WASHINGTON — In December 1868, in a packed courtroom in Richmond, Virginia, the former capital of the Confederacy, Chief Justice Salmon Chase concludes that defeated Rebel President Jefferson Davis should not be prosecuted for treason. I attached it.
That Chase's decision, in addition to another he wrote the following year that touched on the same legal issues but reached a different conclusion, would reemerge from the mists of history to play a role in the ongoing issue. , no one would have expected it at the time. The debate over whether former President Donald Trump should be removed from office.
Both Chase cases – the other involving a black man seeking to have his conviction overturned – will be featured in court filings ahead of next week's Supreme Court oral arguments in the Trump case. In both cases, Chase was a member of the lower court, so he did not serve as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.
Both include a rare contemporary discussion of Section 3 of the then recently enacted Fourteenth Amendment.
This provision was intended to prevent former government officials who joined the Confederacy after the Civil War from holding public office. The law states that anyone who previously swore an oath to support the Constitution and then “participated in insurrection or insurrection” is ineligible to abide by the Constitution again.
Chase's ruling takes on new relevance as the Supreme Court considers Trump's appeal to keep him from being removed from Colorado's Republican primary. Colorado has ruled that he is ineligible under Article III because of his role in trying to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election in the series of events that led to the January 6, 2021, attack on U.S. forces. It seeks to overturn the state Supreme Court's ruling. Houses of Parliament.
“We don't know if a particular case or judge from the past will become the dominant theme or talisman that gets attention in the courtroom,” said Vikram Amar, a professor at the University of California, Davis. Mr. Roe filed a brief addressing Chase's decision.
But, he added, “If you're trying to get people to understand the understanding of the time, you want to make sure you're referring to the words and deeds of prominent people of the time.”
This history is significant because some members of the conservative-majority Supreme Court have given considerable weight to how people understood the Constitution's provisions at the time it was written. It's for a reason.
Mr. Chase, who harbored presidential ambitions, was a former anti-slavery Republican governor of Ohio who was appointed to the Supreme Court by President Abraham Lincoln in 1864. Although he was chief justice, he focused on the presidency, and historians say his rulings reflect that. Political considerations.
At the time the Davis case was before him, Chase was trying to secure the Democratic presidential nomination, but that effort failed before he voted against the charges.
Cynthia Nicoletti, a professor at the University of Virginia School of Law who wrote a book about the Davis prosecution, said in an interview that the arguments Chase used in the Davis case were “strange arguments” that appeared to be driven by political expediency. Stated.
“I think it's a clever ploy by Chase to solve the case,” she said.
Mr. Chase apparently accepts Mr. Davis' lawyers' argument that Article III, which apparently applies to the former Confederate president, is a form of punishment, thereby barring criminal prosecution.
Lawyers argued that Section 3 is “self-executing,” meaning it automatically applies to Davis without Congress having to pass legislation to enforce it.
Historians have concluded that Chase himself personally suggested that Davis' attorney make such a claim.
But just the next year, Chase took the opposite approach in another case in Virginia. The case involved a black criminal defendant, Cesar Griffin, whose presiding judge argued that his conviction for “firing with intent to kill” should be thrown out. Confederate forces were involved in his case.
Griffin argued that Article III applied because the judge had previously taken an oath to uphold the Constitution as a member of the Virginia General Assembly.
Now, Judge Chase is arguing that someone under the 14th Amendment would be entitled to the far-reaching implications of invalidating thousands of decisions made by Confederate officials similar to the judge in the Griffin case. The court ruled that disqualification “requires legislation by Congress.” case.
The question of how exactly Title III can be enforced is one of several legal questions raised in Mr. Trump's case, and if other states follow Colorado's lead and impose If they can be removed from the ballot, it could have far-reaching implications.
Mr. Trump's lawyers cited the Chase decision in Griffin at a news conference, saying it helps confirm “the Congressional Executive Act as the only means of enforcing Title III.” This is just one of several arguments they argue the Colorado ruling should be overturned.
The plaintiffs, six Colorado voters, wrote in their brief that Chase's opinion is “non-binding” and “credibly supports the contention that Section 3 is unenforceable here. It's nothing,” he replied.
They also pointed to Chase's “contradictory positions” in the Davis case.
The Colorado Supreme Court said Chase's decision in a case known as Griffin was not persuasive, but Justice Carlos Samour relied heavily on the decision in his dissenting opinion.
“I find the Griffin decision persuasive,” he wrote.
Josh Blackman, a Trump supporter and professor at South Texas College of Law, feels similarly, arguing that the Griffin decision effectively resolves the issue of how to enforce Title III.
If the Supreme Court is looking for a way to resolve Trump's case without digging into the meaning of “insurrection” under Article III, “I think the Griffin case is one way to do that,” he said. said. Blackmun added that Chase's vote in the Davis case did not carry much weight, in part because the full ruling was only made public several years later.
Other legal experts strongly disagree with Blackmun's reliance on Griffin.
William Bode and Michael Paulsen wrote in an influential legal review article that “Chief Justice Chase was not right” in deciding both cases involving Title III, arguing that the clause was self-defeating. It was claimed to be executory.
Ellen Connally wrote a long article about Davis and Chase when she was doing her doctoral studies. He earned his doctorate in history from the University of Akron 20 years ago. Like Nicoletti, her work is cited in briefs filed in the Trump lawsuit.
Mr. Connally believes the court should take a closer look at the history, but in Mr. Davis' case, “Mr. Chase “I was just looking for a loophole,” she said.
In the end, Chase's decision had little practical impact.
He sat as part of a two-judge panel, the other of whom believed the charges should not be dismissed. Because of the tie vote, a lawsuit based on the then-existing rules would initially end up in Chase's own Supreme Court.
But then there was another development. On December 25, 1868, outgoing President Andrew Johnson announced a pardon for all Confederate troops, including Davis.
The charges were dropped.
