Whom Can We Trust Now? ─ The Meaning of Treason in the United States, from the Revolution Through the Civil War

Historian and lawyer Brian F. Carso, Jr., demonstrates that, although treason law was conflicted and awkward, the broader idea of treason gave recognizable shape to abstract ideas of loyalty, betrayal, allegiance, and political obligation in the United States.
Taking an interdisciplinary approach, Carso begins by exploring the nature of loyalty and betrayal in a democratic republic, using examples ranging from Socrates in Plato's Crito to the dilemma of Robert E. Lee in 1861 and the trial of Timothy McVeigh in 1997. Turning to legal history, the study considers the historical antecedents of the Treason Clause of the U.S. Constitution and examines the utility of American treason law as it was applied in a variety of cases.
By examining editorials, sermons, histories, orations, art, literature, and political cartoons, Carso identifies how the meaning of treason engaged the public imagination in a variety of compelling forms and instructed citizens on loyalty and betrayal outside the courtroom as much as within it.

Brian F. Carso, Jr., holds graduate degrees from the University of Rochester, SUNY Buffalo School of Law, and Boston University, where he received his PhD in American Studies. A practicing attorney, he has held public office in both county and state government. He is currently an assistant professor of history at College Misericordia in Dallas, Pennsylvania.