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Title:  The Writings of Abraham Lincoln

Author:  Abraham Lincoln

June, 2001  [Etext #2658]


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VOLUME SIX

WRITINGS OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN

1862-1863




RECOMMENDATION OF NAVAL OFFICERS

MESSAGE TO CONGRESS.

WASHINGTON, D.C., May 14, 1862.

TO SENATE AND HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES:

The third section of the "Act further to promote the efficiency of
the Navy," approved 21st of December, 1861, provides:

"That the President of the United States by and with the advice and
consent of the Senate, shall have the authority to detail from the
retired list of the navy for the command of squadrons and single
ships such officers as he may believe that the good of the service
requires to be thus placed in command; and such officers may, if upon
the recommendation of the President of the United States they shall
receive a vote of thanks of Congress for their services and gallantry
in action against an enemy, be restored to the active list, and not
otherwise."

In conformity with this law, Captain David G. Farragut was nominated
to the Senate for continuance as the flag-officer in command of the
squadron which recently rendered such important service to the Union
by his successful operations on the lower Mississippi and capture of
New Orleans.

Believing that no occasion could arise which would more fully
correspond with the intention of the law or be more pregnant with
happy influence as an example, I cordially recommend that Captain D.
G. Farragut receive a vote of thanks of Congress for his services and
gallantry displayed in the capture since 21st December, 1861, of
Forts Jackson and St. Philip, city of New Orleans, and the
destruction of various rebel gunboats, rams, etc............




TO THE SENATE AND HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES:

I submit herewith a list of naval officers who commanded vessels
engaged in the recent brilliant operations of the squadron commanded
by Flag-officer Farragut which led to the capture of Forts Jackson
and St.  Philip, city of New Orleans, and the destruction of rebel
gunboats, rams, etc., in April 1862.  For their services and
gallantry on those occasions I cordially recommend that they should,
by name, receive a vote of thanks of Congress:

LIST:
Captain Theodorus Bailey.
Captain Henry W. Morris.
Captain Thomas T. Craven.
Commander Henry H. Bell.
Commander Samuel Phillips Lee.
Commander Samuel Swartwout.
Commander Melancton Smith.
Commander Charles Stewart Boggs
Commander John De Camp
Commander James Alden.
Commander David D. Porter.
Commander Richard Wainwright.
Commander William B. Renshaw.
Lieutenant Commanding Abram D. Harrell.
Lieutenant Commanding Edward Donaldson.
Lieutenant Commanding George H. Preble.
Lieutenant Commanding Edward T. Nichols.
Lieutenant Commanding Jonathan M. Wainwright.
Lieutenant Commanding John Guest.
Lieutenant Commanding Charles H. B. Caldwell.
Lieutenant Commanding Napoleon B. Harrison.
Lieutenant Commanding Albert N. Smith.
Lieutenant Commanding Pierce Crosby.
Lieutenant Commanding George M. Ransom.
Lieutenant Commanding Watson Smith.
Lieutenant Commanding John H. Russell.
Lieutenant Commanding Walter W. Queen.
Lieutenant Commanding K. Randolph Breese.
Acting Lieutenant Commanding Seliin E. Woolworth.
Acting Lieutenant Commanding Charles H. Baldwin.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.
WASHINGTON, D.C., May 14, 1862




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON CITY, May 15, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN, Cumberland, Virginia:

Your long despatch of yesterday is just received.  I will answer more
fully soon.  Will say now that all your despatches to the Secretary
of War have been promptly shown to me.  Have done and shall do all I
could and can to sustain you.  Hoped that the opening of James River
and putting Wool and Burnside in communication, with an open road to
Richmond, or to you, had effected something in that direction.  I am
still unwilling to take all our force off the direct line between
Richmond and here.

A. LINCOLN.




SPEECH TO THE  12TH INDIANA  REGIMENT,
MAY [15?] 1862

SOLDIERS, OF THE TWELFTH INDIANA REGIMENT: It
has not been customary heretofore, nor will it be hereafter, for me
to say something to every regiment passing in review.  It occurs too
frequently for me to have speeches ready on all occasions.  As you
have paid such a mark of respect to the chief magistrate, it appears
that I should say a word or two in reply.  Your colonel has thought
fit, on his own account and in your name, to say that you are
satisfied with the manner in which I have performed my part in the
difficulties which have surrounded the nation.  For your kind
expressions I am extremely grateful, but on the other hand I assure
you that the nation is more indebted to you, and such as you, than to
me.  It is upon the brave hearts and strong arms of the people of the
country that our reliance has been placed in support of free
government and free institutions.

For the part which you and the brave army of which you are a part
have, under Providence, performed in this great struggle, I tender
more thanks especially to this regiment, which has been the subject
of good report.  The thanks of the nation will follow you, and may
God's blessing rest upon you now and forever.  I hope that upon your
return to your homes you will find your friends and loved ones well
and happy.  I bid you farewell.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL I. McDOWELL.

WASHINGTON, May 16, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL McDOWELL:

What is the strength of your force now actually with you?

A. LINCOLN.




MEMORANDUM OF PROPOSED ADDITIONS TO INSTRUCTIONS OF ABOVE DATE TO
GENERAL McDOWELL, AND GENERAL MEIGS'S INDORSEMENT THEREON.

May 17, 1862.
You will retain the separate command of the forces taken with you;
but while co-operating with General McClellan you will obey his
orders, except that you are to judge, and are not to allow your force
to be disposed otherwise than so as to give the greatest protection
to this capital which may be possible from that distance.

[Indorsement.]
TO THE SECRETARY OF WAR:

The President having shown this to me, I suggested that it is
dangerous to direct a subordinate not to obey the orders of his
superior in any case, and that to give instructions to General
McClellan to this same end and furnish General McDowell with a copy
thereof would effect the object desired by the President.  He desired
me to say that the sketch of instructions to General McClellan
herewith he thought made this addition unnecessary.

Respectfully,
M. C. M.




INDORSEMENT RELATING TO GENERAL DAVID HUNTER'S
ORDER OF MILITARY EMANCIPATION,

MAY 17, 1862

No commanding general shall do such a thing upon my responsibility
without consulting me.

A. LINCOLN.




FROM SECRETARY STANTON TO GENERAL McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON, May 18, 1862.

GENERAL:
Your despatch to the President, asking reinforcements, has been
received and carefully considered.

The President is not willing to uncover the capital entirely; and it
is believed that, even if this were prudent, it would require more
time to effect a junction between your army and that of the
Rappahannock by the way of the Potomac and York rivers than by a land
march.  In order, therefore, to increase the strength of the attack
upon Richmond at the earliest moment, General McDowell has been
ordered to march upon that city by the shortest route.  He is
ordered, keeping himself always in position to save the capital from
all possible attack, so to operate as to put his left wing in
communication with your right wing, and you are instructed to co-
operate so as to establish this communication as soon as possible by
extending your right-wing to the north of Richmond.

It is believed that this communication can be safely established
either north or south of the Pamunkey River.

In any event, you will be able to prevent the main body of the
enemy's forces from leaving Richmond and falling in overwhelming
force upon General McDowell.  He will move with between thirty-five
and forty thousand men.

A copy of the instructions to General McDowell are with this.  The
specific task assigned to his command has been to provide against any
danger to the capital of the nation.

At your earnest call for reinforcements, he is sent forward to co-
operate in the reduction of Richmond, but charged, in attempting
this, not to uncover the city of Washington; and you will give no
order, either before or after your junction, which can put him out of
position to cover this city.  You and he will communicate with each
other by telegraph or otherwise as frequently as may be necessary for
efficient cooperation.  When General McDowell is in position on your
right, his supplies must be drawn from West Point, and you will
instruct your staff-officers to be prepared to supply him by that
route.

The President desires that General McDowell retain the command of the
Department of the Rappahannock and of the forces with which he moves
forward.

By order of the President:
EDWIN M. STANTON, Secretary of War.

MAJOR-GENERAL GEORGE B. McCLELLAN,
Commanding Army of the Potomac, before Richmond.




PROCLAMATION REVOKING
GENERAL HUNTER'S ORDER
OF MILITARY EMANCIPATION, MAY 19, 1862.

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:

A Proclamation

Whereas there appears in the public prints what purports to be a
proclamation of Major general Hunter, in the words and figures
following, to wit:

(General Orders No.  11)
HEADQUARTERS DEPARTMENT OF THE SOUTH, HILTON HEAD, PORT ROYAL, S. C.,
May 9, 1862.

"The three States of Georgia, Florida, and South Carolina, comprising
the military department of the South, having deliberately declared
themselves no longer under the protection of the United States of
America, and having taken up arms against the said United States, it
became a military necessity to declare martial law.  This was
accordingly done on the 25th day of April, 1862.  Slavery and martial
law in a free country are altogether incompatible.  The persons in
these three States: Georgia Florida, and South Carolina--heretofore
held as slaves are therefore declared forever free.
"By command of Major-General D. Hunter:
"(Official.)ED. W. SMITH,
"Acting Assistant Adjutant-General."

And whereas the same is producing some excitement and
misunderstanding: therefore,

I,  Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, proclaim and
declare that the Government of the United States, had no knowledge,
information, or belief of an intention on the part of General Hunter
to issue such a proclamation; nor has it yet any authentic
information that the document is genuine.  And further, that neither
General Hunter nor any other commander or person has been authorized
by the Government of the United States to make a proclamation
declaring the slaves of any State free; and that the supposed
proclamation now in question, whether genuine or false, is altogether
void so far as respects such a declaration.

I further make known that whether it be competent for me, as
commander-in-chief of the army and navy, to declare the slaves of any
State or States free, and whether, at any time, in any case, it shall
have become a necessity indispensable to the maintenance of the
government to exercise such supposed power, are questions which under
my responsibility I reserve to myself, and which I cannot feel
justified in leaving to the decision of commanders in the field.

These are totally different questions from those of police
regulations in armies and camps.

On the sixth day of March last, by special message, I recommended to
Congress the adoption of a joint resolution, to be substantially as
follows:

Resolved, That the United States ought to co-operate with any State
which may adopt gradual abolishment of slavery, giving to such State
pecuniary aid, to be used by such State, in its discretion, to
compensate for the inconvenience, public and private, produced by
such change of system.

The resolution in the language above quoted was adopted by large
majorities in both branches of Congress, and now stands an authentic,
definite, and solemn proposal of the nation to the States and people
most immediately interested in the subject-matter.  To the people of
those States I now earnestly appeal.  I do not argue--I beseech you
to make arguments for yourselves.  You cannot, if you would, be blind
to the signs of the times.  I beg of you a calm and enlarged
consideration of them, ranging, if it may be, far above personal and
partisan politics.  This proposal makes common cause for a common
object, casting no reproaches upon any.  It acts not the Pharisee.
The change it contemplates would come gently as the dews of heaven,
not rending or wrecking anything.  Will you not embrace it?  So much
good has not been done, by one effort, in all past time, as in the
providence of God it is now your high privilege to do.  May the vast
future not have to lament that you have neglected it.

In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal
of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the city of Washington, this nineteenth day of May, in the
year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred  and sixty-two, and of
the independence of the United States the eighty-sixth.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

By the President:
WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Secretary of State.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. E. McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON, May 21, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

I have just been waited on by a large committee who present a
petition signed by twenty-three senators and eighty-four
representatives asking me to restore General Hamilton to his
division.  I wish to do this, and yet I do not wish to be understood
as rebuking you.  Please answer at once.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON CITY, May 22, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

Your long despatch of yesterday just received.  You will have just
such control of General McDowell and his forces as you therein
indicate.  McDowell can reach you by land sooner than he could get
aboard of boats, if the boats were ready at Fredericksburg, unless
his march shall be resisted, in which case the force resisting him
will certainly not be confronting you at Richmond.  By land he can
reach you in five days after starting, whereas by water he would not
reach you in two weeks, judging by past experience.  Franklin's
single division did not reach you in ten days after I ordered it.

