Andrew Johnson's Presidential Amnesties III

The purpose of this essay is to lay out President Andrew Johnson's pardon strategy and actual pardons in the four amnesties that he granted from 1865-1868. Many scholars make the distinction between a pardon and an amnesty: the former is directed to an individual and the latter to a group or collectivity, but I know of no definitive court decision or consensus that establishes that distinction. In this essay I will use the terms interchangeably, while being aware of the distinction used by many.

After Lincoln died on April 15, 1865, Johnson had to determine whether he would continue Lincoln's amnesty/pardon program first articulated in Dec. 1863 or whether he would modify it. He was tugged in two directions. If he just continued Lincoln's program without change, he might be perceived as "weak," because he might be ignoring the legitimate cries for punishment on the South for the War and assassination of Lincoln. Indeed, Johnson had said just before Lincoln's death that treason ought to be "made odious;" hence, he had become the early favorite of the more Radical Republicans, and he probably wanted to serve their interests--at least at this time. On the other hand, he had to be careful not to be too rigidly retaliatory agains the South. For one thing, he himself was a Southerner, even though his Unionist credentials and beliefs didn't permit him to support dissolution of the Union. And then, second, he wanted to get over the "long national nightmare" (to quote Gerald Ford in a different context) of the War. He knew that reintegration of the South into the Union was the best policy to pursue for this purpose. Thus, he had to be firm, but he also had to extend an olive branch; he couldn't precisely imitate Lincoln but he also couldn't be so harsh as to provoke feelings of retaliation, sullenness and resentment in the conquered South.

The First General Amnesty--May 29, 1865

With all these things in mind, and after consultation with his cabinet, he issued his first amnesty proclamation on May 29, 1865. It was a stroke of political sagacity, if not genius, and it won him the kudos of both South and North. What did he do? He modeled his plan on the earlier plans of Lincoln, but rather than having seven exceptions to the blanket pardon he would issue, he increased the number of exceptions to 14 (text below). Then, he added a statement that pardons would be liberally dispensed for those from the excepted classes who approached him personally (i.e., through his Attorney General or Pardons clerk). Here are the six (12/63) or seven (3/64) exceptions to pardon for Lincoln. He continued the Lincoln exceptions and added numbers 8-14. Here are exceptions 8-14:

"8th, all military and naval officers in the rebel service, who were educated by the government in the Military Academy at West Point or the United States Naval Academy; 9th, all persons who held the pretended offices of governors of States in insurrection against the United States; 10th, all persons who left their homes within the jurisdiction and protection of the United States, and passed beyond the Federal military lines into the pretended Confederate States for the purpose of aiding the rebellion; 11th, all persons who have been engaged in the destruction of the commerce of the United States upon the high seas, and all persons who have made raids into the United States from Canada, or been engaged in destroying the commerce of the United States upon the lakes and rivers that separate the British Provinces from the United States; 12th, all persons who, at the time when they seek to obtain the benefits hereof by taking the oath herein prescribed, are in military, naval, or civil confinement, or custody, or under bonds of the civil, military, or naval authorities, or agents of the United States as prisoners of war, or persons detained for offenses of any kind, either before or after conviction; 13th, all persons who have voluntarily participated in said rebellion, and the estimated value of whose taxable property is over twenty thousand dollars; 14th, all persons who have taken the oath of amnesty as prescribed in the President's proclamation of December 8th, A.D. 1863, or an oath of allegiance to the government of the United States since the date of said proclamation, and who have not thenceforward kept and maintained the same inviolate."

Then, as indicated above, he added a "provided" clause, which said:

"That special application may be made to the President for pardon by any person belonging to the excepted classes; and such clemency will be liberally extended as may be consistent with the facts of the case and the peace and dignity of the United States."

Analysis of General Amnesty # 1

This, then, was the Johnson "pardon plan" that would be in place until a more liberal amnesty was proclaimed on Sept. 7, 1867. The three things I would point out about this pardon plan are two of the new exceptions and then the "liberally extended" words in the "provided" clause. First, those who went to West Point or Annapolis would have to seek special pardon. Is this a sign of Johnson's own feelings of educational inferiority? To have the American educational elite, in military terms, have to come "hat in hands" to him might have been his true desire. Indeed, in the next year General US Grant testified to Congress that he didn't think such an exception was warranted. But his testimony was to no avail.

Second, we should notice the 13th exception, which proved to be the most controversial of them all. It required personal Presidential pardons to those with big assets. There were lots of questions that had to be answered about this exception, the chief one of which was whether the $20,000 was the value at the beginning or close of the War. The answer? The beginning. Thus, this class contained an estimated 70,000 people, fully 40% of all those in all the exceptions. Why did Johnson define the exception this way? Well, I haven't seen any definitive study that says whether the idea arose from him or from someone else, but it perfectly reflects Johnson's philosophy about the War. He believed that the people driving the war were the wealthy Southern planters who didn't want their property (i.e., slaves) to be confiscated and who felt that they might have the most to gain by a Confederate victory. By having these people "in the palm of his hands," Johnson hoped to show once and for all that the Southerners needed to change their philosophy (i.e., secession was bad; slavery was over) and recognize him in his role as President.

The next essay finishes my exposition of the Johnson pardons.

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