Woman trying to collect Civil War debt from Tampa

If you haven't read it yet, a woman named Joan Kennedy Biddle has filed a lawsuit against the City of Tampa trying to collect on a promissory note the city issued to her ancestor, a storekeeper there in 1861.

The original amount of the note was $299.58, but she and her attorney figure it should be worth about $22.7 million to them today. The note was to cover the cost of supplies needed by the city in June of 1861, as the Civil War was just getting started. (Note: In my opinion, $22.7 million would buy a lot of supplies!).

There are a few problems with all of this (beyond the fact of trying to collect $22.7 million dollars in taxpayer money on a $299.58 debt).

First, Tampa was disbanded as a city in 1869 because the citizens were too broke during the Reconstruction era to pay taxes. Soooo, the promissory note was issued by a governmental entity that no longer exists. The modern city was founded in 1889 using a new charter. The only thing it has in common with the 1861 town is location.

Second, the city was conquered by Union troops during the war, an act of war that overturned its Secessionist government.

And finally, the South wasn't successful in its secession effort. When the Union prevailed, the Confederacy ceased to exist. People who had loaned money to Confederate local governments were out of luck. In a few cases the U.S. Congress stepped in to reimburse communities for losses experienced during the war (primarily for churches and other public buildings destroyed by Union troops), but no public debts of the Confederacy were valid after 1865.