A. LINCOLN,
President United States.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON, May 24, 1862.  4 PM.

MAJOR-GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN:

In consequence of General Banks's critical position, I have been
compelled to suspend General McDowell's movements to join you.  The
enemy are making a desperate push upon Harper's Ferry, and we are
trying to throw General Fremont's force and part of General
McDowell's in their rear.

A. LINCOLN, President.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL McCLELLAN

WASHINGTON May 24, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL GEORGE B. McCLELLAN:

I left General McDowell's camp at dark last evening.  Shields's
command is there, but it is so worn that he cannot move before Monday
morning, the 26th.  We have so thinned our line to get troops for
other places that it was broken yesterday at Front Royal, with a
probable loss to us of one regiment infantry, two Companies cavalry,
putting General Banks in some peril.

The enemy's forces under General Anderson now opposing General
McDowell's advance have as their line of supply and retreat the road
to Richmond.

If, in conjunction with McDowell's movement against Anderson, you
could send a force from your right to cut off the enemy's supplies
from Richmond, preserve the railroad bridges across the two forks of
the Pamunkey, and intercept the enemy's retreat, you will prevent the
army now opposed to you from receiving an accession of numbers of
nearly 15,000 men; and if you succeed in saving the bridges you will
secure a line of railroad for supplies in addition to the one you now
have.  Can you not do this almost as well as not while you are
building the Chickahominy bridges?  McDowell and Shields both say
they can, and positively will, move Monday morning.  I wish you to
move cautiously and safely.

You will have command of McDowell, after he joins you, precisely as
you indicated in your long despatch to us of the 21st.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL RUFUS SAXTON.

WAR DEPARTMENT, May, 24 1862.  2 P.M.

GENERAL SAXTON:

Geary reports Jackson with 20,000 moving from Ashby's Gap by the
Little River turnpike, through Aldie, toward Centreville.  This he
says is reliable.  He is also informed of large forces south of him.
We know a force of some 15,000 broke up Saturday night from in front
of Fredericksburg and went we know not where.  Please inform us, if
possible, what has become of the force which pursued Banks yesterday;
also any other information you have.

A. LINCOLN




TELEGRAM TO COLONEL D. S. MILES.

WAR DEPARTMENT, May 24, 1862.   1.30 P.M.

COLONEL MILES, Harper's Ferry, Virginia

Could you not send scouts from Winchester who would tell whether
enemy are north of Banks, moving on Winchester?  What is the latest
you have?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL J. C. FREMONT.

WAR DEPARTMENT, May 24, 1862.  4 P.M.

MAJOR-GENERAL FREMONT, Franklin:

You are authorized to purchase the 400 horses, or take them wherever
or however you can get them.  The exposed condition of General Banks
makes his immediate relief a point of paramount importance.  You are
therefore directed by the President to move against Jackson at
Harrisonburg and operate against the enemy in such way as to relieve
Banks.  This movement must be made immediately.  You will acknowledge
the receipt of this order, and specify the hour it is received by
you.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL J. C. FREMONT.

WAR DEPARTMENT, May 24, 1862.  7.15 P.M.

MAJOR-GENERAL FREMONT, Franklin, Virginia:

Many thanks for the promptness with which you have answered that you
will execute the order.  Much--perhaps all--depends upon the celerity
with which you can execute it.  Put the utmost speed into it.  Do not
lose a minute.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL H. W. HALLECK.

WAR DEPARTMENT, May 24, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL HALLECK, near Corinth, Mississippi:

Several despatches from Assistant Secretary Scott and one from
Governor Morton asking reinforcements for you have been received.  I
beg you to be assured we do the best we can.  I mean to cast no blame
where I tell you each of our commanders along our line from Richmond
to Corinth supposes himself to be confronted by numbers superior to
his own.  Under this pressure We thinned the line on the upper
Potomac, until yesterday it was broken with heavy loss to us, and
General Banks put in great peril, out of which he is not yet
extricated, and may be actually captured.  We need men to repair this
breach, and have them not at hand.  My dear General, I feel justified
to rely very much on you.  I believe you and the brave officers and
men with you can and will get the victory at Corinth.

A. LINCOLN.



TELEGRAM TO GENERAL I. McDOWELL

WAR DEPARTMENT, May 24, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL McDOWELL, Fredricksburg:

General Fremont has been ordered by telegraph to move from Franklin
on Harrisonburg to relieve General Banks, and capture or destroy
Jackson's and Ewell's forces.  You are instructed, laying aside for
the present the movement on Richmond, to put 20,000 men in motion at
once for the Shenandoah, moving on the line or in advance of the line
of the Manassas Gap railroad.  Your object will be to capture the
forces of Jackson and Ewell, either in co-operation with General
Fremont, or, in case want of supplies or of transportation,
interferes with his movements, it is believed that the force which
you move will be sufficient to accomplish this object alone.  The
information thus far received here makes it probable that if the
enemy operate actively against General Banks, you will not be able to
count upon much assistance from him, but may even have to release
him.   Reports received this moment are that Banks is fighting with
Ewell eight miles from Winchester.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL  McDOWELL.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON CITY, D.C., May 24, 1862

MAJOR-GENERAL I. McDOWELL:

I am highly gratified by your alacrity in obeying my order.  The
change was as painful to me as it can possibly be to you or to any
one.  Everything now depends upon the celerity and vigor of your
movement.

A. LINCOLN




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL J. W. GEARY.

WAR DEPARTMENT, May 25, 1862  1.45 P.M.

GENERAL GEARY, White Plains:

Please give us your best present impression as to the number of the
enemy's forces north of Strasburg and Front Royal.  Are the forces
still moving north through the gap at Front Royal and between you and
there?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON, May 25, 1862.  2 P.M.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

The enemy is moving north in sufficient force to drive General Banks
before him--precisely in what force we cannot tell.  He is also
threatening Leesburg and Geary, on the Manassas Gap railroad, from
both north and south--in precisely what force we cannot tell.  I
think the movement is a general and concerted one, such as would not
be if he was acting upon the purpose of a very desperate defense of
Richmond.  I think the time is near when you must either attack
Richmond or give up the job and come to the defense of Washington.
Let me hear from you instantly.

A. LINCOLN,  President.




ORDER TAKING MILITARY POSSESSION OF RAILROADS.
WAR DEPARTMENT, May 25, 1862.

Ordered: By virtue of the authority vested by act of Congress,  the
President takes military possession of all the railroads in the
United States from and after this date until further order, and
directs that the respective railroad companies, their officers and
servants, shall hold themselves in readiness for the transportation
of such troops and munitions of war as may be ordered by the military
authorities, to the exclusion of all other business.

By order of the Secretary of War.
M. C. MEIGS




TELEGRAM TO SECRETARY CHASE.

WAR DEPARTMENT, May 25, 1862.

SECRETARY CHASE, Fredericksburg, Virginia:

It now appears that Banks got safely into Winchester last night, and
is this morning retreating on Harper's Ferry.  This justifies the
inference that he is pressed by numbers superior to his own.  I think
it not improbable that Ewell, Jackson, and Johnson are pouring
through the gap they made day before yesterday at Front Royal, making
a dash northward.  It will be a very valuable and very honorable
service for General McDowell to cut them off.  I hope he will put all
possible energy and speed into the effort.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL R. SAXTON.

WAR DEPARTMENT, May 25, 1862.

GENERAL SAXTON, Harper's Ferry:

If Banks reaches Martinsburg, is he any the better for it?  Will not
the enemy cut him from thence to Harper's Ferry?  Have you sent
anything to meet him and assist him at Martinsburg?  This is an
inquiry, not an order.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL R. SAXTON.

WAR DEPARTMENT, May 25, 1862.  6.30 P.M.

GENERAL SAXTON, Harper's Ferry:

One good six-gun battery, complete in its men and appointments, is
now on its way to you from Baltimore.  Eleven other guns, of
different sorts, are on their way to you from here.  Hope they will
all reach you before morning.  As you have but 2500 men at Harper's
Ferry, where are the rest which were in that vicinity and which we
have sent forward?  Have any of them been cut off?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL R. SAXTON.

WAR DEPARTMENT, May 25, 1862.

GENERAL SAXTON, Harper's Ferry:

I fear you have mistaken me.  I did not mean to question the
correctness of your conduct; on the contrary1 I approve what you have
done.  As the 2500 reported by you seemed small to me, I feared some
had got to Banks and been cut off with him.  Please tell me the exact
number you now have in hand.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.
[Sent in cipher.]
WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON CITY, D. C., May 25,1862.  8.30 P.M.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

Your despatch received.  General Banks was at Strasburg, with about
6,000 men, Shields having been taken from him to swell a column for
McDowell to aid you at Richmond, and the rest of his force scattered
at various places.  On the 23d a rebel force of 7000 to 10,000 fell
upon one regiment and two companies guarding the bridge at Front
Royal, destroying it entirely; crossed the Shenandoah, and on the
24th (yesterday) pushed to get north of Banks, on the road to
Winchester.  Banks ran a race with them, beating them into Winchester
yesterday evening.  This morning a battle ensued between the two
forces, in which Banks was beaten back into full retreat toward
Martinsburg, and probably is broken up into a total rout.  Geary, on
the Manassas Gap railroad, just now reports that Jackson is now near
Front Royal, With 10,000, following up and supporting, as I
understand, the forces now pursuing Banks, also that another force of
10,000 is near Orleans, following on in the same direction.  Stripped
here, as we are here, it will be all we can do to prevent them
crossing the Potomac at Harper's Ferry or above.  We have about
20,000 of McDowell's force moving back to the vicinity of Front
Royal, and General Fremont, who was at Franklin, is moving to
Harrisonburg; both these movements intended to get in the enemy's
rear.

One more of McDowell's brigades is ordered through here to Harper's
Ferry; the rest of his force remains for the present at
Fredericksburg.  We are sending such regiments and dribs from here
and Baltimore as we can spare to Harper's Ferry, supplying their
places in some sort by calling in militia from the adjacent States.
We also have eighteen cannon on the road to Harper's Ferry, of which
arm there is not a single one yet at that point.  This is now our
situation.

If McDowell's force was now beyond our reach, we should be utterly
helpless.  Apprehension of something like this, and no unwillingness
to sustain you, has always been my reason for withholding McDowell's
force from you.  Please understand this, and do the best you can with
the force you have.

A. LINCOLN.




HISTORY OF CONSPIRACY OF REBELLION

MESSAGE TO CONGRESS.

MAY 16, 1862

TO THE SENATE AND HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES:

The insurrection which is yet existing in the United States and aims
at the overthrow of the Federal Constitution and the Union, was
clandestinely prepared during the Winter of 1860 and 1861, and
assumed an open organization in the form of a treasonable provisional
government at Montgomery, in Alabama on the 18th day of February,
1861.  On the 12th day of April, 1861, the insurgents committed the
flagrant act of civil war by the bombardment and the capture of Fort
Sumter, Which cut off the hope of immediate conciliation.
Immediately afterward all the roads and avenues to this city were
obstructed, and the capital was put into the condition of a siege.
The mails in every direction were stopped and the lines of telegraph
cut off by the insurgents, and military and naval forces which had
been called out by the government for the defense of Washington were
prevented from reaching the city by organized and combined
treasonable resistance in the State of Maryland.  There was no
adequate and effective organization for the public defense.  Congress
had indefinitely adjourned.  There was no time to convene them.  It
became necessary for me to choose whether, using only the existing
means, agencies, and processes which Congress had provided, I should
let the government fall at once into ruin or whether, availing myself
of the broader powers conferred by the Constitution in cases of
insurrection, I would make an effort to save it, with all its
blessings, for the present age and for posterity.

