I was thinking recently about what might be a “moonshot” project during my sabbatical. In other words, basic research that may well yield nothing but would have a large payoff in the unlikely event that there is something.
One possibility would be to go through each and every member of the Joint Committee on Reconstruction (especially the more obscure ones) to see if any of them wrote anything about the deliberations. The work of the Joint Committee is one of the great mysteries in constitutional history. The most prominent members–people like John Bingham and Thaddeus Stevens–did not leave behind any records about what occurred behind closed doors. And probably no member did, as you would think that if someone had we would know about that.
If I try, I’ll report back on any discoveries.
Posted by Gerard Magliocca on November 23, 2022 at 07:59 AM