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The Strangely Insignificant Role of the U.S. Supreme Court in the Civil War

The Strangely Insignificant Role of the U.S. Supreme Court in the Civil War jonathan w. wh ite The Strangely Insignifi cant Role of the U.S. Supreme Court in the Civil War For as much as has been written about the legal and constitutional issues of the Civil War, few scholars have ventured to answer the question of why the Supreme Court did not decide more war-related cases during the war years. Harold M. Hyman suggests that a majority of the justices on the bench were not willing to join Chief Justice Roger B. Taney in striking down federal actions in wartime. They had learned from their “Dred Scott mistakes” which had caused “awful consequences nationally.” Thus, when they were again given the opportunity to decide issues of national conse- quence (related to civil liberties, in the instance that Hyman discusses), they denied themselves jurisdiction rather than condemn the actions of a coordinate branch of the government. “Politics and battles more than litigations decided public policies,” concludes Hyman. This view has some credibility. The Court denied itself jurisdiction in Ex parte Vallandigham (1864), refusing to determine the validity of Lincoln’s use of the military to arrest and try civilians in places where the civil courts were open. Justice David Davis’s opinion in Ex http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png The Journal of the Civil War Era University of North Carolina Press

The Strangely Insignificant Role of the U.S. Supreme Court in the Civil War

The Journal of the Civil War Era , Volume 3 (2) – May 7, 2013

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Publisher
University of North Carolina Press
Copyright
Copyright @ The University of North Carolina Press
ISSN
2159-9807

Abstract

jonathan w. wh ite The Strangely Insignifi cant Role of the U.S. Supreme Court in the Civil War For as much as has been written about the legal and constitutional issues of the Civil War, few scholars have ventured to answer the question of why the Supreme Court did not decide more war-related cases during the war years. Harold M. Hyman suggests that a majority of the justices on the bench were not willing to join Chief Justice Roger B. Taney in striking down federal actions in wartime. They had learned from their “Dred Scott mistakes” which had caused “awful consequences nationally.” Thus, when they were again given the opportunity to decide issues of national conse- quence (related to civil liberties, in the instance that Hyman discusses), they denied themselves jurisdiction rather than condemn the actions of a coordinate branch of the government. “Politics and battles more than litigations decided public policies,” concludes Hyman. This view has some credibility. The Court denied itself jurisdiction in Ex parte Vallandigham (1864), refusing to determine the validity of Lincoln’s use of the military to arrest and try civilians in places where the civil courts were open. Justice David Davis’s opinion in Ex

Journal

The Journal of the Civil War EraUniversity of North Carolina Press

Published: May 7, 2013

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