Joe Biden’s great-grandfather was charged with attempted murder after a Civil War-era brawl, but Abraham Lincoln was pardoned for his misdeeds, a newspaper reported on Monday, reinstated on the US President’s Day holiday. The issue of presidential pardon power is often a topic of debate.
Citing documents from the U.S. National Archives, historian David J. Gellman writes: washington post Biden’s paternal ancestor, Moses J. Robinette, was pardoned by Lincoln after a fight with John J. Alexander, a Union Army civilian in Virginia. Robinette drew a knife and sliced Alexander.
The newspaper reported that Robinette worked as an Army veterinarian during the U.S. Interstate War. Unable to convince the court that he acted in self-defense, he was convicted of attempted murder and sentenced to two years’ hard labor.
Three military officers appealed to President Lincoln, arguing that the convictions were too harsh. Biden’s much earlier White House predecessor agreed, and Robinette was pardoned on September 1, 1864, seven months before Lincoln was assassinated.
Gellman said 22 pages of court martial records he found in the National Archives on President’s Day, one week after President Lincoln’s death on Feb. 12, helped “fill in unknown parts of the Biden family history.” ta, I wrote. Birthday, extra.
The historian notes that Robinette’s trial record was “squeezed inconspicuously among hundreds of other routine courts-martial,” and that it was a “problem between two men and two centuries old.” He said he had uncovered “hidden connections between the presidents.”
Article II, Section 2 of the U.S. Constitution gives the President of the United States the power to “grant reprieves and pardons for crimes against the United States, except in cases of impeachment.”
This power is rooted in the monarch’s prerogative to grant mercy under early English law, which then traveled across the Atlantic to the American colonies. The President of the United States typically exercises pardon power at the end of his term.
The recent president is exercised power to varying degrees. George W. Bush issued 200 amnesty laws. Barack Obama, 1,927 years old: Donald Trump, 237 years old.and Biden has 14 so farexcluding the thousands who were pardoned for simple possession of marijuana.
Biden’s marijuana amnesty only applies to people convicted of marijuana use and simple possession in federal territories and the District of Columbia.
Jimmy Carter issued 566 amnesty laws, excluding more than 200,000 for Vietnam War draft evasion.
Lincoln’s pardons for Robinette numbered 343.
According to the newspaper, the Battle of Robinett and Alexander took place on the night of March 21, 1864, with troops at the Army of the Potomac winter camp near Beverly Ford, Virginia.
Alexander, the brigade’s coachmaster, heard Robinette say something about himself to a female cook. An altercation resulted in Alexander bleeding. Robinette’s charges also included attempted murder. Although she was not found guilty on that charge, she was found guilty on the other charges and she was imprisoned on the Dry Tortugas Islands near Florida.
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Three Army officers who knew Robinette later petitioned Lincoln to overturn the conviction, and the court ruled that “all of the men who were defending themselves and slashing with a penknife a Teamster who was far superior in strength and size to him.” “It was an act driven by the excitement of the match and was unduly harsh.” It’s a moment.
The request came through a West Virginia state senator who called Robinette’s punishment “as stated, a harsh sentence for this case.” It then went to Lincoln’s private secretary, requesting judicial reports and court records.
When the letter finally reached Lincoln, he pardoned him “for the unfulfilled portion of his sentence.” The president at the time signed it. “A. Lincoln. September 1, 1864.”
Robinette was released from prison, returned to his family in Maryland, and resumed farming.
A short obituary after Robinette’s death in 1903 praised him as “a man of education and gentlemanly qualities.”
The newspaper said the obituary did not mention Robinette’s wartime court martial or his relationship with Lincoln.
Robinette was Biden’s late father, who died about 12 years before his great-grandson was born.