I thereupon summoned my constitutional advisers, the heads of all the
departments, to meet on Sunday, the 20th day of April, 1861, at the
office of the Navy Department, and then and there, with their
unanimous concurrence, I directed that an armed revenue cutter should
proceed to sea to afford protection to the commercial marine, and
especially the California treasure ships then on their way to this
coast.  I also directed the commandant of the navy-yard at Boston to
purchase or charter and arm as quickly as possible five steamships
for purposes of public defense.  I directed the commandant of the
navy-yard at Philadelphia to purchase or charter and arm an equal
number for the same purpose.  I directed the commandant at New York
to purchase or charter and arm an equal number.  I directed Commander
Gillis to purchase or charter and arm and put to sea two other
vessels.  Similar directions were given to Commodore Dupont, with a
view to the opening of passages by water to and from the capital.  I
directed the several officers to take the advice and obtain the aid
and efficient services, in the matter, of his Excellency Edwin D.
Morgan, the Governor of New York, or in his absence George D. Morgan,
William M. Evarts, R. M. Blatchford, and Moses H. Grinnell, who were
by my directions especially empowered by the Secretary of the Navy to
act for his department in that crisis in matters pertaining to the
forwarding of troops and supplies for the public defense.

The several departments of the government at that time contained so
large a number of disloyal persons that it would have been impossible
to provide safely through official agents only for the performance of
the duties thus confided to citizens favorably known for their
ability, loyalty, and patriotism.

The several orders issued upon these occurrences were transmitted by
private messengers, who pursued a circuitous way to the seaboard
cities, inland across the States of Pennsylvania and Ohio and the
northern lakes.  I believe by these and other similar measures taken
in that crisis, some of which were without any authority of law, the
government was saved from overthrow.  I am not aware that a dollar of
the public funds thus confided without authority of law to unofficial
persons was either lost or wasted, although apprehensions of such
misdirection occurred to me as objections to those extraordinary
proceedings, and were necessarily overruled.

I recall these transactions now because my attention has been
directed to a resolution which was passed by the House of
Representatives on the 30th day of last month, which is in these
words:

"Resolved, That Simon Cameron, late Secretary of War by investing
Alexander Cummings with the control of large sums of the public money
and authority to purchase military supplies without restriction,
without requiring from him any guaranty for the faithful performance
of his duties, when the services of competent public officers were
available, and by involving the government in a vast number of
contracts with persons not legitimately engaged in the business
pertaining to the subject-matter of such contracts, especially in the
purchase of arms for future delivery, has adopted a policy highly
injurious to the public service, and deserves the censure of the
House."

Congress will see that I should be wanting equally in candor and in
justice if I should leave the censure expressed in this resolution to
rest exclusively or chiefly upon Mr. Cameron.  The same sentiment is
unanimously entertained by the heads of department who participated
in the proceedings which the House of Representatives have censured.
It is due to Mr. Cameron to say that although he fully approved the
proceedings they were not moved nor suggested by himself, and that
not only the President, but all the other heads of departments, were
at least equally responsible with him for whatever error, wrong, or
fault was committed in the premises.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON, May 26, 1862.  12.40

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

We have General Banks's official report.  He has saved his army and
baggage, and has made a safe retreat to the river, and is probably
safe at Williamsport.  He reports the attacking force at 15,000.

A. LINCOLN, President.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL I. McDOWELL.

WAR DEPARTMENT, May 26, 1862.  1 P.M.

MAJOR-GENERAL McDOWELL, Falmouth, Virginia:

Despatches from Geary just received have been sent you.  Should not
the remainder of your forces, except sufficient to hold the point at
Fredericksburg, move this way--to Manassas Junction or Alexandria?
As commander of this department, should you not be here?  I ask these
questions.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON, May 26, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL GEORGE B. McCLELLAN:

Can you not cut the Alula Creek railroad?  Also, what impression have
you as to intrenched works for you to contend with in front of
Richmond?  Can you get near enough to throw shells into the city?

A. LINCOLN, President.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL J. C. FREMONT.

May 27.1862.  9.58 P.M.

MAJOR-GENERAL FREMONT:

I see that you are at Moorefield.  You were expressly ordered to
march to Harrisonburg.  What does this mean?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM FROM SECRETARY STANTON
TO GOVERNOR ANDREW.

WASHINGTON, May 27, 1862.

GOVERNOR ANDREW, Boston:

The President directs that the militia be relieved, and the
enlistments made for three years, or during the war.  This, I think,
will practically not be longer than for a year.  The latest
intelligence from General Banks states that he has saved nearly his
whole command with small loss.

Concentrations of our force have been made, which it is hoped will
capture the enemy.

EDWIN M. STANTON, Secretary of War.




TELEGRAM FROM SECRETARY STANTON
TO GENERAL J. C. FREMONT,

WASHINGTON, May 28, 1862

MAJOR-GENERAL FREMONT, Moorefield

The President directs you to halt at Moorefield and await orders,
unless you hear of the enemy being in the general direction of
Rodney, in which case you will move upon him.  Acknowledge the
receipt of this order, and the hour it is received.

EDWIN M. STANTON,  Secretary of War.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL I. McDOWELL.

WASHINGTON, May 28, 1862.

GENERAL McDOWELL, Manassas Junction:

General McClellan at 6.30 P.M. yesterday telegraphed that Fitz-John
Porter's division had fought and driven 13,000 of the enemy, under
General Branch, from Hanover Court-House, and was driving them from a
stand they had made on the railroad at the time the messenger left.
Two hours later he telegraphed that Stoneman had captured an engine
and six cars on the Virginia Central, which he at once sent to
communicate with  Porter.  Nothing further from McClellan.

If Porter effects a lodgment on both railroads near Hanover
Court-House, consider whether your forces in front of Fredericksburg
should not push through and join him.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON, May 28, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

What of F.J. Porter's expedition?  Please answer.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL I. McDOWELL.

WASHINGTON. May 28, 1862.  4 P.M.

GENERAL McDOWELL, Manassas Junction:

You say General Geary's scouts report that they find no enemy this
side of the Blue Ridge.  Neither do I. Have they been to the Blue
Ridge looking for them.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL I. McDOWELL.

WASHINGTON, May 28, 1862.   5.40 P.M.

GENERAL McDOWELL, Manassas Junction:

I think the evidence now preponderates that Ewell and Jackson are
still about Winchester.  Assuming this, it is for you a question of
legs.  Put in all the speed you can.  I have told Fremont as much,
and directed him to drive at them as fast as possible.  By the way, I
suppose you know Fremont has got up to Moorefield, instead of going
into Harrisonburg.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN

WASHINGTON May 28, 1862.  8.40 P.M.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

I am very glad of General F. J. Porter's victory.  Still, if it was a
total rout of the enemy, I am puzzled to know why the Richmond and
Fredericksburg railroad was not seized again, as you say you have all
the railroads but the Richmond and Fredericksburg.  I am puzzled to
see how, lacking that, you can have any, except the scrap from
Richmond to West Point.  The scrap of the Virginia Central from
Richmond to Hanover Junction, without more, is simply nothing.  That
the whole of the enemy is concentrating on Richmond, I think cannot
be certainly known to you or me.  Saxton, at Harper's Ferry informs
us that large forces, supposed to be Jackson's and Ewells, forced his
advance from Charlestown today.  General King telegraphs us from
Fredericksburg that contrabands give certain information that 15,000
left Hanover Junction Monday morning to reinforce Jackson.  I am
painfully impressed with the importance of the struggle before you,
and shall aid you all I can consistently with my view of due regard
to all points.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM FROM SECRETARY STANTON
TO GENERAL FREMONT.

WASHINGTON, May 28, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL JOHN C. FREMONT, Moorefield:

The order to remain at Moorefield was based on the supposition that
it would find you there.

Upon subsequent information that the enemy were still operating in
the vicinity of Winchester and Martinsburg, you were directed to move
against the enemy.

The President now again directs you to move against the enemy without
delay.   Please acknowledge the receipt of this, and the time
received.

EDWIN M. STANTON,  Secretary of War.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL MARCY.

WASHINGTON, May 29, 1862.  10 A.M.

GENERAL R. B. MARCY, McClellan's Headquarters:

Yours just received.  I think it cannot be certainly known whether
the force which fought General Porter is the same which recently
confronted McDowell.  Another item of evidence bearing on it is that
General Branch commanded against Porter, while it was General
Anderson who was in front of McDowell.  He and McDowell were in
correspondence about prisoners.
A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON CITY, D. C.,
May 29, 1862.  10.30 A.M.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

I think we shall be able within three days to tell you certainly
whether any considerable force of the enemy--Jackson or any one else
--is moving on to Harper's Ferry or vicinity.  Take this expected
development into your calculations.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL N. P. BANKS.

WASHINGTON, May 29, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL BANKS, Williamsport, Maryland:

General McDowell's advance should, and probably will, be at or near
Front Royal at twelve (noon) tomorrow.  General Fremont will be at or
near Strasburg as soon.  Please watch the enemy closely, and follow
and harass and detain him if he attempts to retire.  I mean this for
General Saxton's force as well as that immediately with you.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL  FREMONT

WASHINGTON, May 29, 1862.  12 M.

MAJOR-GENERAL FREMONT, Moorefield, Virginia:

General McDowell's advance, if not checked by the enemy, should, and
probably will, be at Front Royal by twelve (noon) to-morrow.  His
force, when up, will be about 20,000.  Please have your force at
Strasburg, or, if the route you are moving on does not lead to that
point, as near Strasburg as the enemy may be by the same time.  Your
despatch No.30 received and satisfactory.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL I. McDOWELL.

WASHINGTON, May 29, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL McDOWELL, Manassas Junction:

General Fremont's force should, and probably will, be at or near
Strasburg by twelve (noon) tomorrow.  Try to have your force, or the
advance of it, at Front Royal as soon.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL MARCY.

WASHINGTON, May 29, 1862.  1.20 P.M.

GENERAL R. B. MARCY:

Your despatch as to the South Anna and Ashland being seized by our
forces this morning is received.  Understanding these points to be on
the Richmond and Fredericksburg railroad, I heartily congratulate the
country, and thank General McClellan and his army for their seizure.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL I. McDOWELL.

WASHINGTON, May 30, 1862.  10 A.M.

MAJOR-GENERAL McDOWELL, Manassas Junction:

I somewhat apprehend that Fremont's force, in its present condition,
may not be quite strong enough in case it comes in collision with the
enemy.  For this additional reason I wish you to push forward your
column as rapidly as possible.  Tell me what number your force
reaching Front Royal will amount to.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL N. P. BANKS.

WASHINGTON, May 30, 1862.  10.15 A.M.

MAJOR-GENERAL BANKS,
Williamsport, Maryland, via Harper's Ferry:

If the enemy in force is in or about Martinsburg, Charlestown, and
Winchester, Or any or all of them, he may come in collision with
Fremont, in which case I am anxious that your force, with you and at
Harper's Ferry, should so operate as to assist Fremont if possible;
the same if the enemy should engage McDowell.  This was the meaning
of my despatch yesterday.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL I. McDOWELL.

WASHINGTON, May 30, 1862.  12.40.

