page_title: Copperhead (politics)
section_title: Copperhead resistance
hierarchical_section_title: Copperhead (politics) / Copperhead resistance
caption_attribution_description: Clement Vallandigham. Library of Congress description: "Hon. Clement Laird Vallandigham [?] of Ohio"
context_page_description: In the 1860s, the Copperheads, also known as Peace Democrats, were a faction of Democrats in the Union who opposed the American Civil War and wanted an immediate peace settlement with the Confederates.
  Republicans started calling anti-war Democrats "Copperheads," framing them as poisonous as a venomous snake. Those Democrats accepted the label, reinterpreting the copper "head" as the likeness of Liberty, which they cut from Liberty Head large cent coins and proudly wore as badges. By contrast, Democratic supporters of the war were called War Democrats. Notable Copperheads included two Democratic Congressmen from Ohio: Clement L. Vallandigham and Alexander Long. Republican prosecutors accused some prominent Copperheads of treason in a series of trials in 1864.
  Copperheadism was a highly contentious grass-roots movement. It had its strongest base in the area just north of the Ohio River as well as in some urban ethnic wards.
context_section_description: The Copperheads sometimes talked of violent resistance and in some cases started to organize. However, they never actually made an organized attack. As war opponents, Copperheads were suspected of disloyalty and their leaders were sometimes arrested and held for months in military prisons without trial. One famous example was General Ambrose Burnside's 1863 General Order Number 38, issued in Ohio, which made it an offence (to be tried in military court) to criticize the war in any way. The order was used to arrest Ohio congressman Clement L. Vallandigham when he criticized the order itself. However, Lincoln commuted his sentence while requiring his exile to the Confederacy.
  Probably the largest Copperhead group was the Knights of the Golden Circle. Formed in Ohio in the 1850s, it became politicized in 1861. It reorganized as the Order of American Knights in 1863 and again in early 1864 as the Order of the Sons of Liberty, with Vallandigham as its commander. One leader, Harrison H. Dodd, advocated violent overthrow of the governments of Indiana, Illinois, Kentucky and Missouri in 1864. Democratic Party leaders and a Federal investigation, thwarted his conspiracy. In spite of this Copperhead setback, tensions remained high. The Charleston Riot took place in Illinois in March 1864. Indiana Republicans then used the sensational revelation of an antiwar Copperhead conspiracy by elements of the Sons of Liberty to discredit Democrats in the 1864 House elections. The military trial of Lambdin P. Milligan and other Sons of Liberty revealed plans to set free the Confederate prisoners held in the state. The culprits were sentenced to hang, but the Supreme Court intervened in ex parte Milligan, saying they should have received civilian trials.
  Most Copperheads actively participated in politics. On May 1, 1863, former Congressman Vallandigham declared the war was being fought not to save the Union, but to free the blacks and enslave Southern whites. The army then arrested him for declaring sympathy for the enemy. He was court-martialed by the Army and sentenced to imprisonment, but Lincoln commuted the sentence to banishment behind Confederate lines. The Democrats nevertheless nominated him for governor of Ohio in 1863. He campaigned from Canada, but lost after an intense battle. He operated behind the scenes at the 1864 Democratic convention in Chicago. This convention adopted a largely Copperhead platform and selected Ohio Representative George Pendleton (a known Peace Democrat) as the vice presidential candidate. However, it chose a pro-war presidential candidate, General George B. McClellan. The contradiction severely weakened the party's chances to defeat Lincoln.
caption: Clement Vallandigham, leader of the Copperheads, coined the slogan: "To maintain the Constitution as it is, and to restore the Union as it was."
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