADE)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 53 | View Replies ]


To: okie01
President Lincoln and the military ignored Justice Taney's ruling.

Which of course simply proved the case the South was making that Lincoln was an out of control tyrant.

L

55 posted on 06/24/2007 8:48:51 PM PDT by Lurker (Comparing moderate islam to extremist islam is like comparing small pox to ebola.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 54 | View Replies ]

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article


FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson