How many presidents did the Confederacy have?
Thatâs a trick question, or at least a trick answer: The secessionist slave-holding confederacy elected just one president, Jefferson Davis.
But it can lay claim to another president â former U.S. President John Tyler, who later abandoned the country he once led to become a member of the rebel Congress.
We dredge up this history because itâs not simply history. As William Faulkner once wrote, âThe past is never dead. Itâs not even past.â In this case, Tyler is long since dead but still presents us with a modern-day question. While we are reappraising whether we want to honor former Confederates with statues and naming honors, what should we do about John Tyler?