Jeremy Duda Books

Treason is the only crime explicitly defined in America’s Constitution. Relatively few Americans have been convicted of it. Far more have had the poisonous word thrown at them.

Through the cases of Americans who—whether acting in defense of their country, for personal gain, or simply when society had redefined treasonous activity—were accused of betraying their country, though not charged with the ultimate crime against one’s nation, If This Be Treason tackles the complicated question of where dissent ends and betrayal begins. Jeremy Duda covers the gamut of American history, from the earliest days of the republic, when George Logan’s act of unauthorized diplomacy kept his fledgling country out of war with France but so outraged his enemies that Congress passed a law to prevent it from ever happening again, to today as Edward Snowden remains an international fugitive for exposing the government’s spying on its own citizens. Among other examples are diplomatic envoy Nicholas Trist, who betrayed his president’s order to return home so he could negotiate a just treaty with a vanquished foe; former congressman Clement Vallandigham, who was exiled from his own country for speaking out against Lincoln’s prosecution of the Civil War; and Richard Nixon, who scuttled a peace deal to end the war in Vietnam.

“If this be treason, make the most of it!” So proudly declared Patrick Henry, accused of treason for opposing the Stamp Act imposed by Great Britain on its American colonies. Throughout history, Americans have toed the line between treason and dissent. Exactly where that line is has remained difficult to ascertain. But these cases serve as a fascinating way to explore and interpret where dissent ends and betrayal begins.

Read If This Be Treason to learn about:

• George Logan: The Philadelphia doctor's unauthorized diplomatic mission to France helped avert a war, but so incensed the Federalists that Congress passed the Logan Act, which bars Americans from negotiating with foreign governments. Though no one has ever been convicted of violating this law, many Americans have stood accused of violating it, a list that includes Henry Ford, Martin Luther King Jr., Jane Fonda, Richard Nixon, Jesse Jackson, Jim Wright, Nancy Pelosi, Tom Cotton, Michael Flynn and Donald Trump.

• The Alien and Sedition Acts: America's first anti-sedition law was used to punish opponents of President John Adams, most notably the Democratic-Republican writers of the Philadelphia Aurora. 

• The Hartford Convention: Once America's dominant ruling party, the Federalists had been relegated to a regional opposition party by the time of the War of 1812. Beaten down by war and fourteen years of Democratic-Republican rule, the Federalists convened in Hartford, Conn., to make their voices heard. They would spend the rest of their lives fending off accusations of treason.

• Nicholas Trist: President James K. Polk's peace envoy to Mexico left America as a loyal supporter of the war. But what he saw in Mexico changed his view of the war, and the rogue envoy joined with Gen. Winfield Scott to betray President Polk and forge the peace treaty that gave America the borders we know today.

• William Walker: In the 1850s, "filibusters" were swashbuckling mercenaries who sought to conquer Latin American nations in the name of Manifest Destiny, and William Walker was the most famous of them all. Walker conquered and ruled Nicaragua, where he hoped to lure colonists from the American South by reintroducing slavery. But his adventures brought him into conflict with his own government, Nicaragua's neighbors, Great Britain and Cornelius Vanderbilt, who conspired to bring him down.

• Clement Vallandigham: As leader of the Copperheads, the Democrats who opposed the Civil War and Abraham Lincoln, Vallandigham was a thorn in Lincoln's side as he sought to hold the country together. The former Ohio congressman was one of Lincoln's fiercest opponents, and found himself exiled to the Confederate States for his outspoken criticism.

• Victor Berger: The voters of Milwaukee elected Berger as the first Socialist to ever serve in Congress. But America's ruling parties had other plans. For his Socialist views and opposition to America's entry into World War I, Congress refused to give Berger the seat in the House of Representatives to which he'd been duly elected while the government shut down his Socialist newspaper and attempted to imprison him for sedition.

• Jack Reed: A journalist who made his name covering the battlefields of Mexico and Europe, Reed's greatest claim to fame was Ten Days That Shook the World, his firsthand account of the Bolshevik Revolution. Reed became Bolshevism's emissary in America, and spent his last years promoting the revolution in his beloved Soviet Union.
  

• The greatest press leak in American history: The Chicago Tribune, a leader of America's isolationist movement, saw Roosevelt as a hypocrite who claimed to be keeping his nation out of World War II while constantly pushing the United States closer to joining the conflict. When one of its reporters obtained a highly classified copy of Roosevelt's European war plans, the Tribune splashed the news across its front page just days before the bombing of Pearl Harbor to warn Americans of their president's plans.

• The Smith Act trial: In an episode that has largely been forgotten by history, eleven leaders of the Communist Party of the United States went on trial for violating the Smith Act, a law that essentially made it illegal to be a communist. Amid the excesses and hysteria of the early Cold War and the McCarthy era, their conviction began a wave of terror against American communists.
  

• The Chennault Affair: Years before the Watergate scandal that forced Richard Nixon from the White House came the Chennault Affair, the scandal that helped get him there in the first place. As Lyndon Johnson spent the last months of his presidency trying to end the war in Vietnam, Nixon secretly worked with South Vietnamese leaders and a China Lobby activists named Anna Chennault to prolong it in an underhanded bid to ensure he won the presidency in 1968.
  

• Iran-Contra: Ronald Reagan hoped he could win the freedom of American hostages in the Middle East by secretly selling arms to Iran. But when America learned that Oliver North and John Poindexter had been funneling the profits to the anti-communist Nicaraguan forces known as the contras, it created a scandal that shook the Reagan administration to its core.
  

• Edward Snowden: When the rogue National Security Agency contractor revealed some of the biggest secrets of America's intelligence community, Americans learned the shocking truth about how much their leaders were watching them. As Snowden lives out his days in exile in Russia, the debate continues to rage at home. Is Snowden a patriot who exposed government wrongdoing, or a traitor who betrayed his country?