the writ of habeas corpus for the public safety;" and that, while he fully appreciated the delicacy of the trust, he was also instructed "that, in times of civil strife, errors, if any, should be on the side of safety to the country." The commanding General accordingly declined to obey the writ, whereupon an attachment was forthwith issued against him for contempt of court, made returnable at noon on the next day. On that day, the marshal charged with serving the attachment made return that he was not admitted within the fortress, and had consequently been unable to serve the writ. The Chief-Justice, thereupon, read an opinion that the President could not suspend the writ of habeas corpus, nor authorize any military officer to do so, and that a military officer had no right to arrest any person, not subject to the rules and articles of war, for an offence against the laws of the United States, except in aid of the judicial authority, and subject to its control. The Chief-Justice stated further, that the marshal had the power to summon out the posse comitatus to enforce the service of the writ, but as it was apparent that it would be resisted by a force notoriously superior, the Court could do nothing further in the premises.

On the 12th of May, another writ was issued by Judge Giles, of Baltimore, to Major Morris, of the United States Artillery, at Fort McHenry, who, in a letter dated the 14th, refused to obey the writ, because at the time it was issued, and for two weeks previous, the city of Baltimore had been completely under the control of the rebel authorities—United States soldiers had been murdered in the streets-the intention to capture that fort had been openly proclaimed, and the Legislature of the State was at that moment debating the question of making war upon the Government of the United States. All this, in his judgment, constituted a case of rebellion, and afforded sufficient legal cause for suspending the writ of habeas corpus. Similar cases arose, and

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were disposed of in a similar manner, in other sections of the country.

The Governor of Virginia had proposed to Mr. G. Heincken, of New York, the agent of the New York and Virginia Steamship Company, payment for two steamers of that line, the Yorktown and Jamestown, which he had seized for the rebel service, an acceptance of which proffer, Mr. Heincken was informed, would be treated as an act of treason to the Government; and on his application, Mr. Seward, the Secretary of State, gave him the following reasons for this decision:

An insurrection has broken out in several of the States of this Union, including Virginia, designed to overthrow the Government of the United States. The executive authorities of that State are parties to that insurrection, and so are public enemies. Their action in seizing or buying vessels to be employed in executing that design, is not merely without authority of law, but is treason. It is treason for any person to give aid and comfort to public enemies. To sell vessels to them which it is their purpose to use as ships of war, is to give them aid and comfort. To receive money from them in payment for vessels which they have seized for those purposes, would be to attempt to convert the unlawful seizure into a sale, and would subject the party so offending to the pains and penalties of treason, and the Government would not hesitate to bring the offender to punishment.

These acts and decisions of the Government were vehemently assailed by the party opponents of the Administration, and led to the most violent and intemperate assaults upon the Government in many of the public prints. Some of these journals were refused the privilege of the public mails, the Government not holding itself under any obligation to aid in circulating assaults upon its own authority, and stringent restrictions were placed upon the transmission of intelligence by telegraph. On the 5th of July, 1862, Attorney-General Bates transmitted to the President an elaborate opinion, prepared at his request, upon his power to make arrests of persons known to have criminal intercourse with the insurgents,

or against whom there is probable cause for suspicion of such criminal complicity,-and also upon his right to refuse to obey a writ of habeas corpus in case of such arrests. The Attorney-General discussed the subject at considerable length, and reached a conclusion favorable to the action of the Government. From that time forward the Government exerted, with vigor and energy, all the power thus placed in its hands to prevent the rebellion from receiving aid from those in sympathy with its objects in the Northern States. A large number of persons, believed to be in complicity with the insurgents, were placed in arrest, but were released upon taking an oath of allegiance to the United States. Baltimore continued for some time to be the head-quarters of conspiracies and movements of various kinds in aid of the rebellion, and the arrests were consequently more numerous there than elsewhere. Indeed, very strenuous efforts were made throughout the summer to induce some action on the part of the Legislature which should place the State in alliance with the rebel Confederacy, and it was confidently believed that an ordinance looking to this end would be passed at the extra session which was convened for the 17th of September; but on the 16th nine secession members of the House of Delegates, with the officers of both houses, were arrested by General McClellan, then in command of the army, who expressed his full approbation of the proceedings, and the session was not held.

The President at the time gave the following statement of his views in regard to these arrests:

The public safety renders it necessary that the grounds of these arrests should at present be withheld, but at the proper time they will be made public. Of one thing the people of Maryland may rest assured, that no arrest has been made, or will be made, not based on substantial and unmistakable complicity with those in armed rebellion against the Government of the United States. In no case has an arrest been made on mere suspicion, or through personal or partisan animosi

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ties, but in all cases the Government is in possession of tangible and unmistakable evidence, which will, when made public, be satisfactory to every loyal citizen.

Arrests continued to be made under authority of the State Department, not without complaint, certainly, from large numbers of the people, but with the general acquiescence of the whole community, and beyond all question greatly to the advantage of the Government and the country. On the 14th of February, 1862, an order was issued on the subject, which transferred control of the whole matter to the War Department. The circumstances which had made these arrests necessary are stated with so much clearness and force in that order, that we insert it at length as follows:

EXECUTIVE ORDERS IN RELATION TO STATE PRISONERS.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, Feb. 14.

The breaking out of a formidable insurrection, based on a conflict of political ideas, being an event without precedent in the United States, was necessarily attended by great confusion and perplexity of the public mind. Disloyalty, before unsuspected, suddenly became bold, and treason astonished the world by bringing at once into the field military forces superior in numbers to the standing army of the United States. Every department of the Government was paralyzed by treason. Defection appeared in the Senate, in the House of Representatives, in the Cabinet, in the Federal Courts; Ministers and Consuls returned from foreign countries to enter the insurrectionary councils, or land or naval forces; commanding and other officers of the army and in the navy betrayed the councils or deserted their posts for commands in the insurgent forces. Treason was flagrant in the revenue and in the postoffice service, as well as in the territorial governments and in the Indian reserves.

Not only Governors, Judges, Legislators, and ministerial officers in the States, but even whole States, rushed, one after another, with apparent unanimity, into rebellion. The capital was besieged and its connection with all the States cut off.

Even in the portions of the country which were most loyal, political combinations and secret societies were formed furthering the work of

disunion, while, from motives of disloyalty or cupidity, or from excited passions or perverted sympathies, individuals were found furnishing men, money, and materials of war and supplies to the insurgents' military and naval forces. Armies, ships, fortifications, navy yards, arsenals, 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 abetters 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 post-office 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 and 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.