MAJOR-GENERAL McDOWELL, Rectortown:

Your despatch of to-day received and is satisfactory.   Fremont has
nominally  22,000, really about 17,000.  Blenker's division is part
of it.  I have a despatch from Fremont this morning, not telling me
where he is; but he says:
"Scouts and men from Winchester represent Jackson's force variously
at 30,000 to 60,000.  With him Generals Ewell and Longstreet."

The high figures erroneous, of course.  Do you know where Longstreet
is?  Corinth is evacuated and occupied by us.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL  FREMONT.

WASHINGT0N, May 30, 1862.  2.30 P.M.

MAJOR-GENERAL FREMONT, Moorefield, Virginia:

Yours, saying you will reach Strasburg or vicinity at 5 P.M.
Saturday, has been received and sent to General McDowell, and he
directed to act in view of it.  You must be up to the time you
promised, if possible.

Corinth was evacuated last night, and is occupied by our troops to-
day; the enemy gone south to Okolotia, on the railroad to Mobile.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL I. McDOWELL.

WAR DEPARTMENT WASHINGTON CITY, May 30, 1862.9.30 P.M.

MAJOR-GENERAL McDOWELL, Rectortown, Va.:

I send you a despatch just received from Saxton at Harper's Ferry:
"The rebels are in line of battle in front of our lines.  They have
nine pieces of artillery, and in position, and cavalry.   I shelled
the woods in which they were, and they in return threw a large number
of shells into the lines and tents from which I moved last night to
take up a stronger position.  I expect a great deal from the battery
on the mountain, having three 9 inch Dahlgren bearing directly on the
enemy's approaches.  The enemy appeared this morning and then
retired, with the intention of drawing us on.  I shall act on the
defensive, as my position is a strong one.  In a skirmish which took
place this afternoon I lost one horse, The enemy lost two men killed
and seven wounded.
"R. SAXTON, Brigadier General."

It seems the game is before you.  Have sent a copy to General
Fremont.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON, May 31, 1862.   10.20 PM.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

A circle whose circumference shall pass through Harper's Ferry, Front
Royal, and Strasburg, and whose center shall be a little northeast of
Winchester, almost certainly has within it this morning the forces of
Jackson, Ewell, and Edward Johnson.  Quite certainly they were within
it two days ago.  Some part of their forces attacked Harper's Ferry
at dark last evening, and are still in sight this morning.  Shields,
with McDowell's advance, retook Front Royal at 11 A.M. yesterday,
with a dozen of our own prisoners taken there a week ago, 150 of the
enemy, two locomotives, and eleven cars, some other property and
stores, and saved the bridge.

General Fremont, from the direction of Moorefield, promises to be at
or near Strasburg at 5 P.M. to-day.  General Banks at Williamsport,
with his old force and his new force at Harper's Ferry, is directed
to co-operate.  Shields at Front Royal reports a rumor of still an
additional force of the enemy, supposed to be Anderson's, having
entered the valley of Virginia.  This last may or may not be true.
Corinth is certainly in the hands of General Halleck.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM FROM SECRETARY STANTON

TO GENERAL G. A. McCALL.,WASHINGTON, May 31, 1562.

GENERAL McCALL:

The President directs me to say to you that there can be nothing to
justify a panic at Fredericksburg.  He expects you to maintain your
position there as becomes a soldier and a general.

EDWIN M. STANTON,  Secretary of War.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON CITY, D.C., June 1, 1862.  9.30.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

You are probably engaged with the enemy.  I suppose he made the
attack.  Stand well on your guard, hold all your ground, or yield any
only inch by inch and in good order.  This morning we merge General
Wool's department into yours, giving you command of the whole, and
sending General Dix to Port Monroe and General Wool to Fort McHenry.
We also send General Sigel to report to you for duty.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON, June 3, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

With these continuous rains I am very anxious about the Chickahominy
so close in your rear and crossing your line of communication.
Please look to it.

A. LINCOLN, President.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL I. McDOWELL.

WASHINGTON, June 3, 1862.  6.15 P.M.

MAJOR-GENERAL McDOWELL, Front Royal, Virginia:

Anxious to know whether Shields can head or flank Jackson.  Please
tell about where Shields and Jackson, respectively, are at the time
this reaches you.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL H. W. HALLECK.

WASHINGTON, June 4, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL HALLECK, Corinth:

Your despatch of to-day to Secretary of War received.  Thanks for the
good news it brings.

Have you anything from Memphis or other parts of the Mississippi
River?  Please answer.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GOVERNOR JOHNSON.
[cipher.]
WASHINGTON, June 4, 1862.

HON. ANDREW JOHNSON, Nashville, Tennessee:

Do you really wish to have control of the question of releasing rebel
prisoners so far as they may be Tennesseeans?  If you do, please tell
us so.  Your answer not to be made public.

A. LINCOLN.




TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.
[Cipher.]
WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, D.C., June 7, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

Your despatch about Chattanooga and Dalton was duly received and sent
to General Halleck.  I have just received the following answer from
him:

We have Fort Pillow, Randolph, and Memphis.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL H. W. HALLECK.

WASHINGTON, June 8, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL HALLECK, Corinth, Mississippi:

We are changing one of the departmental lines, so as to give you all
of Kentucky and Tennessee.  In your movement upon Chattanooga I think
it probable that you include some combination of the force near
Cumberland Gap under General Morgan.

Do you?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL N. P. BANKS.

WASHINGTON, June 9, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL BANKS, Winchester:

We are arranging a general plan for the valley of the Shenandoah, and
in accordance with this you will move your main force to the
Shenandoah at or opposite Front Royal as soon as possible.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL J. C. FREMONT.

WASHINGTON, June 9, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL FREMONT:

Halt at Harrisonburg, pursuing Jackson no farther.  Get your force
well in hand and stand on the defensive, guarding against a movement
of the enemy either back toward Strasburg or toward Franklin, and
await further orders, which will soon be sent you.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GOVERNOR JOHNSON.
[Cipher.]
WASHINGTON, June 9, 1862.

HON. ANDREW JOHNSON, Nashville, 'Tennessee:

Your despatch about seizing seventy rebels to exchange for a like
number of Union men was duly received.  I certainly do not disapprove
the proposition.

A. LINCOLN.




TO GENERAL J. C. FREMONT.
WASHINGTON, June 12, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL FREMONT:

Accounts, which we do not credit, represent that Jackson is largely
reinforced and turning upon you.  Get your forces well in hand and
keep us well and frequently advised; and if you find yourself really
pressed by a superior force of the enemy, fall back cautiously toward
or to Winchester, and we will have in due time Banks in position to
sustain you.  Do not fall back upon Harrisonburg unless upon
tolerably clear necessity.  We understand Jackson is on the other
side of the Shenandoah from you, and hence cannot in any event press
you into any necessity of a precipitate withdrawal.

A. LINCOLN.

P.S.--Yours, preferring Mount Jackson to Harrisonburg, is just
received.   On this point use your discretion, remembering that our
object is to give such protection as you can to western Virginia.
Many thanks to yourself, officers, and men for the gallant battle of
last Sunday.
A. L.




MESSAGE TO CONGRESS.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,

June 13, 1862.

FELLOW-CITIZENS OF THE SENATE AND HOUSE OF
REPRESENTATIVES:   I herewith transmit a memorial addressed and
presented to me in behalf of the State of New York in favor of
enlarging the locks of the Erie and Oswego Canal.  While I have not
given nor have leisure to give the subject a careful examination, its
great importance is obvious and unquestionable.  The large amount of
valuable statistical information which is collated and presented in
the memorial will greatly facilitate the mature consideration of the
subject, which I respectfully ask for it at your hands.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.




TO GENERAL J. C. FREMONT.

WASHINGTON; June 13.  1862

MAJOR-GENERAL FREMONT:

We cannot afford to keep your force and Banks's and McDowell's
engaged in keeping Jackson south of Strasburg and Front Royal.  You
fought Jackson alone and worsted him.  He can have no substantial
reinforcements so long as a battle is pending at Richmond.  Surely
you and Banks in supporting distance are capable of keeping him from
returning to Winchester.  But if Sigel be sent forward to you, and
McDowell (as he must) be put to other work, Jackson will break
through at Front Royal again.  He is already on the right side of the
Shenandoah to do it, and on the wrong side of it to attack you.  The
orders already sent you and Banks place you and him in the proper
positions for the work assigned you.  Jackson cannot move his whole
force on either of you before the other can learn of it and go to his
assistance.  He cannot divide his force, sending part against each of
you, because he will be too weak for either.  Please do as I directed
in the order of the 8th and my despatch of yesterday, the 12th, and
neither you nor Banks will be overwhelmed by Jackson.  By proper
scout lookouts, and beacons of smoke by day and fires by night you
can always have timely notice of the enemy's's approach.  I know not
as to you, but by some this has been too much neglected.

A. LINCOLN.



TO GENERAL J. C. FREMONT

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON CITY, D. C., June 15, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL FREMONT:

MY DEAR SIR:--Your letter of the 12th by Colonel Zagonyi is just
received.  In answer to the principal part of it, I repeat the
substance of an order of the 8th and one or two telegraphic
despatches sent you since.

We have no definite power of sending reinforcements; so that we are
compelled rather to consider the proper disposal of the forces we
have than of those we could wish to have.  We may be able to send you
some dribs by degrees, but I do not believe we can do more.  As you
alone beat Jackson last Sunday, I argue that you are stronger than he
is to-day, unless he has been reinforced; and that he cannot have
been materially reinforced, because such reinforcement could only
have come from Richmond, and he is much more likely to go to Richmond
than Richmond is to come to him.   Neither is very likely.  I think
Jackson's game--his assigned work--now is to magnify the accounts of
his numbers and reports of his movements, and thus by constant alarms
keep three or four times as many of our troops away from Richmond as
his own force amounts to.  Thus he helps his friends at Richmond
three or four times as much as if he were there.  Our game is not to
allow this.  Accordingly, by the order of the 8th, I directed you to
halt at Harrisonburg, rest your force, and get it well in hand, the
objects being to guard against Jackson's returning by the same route
to the upper Potomac over which you have just driven him out, and at
the same time give some protection against a raid into West Virginia.

Already I have given you discretion to occupy Mount Jackson instead,
if, on full consideration, you think best.  I do not believe Jackson
will attack you, but certainly he cannot attack you by surprise; and
if he comes upon you in superior force, you have but to notify us,
fall back cautiously, and Banks will join you in due time.  But while
we know not whether Jackson will move at all, or by what route, we
cannot safely put you and Banks both on the Strasburg line, and leave
no force on the Front Royal line--the very line upon which he
prosecuted his late raid.  The true policy is to place one of you on
one line and the other on the other in such positions that you can
unite once you actually find Jackson moving upon it.  And this is
precisely what we are doing.  This protects that part of our
frontier, so to speak, and liberates McDowell to go to the assistance
of McClellan.  I have arranged this, and am very unwilling to have it
deranged.  While you have only asked for Sigel, I have spoken only of
Banks, and this because Sigel's force is now the principal part of
Bank's force.

About transferring General Schenck's commands,  the purchase of
supplies, and the promotion and appointment of officers, mentioned in
your letter, I will consult with the Secretary of War to-morrow.

Yours truly,

A. LINCOLN.




TO GENERAL J. C. FREMONT.

WASHINGTON, June 16, 1862

MAJOR-GENERAL FREMONT, Mount Jackson, Virginia:

Your despatch of yesterday, reminding me of a supposed understanding
that I would furnish you a corps of 35,000 men, and asking of me the
"fulfilment of this understanding," is received.  I am ready to come
to a fair settlement of accounts with you on the fulfilment of
understandings.

