REPORT OF THE SECRETARY OF WAR. treacherously seized upon by the enemies of the Government, and to reestablish the authority and laws of the United States in the places where it is opposed or overthrown by armed insurrection and rebellion. Its purpose is to recover and defend what is justly its own. "War, even between independent nations, is made to subdue the enemy, and all that belongs to that enemy, by occupying the hostile country, and exercising dominion over all the men and things within its territory. This being true in respect to independent nations at war with each other, it follows that rebels who are laboring by force of arms to overthrow a Government, justly bring upon themselves all the consequences of war, and provoke the destruction merited by the worst of crimes. That Government would be false to national trust, and would justly excite the ridicule of the civilized world, that would abstain from the use of any efficient means to preserve its own existence, or to overcome a rebellious and traitorous enemy, by sparing or protecting the property of those who are waging war against it. "The principal wealth and power of the Rebel States is a peculiar species of property, consisting of the service or labor of African slaves, or the descendants of Africans. This property has been variously estimated at the value of from $700,000,000 to $1,000,000,000. 66 Why should this property be exempt from the hazards and consequences of a rebellious war? "It was the boast of the leader of the rebellion, while he yet had a seat in the Senate of the United States, that the Southern States would be comparatively safe and free from the burdens of war, if it should be brought on by the contemplated rebellion, and that boast was accompanied by the savage threat, that Northern towns and cities would become the victims of rapine and military spoil,' and that Northern men should smell Southern gunpowder and feel Southern steel.' No one doubts the disposition of the rebels to carry that threat into execution. The wealth of Northern towns and cities, the produce of Northern farms, Northern workshops and manufactories, would certainly be seized, destroyed, or appropriated as military spoil. No property in the North would be spared from the hands of the rebels, and their rapine would be defended under the laws of war. While the loyal States thus have all their property and possessions at stake, are the insurgent rebels to carry on warfare against the Government in peace and security to their own property? 521 traitors and rebels to the extremity of war, all the rights and powers of war should be exercised to bring it to a speedy end. "Those who make war against the Government justly forfeit all rights of property, privilege, or se curity, derived from the Constitution and laws, against which they are in armed rebellion; and as the labor and service of their slaves constitute the chief property of the rebels, such property should share the common fate of war to which they have devoted the property of loyal citizens. "While it is plain that the slave property of the South is justly subjected to all the consequences of this rebellious war, and that the Government would be untrue to its trust in not employing all the rights and powers of war to bring it to a speedy close, the details of the plan for doing so, like all other military measures, must, in a great degree, be left to be determined by particular exigencies. The disposition of other property belonging to the rebels that becomes subject to our arms is governed by the circumstances of the case. The Government has no power to hold slaves, none to restrain a slave of his liberty, or to exact his service. It has a right, however, to use the voluntary service of slaves liberated by war from their rebel masters, like any other property of the rebels, in whatever mode may be most efficient for the defense of the Government, the prosecution of the war and the suppression of the rebellion. It is as clearly a right of the Government to arm slaves when it may become necessary as it is to use gunpowder taken from the enemy. Whether it is expedient to do so is purely a military question. The right is unquestionable by the laws of war. The expediency must be determined by circumstances, keeping in view the great object of overcoming the rebels, reestablishing the laws, and restoring peace to the nation. "It is vain and idle for the Government to carry on this war, or hope to maintain its existence against rebellious force, without employing all the rights and powers of war. As has been said, the right to deprive the rebels of their property in slaves and slave labor, is as clear and absolute as the right to take forage from the field, or cotton from the warehouse, or powder and arms from the magazine. To leave the enemy in the possession of such such property as forage and cotton and military stores, and the means of constantly reproducing them, would be madness. It is, therefore, equal madness to leave them in peaceful and secure possession of slave property, more valuable and efficient to them for war, than forage, cotton and mili tary