The Notorious Benedict Arnold

Use these questions or activities to help gauge students’ familiarity with and spark their interest in the context of the work, giving them an entry point into the text itself.

Short Answer

1. What do you know about the definition of the word “treason”?

Teaching Suggestion: Offer students a dictionary definition to check their initial ideas against. Then, expand their understanding by asking about related terms, like “traitor,” “betrayal,” and “disloyal.” Help them see where these ideas overlap—in the sense of choosing to go against the interests of an entity one owes loyalty to—and where they do not. Guide them to see that these related words highlight the specific target of treason—a government—and the grave seriousness of the offense. Finally, explain that our Constitution has a specific clause regarding treason, and that in this definition, a person can only commit treason during a time of war.

• The Constitution Center explains the Treason Clause in this essay.
• This Washington Post article discusses myths about the crime of treason.

2. Do you think there can ever be an ethical excuse or a logical explanation for committing treason?

Teaching Suggestion: Students are likely, at first, to say that there might be explanations, but that these explanations cannot excuse treason. After allowing some time for them to consider The Devastation of Treason, challenge their thinking by asking whether treason against a government like the Third Reich would have been morally permissible. Ask them to think about being assigned at birth to be “loyal” to a government. Does the nature of the government matter? How repressive and undemocratic does the government have to be in order to “excuse” treason? Were the American Revolutionaries morally justified in committing treason against the British crown?

• This History Channel article describes the case of a teen executed for treason by the Third Reich.
• This site, hosted by Arizona State University, offers a thoughtful discussion of the American Revolution as an act of treason, among other nuanced cases of treason in America.