Early in March last, when I assigned you to the command of the
Mountain Department, I did tell you I would give you all the force I
could, and that I hoped to make it reach 35,000.  You at the same
time told me that within a reasonable time you would seize the
railroad at or east of Knoxville, Tenn., if you could.  There was
then in the department a force supposed to be 25,000, the exact
number as well known to you as to me.  After looking about two or
three days, you called and distinctly told me that if I would add the
Blenker division to the force already in the department, you would
undertake the job.  The Blenker division contained 10,000, and at the
expense of great dissatisfaction to General McClellan I took it from
his army and gave it to you.  My promise was literally fulfilled.  I
have given you all I could, and I have given you very nearly, if not
quite, 35,000.

Now for yours.  On the 23d of May, largely over two months afterward,
you were at Franklin, Va., not within 300 miles of Knoxville, nor
within 80 miles of any part of the railroad east of it, and not
moving forward, but telegraphing here that you could not move for
lack of everything.  Now, do not misunderstand me.  I do not say you
have not done all you could.  I presume you met unexpected
difficulties; and I beg you to believe that as surely as you have
done your best, so have I. I have not the power now to fill up your
Corps to 35,000.  I am not demanding of you to do the work of 35,000.
I am only asking of you to stand cautiously on the defensive, get
your force in order, and give such protection as you can to the
valley of the Shenandoah and to western Virginia.

Have you received the orders, and will you act upon them?

A. LINCOLN.




TO GENERAL C. SCHURZ.

WASHINGTON, June 16, 1862

BRIGADIER-GENERAL SCHURZ, Mount Jackson, Virginia:

Your long letter is received.  The information you give is valuable.
You say it is fortunate that Fremont did not intercept Jackson; that
Jackson had the superior force, and would have overwhelmed him.  If
this is so, how happened it that Fremont fairly fought and routed him
on the 8th?  Or is the account that he did fight and rout him false
and fabricated?  Both General Fremont and you speak of Jackson having
beaten Shields.  By our accounts he did not beat Shields.  He had no
engagement with Shields.  He did meet and drive back with disaster
about 2000 of Shields's advance till they were met by an additional
brigade of Shields's, when Jackson himself turned and retreated.
Shields himself and more than half his force were not nearer than
twenty miles to any of it.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL H. W. HALLECK.

WASHINGTON, June 18, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL HALLECK, Corinth, Mississippi:

It would be of both interest and value to us here to know how the
expedition toward East Tennessee is progressing, if in your judgment
you can give us the information with safety.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, D. C., June 18, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

Yours of to-day, making it probable that Jackson has been reinforced
by about 10,000 from Richmond, is corroborated by a despatch from
General King at Fredericksburg, saying a Frenchman, just arrived from
Richmond by way of Gordonsville, met 10,000 to 15,000 passing through
the latter place to join Jackson.

If this is true, it is as good as a reinforcement to you of an equal
force.  I could better dispose of things if I could know about what
day you can attack Richmond, and would be glad to be informed, if you
think you can inform me with safety.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON, JUNE 19, 1862

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

Yours of last night just received, and for which I thank you.

If large reinforcements are going from Richmond to Jackson, it proves
one of two things: either they are very strong at Richmond, or do not
mean to defend the place desperately.

On reflection, I do not see how reinforcements from Richmond to
Jackson could be in Gordonsville, as reported by the Frenchman and
your deserters.  Have not all been sent to deceive?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, June  20, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

In regard to the contemplated execution of Captains Spriggs and
Triplett the government has no information whatever, but will inquire
and advise you.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON CITY, June 20, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

We have this morning sent you a despatch of General Sigel
corroborative of the proposition that Jackson is being reinforced
from Richmond.  This may be reality, and yet may only be contrivance
for deception, and to determine which is perplexing.  If we knew it
was not true, we could send you some more force; but as the case
stands we do not think we safely can.  Still, we will watch the signs
and do so if possible.

In regard to a contemplated execution of Captains Spriggs and
Triplett the government has no information whatever, but will inquire
and advise you.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON, June 21 1862  6 PM.

MAJOR-GENERAL GEORGE B. McCLELLAN:

Your despatch of yesterday (2 P. M.) was received this morning.  If
it would not divert too much of your time and attention from the army
under your immediate command, I would be glad to have your views as
to the present state of military affairs throughout the whole
country, as you say you would be glad to give them.  I would rather
it should be by letter than by telegraph, because of the better
chance of secrecy.  As to the numbers and positions of the troops not
under your command in Virginia and elsewhere, even if I could do it
with accuracy, which I cannot, I would rather not transmit either by
telegraph or by letter, because of the chances of its reaching the
enemy.  I would be very glad to talk with you, but you cannot leave
your camp, and I cannot well leave here.

A. LINCOLN, President




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL N. P. BANKS.

WAR DEPARTMENT, June 22, 1862

MAJOR-GENERAL BANKS, Middletown:

I am very glad you are looking well to the west for a movement of the
enemy in that direction.  You know my anxiety on that point.

All was quiet at General McClellan's headquarters at two o'clock
to-day.

A. LINCOLN.




TREATY WITH MEXICO

MESSAGE TO THE SENATE.

WASHINGTON, June 23, 1862.

TO THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES:

On the 7th day of December, 1861, I submitted to the Senate the
project of a treaty between the United States and Mexico which had
been proposed to me by Mr. Corwin, our minister to Mexico, and
respectfully requested the advice of the Senate thereupon.

On the 25th day of February last a resolution was adopted by the
Senate to the effect

"that it is not advisable to negotiate a treaty that will require the
United States to assume any portion of the principal or interest of
the debt of Mexico, or that will require the concurrence of European
powers."

This resolution having been duly communicated to me, notice thereof
was immediately given by the Secretary of State to Mr. Corwin, and he
was informed that he was to consider his instructions upon the
subject referred to modified by this resolution and would govern his
course accordingly.  That despatch failed to reach Mr. Corwin, by
reason of the disturbed condition of Mexico, until a very recent
date, Mr. Corwin being without instructions, or thus practically left
without instructions, to negotiate further with Mexico.

In view of the very important events Occurring there, he has thought
that the interests of the United States would be promoted by the
conclusion of two treaties which should provide for a loan to that
republic.   He has therefore signed such treaties, and they having
been duly ratified by the Government of Mexico, he has transmitted
them to me for my consideration.  The action of the Senate is of
course conclusive against an acceptance of the treaties On my part.
I have, nevertheless, thought it just to our excellent minister in
Mexico and respectful to the Government of that republic to lay the
treaties before the Senate, together with the correspondence which
has occurred in relation to them.  In performing this duty I have
only to add that the importance of the subject thus submitted to the
Senate, can not be over estimated, and I shall cheerfully receive and
consider with the highest respect any further advice the Senate may
think proper to give upon the subject.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.




VETO OF A CURRENCY BILL

MESSAGE TO THE SENATE, JUNE 23, 1862.

TO THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES:

The bill which has passed the House of Representatives and the
Senate, entitled "An act to repeal that part of an act of Congress
which prohibits the circulation of bank-notes of a less denomination
than five dollars in the District of Columbia," has received my
attentive consideration, and I now return it to the Senate, in which
it originated, with the following objections:

1.  The bill proposes to repeal the existing legislation prohibiting
the circulation of bank-notes of a less denomination than five
dollars within the District of Columbia, without permitting the
issuing of such bills by banks not now legally authorized to issue
them.  In my judgment, it will be found impracticable,  in the
present condition of the currency, to make such a discrimination.
The banks have generally suspended specie payments, and a legal
sanction given to the circulation of the irredeemable notes of one
class of them will almost certainly be so extended, in practical
operation, as to include those of all classes, whether authorized or
unauthorized.  If this view be correct, the currency of the District,
should this act become a law, will certainly and greatly deteriorate,
to the serious injury of honest trade and honest labor.

2.  This bill seems to contemplate no end which cannot be otherwise
more certainly and beneficially attained.  During the existing war it
is peculiarly the duty of the National Government to secure to the
people a sound circulating medium.  This duty has been, under
existing circumstances, satisfactorily performed, in part at least,
by authorizing the issue of United States notes, receivable for all
government dues except customs, and made a legal tender for all
debts, public and private, except interest on public debt.  The
object of the bill submitted to me--namely, that of providing a small
note currency during the present suspension--can be fully
accomplished by authorizing the issue, as part of any new emission of
United States notes made necessary by the circumstances of the
country, of notes of a similar character, but of less denomination
than five dollars.   Such an issue would answer all the beneficial
purposes of the bill, would save a considerable amount to the
treasury in interest, would greatly facilitate payments to soldiers
and other creditors of small sums, and would furnish; to the people a
currency as safe as their own government.

Entertaining these objections to the bill, I feel myself constrained
to withhold from it my approval and return it for the further
consideration and action of Congress.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN




SPEECH AT JERSEY CITY, JUNE 24, 1862.

When birds and animals are looked at through a fog, they are seen to
disadvantage, and so it might be with you if I were to attempt to
tell you why I went to see General Scott.  I can only say that my
visit to West Point did not have the importance which has been
attached to it; but it concerned matters that you understand quite as
well as if I were to tell you all about them.  Now, I can only remark
that it had nothing whatever to do with making or unmaking any
general in the country.  The Secretary of War, you know, holds a
pretty tight rein on the press, so that they shall not tell more than
they ought to; and I 'm afraid that if I blab too much, he might draw
a tight rein on me.




TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON, June 26, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

Your three despatches of yesterday in relation to the affair, ending
with the statement that you completely succeeded in making your
point, are very gratifying.

The later one of 6.15 P.M., suggesting the probability of your being
overwhelmed by two hundred thousand, and talking of where the
responsibility will belong, pains me very much.  I give you all I
can, and act on the presumption that you will do the best you can
with what you have, while you continue, ungenerously I think, to
assume that I could give you more if I would.  I have omitted, and
shall omit, no opportunity to send you reinforcements whenever I
possibly can.

A. LINCOLN.

P. S.  General Pope thinks if you fall back it would be much better
towards York River than towards the James.  As Pope now has charge of
the capital, please confer with him through the telegraph.




ORDER CONSTITUTING THE ARMY OF VIRGINIA.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, D. C.,
June 26, 1862.

Ordered:
1st.  The forces under Major-Generals Fremont, Banks, and McDowell,
including the troops now under Brigadier-General Sturgis at
Washington, shall be consolidated and form one army, to be called the
Army of Virginia.

2d.  The command of the Army of Virginia is specially assigned to
Major-General John Pope, as commanding general.  The troops of the
Mountain Department, heretofore under command of General Fremont,
shall constitute the First Army Corps, under the command of General
Fremont; the troops of the Shenandoah Department, now under General
Banks, shall constitute the Second Army Corps, and be commanded by
him; the troops under the command of General McDowell, except those
within the fortifications and city of Washington, shall form the
Third Army Corps, and be under his command.

3d.  The Army of Virginia shall operate in such manner as, while
protecting western Virginia and the national capital from danger or
insult, it shall in the speediest manner attack and overcome the
rebel forces under Jackson and Ewell, threaten the enemy in the
direction of Charlottesville, and render the most effective aid to
relieve General McClellan and capture Richmond.

4th.  When the Army of the Potomac and the Army of Virginia shall be
in position to communicate and directly co-operate at or before
Richmond, the chief command, while so operating together, shall be
governed, as in like cases, by the Rules and Articles of War.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM FROM SECRETARY STANTON
TO GENERAL H. W. HALLECK.