stores. Such policy would be national suicide. What to do with that species of property, is a ques tion that time and circumstance will solve, and need "This is contrary to the intent of General Order No. 3. The object of these orders is to prevent any person in the army from acting in the capacity of not be anticipated further than to repeat that they cannot be held by the Government as slaves. It would be useless to keep them as prisoners of war; and self-preservation, the highest duty of a Govern-negro-catcher or negro-stealer. The relation be ment, or of individuals, demands that they should be disposed of or employed in the most effective manner that will tend most speedily to suppress the insurrection and restore the authority of the Government. If it shall be found that the men who have been held by the rebels as slaves are capable of bearing arms and performing efficient military service, it is the right, and may become the duty, of the Government to arm and equip them, and employ their services against the rebels, under proper military regulation, discipline and command. "But in whatever manner they may be used by the Government, it is plain that once liberated by the rebellious act of their masters, they should never again be restored to bondage. By the master's treason and rebellion he forfeits all right to the labor and service of his slave; and the slave of the rebellious master, by his service to the Government, becomes justly entitled to freedom and protection. "The disposition to be made of the slaves of rebels, after the close of the war, can be safely left to the wisdom and patriotism of Congress. The Representatives of the people will unquestionably secure to the loyal slaveholders every right to which they are entitled under the Constitution of the country. "SIMON CAMERON, "To the President." tween the slave and his master is not a matter to be determined by military officers, except in the single case provided by Congress. This matter in all other cases must be decided by the civil authorities. One object in keeping the fugitive slaves out of our camps is to keep clear of all such questions. Masters or pretended masters must establish the rights of property to the negroes as best they may, without our assistance or interference, except where the law authorizes such interference. "Order No. 3 does not apply to the authorized private servants of officers, nor to negroes employed by proper authority in camps; it applies only to fugitive slaves.' The prohibition to admit them within our lines does not prevent the exercise of all proper offices of humanity, in giving them food and clothing outside, where such offices are neccessary to prevent suffering. "Very respectfully, your obedient servant, THE "CONVENTION" BY WHICH MISSOURI We refer on pages 434, to the transfer by Commissioners of Missourl to the Southern Confede racy. The following is the document of agreement: "Whereas, it is the common desire of the State of Missouri and the Confederate States of America, that said State should become a member of the confederacy; and whereas, the accomplishment of their GENERAL HALLECK'S INTERPRETATION OF purpose is now prevented by an armed invasion ef HIS ORDER NUMBER THREE. On page 451 we refer to Halleck's General Order Number Three, relating to the banishment of "fugitive slaves" from his lines. It ought, in justice to the General, and as expressive of the course really pursued toward the blacks during his administration in Missouri, to give his letter to General Asboth, who, it would appear, followed orders even against his own sense of humanity, by delivering up a slave to the agent of his professed master: 64 HEADQUARTERS DEPARTMENT OF MISSOURI, St. Louis, Dec. 26th, 1861. "GENERAL ASBOTH, Rolla, Mo. the territory of said State by the United States; and whereas, the interests of both demand that they should make common cause in the war waged by the United States against the liberties of both; now, therefore, for these most desirable objects, the Executive power of the State of Missouri has conferred full powers on Edward Carrington Cabell and Thomas L. Snead, and the President of the Confederate States of America on R. M. T. Hunter, their Secretary of State, who, after having exchanged their said full powers in due and proper form, have agreed to the following articles: Article 1. The State of Missouri shall be admitted into the Confederacy on an equal footing with the other States composing the same, on the fulfilment of the conditions set forth in the second section of the act of the Congress of the Confederate States, entitled An act to aid the State of Missouri in repelling invasion by the United States, and to autho PROTEST AGAINST THE DEFENSIVE POLICY. 