Amnesty Quotes
Statement made during televised debate with Walter Mondale, October 21, 1984 (see citation).
There was some political pressure in the North, to offer terms to the South where they could cease the rebellion and return to the Union and return to the status quo ante—before the rebellion.
For the required Oath, see {623308} . There were several to the amnesty. These included graduates of West Point and the Naval Academy who had joined the rebellion, senior officers and officials of the Confederacy, those who were accused of war crimes and abusing Union prisoners of war, persons who went abroad to help the Confederacy, and Northerners who had gone South to aid the rebellion. Many scholars think that although Lincoln had expressed his desire to provide an amnesty after the war was over, he probably would have been more lenient than Johnson who exempted many on the Southern side—especially the leaders. Ironically, Johnson was a Southerner but was personally, morally outraged at taking up arms against the United States and in that sense was much more of a hawk than Lincoln and many of the radical Republicans even. However, he was an inveterate racist and resisted most of the attempts to implement equality during the Reconstruction. Many argue that but for Johnson, Reconstruction might have been much more successful. It was easy for Southerners to resist equal rights for Blacks when they knew that the President was also opposed to measures to produce equality.
