Recent allegations of sedition against members of Congress are not new. During the Civil War, a Democrat member of Congress was convicted of sedition by a military tribunal for urging Union soldiers to disobey “illegal orders” and desert.

Forty-four-year-old Ohio Congressman Clement Laird Vallandigham was a dynamic lawyer with mesmerizing oratorical skills who drew huge crowds. Vallandigham believed the war to be unconstitutional, and “waged only to free negros and enslave white men.” Therefore, the orders issued by the troops’ officers were illegal – he urged Union troops to disobey them: “Refuse to obey the orders of your officers.” He believed the Southern states would never return “back into the fellowship and love at the point of a bayonet.” The Ohioan called for an armistice and an

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