Should Robert E. Lee have been put on trial for treason?

Question

As a West Pointer he had sworn allegiance to the United States.
He broke that vow and was the leader of the revolting arny.
Should he have been tried as a traitor?

Answer 1

Put yourself in his shoes. While he swore an allegiance to the United States he also swore an allegiance to Virginia. Would you not have a problem leading a hostile force into your home and killing your family and friends. If not for Robert E Lee the Civil War could have gone on for many more years. He was a great man and a great leader.

Answer 2

No, before Robert E. Lee left West Point in 1861, he was offered command of all the Union forces by General Winfield Scott, he turned it down .He said he would fight for Virginia and Virginia was fighting for the south. When the war started all officers and soldiers were givin the choice to fight for the North or South, Lee did nothing wrong.

Answer 3

The confederacy became the final gasp of gentility. This became the time the final of the cavaliers(Knights) rode. It became a time whilst being a citizen of a definite state meant some thing. It became the final, maximum suitable situation the blue-bloods ever did. The leaders of the confederacy weren't tried for treason via fact of two motives. a million) They weren't very particular that the states did no longer have an exquisite to secede from the Union. The question remains. 2) The usa became bored to death in conflict and killing. they simply needed to heal. As to reconstruction - neither the North or the South needed it to succeed. Graft became rampant collectively as the do-gooders tried to erect a Utopian dream. Jim Crow became social law and does not have been powerful if it hadn't been for the erection of a clean financial sort talked approximately as the proportion-cropper. to your final question:immediately it incredibly is in basic terms uncomplicated insurrection against authority. a feeling of a unified identity.

Answer 4

NO! to commit treason one must betray his own country. he resigned from the U.S. Army. he was a citizen of Virginia which made him a citizen of the Confederate States of America. a newly formed country with it's own president, government and army.
now if he had stayed in the U.S. Army and fought against the south, tactically speaking then he would have committed treason and been a traitor to the Confederacy.

Answer 5

Yes, I believe he should have been tried as a war criminal. While I am by far no Southern sympathizer, Jefferson Davis, the president of the confederacy was imprisoned and tried for treason, why shouldn't Lee have been? Further, generally coups and rebellions that are thwarted are punctuated with the punishments of the rebellion's proponents.

Answer 6

All the confederate commanders should have been tried as traitors. Unfortunately it was part of the surrender agreement between Lee and Grant that ALL (this includes officers)soldiers in the confederacy will just lay down their arms and go home.

Answer 7

No. He just wanted to do for the south what the founding fathers wanted to do for America: make it a separate country from an oppressive ruler. But that was a long time ago. A better question is should George W. Bush be tried as a war criminal?

Answer 8

No, He should be raised up to the status of national hero and have his own holiday. What he did took courage and his actions were EXACTLY as those of George Washington, Fighting against a preserved tyrannical Government for freedom.( alot of more undeserving holidays have been made up in the last 20 years)

Answer 9

No, just because a war is lost it does not make one a traitor. It is smart to have a forgiving end of the war, look at the close relationship we have with England, Germany, and Japan?

Answer 10

Lee and all of the other confederate traitors should have been taken captive and executed as deserters.

President Jefferson Davis should have been tried for treason and be punished according to the will of the jury.