523 rize the admission of said State as a member of the Confederate States of America, and for other purposes,' approved August 20th, 1861. “ Art, 2. Until said State of Missouri shall become a member of said Confederacy, the whole military force, material of war and military operations, offensive and defensive, of said State shall be under the chief control and direction of the President of the Confederate States, upon the same basis, princlples and footing as if said State were now and during the interval, a member of said Confederacy, the said force, together with that of the Confederate States, to be employed for their common defense. "Art. 3. The State of Missouri will, whenever she becomes a member of said Confederacy, turn over to said Confederate States all the public property, naval stores and munitions of war, of which she may then be in possession, acquired from the United States (excepting the public lands) on the same terms and in the same manner as the other States of said Confederacy have done in like cases. “Art, 4. All expenditures for the prosecution of the existing war incurred by the State of Missouri, from and after the date of the signing of this convention, shall be met and provided for by the Confedeerate States. Art. 5. The alliance hereby made between the said State of Missouri and the Confederate States shall be offensive and defensive, and shall be and remain in force during the continuance of the existing war with the United States, or until superseded by the admission of said State into the Confederacy, and shall take effect from the date thereof, according to the provisions of the third section of the aforesaid act, approved August 20th, 1861. "In faith whereof, we, the Commissioners of the State of Missouri, and of the Confederate States of America, have signed and sealed these presents. "Done, in duplicate, at the city of Richmond, on the 31st day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-one. "E. C. CABELL, "THOS. L. SNEAD, "R. M. T. HUNTER." 1861, yet, it is nearer the truth than the President's hypocritical statement of "glorious results." "The policy of monotonous defense which has been perseveringly pursued by the authorities of the Confederacy has been the subject of universal regret among the Southern people, of annoyance to our generals, and of disease and death to our armies. On the side of the enemy, it has more than repaired the damage inflicted upon them in many brilliant battles; and, among foreign nations, it has engendered more distrust of our ability to make good our independence than all other causes combined. "On the army it has had a deplorable effect; not merely producing that ennui which is the fruitful mother of diseases, discontents and demoralization in the camp; but it has substituted for that buoyant confidence and resolution to do, to dare, and to die, which actuated our volunteers, a wide spread feel. ing of listless hopelessness of results, with an indisposition and partial incapacity to achieve them. "The enemy have found themselves at perfect leisure, in the very presence of our legions, to devise, mature and make trial of any plan of campaign or assault which they have thought expedient. Nowhere have they been thrown, by any movement of ours, into a moment's alarm for the safety of any army or any district of country in their possession, except on the memorable occasion of their panic for the safety of Washington city, which the same evil genius of defense prevented from being taken by our forces. Their generals and their politicians have been left to entire liberty to plan any schemes of campaign, any assaults, or raids, or incursion into our territory that their genius might suggest, or their rapacity or malignity might devise. They have encountered no opposition at any stage of their preparations for these operations. We have stood still and allowed all their preliminary arrangements to be perfected, attempting to nip no scheme of mischief in the bud, and never thinking for a single moment or in a solitary instance how much more easily mischief may be crushed in its inception than successfully withstood when at the head and in full tide and momentum of execution. "To all eyes abroad our energies seem to have been palsied by a fatal paralysis. All that might have been achieved by policy and genius has been PROTEST AGAINST THE DEFENSIVE POLICY. neglected; and nothing has retrieved our reputation The Confederate President inaugurated the defen- for vigor and capacity but the boldness of our solsive policy pursued during 1861. To it the opposi-diers and the success of our generals in active ention was very bitter, but Davis' voice was supreme, gagement. The impression made upon the foreign and his system prevailed. The Richmond Examiner of Dec. 30th, thus gave the summary of the year's doings under that system of warfare. The tone of this article, it will be perceived, is not quite so exultant as that of Davis' message of November 18th, mind is, as if our generals had been all the time manacled by secret instructions from the closet, and our soldiers leashed like hounds, forced to slink and crawl at the heels of the hunter, though it was felt that they were noble bloods needing but the sound of the bugle to open in full and terrible cry. For | and which, though expecting an attack every day, a general to put forth exertion, was to render yet decimates its armies by inaction." some explanation of conduct necessary; for him to fight battles and win victories, was to encounter direct censure, to