Lieber Code
100, April 24, 1863) was the military law that governed the wartime conduct of the Union Army by defining and describing command responsibility for war crimes and crimes against humanity; and the military responsibilities of the Union soldier fighting in the American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865) against the Confederate States of America (February 8, 1861 – May 9, 1865).
[3] In fighting the Confederate Army, guerrillas, and civilian collaborators of the Confederacy, Union Army soldiers and officers faced ethical dilemmas of command responsibility concerning their summary execution in situ, per military custom, because the 1806 Articles of War did not address the management and disposition of prisoners of war and irregular fighters; nor the management and safe disposition of escaped black slaves – who were not to be repatriated to the Confederacy, per the Act Prohibiting the Return of Slaves (1862).
Gen. Halleck edited Lieber's military law to concur with the Emancipation Proclamation (1 January 1863), and, on April 24, 1863, President Lincoln promulgated General Orders No.
100 (April 24, 1863) concerns the practical particulars of martial law, military jurisdiction, and the treatment of Confederate irregular fighters, such as spies, deserters, and prisoners of war.
"[10] The Code forbids torture as warfare; thus Article 44, Section II prohibits "all wanton violence committed against persons in the invaded country, all destruction of property not commanded by the authorized officer, all robbery, all pillage or sacking, even after taking a place by main force, all rape, wounding, maiming, or killing of such inhabitants, are prohibited under the penalty of death, or such other severe punishment as may seem adequate for the gravity of the offense.
[13] Those stipulations of U.S. military law specifically addressed the Confederate government's proclamation that the Confederate Army would treat captured black soldiers of the Union Army as escaped slaves, and not as prisoners of war, subject either to summary execution or to re-enslavement in the Confederacy; likewise, the white officers commanding the captured black soldiers would be denied prisoner-of-war status and would be arrested, tried, and condemned as common criminals for helping slaves escape human bondage.
[16] Moreover, to defend against the Confederate Army's violations of the laws of war by way of irregular fighters, the Lieber Code allowed retaliation by musketry against Confederate POWs, and allowed the summary execution of captured enemy civilians (spies, saboteurs, francs-tireurs, guerrillas) caught attacking the Union Army and the United States.
[18][19] For the conquest and military occupation of the Confederate States of America (February 8, 1861 – May 9, 1865), General William Tecumseh Sherman based his Special Field Orders No.
[22] An abridged version of the Lieber Code was published in The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies (1899).
The Lieber Code was the military law then applied for courts martial of American military personnel, and for litigation against the Filipino natives and against the Filipino revolutionaries fighting the U.S. occupation of the Philippine Islands; e.g. the unlawful concentration camps of General J. Franklin Bell and war-crime trial of Littleton Waller.
