What Trump Could Learn From Ulysses S. Grant

"The American military is not supposed to intervene in domestic politics. This is the long-standing norm governing U.S. civil-military relations. The Constitution asserts civilian control over the military, divided between the executive and legislative branches, as a means of preventing the military from becoming a partisan force of domestic oppression. President Donald Trump has destabilized this arrangement more than any president in recent memory."

"He has imposed National Guard forces on unwilling governors and mayors on the dubious grounds that American cities are more violent than battlefields in Afghanistan. He has invoked laws designed to limit the domestic use of the military-the Insurrection Act, for example-for the opposite purpose. And he has openly encouraged military partisanship, such as when he held political rallies with military audiences at Fort Bragg and Naval Station Norfolk, encouraging them to cheer his disparagement of Democratic governors."

"The last time the American military found itself under anything close to this kind of political pressure was during the constitutional crisis of 1866-67. At that time, Ulysses S. Grant was the commanding general of the U.S. Army. The Civil War had recently ended, and President Andrew Johnson faced monumental decisions: On what terms would his administration allow the readmission of Confederate states to the Union, and what civic and economic roles would Black Americans play in the antebellum South?"

The United States maintains a long-standing norm that the military must not intervene in domestic politics, enforcing civilian control divided between the executive and legislative branches. Recent presidential actions have strained that norm by deploying National Guard units against governors' wishes, invoking laws meant to limit domestic military use, and encouraging partisan military support at political rallies. The closest historical parallel occurred in the 1866–67 constitutional crisis when Ulysses S. Grant led the Army amid debates over Reconstruction, readmission of Confederate states, and protections for Black citizens while insurgent violence terrorized Black citizens, Republicans, and northern businessmen.

Read at The Atlantic