Act of Justice: Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation and the Law of War
This slim tome is a lawyer’s delight. It shows how the law of war developed through U.S. diplomatic and judicial precedents and ultimately provided the legal structure for the Emancipation Proclamation. Burrus Carnahan explores the origins and ultimate codification in the Lieber Code (General Order 100) of the law of war. Then he demonstrates how President Lincoln used those legal principles when he exercised his powers as commander-in-chief. The Emancipation Proclamation, Carnahan shows, was based on a warring party’s right “to seize and destroy enemy property for reasons of military necessity” and its right “to seek allies through promising liberty to an oppressed people.” An interesting highlight is the author’s explanation that Union mid-1862 misfortunes and stalemates (Seven Days’, Shiloh, Second Manassas) created the military necessity that was legally necessary for Lincoln to take such a radical step as emancipation of Confederate slaves. Demonstrating that “timing is everything,” Lincoln’s decision about when to issue his proclamation was militarily and legally perfect. Highly recommended for those interested in constitutional, legal, and emancipation issues. Reviewer: Edward Bonekemper Book Review Editor Ed Bonekemper, adjunct military history lecturer at Muhlenberg College, is the author of four Civil War books.
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Appendices, index, notes, 212 pp., 2007, University Press of Kentucky,