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military posts and garrisons, one after another were betrayed or abandoned to the insurgents.

Congress had not anticipated and so had not provided for the emergency. The municipal authorities were powerless and inactive. The judicial machinery seemed as if it had been designed not to sustain the government, but to embarrass and betray it.

Foreign intervention, openly invited and industriously instigated by the abettors of the insurrection, became imminent, and has only been prevented by the practice of strict and impartial justice, with the most perfect moderation, in our intercourse with nations.

The public mind was alarmed and apprehensive, though fortunately not distracted or disheartened. It seemed to be doubtful whether the Federal Government, which one year before had been thought a model worthy of universal acceptance, had indeed the ability to defend and maintain itself.

Some reverses, which perhaps were unavoidable, suffered by newly levied and inefficient forces, discouraged the loyal, and gave new hopes to the insurgents. Voluntary enlistments seemed about to cease, and desertions commenced. Parties speculated upon the question whether conscription had not become necessary to fill up the armies of the United States.

In this emergency the President felt it his duty to employ with energy the extraordinary powers which the Constitution confides to him in cases of insurrection. He called into the field such military and naval forces, unauthorized by the existing laws, as seemed necessary. He directed measures to prevent the use of the postoffice for treasonable correspondence. He subjected passengers to and from foreign countries to new passport regulations, and he instituted a blockade, suspended the writ of habeas corpus in various places, and caused persons who were represented to him as being or about to engage in disloyal or treasonable practices to be arrested by special civil as well as military agencies, and detained in military custody, when necessary, to prevent them and deter others from such practices. Examinations of such cases were instituted, and some of the persons so arrested have been discharged from time to time, under circumstances or upon conditions compatible, as was thought, with the public safety.

Meantime a favorable change of public opinion has occurred. The line between loyalty and disloyalty is plainly defined; the whole structure of the government is firm and stable; apprehensions of public danger and facilities for treasonable practices have diminished with the passions which prompted heedless persons to adopt them. The insurrection is believed to have culminated and to be declining.

The President, in view of these facts, and anxious to favor a return to the normal course of the administration, as far as regard for the public welfare will allow, directs that all political prisoners or state prisoners now held in military custody be released on their subscribing to a parole engaging them to render no aid or comfort to the enemies in hostility to the United States.

The Secretary of War will, however, at his discretion, except from the effect of this order any persons detained as spies in the service of the insurgents, or others whose release at the present moment may be deemed incompatible with the public safety.

To all persons who shall be so released, and who shall keep their parole, the President grants an amnesty for any past offenses of treason or disloyalty which they may have committed.

Extraordinary arrests will hereafter be made under the direction of the military authorities alone. By order of the President:

Edwin M. Stanton, Secretary of War.

On February 27, 1862, Edwin M. Stanton, Secretary of War, signed EXECUTIVE ORDER No. 2, IN RELATION TO STATE PRISONERS. Major-General John A. Dix, of Baltimore, and Edwards Pierrepont, of New York, were appointed commissioners to pass upon cases of persons in military custody.

President's Special War Order No. 2.

MARCH 8, 1862.

Ordered, 1. That the major-general commanding the Army of the Potomac proceed forthwith to organize that part of the said army destined to enter upon active operations (including the

reserve, but excluding the troops to be left in the fortifications about Washington) into four army corps, to be commanded, according to seniority of rank, as follows:

First corps to consist of four divisions, and to be commanded by Major-General I. McDowell. Second corps to consist of three divisions, and to be commanded by Brigadier-General E. V. Sumner. Third corps to consist of three divisions, and to be commanded by BrigadierGeneral S. P. Heintzelman. Fourth corps to consist of three divisions, and to be commanded by Brigadier-General E. D. Keyes.

2. That the divisions now commanded by the officers above assigned to the commands of army corps shall be embraced in and form part of their respective corps.

3. The forces left for the defense of Washington will be placed in command of BrigadierGeneral James S. Wadsworth, who shall also be military governor of the District of Columbia.

4. That this order be executed with such promptness and despatch as not to delay the commencement of the operations already directed to be undertaken by the Army of the Potomac.

5. A fifth army corps, to be commanded by Major-General N. P. Banks, will be formed from his own and General Shields's (late General Lander's) divisions. Abraham Lincoln.

President's General War Order No. 3.

MARCH 8, 1862.

Ordered, That no change of the base of operations of the Army of the Potomac shall be made

without leaving in and about Washington such a force as in the opinion of the general-in-chief and the commanders of all the army corps shall leave said city entirely secure.

That no more than two army corps (about 50,000 troops) of said Army of the Potomac shall be moved en route for a new base of operations until the navigation of the Potomac from Washington to the Chesapeake Bay shall be freed from enemy's batteries and other obstructions, or until the President shall hereafter give express permission.

That any movement as aforesaid en route for a new base of operations which may be ordered by the general-in-chief, and which may be intended to move upon the Chesapeake Bay, shall begin to move upon the bay as early as the 18th day of March instant, and the general-in-chief shall be responsible that it so move as early as that day.

Ordered, That the army and navy co-operate in an immediate effort to capture the enemy's batteries upon the Potomac between Washington and the Chesapeake Bay.

A. Lincoln.

Lorenzo Thomas, Adjutant-General.

President's Special War Order No. 3.

MARCH 11, 1862.

Major-General McClellan having personally taken the field as the head of the Army of the Potomac, until otherwise ordered he is relieved from the command of the other military depart

ments, he retaining command of the Department of the Potomac.

Ordered further, that the two departments now under the respective commands of Generals Halleck and Hunter, together with so much of that under General Buell as lies west of a north and south line indefinitely drawn through Knoxville, Tenn., be consolidated and designated the Department of the Mississippi, and that until otherwise ordered Major-General Halleck have command of said department.

Ordered also, that the country west of the Department of the Potomac and east of the Department of the Mississippi be a military department to be called the Mountain Department, and that the same be commanded by Major-General Frémont.

That all the commanders of departments, after the receipt of this order by them respectively, report severally and directly to the Secretary of War, and that prompt, full, and frequent reports will be expected of all and each of them.

Abraham Lincoln.

Order Taking Military Possession of Railroads.

On May 25, 1862, the President by authority of an act of Congress, issued through M. Č. Meigs, Quartermaster-General, an ORDER TAKING MILITARY POSSESSION OF ALL RAILROADS in the United States, directing the railroad companies to be ready to transport troops and munitions of war to the exclusion of all other business.

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