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PREFACE.

This compilation contains all the permanent laws of the United States directly affecting the War Department, the Regular Army, the Volunteers, and the Militia, including the legislation enacted by the 63d Congress, which adjourned March 4, 1915.

As originally prepared and submitted to the Public Printer, it embraced all legislation enacted prior to June 1, 1914, and was set up in that form. The publication was delayed, and it became necessary to include legislation enacted after that date, during the remainder of the second session and also during the third session of that Congress. This later legislation will be found in the supplement. The numerical designations of paragraphs in the supplement correspond to those of related paragraphs in the original text, being distinguished for the purpose of citation by a letter added to the paragraph number, thus following the style of previous compilations. It has not been found practicable to include, as in prior editions, all the laws directly affecting the civil administration under the War Department, nor to include certain laws indirectly affecting the administration of the department and the military establishment without expanding the volume to an inconvenient size. Accordingly only such laws of this character as are frequently consulted at the War Department and other military headquarters have been retained and the others have been eliminated, citations to the latter being placed in a table of related statutes. The references in this list will enable any searcher for a statute to pass readily to the section of the Revised Statutes or the volume and page of the Statutes at Large where the act is to be found.

As a further aid to ready reference, there has been inserted a table which will enable one to pass from a particular paragraph of this compilation to the corresponding provisions of the Revised Statutes and the Statutes at Large.

March 18, 1915.

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E. H. CROWDER, Judge Advocate General.

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4 Notification of rejections and confirmations.....

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Details of clerks to Executive Office. 12

shall be vested in He shall hold his

Succession of Vice President...
Succession of Cabinet officer
Same-Limitations....

1. The executive power.-The executive power
a President of the United States of America.
office during the term of four years.
11, sec. 1.

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Constitution, Art.

2. Commander in Chief-Cabinet-Pardoning power.-The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the militia of the several States, when called into the actual service of the United States; he may require the

'The Executive Power.-The executive power is vested in a President, and, as far as his powers are derived from the Constitution, he is beyond the reach of any other Department, except in the mode prescribed by the Constitution through the impeaching power. (Kendall v. U. S., 12 Pet., 524, 610; Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cranch, 137, 166.)

Execution of the laws.-The President is required to see that the laws are faithfully executed, but he is not obliged to execute them himself. (IV Opin. Att. Gen., 515; Williams v. U. S., 12 Pet., 524, 610.) The President speaks and acts through the heads of the several Departments in relation to subjects which appertain to their respective duties. (Wilcox v. Jackson, 13 Pet., 498, 513; Wolsey v. Chapman, 101 U. S., 755; Runkle v. U. S., 122 U. S., 543, 557.) As a general rule, the direction of the President is presumed in all instructions and orders issuing from the competent Department. (VII Opin. Att. Gen., 453.) In a matter which the law confides to the pure discretion of the Executive, the decision of the President, or proper head of Department, on any question of fact involved is conclusive, and is not subject to review by any other authority in the United States. (VI Opin. Att. Gen., 226 Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cr., 137, 166.) The President can not be restrained by injunction from executing a law of Congress. (Mississippi v. Johnson, 4 Wall., 475; Bates v. Taylor, 11 S. W. Rep., 266.)

Powers as Commander in Chief.-As Commander in Chief he is authorized to direct the movements of the land and naval forces placed by law at his command, and to employ them in the manner he may deem most effectual to harass and conquer and subdue the enemy. He may invade the hostile country and subject it to the sovereignty and authority of the United States. But his conquests do not enlarge the boundaries of this Union, nor extend the operations of our institutions and laws beyond the limits before assigned to them by the legislative power. (Fleming v. Page, 9 How., 603. 615.) The power of command and control reserved by the Crown was placed by the Constitution in the

opinion, in writing, of the principal officer in each of the Executive Departments upon any subject relating to the duties of their respectice offices, and he shall have power to grant reprieves and pardons for offenses against the United States, except in cases of impeachment. Constitution, Art. II, sec. 2.

3. Term of office.-The term of four years for which a President and Vice-President shall be elected shall in all cases commence on the 4th day of March next succeeding the day on which the votes of the electors have been given. Sec. 152, R. S.

4. Succession of Vice President.-In case of the removal of the President from office, or of his death, resignation, or inability to discharge the powers and duties of the said office, the same shall

hands of the President. (Street v. U. S., 24 Ct. Cls., 230; 25, id., 515, 113, U. S., 299. See also, the chapter entitled The Employment of Military Force.)

May form military governments in occupied territory.-As an incident of the exercise of belligerent rights, the President may form military and civil governments in the territory of the enemy occupied by the armies of the United States. (Cross v. Harrison, 16 How., 164, 190, 193. The Grapeshot, 19 Wall, 129, 132.) He may also institute temporary governments within insurgent districts occupied by the national forces. (Texas v. White. 7 Wall., 700, 730.) May establish courts in occupied territory—Limitation.-The courts established or sanctioned in Mexico during the War by the commanders of the United States forces were nothing more than the agents of the military power, to assist it in preserving order in the conquered territory and to protect the inhabitants in their persons and property while it was occupied by the American armies. They were subject to the military power, and their decisions were under its control whenever the commanding officer thought proper to interfere. Neither the President nor any military officer can establish a court in a conquered country and authorize it to decide upon the rights of the United States, or of individuals in prize cases, nor to administer the laws of nations. (Jecker v. Montgomery, 13 How., 498, 515. The Grapeshot, 9 Wall., 129, 132.)

For authority to employ secret agents in time of war, see Totten v. U. S., 92 U. S., 105, 107. For powers and duties of the Executive in connection with the Army, the Militia, and the Army Regulations, etc., see the chapters so entitled. The constitutional power of the President to command the Army and Navy, and of Congress "to make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces" are distinct; the President can not, by military orders, evade the legislative regulations; Congress can not, by rules and regulations, impair the authority of the President as Commander in Chief. (Swaim v. U. S., 28 Ct. Cls., 173.) When a law is passed for the regulation of the Army which does not impair the efficiency of the President as Commander in Chief, he becomes, as to that law, an executive officer, and is limited in the discharge of his duties by the statute. (McBlair v. U. S., 19 id., 528.)

1 The pardoning power.-A pardon is an act of grace proceeding from the power intrusted with the execution of the laws, which exempts the individual on whom it is bestowed from the punishment the law inflicts for a crime he has committed. It is the private though official act of the executive magistrate, delivered to the individual for whose benefit it is intended, and not communicated officially to the court. (U. S. v. Wilson, 7 Pet., 150, 161; Coke, 3d Inst., 233.) The power which the Constitution confers upon the President to grant pardons can not be controlled or limited, in any manner, by Congress. (Ex parte Garland, 4 Wall., 333, 380; U. S. v. Klein, 13 Wall., 128, 147; IV Opin. Att. Gen., 458; 19 id., 476.)

Delivery and acceptance. The pardon is a private though official act. It is official in that it is the act of the Executive; it is private in that it is delivered to the individual and not to the court. It must be pleaded, or brought officially to the knowledge of the court, in order that the court may give it effect in any given case. There is nothing peculiar in it to distinguish it from other acts.

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