Birchard Letter facts for kids
The Birchard Letter (June 29, 1863), was a public letter from United States President Abraham Lincoln to Matthew Birchard and eighteen other Ohio Democrats in which Lincoln defended the administration's treatment of antiwar agitators, and offered to release Clement Vallandigham if a majority of those to whom the letter was addressed would subscribe to three pledges in connection with the prosecution of the American Civil War.
The three pledges read as follows:
1. That there is now a rebellion in the United States, the object and tendency of which is to destroy the national Union; and that in your opinion, an army and navy are constitutional means for suppressing that rebellion.
2. That no one of you will do any thing which in his own judgment, will tend to hinder the increase, or favor the decrease, or lessen the efficiency of the army or navy, while engaged in the effort to suppress that rebellion; and,
3. That each of you will, in his sphere, do all he can to have the officers, soldiers, and seamen of the army and navy, while engaged in the effort to suppress the rebellion, paid, fed, clad, and otherwise well provided and supported.
On July 1, 1863, Birchard replied to Lincoln. His letter concluded with a reply to Lincoln's offer of subscription to certain pledges: "they have asked the revocation of the order of banishment, not as a favor, but as a right due to the people of Ohio". In his letter, Birchard cited habeas corpus. On September 15, 1863, Lincoln made a proclamation suspending habeas corpus.
Prior to the Birchard letter, Lincoln also sent a letter to Erastus Corning regarding the Vallandigham controversy on June 12, 1863.
