Civil War historians: We back Colorado on Trump ballot removal

Per the Guardian, discussed also at Raw Story, a group of 25 US Civil War and Reconstruction historians back the Colorado Supreme Court removing Donald Trump from the ballot, in an amicus brief filed with the Supreme Court.

First, the group, referring to precedent from both the authors of the 14th Amendment and language used by the first impeached president, Andrew Johnson, to note that the presidency is an office and the language of the amendment applies to it.

I agree. And, contra various wrongful musings of Richard Winger at Ballot Access News, this would be no more anti-democratic than a minimum age to hold the presidency or other federal offices, residency requirements, birth requirements for the president and more.

Of course, Winger is an under-the-radar semi-hardcore libertarian who was converted by The Little House on the Prairie's author's daughter, Rose Wilder Lane contra the fact that most of her arguments for libertarianism don't square with the semi-reality of Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House books, let alone the full reality behind them. See this book for more. And this story.

To the matter at hand? Contra this by Winger, even if ballots in 1868 were private and not government printed, the government still did the counting, and could tell political parties not to put Andy Johnson's name on the ballot.

That said, there's only three A-list historians on that brief: James McPherson, Nell Irvin Painter and Karen L. Cox. A few others are A-minus level.

But? No Eric Foner. No Gabor Boritt. Etc., etc.

Update: Also via BAN, as I guess historians are either squabblers or can't get their shit together, four others have filed a second amicus. David Blight might be A-list. Drew Gilpin Faust might be an A-minus. Jill Lepore? This is the Goodreads version of what was the top-rated one-star review of These Truths before the chuds at Amazon deleted all but one of my reviews for me reporting wingnut reviews and them getting pissed about me reporting them. She's not a good historian and definitely not an A-list Civil War historian. The four do cite Foner, but his name's still not there.