The draft riots, 1863. Chicka mauga, Sep- lion or invasion the public safety may require it." Article i relates to the legislative power, and it might be inferred from this that the intention of the Constitution was that Congress should exercise the suspending power. The President ordered the suspension of the writ when Congress was not in session, and there was ground for the argument that unless the Executive exercised this function it could not be exercised at all in very critical moments. In 1863 Congress, by act, conferred on the President the right to suspend the operation of the writ. Since the war, the Supreme Court has decided that the final decision as to the suspension of the writ in a particular case belongs to the courts. Another cause of opposition was the action of the government in pursuance of an act of Congress passed in 1863. This authorized the general government to have recourse to a "draft" or conscription to fill the ranks of the armies. In the summer of 1863 riots directed against the enforcement of this law occurred in several places, especially in New York. The government was now strong enough to bear down all opposition, and the rioters were severely dealt with. The real result of the draft act, however, was to compel the states to fill their quotas of soldiers by paying large bounties to those who would enlist in the army. 364. Chickamauga and Chattanooga, 1863. — In June, 1863, Rosecrans again took up the task of capturing Chattanooga. By a series of well-planned and admirably executed maneuvers he compelled Bragg to abandon that place. After Gettysburg, the Confederate army in the West was reinforced by one of Lee's divisions, under one of his best commanders, General Longstreet. General Burnside also led a new Union army to eastern Tennessee, and occupied Knoxville. On September 19, 1863, Bragg suddenly attacked Rosecrans at Chickamauga, and nearly routed him. But here, as at Murfreesboro, Thomas saved the day by holding the center of the Union position. Thomas then succeeded Rosecrans in command, but was obliged to shelter his army in Chattanooga, where Bragg blockaded it, while Longstreet besieged November, Burnside at Knoxville. Meantime, Grant had assumed command of all the Union armies west of the Alleghanies. He hastened to the succor of Thomas and Burnside. Reinforcements had also been sent from the East, and Hooker, Chattanooga, with a detachment from the Army of the Potomac, reached Chattanooga immediately before Grant, with Sherman's corps of the Mississippi army, arrived on the scene of action. Grant at once sent Sherman to attack Bragg's right and Hooker to gain his left, while with Thomas's veterans he held him fast in his lines. Everything fell out happily: Thomas's men, eager to show their courage, carried the Confederate center by assault, and Bragg retreated in confusion (November, 1863). Sherman then went to the relief of Knoxville; on his approach Longstreet retired through the mountains to Virginia. 1863. Battles and Leaders, III, 679; Dodge's View, 184-189. Grant made lieutenant general, March, 1864. Atlanta Battles and 223-243, Grant had won the confidence of the Northern people by his brilliant successes. He was now made lieutenant general, and given command of all the Union armies on both sides of the Alleghanies (March, 1864). He assumed direct control of the operations in Virginia, and confided the leadership of the armies operating from Chattanooga to his tried and trusted subordinate, General Sherman. 365. The Atlanta Campaign, May to July, 1864. — The task to which Sherman set himself was most arduous. Atlanta was the only manufacturing town of importance, from a military point of view, in the Confederacy. It also was an important railway center, as the lines from Alabama, Georgia, and the Carolinas converged there. The country between Chattanooga and Atlanta was very difficult of access: the railroad ran through narrow gorges under mountains, whose tops, crowned with artillery, made advance on that line impossible. The Confederate government gathered every soldier who could be spared from the defense of Richmond to guard this important post, and placed in command Joseph E. Johnston, of living Southern commanders second only to Lee. To the conquest of these seventy-five thousand men, Sherman brought one hundred thousand veterans. 1864] Plan of Campaign 547 But Instead of attacking Johnston in front, Sherman used his superiority in numbers to outflank him, and thus compelled him to retreat from one impregnable position to another. Johnston showed great ability, but the skill of the Union commanders and the enthusiasm, courage, and discipline of the Northern soldiers overbore all obstacles. The Confederate government had never placed entire confidence in Johnston, and his retreat impelled them to displace him and appoint Hood to the chief command at the moment when the Union army was approaching Atlanta. Hood was expected to fight, and not to retreat. Again and again he attacked Sherman, only to be beaten off with cruel loss. He then advanced northward in the expectation that Sherman would follow him, and thus abandon the conquest of Atlanta. the Union commander contented himself with sending back a portion of his troops under Thomas and Schofield. With the remainder, some sixty thousand strong, he completed the destruction of the mills and factories at Atlanta, and set out for the seacoast through the heart of the Confederacy. 366. Plan of Campaign. The "march to the sea" had long been in contemplation. In the preceding years, while the Vicksburg campaign was still in progress, Colonel Grierson, with seventeen hundred men, had ridden from the Tennessee to Baton Rouge. He reported that "the Confederacy was a mere shell." Apart from the soldiers in the front, there were almost no fighting men in the South. Sherman thought, and Grant agreed with him, that as long as he was out of the reach of the armies under Lee and Hood, he would be perfectly safe. The advantages of his proposed movement were many in the first place, it would go far toward convincing the Southerners of the hopelessness of further resistance, and would probably increase the opposition to the Confederate government, which was already noticeable in some portions of the South in the second place, its successful prosecution would encourage the people of the North, and might have an important effect on European public opinion. The great dangers to be apprehended were Strategy of 1864. Battles and Leaders, Sherman's marches through Georgia and the Carolinas. Old South III, No. 5; IV, 663; 279-292, from the two Confederate armies. Grant felt able to keep Lee fully employed; but could Thomas, without Sherman's aid, crush Hood? After a thorough consideration of all these points, Grant gave Sherman permission to go. 367. Sherman and Thomas. Leaving Atlanta, Sherman and his men marched gayly through Georgia. Everywhere as they passed along they ruthlessly destroyed the railroad system by tearing up rails and twisting them into fantastic shapes by means of fire. The soldiers lived off the country, but, when not opposed, otherwise respected the rights of private property. On December 10, 1864, Sherman opened communication with the Union fleet blockading Savannah. Ten days later, his soldiers entered that city. After resting his men, he again set out this time on a more arduous and dangerous enterprise. The plan now was that he should march northward through the Carolinas, and occupy some position whence he could menace Lee's communications with the Southern states. With his customary foresight and energy, Sherman started before he was expected to do so, and thus gained a position in front of a force which had been gathered to oppose him. His northward advance compelled the evacuation of Charleston, and, on February 17, he entered Columbia, the capital of South Carolina. Lee now assumed the responsibility of appointing Johnston to command the defense against this invasion from the South. That general exercised all his old-time skill, but nothing that he was able to do could stop Sherman: the latter reached Goldsboro, North Carolina, in safety, and once again opened communication with the fleet. Meantime Wilmington had fallen, and Thomas had destroyed Hood's army. Schofield, with a portion of the Western army, joined Sherman at Goldsboro; the latter was now (March 21, 1865) fully able to cope with any army the Confederates could place in the field. For a time, indeed, it had seemed as if Thomas would not be able to carry out the part of the plan which had been assigned to him. A portion of his force under Schofield |