WAR DEPARTMENT, June 28, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL HALLECK:

The enemy have concentrated in such force at Richmond as to render it
absolutely necessary, in the opinion of the President, for you
immediately to detach 25,000 of your force and forward it by the
nearest and quickest route by way of Baltimore and Washington to
Richmond.  It is believed that the quickest route would be by way of
Columbus, Ky., and up the Ohio River.  But in detaching your force
the President directs that it be done in such a way as to enable you
to hold your ground and not interfere with the movement against
Chattanooga and East Tennessee.  This condition being observed, the
forces to be detached and the routes they are to be sent are left to
your own judgment.

The direction to send these forces immediately is rendered imperative
by a serious reverse suffered by General McClellan before Richmond
yesterday, the full extent of which is not yet known.

You will acknowledge the receipt of this despatch, stating the day
and hour it is received, and inform me what your action will be, so
that we may take measures to aid in river and railroad
transportation.

EDWIN M. STANTON, Secretary of War.




TELEGRAMS TO GENERAL A. E. BURNSIDE.

WASHINGTON, June 28, 1862.

GENERAL BURNSIDE:

I think you had better go, with any reinforcements you can spare, to
General McClellan.

A. LINCOLN.




WAR DEPARTMENT, June, 28, 1862

MAJOR-GENERAL BURNSIDE, Newbern:

We have intelligence that General McClellan has been attacked in
large force and compelled to fall back toward the James River.  We
are not advised of his exact condition, but the President directs
that you shall send him all the reinforcements from your command to
the James River that you can safely do without abandoning your own
position.  Let it be infantry entirely, as he said yesterday that he
had cavalry enough.

EDWIN M. STANTON,
Secretary of War.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON CITY,  June 28, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

Save your army, at all events.  Will send reinforcements as fast as
we can.  Of course they cannot reach you to-day, to-morrow, or next
day.  I have not said you were ungenerous for saying you needed
reinforcements.  I thought you were ungenerous in assuming that I did
not send them as fast as I could.  I feel any misfortune to you and
your army quite as keenly as you feel it yourself.  If you have had a
drawn battle, or a repulse, it is the price we pay for the enemy not
being in Washington.  We protected Washington, and the enemy
concentrated on you.  Had we stripped Washington, he would have been
upon us before the troops could have gotten to you.  Less than a week
ago you notified us that reinforcements were leaving Richmond to come
in front of us.  It is the nature of the case, and neither you nor
the government is to blame.  Please tell at once the present
condition and aspect of things.

A. LINCOLN




TO SECRETARY SEWARD.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, June 28, 1862

HON. W. H. SEWARD.

MY DEAR SIR:--My view of the present condition of the war is about as
follows:

The evacuation of Corinth and our delay by the flood in the
Chickahominy have enabled the enemy to concentrate too much force in
Richmond for McClellan to successfully attack.  In fact there soon
will be no substantial rebel force anywhere else.  But if we send all
the force from here to McClellan, the enemy will, before we can know
of it, send a force from Richmond and take Washington.  Or if a large
part of the western army be brought here to McClellan, they will let
us have Richmond, and retake Tennessee, Kentucky, Missouri, etc.
What should be done is to hold what we have in the West, open the
Mississippi, and take Chattanooga and East Tennessee without more.  A
reasonable force should in every event be kept about Washington for
its protection.  Then let the country give us a hundred thousand new
troops in the shortest possible time, which, added to McClellan
directly or indirectly, will take Richmond without endangering any
other place which we now hold, and will substantially end the war.  I
expect to maintain this contest until successful, or till I die, or
am conquered, or my term expires, or Congress or the country forsake
me; and I would publicly appeal to the country for this new force
were it not that I fear a general panic and stampede would follow, so
hard it is to have a thing understood as it really is.  I think the
new force should be all, or nearly all, infantry, principally because
such can be raised most cheaply and quickly.

Yours very truly,

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL J. A. DIX.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, D.C.,  June 28,1862.

GENERAL DIX:

Communication with McClellan by White House is cut off.  Strain every
nerve to open communication with him by James River, or any other way
you can.  Report to me.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO FLAG-OFFICER L. M. GOLDSBOROUGH.

WASHINGTON, D.C., June 28, 1862.

FLAG-OFFICER GOLDS BOROUGH, Fort Monroe:

Enemy has cut McClellan's communication with White House, and is
driving Stoneman back on that point.  Do what you can for him with
gunboats at or near that place.  McClellan's main force is between
the Chickahominy and the James.  Also do what you can to communicate
with him and support him there.

A. LINCOLN




To GOVERNOR MORTON.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, D.C.
June 28, 1862.


GOVERNOR O. P. MORTON, Indianapolis, Ind:

Your despatch of to-day is just received.  I have no recollection of
either John R. Cravens or Cyrus M. Allen having been named to me for
appointment under the tax law.  The latter particularly has been my
friend, and I am sorry to learn that he is not yours.  No appointment
has been or will be made by me for the purpose of stabbing you.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO SECRETARY SEWARD.

WAR DEPARTMENT, June 29, 1862.6 P.M.

HON. WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Astor House, New York:

Not much more than when you left.  Fulton of Baltimore American is
now with us.   He left White House at 11 A.M. yesterday.  He
conversed fully with a paymaster who was with Porter's force during
the fight of Friday and fell back to nearer McClellan's quarters just
a little sooner than Porter did, seeing the whole of it; stayed on
the Richmond side of the Chickahominy over night, and left for White
House at 5 A.M. Saturday.  He says Porter retired in perfect order
under protection of the guns arranged for the purpose, under orders
and not from necessity; and with all other of our forces, except what
was left on purpose to go to White House, was safely in pontoons over
the Chickahominy before morning, and that there was heavy firing on
the Richmond side, begun at 5 and ceased at 7 A.M. Saturday.  On the
whole, I think we have had the better of it up to that point of time.
What has happened since we still know not, as we have no
communication with General McClellan.  A despatch from Colonel
Ingalls shows that he thinks McClellan is fighting with the enemy at
Richmond to-day, and will be to-morrow.  We have no means of knowing
upon what Colonel Ingalls founds his opinion.  Confirmed about saving
all property.  Not a single unwounded straggler came back to White
House from the field, and the number of wounded reaching there up to
11 A.M. Saturday was not large.

A. LINCOLN.


To what the President has above stated I will only add one or two
points that may be satisfactory for you to know.

First.  All the sick and wounded were safely removed

Second.  A despatch from Burnside shows that he is from White House;
not a man left behind in condition to afford efficient support, and
is probably doing so.

Third.  The despatch from Colonel Ingalls impresses me with the
conviction that the movement was made by General McClellan to
concentrate on Richmond, and was successful to the latest point of
which we have any information.

Fourth.  Mr. Fulton says that on Friday night, between twelve and one
o'clock, General McClellan telegraphed Commodore Goldsborough that
the result of the movement was satisfactory to him.

Fifth.  From these and the facts stated by the President, my
inference is that General McClellan will probably be in Richmond
within two days.

EDWIN M. STANTON, Secretary of War.

[Unfortunately McClellan did not do any of the things he was ordered,
and that it was very likely possible to do.   It is still some
mystery what he was doing all these days other than hiding in the
woods and staying out of communication so he would not receive any
more uncomfortable orders.   This was another place where the North
was close to wining the war and did not.  D.W.]




TELEGRAM TO SECRETARY SEWARD.

WAR DEPARTMENT, June 30, 1862.

HON. WM. H. SEWARD, New York:

We are yet without communication with General McClellan, and this
absence of news is our point of anxiety.  Up to the latest point to
which we are posted he effected everything in such exact accordance
with his plan, contingently announced to us before the battle began,
that we feel justified to hope that he has not failed since.  He had
a severe engagement in getting the part of his army on this side of
the Chickahominy over to the other side, in which the enemy lost
certainly as much as we did.  We are not dissatisfied with this, only
that the loss of enemies does not compensate for the loss of friends.
The enemy cannot come below White House; certainly is not there now,
and probably has abandoned the whole line.  Dix's pickets are at New
Kent Court-House.

A. LINCOLN.




CALL FOR TROOPS.

NEW YORK, June 30, 1862.

TO THE GOVERNORS OF THE SEVERAL STATES:

The capture of New Orleans, Norfolk, and Corinth by the national
forces has enabled the insurgents to concentrate a large force at and
about Richmond, which place we must take with the least possible
delay; in fact, there will soon be no formidable insurgent force
except at Richmond.  With so large an army there, the enemy can
threaten us on the Potomac and elsewhere.  Until we have
re-established the national authority, all these places must be held,
and we must keep a respectable force in front of WASHINGTON. But
this, from the diminished strength of our army by sickness and
casualties, renders an addition to it necessary in order to close the
struggle which has been prosecuted for the last three months with
energy and success.  Rather than hazard the misapprehension of our
military condition and of groundless alarm by a call for troops by
proclamation, I have deemed it best to address you in this form.  To
accomplish the object stated we require without delay 150,000 men,
including those recently called for by the Secretary of War.  Thus
reinforced our gallant army will be enabled to realize the hopes and
expectations of the government and the people.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL J. A. DIX.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON CITY, June 30, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL Dix, Fort Monroe:

Is it not probable that the enemy has abandoned the line between
White House and McClellan's rear?  He could have but little object to
maintain it, and nothing to subsist upon.  Would not Stoneman better
move up and see about it?  I think a telegraphic communication can at
once be opened to White House from Williamsburg.  The wires must be
up still.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAMS TO GENERAL H. W. HALLECK.

WAR DEPARTMENT, JUNE 30, 1862.  3 P. M.

MAJOR-GENERAL HALLECK, Corinth:

Your telegram of this date just received.  The Chattanooga expedition
must not on any account be given up.  The President regards that and
the movement against East Tennessee as one of the most important
movements of the war, and its occupation nearly as important as the
capture of Richmond.  He is not pleased with the tardiness of the
movement toward Chattanooga, and directs that no force be sent here
if you cannot do it without breaking up the operations against that
point and East Tennessee.  Infantry only are needed; our cavalry and
artillery are strong enough.  The first reports from Richmond were
more discouraging than the truth warranted.  If the advantage is not
on our side, it is balanced.  General McClellan has moved his whole
force on the line of the James River, and is supported there by our
gunboats; but he must be largely strengthened before advancing, and
hence the call on you, which I am glad you answered so promptly.  Let
me know to what point on the river you will send your forces, so as
to provide immediately for transportation.

EDWIN M. STANTON,
Secretary of War.




WASHINGTON, D.C., June 30, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL HALLECK, Corinth, Mississippi:

Would be very glad of 25,000 infantry; no artillery or cavalry; but
please do not send a man if it endangers any place you deem important
to hold, or if it forces you to give up or weaken or delay the
expedition against Chattanooga.  To take and hold the railroad at or
east of Cleveland, in East Tennessee, I think fully as important as
the taking and holding of Richmond.

A. LINCOLN.




CALL FOR 300,000 VOLUNTEERS, JULY 1, 1862.

June 28, 1861.

The undersigned, governors of States of the Union, impressed with the
belief that the citizens of the States which they respectively
represent are of one accord in the hearty desire that the recent
successes of the Federal arms may be followed up by measures which
must insure the speedy restoration of the Union, and believing that,
in view of the present state of the important military movements now
in progress, and the reduced condition of our effective forces in the
field, resulting from the usual and unavoidable casualties in the
service, the time has arrived for prompt and vigorous measures to be
adopted by the people in support of the great interests committed to
your charge, respectfully request, if it meets with your entire
approval, that you at once call upon the several States for such
number of men as may be required to fill up all military
organizations now in the field, and add to the armies heretofore
organized such additional number of men as may, in your judgment, be
necessary to garrison and hold all the numerous cities and military
positions that have been captured by our armies, and to speedily
crush the rebellion that still exists in several of the Southern
States, thus practically restoring to the civilized world our great
and good government.  All believe that the decisive moment is near at
hand, and to that end the people of the United States are desirous to
aid promptly in furnishing all reinforcements that you may deem
needful to sustain our government.

