Democrats party should have been outlawed after the bastards killed Lincoln. AND MORE THAN 5 of the conspirators caught should have been hanged!
It’s TRUMP OR BUST!
Trump or death.....
As an historical matter, no. The investigation and trial of the Lincoln conspirators, in retrospect, was a marvel of discipline under extraordinarily trying circumstances. Most governments throughout history would have done what you suggest, with an indiscriminate hanging binge. In the Lincoln case, however, the government not only refused to seize the opportunity for vengeance against all rebels, it carefully distinguished among participants in the hastily improvised assassination plot, participants in the earlier, abortive kidnapping plot, and Booth associates in the long-standing confederate underground. A job well done.