Comte de Paris, History of the Civil War in America. Vol. 2.
Henry Coppee , LL.D., Ed.

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[718] law, or the names of all persons who, having knowledge of such property, had neglected to reveal the fact. Severe penalties were pronounced against all false declarations. This terrible law was rigorously applied, especially against all native citizens of Southern States who had remained in the North and were serving the Federal cause. On the 30th of September, 1863, the Confederate treasury had realized by the sale of property thus confiscated the sum of $1,862,650. So violent a measure was well calculated to drive the North to adopt a system of reprisals, and the law of August 6, 1861, was soon declared to be insufficient.

It was replaced by the more severe enactments of July 17, 1862. This new law was not intended, like the previous one, simply to exact some kind of indemnity for the costs of the war from the abettors of the rebellion; for these costs had assumed proportions which would have rendered such a pretext futile. It possessed all the features of a penal law, and began by proclaiming the penalty of death against those who should be guilty of treason; but it was evident that this penalty could not be applied to those who were engaged in a war, the combatants in which were treated like ordinary prisoners of war, and the very coincidence between the date of this law and that on which the convention for the exchanges was concluded forbade such an interpretation. As a simple menace against the principal political personages of the Confederacy, or their accomplices in the North, this clause, fortunately, remained a dead letter. It was the same with the lesser penalties, such as imprisonment for ten years and fines of ten thousand dollars, pronounced against those who had become associated with the rebellion. The refusal to put Mr. Davis himself upon trial at the close of the war—a refusal which was highly creditable to the Federal government—showed at the same time all that is false and worthless in those exceptional laws prompted by the passion of the moment. The forfeiture of political rights pronounced against the same persons was on the contrary, perfectly legitimate, for it was natural that those who had taken up arms against the Constitution should be excluded from all participation in the affairs of the government; this penalty, therefore, was applied by the North after the victory; the law which decreed this penalty, however, carried its own corrective