provoke the cold shoulder, and to inaugurate a quarrel with the powers above. "The effect of this obstinate adherance to the defensive programme has been very deplorable upon the lists of mortality. While we have lost thousands by disease, we have lost only tens by the casualties of the battle field. The whole country is filled with mourning; and the sad lament of mother, father, wife, sister, all, is that their kinsman died the horrid death of the hospital, and not the glorious death of the soldier on the battle field. The noble spirits that, in volunteering for their country's defense, thought to seek glory at the cannon's mouth, have paid the debt of nature upon beds of fever in vast charnel houses of disease, where those who ministered to them knew not their names, and where they were lost to all possibility of discovery from anxiously seeking friends. The policy of defense has cost the lives of the more gallant and brave spirits who chafed under inaction; it has bereft our armies of ten thousand heroes, who, if led against the enemy, would have escaped the dangers of the field after winning victories that would have added lustre to our annals. This defensive policy has not only cost us men, but it has cost us territory. Many counties of Eastern Virginia and important regions on the more southern seaboard are now occupied by the enemy, who would never have ventured forth to such distances if they had been menaced nearer home. Nearly all of Western Virginia is in the hands of an enemy who never would have gained a foothold in the interior if the original plan of aggressive attack along the line of the Baltimore and Ohio railway, and from Wytheville toward the mouth of the Kanawha and Sandy, through Eastern Kentucky toward Cincinnati, had been adhered to, instead of concentrating our forces for mere defense on Cheat Mountain and on Sewell. This moment Bowling Green and Columbus could be more effectually relieved and the Southern cause in Kentucky put more speedily on its legs, by menacing Cincinnati with a column of ten thousand men from Western Virginia, than by concentrating a hundred thousand men in the path which the enemy has chosen for his march from Louisville southward. That cannot be good generalship which leaves the enemy at perfect leisure to mature all his preparations for aggression, and then to choose the roads by which he will march and the fields on which he will fight. That cannot be a glorious system of warfare which never ventures an aggressive movement, or even a battle, GOVERNOR LETCHER'S MESSAGE OF JANUA- TURE. EXECUTIVE DEPARTMENT, Jan. 6th, 1862. GENTLEMEN OF THE SENATE AND HOUSE OF DELE GATES: I received from his Excellency Joseph E. Brown, Governor of the State of Georgia, a communication enclosing joint resolutions adopted by the Legisla ture of that State, and approved December 11, 1861. These resolutions relate to matters of the first importance, and they command my cordial approbation. They declare the sentiments of the Southern Confederacy, and will be enthusiastically responded to by the people of all classes. In communicating those resolutions to the General Assembly I embrace the opportunity to fill up a hiatus in the history of the State growing out of her changed relations. Virginia dissolved her connec⚫ tion with the Government of the United States on the 17th day of April last, having watched closely the political conduct of President Lincoln and his Cabinet from the 4th day of March preceding. A large portion of our people believed, from the revelations of his inaugural message, that he designed to subjugate the South, and much of his policy as developed in the first six weeks of his administration, tended to confirm and strengthen this belief. The appearance of his proclamation, however, calling on Virginia and other States for volunteers, removed all doubts, and made it plain and palpable that subju. gation was his object. He had revealed his purpose by the issue of his proclamation, to use Virginians, if possible, in coercing their Southern slaveholding brethren into submission to his will and obedience to his Government and authority. Virginia, seeing that the only hope of preserving her rights and honor as a State and the liberties of her people consisted in dissolving her connection with the Government of the United States and resuming her sovereignty, adopted that course, and subsequently determined to unite her destiny with her Southern sisters. She did so; and her Convention, being at the time in session, adopted such ordinances and regulations as were necessary to protect her citizens against the machinations of enemies at home and the encroach ments of enemies from abroad. Events that have transpired since the 17th day of April last have more than confirmed the worst apprehensions of the people of Virginia, and have furnished an ample and complete justification for the GOVERNOR LETCHER'S MESSAGE. 