ISRAEL WASHBURN, JR., Governor of Maine.
H. S. BERRY, Governor of New Hampshire.
FREDERICK HOLBROOK, Governor of Vermont.
WILLIAM A. BUCKINGHAM, Governor of Connecticut.
E. D. MORGAN, Governor of New York.
CHARLES S. OLDEN, Governor of New Jersey.
A. G. CURTIN, Governor of Pennsylvania.
A. W. BRADFORD, Governor of Maryland.
F. H. PIERPOINT, Governor of Virginia.
AUSTIN BLAIR, Governor of Michigan.
J. B. TEMPLE, President Military Board of Kentucky.
ANDREW JOHNSON, Governor of Tennessee.
H. R. GAMBLE, Governor of Missouri.
O. P. MORTON, Governor of Indiana.
DAVID TODD, Governor of Ohio.
ALEXANDER RAMSEY, Governor of Minnesota.
RICHARD YATES, Governor of Illinois.
EDWARD SALOMON, Governor of Wisconsin.

THE PRESIDENT




EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,
July 1, 1862

GENTLEMEN:--Fully concurring in the wisdom of the views expressed to
me in so patriotic a manner by you, in the communication of the
twenty-eighth day of June, I have decided to call into the service an
additional force of 300,000 men.  I suggest and recommend that the
troops should be chiefly of infantry.  The quota of your State would
be ______  .  I trust that they may be enrolled without delay, so as
to bring this unnecessary and injurious civil war to a speedy and
satisfactory conclusion.  An order fixing the quotas of the
respective States will be issued by the War Department to-morrow.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.




PROCLAMATION CONCERNING TAXES IN
REBELLIOUS STATES, JULY 1, 1862.

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF
AMERICA:

A Proclamation.

Whereas in and by the second section of an act of Congress passed on
the 7th day of June, A. D. 1862, entitled "An act for the collection
of direct taxes in insurrectionary districts within the United
States, and for other purposes," it is made the duty of the President
to declare, on or before the first day of July then next following,
by his proclamation, in what States and parts of States insurrection
exists:

Now, therefore, be it known that I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the
United States of America, do hereby declare and proclaim that the
States of South Carolina, Florida, Georgia, Alabama, Louisiana,
Texas, Mississippi, Arkansas, Tennessee, North Carolina, and the
State of Virginia except the following counties-Hancock, Brooke,
Ohio, Marshall, Wetzel, Marion, Monongalia, Preston, Taylor,
Pleasants, Tyler, Ritchie, Doddridge, Harrison, Wood, Jackson, Wirt,
Roane, Calhoun, Gilmer, Barbour, Tucker, Lewis, Braxton, Upsbur,
Randolph, Mason, Putnam, Kanawha, Clay, Nicholas, Cabell, Wayne,
Boone, Logan, Wyoming, Webster, Fayette, and Raleigh-are now in
insurrection and rebellion, and by reason thereof the civil authority
of the United States is obstructed so that the provisions of the "Act
to provide increased revenue from imports, to pay the interest on the
public debt, and for other purposes," approved August 5, 1861, can
not be peaceably executed; and that the taxes legally chargeable upon
real estate under the act last aforesaid lying within the States and
parts of States as aforesaid, together with a penalty of 50 per
centum of said taxes, shall be a lien upon the tracts or lots of the
same, severally charged, till paid.

In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of
the United States to be affixed..............

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

By the President:
F. W. SEWARD, Acting Secretary of State.




MESSAGE TO CONGRESS, JULY 1, 1862.

TO THE SENATE AND HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

I most cordially recommend that Captain Andrew H. Foote, of the
United States Navy, receive a vote of thanks of Congress for his
eminent services in Organizing the flotilla on the western Waters,
and for his gallantry at Fort Henry, Fort Donelson, Island Number
Ten, and at various other places, whilst in command of the naval
forces, embracing a period of nearly ten months.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.
WASHINGTON, D. C. July 1, 1862




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON, JULY 1,1862.   3.30 P.M.

MAJOR-GENERAL GEORGE B. McCLELLAN:

It is impossible to reinforce you for your present emergency.  If we
had a million of men, We could not get them to you in time.  We have
not the men to send.   If you are not strong enough to face the
enemy, you must find a place of security, and wait, rest, and repair.
Maintain your ground if you can, but save the army at all events,
even if you fall back to Fort Monroe.  We still have strength enough
in the country, and will bring it out.

A. LINCOLN.




TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.
WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, D.C., July 2, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

Your despatch of Tuesday morning induces me to hope your army is
having some rest.  In this hope allow me to reason with you a moment.
When you ask for 50,000 men to be promptly sent you, you surely labor
under some gross mistake of fact.  Recently you sent papers showing
your disposal of forces made last spring for the defense of
WASHINGTON, and advising a return to that plan.  I find it included
in and about WASHINGTON 75,000 men.  Now, please be assured I have
not men enough to fill that very plan by 15,000.  All of Fremont's in
the valley, all of Banks's, all of McDowell's not with you, and all
in WASHINGTON, taken together, do not exceed, if they reach, 60,000.
With Wool and Dix added to those mentioned, I have not, outside of
your army, 75,000 men east of the mountains.  Thus the idea of
sending you 50,000, or any other considerable force, promptly, is
simply absurd.  If, in your frequent mention of responsibility, you
have the impression that I blame you for not doing more than you can,
please be relieved of such impression.  I only beg that in like
manner you will not ask impossibilities of me.   If you think you are
not strong enough to take Richmond just now, I do not ask you to try
just now.  Save the army, material and personal, and I will
strengthen it for the offensive again as fast as I can.  The
governors of eighteen States offer me a new levy of 300,000, which I
accept.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL H. W. HALLECK.

WASHINGTON, D.C. July 2, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL HALLECK, Corinth, Mississippi:

Your several despatches of yesterday to Secretary of War and myself
received.   I did say, and now repeat, I would be exceedingly glad
for some reinforcements from you.  Still do not send a man if in your
judgment it will endanger any point you deem important to hold, or
will force you to give up or weaken or delay the Chattanooga
expedition.

Please tell me could you not make me a flying visit for consultation
without endangering the Service in your department.

A. LINCOLN.




MESSAGE TO THE SENATE.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, July 2, 1862.

TO THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES:

I herewith return to your honorable body, in which it originated, an
act entitled "An act to provide for additional medical officers of
the volunteer service," without my approval.

My reason for so doing is that I have approved an act of the same
title passed by Congress after the passage of the one first mentioned
for the express purpose of correcting errors in and superseding the
same, as I am informed.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.




CIRCULAR LETTER TO THE GOVERNORS.
(Private and Confidential.)

WAR DEPARTMENT, July 3, 1862.10.30 A.M.

GOVERNOR WASHBURN, Maine [and other governors] I should not want the
half of 300,000 new troops if I could have them now.  If I had 50,000
additional troops here now, I believe I could substantially close the
war in two weeks.  But time is everything, and if I get 50,000 new
men in a month, I shall have lost 20,000 old ones during the same
month, having gained only 30,000, with the difference between old and
new troops still against me.  The quicker you send, the fewer you
will have to send.  Time is everything.  Please act in view of this.
The enemy having given up Corinth, it is not wonderful that he is
thereby enabled to check us for a time at Richmond.

Yours truly,

A. LINCOLN.




TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.
WAR DEPARTMENT WASHINGTON, D.C., JULY 3, 1862

MAJOR-GENERAL GEORGE B. McCLELLAN:

Yours of 5.30 yesterday is just received.  I am satisfied that
yourself, officers, and men have done the best you could.  All
accounts say better fighting was never done.  Ten thousand thanks for
it.

On the 28th we sent General Burnside an order to send all the force
he could spare to you.  We then learned that you had requested him to
go to Goldsborough; upon which we said to him our order was intended
for your benefit, and we did not wish to be in conflict with your
views.

We hope you will have help from him soon.  Today we have ordered
General Hunter to send you all he can spare.  At last advices General
Halleck thinks he cannot send reinforcements without endangering all
he has gained.

A. LINCOLN, President




TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON CITY, D.C., July 4, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

I understand your position as stated in your letter and by General
Marcy.  To reinforce you so as to enable you to resume the offensive
within a month, or even six weeks, is impossible.  In addition to
that arrived and now arriving from the Potomac (about 10,000 men, I
suppose), and about 10,000 I hope you will have from Burnside very
soon, and about 5000 from Hunter a little later, I do not see how I
can send you another man within a month.  Under these circumstances
the defensive for the present must be your only care.  Save the army
first, where you are, if you can; secondly, by removal, if you must.
You, on the ground, must be the judge as to which you will attempt,
and of the means for effecting it.  I but give it as my opinion that
with the aid of the gunboats and the reinforcements mentioned above
you can hold your present position--provided, and so long as, you can
keep the James River open below you.  If you are not tolerably
confident you can keep the James River open, you had better remove as
soon as possible.  I do not remember that you have expressed any
apprehension as to the danger of having your communication cut on the
river below you, yet I do not suppose it can have escaped your
attention.

Yours very truly,

A. LINCOLN.

P.S.--If at any time you feel able to take the offensive, you are not
restrained from doing so.
A.L.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL H. W. HALLECK.

WAR DEPARTMENT, July 4, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL HALLECK, Corinth, Mississippi:

You do not know how much you would oblige us if, without abandoning
any of your positions or plans, you could promptly send us even
10,000 infantry.  Can you not?  Some part of the Corinth army is
certainly fighting McClellan in front of Richmond.  Prisoners are in
our hands from the late Corinth army.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL J. A. DIX.

WASHINGTON CITY, July 4,1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL Dix, Fort Monroe:

Send forward the despatch to Colonel Hawkins and this also.  Our
order and General McClellan's to General Burnside being the same, of
course we wish it executed as promptly as possible.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON, July 5, 1862.  9 A.M.

MAJOR-GENERAL GEORGE B. McCLELLAN:

A thousand thanks for the relief your two despatches of 12 and 1 P.M.
yesterday gave me.  Be assured the heroism and skill of yourself and
officers and men is, and forever will be, appreciated.

If you can hold your present position, we shall have the enemy yet.

A. LINCOLN




TO GENERAL H. W. HALLECK.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON CITY, D.C., July 6, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL HALLECK, Corinth, Mississippi.

MY DEAR SIR:--This introduces Governor William Sprague, of Rhode
Island.  He is now Governor for the third time, and senator-elect of
the United States.

I know the object of his visit to you.  He has my cheerful consent to
go, but not my direction.  He wishes to get you and part of your
force, one or both, to come here.  You already know I should be
exceedingly glad of this if, in your judgment, it could be without
endangering positions and operations in the southwest; and I now
repeat what I have more than once said by telegraph: "Do not come or
send a man if, in your judgment, it will endanger any point you deem
important to hold, or endangers or delays the Chattanooga
expedition."

Still, please give my friend, Governor Sprague, a full and fair
hearing.

Yours very truly,

A. LINCOLN.




MEMORANDUM OF AN INTERVIEW BETWEEN THE PRESIDENT AND GENERAL
McCLELLAN AND OTHER OFFICERS DURING A VISIT TO THE ARMY OF THE
POTOMAC AT HARRISON'S LANDING, VIRGINIA.

July 9, 1862.

THE PRESIDENT: What amount of force have you now?


GENERAL McCLELLAN: About 80,000, can't vary much, certain1y 75,000.

THE PRESIDENT:[to the corps commanders]
What is the whole amount of your corps with you now.

