Читать книгу Lost Worlds of 1863. Relocation and Removal of American Indians in the Central Rockies and the Greater Southwest онлайн

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As already mentioned, on August 30, 1861 Frémont, as commander of the Western Department, issued a controversial proclamation putting Missouri under martial law and declaring that anyone who took up arms against the Federal government, or supported those who did so, will have their property, including slaves, confiscated. By November Lincoln had rescinded the proclamation and relieved Frémont of his command, telling Jessie Benton Frémont in person that “General Frémont should not have dragged the Negro into it.” Yet, the second Confiscation Act passed by Congress and issued by Lincoln in July 1862 was very similar to Frémont’s proclamation in regard to the confiscation of property of persons disloyal to the United States.⁶³

Another major confrontation came in May 1864 when Radical Republicans, meeting in a separate convention one month before the Republican convention, nominated Frémont as their candidate for president. These were anti-slavery zealots who thought that Lincoln was too moderate in his plans for the reconstruction of the South. With the Civil War still raging, Lincoln was later nominated in June as the Republican candidate for president, while a pro-Union Democrat from Tennessee, Andrew Johnson, received the vice-presidency nod.⁶⁴ In the very near future Lincoln would be assassinated, and Frémont, over the next 26 years, would die a slow death after a series of scandals and financial and political failures.