525 sion of Virginia, others show violations equally palpable subsequent to her secession. secession of the State. All the wicked results ap-specifications show violations anterior to the secesprehended when she seceded have been fearfully realized, and they now constitute an important chapter in the history of the stirring times in which we live. In the preamble to the Constitution of the United States our forefathers declared the purposes and ob Such were the considerations that influenced and jects they had in view in the formation of the Govdetermined the action of Virginia. I now propose to show that while President Lincoln professes to have inaugurated this war for preservation and perpetuation of the Constitution in its spirit and letter, he has violated in the most direct manner many of its most important provisions. I propose, in the next place, to compare his conduct with the conduct of George the Third, and to prove, by reference to the Declaration of Independence, that most of his acts have been identical with those denounced by our forefathers as justifiable grounds for our separation from the mother country. ernment, and those purposes and objects were "to establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty" to themselves and their posterity. The Government has been so administered and directed as to defeat all these purposes and objects. Justice has not been established, nor is it respected by President Lincoln and his Cabinet. Domestic tranquillity has not been insured, but domestic disturbance has been inaugurated and encouraged. The common defense has not been provided for, but Northern arms have been The war which has been waged against us by Pre- levelled at Southern breasts, and the welfare of our sident Lincoln is the most unnatural and at the same people has been disregarded. The blessings of libtime, the most disgraceful that has ever occurred. erty have not been secured to us, but we have We are struggling for our rights and liberties, for found the Federal authorities exerting all their pow the protection of persons and property, and for the er and using all the means at their command to represervation of the honor and institutions of the duce the Southern people to abject submission to South. The ruthless assault that has been made | Northern numbers. upon us and the unjustifiable attempt to submission present a most extraordinary spectacle in the eyes of the civilized world. When a Secretary of War can quietly seat himself at his desk and coolly, calmly and deliberately commit to paper a recommendation to arm the slaves of the Southern States, place them in the field and incite them to hostility to their masters and the destruction of their families, what extreme may we not reasonably anticipate from an administration that retains such an official in its service? When an administration can go to work to destroy ports in States over which they claim to have jurisdiction, by sinking obstructions in the channels of our rivers and harbors (a policy unheard of among civilized nations), what enormity may we not be prepared to expect? President Lincoln and his Cabinet have annulled the Constitution, have suspended the writ of habeas corpus, and have declared martial law without constitutional warrant, but in defiance of it. Representative government has ceased to command their respect, and the direct tendency now in what remains of the late United States Government is inevitably towards consolidation and despotism. Passions and prejudice, avarice and selfishness, malignity and meanness have controlled their action and directed their efforts against us. Having presented these general views, I now present specifications showing in what particulars the Constitution has been violated. Some of these President Lincoln and his Cabinet have wilfully and deliberately proposed to violate every provision of the third section of the fourth article of the Con stitution, which each one of them solemnly swore or affirmed, iu the presence of Almighty God, to "preserve, protect and defend." That section is in these words: "New States may be admitted by the Congress into this Union; but no new State shall be formed or erected within the jurisdiction of any other State, nor any State formed by the junction of two or more States or parts of States, without the consent of the Legislatures of the States concerned as well as of the Congress." They have deliberately proposed to annex certain counties in Maryland to Virginia, and thus form the new State of Kanawha, within the jurisdiction of Virginia, without the consent of the Legislatures of those States and of Congress. They have proposed to take the four counties lying in the Pan Handle, from Virginia and attach them to Pennsylvania, without the consent of the Legislature of the States interested and of Congress. They have proposed to join the eastern counties of Virginia to Maryland, and thus make a new State by the junction of parts of two States, without the consent of the Legisla tures of these States and of Congress. These propositions present a most plain and glaring violation of the Constitution, and evidence an intensity of ma lignity towards Virginia and Virginians without a a parallel in the history of the United States. The first amendment to the Constitution declares "that Congress shall make no law abridging the |