GENERAL SUMNER: About 15,000.
GENERAL HEINTZELMAN: 15,000 for duty.
GENERAL KEYES: About 12,500.
GENERAL PORTER: About 23,000--fully 20,000 fit for duty.
GENERAL FRANKLIN: About 15,000.

THE PRESIDENT: What is likely to be your condition as to health in
this camp?

GENERAL McCLELLAN: Better than in any encampment since landing at
Fortress Monroe.

PRESIDENT LINCOLN:[to the corps commanders]
In your present encampment what is the present and prospective
condition as to health?

GENERAL SUMNER: As good as any part of Western Virginia.

GENERAL HEINTZELMAN: Excellent for health, and present health
improving.

GENERAL KEYES: A little improved, but think camp is getting worse.

GENERAL PORTER: Very good.

GENERAL FRANKLIN:  Not good.

THE PRESIDENT: Where is the enemy now?

GENERAL McCLELLAN: From four to five miles from us on all the roads--
I think nearly the whole army--both Hills, Longstreet, Jackson,
Magruder, Huger.

THE PRESIDENT: [to the corps commanders] Where and in what condition
do you believe the enemy to be now?

GENERAL SUMNER: I think they have retired from our front; were very
much damaged, especially in their best troops, in the late actions,
from superiority of arms.

GENERAL HEINTZELMAN:  Don't think they are in force in our vicinity.

GENERAL KEYES: Think he has withdrawn, and think preparing to go to
WASHINGTON.

GENERAL PORTER: Believe he is mainly near Richmond.  He feels he dare
not attack us here.

GENERAL FRANKLIN: I learn he has withdrawn from our front and think
that is probable.

THE PRESIDENT: [to the corps commanders] What is the aggregate of
your killed, wounded, and missing from the attack on the 26th ultimo
till now?

GENERAL SUMNER:     1175.
GENERAL HEINTZELMAN: Not large  745.
GENERAL KEYES: Less than 500.
GENERAL PORTER:       Over 5000.
GENERAL FRANKLIN: Not over 3000.

THE PRESIDENT: If you desired could you remove the army safely?

GENERAL McCLELLAN: It would be a delicate and very difficult matter.

THE PRESIDENT: [to the corps commanders] If it were desired to get
the army away, could it be safely effected?

GENERAL SUMNER: I think we could, but I think we give up the cause if
we do.

GENERAL HEINTZELMAN: Perhaps we could, but I think it would be
ruinous to the country.

GENERAL KEYES: I think it could if done quickly.

GENERAL PORTER: Impossible--move the army and ruin the country.

GENERAL FRANKLIN: I think we could, and that we had better--think
Rappahannock the true line.

THE PRESIDENT: [to the corps commanders] Is the army secure in its
present position ?

GENERAL SUMNER: Perfectly so, in my judgment.
GENERAL HEINTZELMAN: I think it is safe.
GENERAL KEYES: With help of General B. [Burnside] can hold position.
GENERAL PORTER: Perfectly so.  Not only, but we are ready to begin
moving forward.
GENERAL FRANKLIN: Unless river can be closed it is.




ORDER MAKING HALLECK GENERAL-IN-CHIEF.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, July 11,1862.

Ordered, That Major-General Henry W. Halleck be assigned to command
the whole land forces of the United States, as general-in-chief, and
that he repair to this capital so soon as he can with safety to the
positions and operations within the department now under his charge.

A. LINCOLN




ORDER CONCERNING THE SOUTHWEST BRANCH
OF THE PACIFIC RAILROAD.

Whereas, in the judgment of the President, the public safety does
require that the railroad line called and known as the Southwest
Branch of the Pacific Railroad in the State of Missouri be repaired,
extended, and completed from Rolla to Lebanon, in the direction to
Springfield, in the said State, the same being necessary to the
successful and economical conduct of the war and to the maintenance
of the authority of the government in the Southwest:

Therefore, under and in virtue of the act of Congress entitled "An
act to authorize the President of the United States in certain cases
to take possession of railroad and telegraph lines, and for other
purposes," approved January 31, 1862, it is ordered, That the portion
of the said railroad line which reaches from Rolla to Lebanon be
repaired, extended, and completed, so as to be made available for the
military uses of the government, as speedily as may be.  And,
inasmuch as upon the part of the said line from Rolla to the stream
called Little Piney a considerable portion of the necessary work has
already been done by the railroad company, and the road to this
extent may be completed at comparatively small cost, it is ordered
that the said line from Rolla to and across Little Piney be first
completed, and as soon as possible.

The Secretary of War is charged with the execution of this order.
And to facilitate the speedy execution of the work, he is directed,
at his discretion, to take possession and control of the whole or
such part of the said railroad line, and the whole or such part of
the rolling stock, offices, shops, buildings, and all their
appendages and appurtenances, as he may judge necessary or convenient
for the early completion of the road from Rolla to Lebanon.

Done at the city of WASHINGTON, July 11, 1862.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.




MESSAGE TO CONGRESS.

WASHINGTON, D C., July 11, 1862

TO THE SENATE AND HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES:

I recommend that the thanks of Congress be given to the following
officers of the United States Navy:
Captain James L. Lardner, for meritorious conduct at the battle of
Port Royal and distinguished services on the coast of the United
States against the enemy.

Captain Charles Henry Davis, for distinguished services in conflict
with the enemy at Fort Pillow, at Memphis, and for successful
operations at other points in the waters of the Mississippi River.

Commander John A. Dahlgren, for distinguished services in the line of
his profession, improvements in ordnance, and zealous and efficient
labors in the ordnance branch of the service.

Commander Stephen C. Rowan, for distinguished services in the waters
of North Carolina, and particularly in the capture of Newbern, being
in chief command of the naval forces.

Commander David D. Porter, for distinguished services in the
conception and preparation of the means used for the capture of the
forts below New Orleans, and for highly meritorious conduct in the
management of the mortar flotilla during the bombardment of Forts
Jackson and St.  Philip.

Captain Silas H. Stringharn, now on the retired list, for
distinguished services in the capture of Forts Hatteras and Clark.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GOVERNOR JOHNSON.

WAR DEPARTMENT, July 11, 1862.

HON. ANDREW JOHNSON.

MY DEAR SIR:--Yours of yesterday is received.  Do you not, my good
friend, perceive that what you ask is simply to put you in command in
the West?  I do not suppose you desire this.  You only wish to
control in your own localities; but this you must know may derange
all other posts.  Can you not, and will you not, have a full
conference with General Halleck?  Telegraph him, and meet him at such
place as he and you can agree upon.  I telegraph him to meet you and
confer fully with you.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL H. W. HALLECK.

WAR DEPARTMENT, July11, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL HALLECK, Corinth:

Governor Johnson, at Nashville, is in great trouble and anxiety about
a raid into Kentucky.  The governor is a true and valuable man--
indispensable to us in Tennessee.  Will you please get in
communication with him, and have a full conference with him before
you leave for here?  I have telegraphed him on the subject.

A. LINCOLN.




APPEAL TO BORDER-STATE REPRESENTATIVES IN FAVOR OF
COMPENSATED EMANCIPATION.

July 12, 1862.

GENTLEMEN:--After the adjournment of Congress now very near, I shall
have no opportunity of seeing you for several months.  Believing that
you of the border States hold more power for good than any other
equal number of members, I feel it a duty which I cannot justifiably
waive to make this appeal to you.  I intend no reproach or complaint
when I assure you that, in my opinion, if you all had voted for the
resolution in the gradual-emancipation message of last March, the war
would now be substantially ended.  And the plan therein proposed is
yet one of the most potent and swift means of ending it.  Let the
States which are in rebellion see definitely and certainly that in no
event will the States you represent ever join their proposed
confederacy, and they cannot much longer maintain the contest.  But
you cannot divest them of their hope to ultimately have you with them
so long as you show a determination to perpetuate the institution
within your own States.    Beat them at elections, as you have
overwhelmingly done, and, nothing daunted, they still claim you as
their own.  You and I know what the lever of their power is.  Break
that lever before their faces, and they can shake you no more
forever.  Most of you have treated me with kindness and consideration
and I trust you will not now think I improperly touch what is
exclusively your own, when, for the sake of the whole country, I ask,
Can you, for your States, do better than to take the course I urge?
Discarding punctilio and maxims adapted to more manageable times, and
looking only to the unprecedentedly stern facts of our case, can you
do better in any possible event?  You prefer that the constitutional
relation of the States to the nation shall be practically restored
without disturbance of the institution; and if this were done, my
whole duty in this respect, under the Constitution and my oath of
office, would be performed.  But it is not done, and we are trying to
accomplish it by war.  The incidents of the war cannot be avoided.
If the war continues long, as it must if the object be not sooner
attained, the institution in your States will be extinguished by mere
friction and abrasion--by the mere incidents of the war.  It will be
gone, and you will have nothing valuable in lieu of it.  Much of its
value is gone already.  How much better for you and for your people
to take the step which at once shortens the war and secures
substantial compensation for that which is sure to be wholly lost in
any other event! How much better to thus save the money which else we
sink forever in war! How much better to do it while we can, lest the
war ere long render us pecuniarily unable to do it! How much better
for you as seller, and the nation as buyer, to sell out and buy out
that without which the war could never have been, than to sink both
the thing to be sold and the price of it in cutting one another's
throats! I do not speak of emancipation at once, but of a decision at
once to emancipate gradually.  Room in South America for colonization
can be obtained cheaply and in abundance, and when numbers shall be
large enough to be company and encouragement for one another, the
freed people will not be so reluctant to go.

I am pressed with a difficulty not yet mentioned--one which threatens
division among those who, united, are none too strong.  An instance
of it is known to you.  General Hunter is an honest man.  He was, and
I hope still is, my friend.  I valued him none the less for his
agreeing with me in the general wish that all men everywhere could be
free.  He proclaimed all men free within certain States, and I
repudiated the proclamation.   He expected more good and less harm
from the measure than I could believe would follow.  Yet, in
repudiating it, I gave dissatisfaction, if not offence, to many whose
support the country cannot afford to lose.  And this is not the end
of it.  The pressure in this direction is still upon me, and is
increasing.  By conceding what I now ask you can relieve me, and,
much more, can relieve the country in this important point.

Upon these considerations, I have again begged your attention to the
message of March last.  Before leaving the Capital, consider and
discuss it among yourselves.  You are patriots and statesmen, and as
such I pray you consider this proposition; and, at the least, commend
it to the consideration of your States and people.  As you would
perpetuate popular government for the best people in the world, I
beseech you that you do in nowise omit this.  Our common country is
in great peril, demanding the loftiest views and boldest action to
bring a speedy relief.  Once relieved, its form of government is
saved to the world; its beloved history and cherished memories are
vindicated, and its happy future fully assured and rendered
inconceivably grand.  To you, more than to any others, the privilege
is given to assure that happiness and swell that grandeur, and to
link your own names therewith forever.




TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.
EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, July 13, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

MY DEAR SIR:--I am told that over 160,000 men have gone into your
army on the Peninsula.  When I was with you the other day we made out
86,500 remaining, leaving 73,500 to be accounted for.  I believe
23,500 will cover all the killed, wounded, and missing in all your
battles and skirmishes, leaving 50,000 who have left otherwise.  No
more than 5000 of these have died, leaving 45,000 of your army still
alive and not with it.  I believe half or two-thirds of them are fit
for duty to-day.  Have you any more perfect knowledge of this than I
have?  If I am right, and you had these men with you, you could go
into Richmond in the next three days.  How can they be got to you,
and how can they be prevented from getting away in such numbers for
the future?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL H. W. HALLECK.

WAR DEPARTMENT, July 13, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL HALLECK, Corinth, Mississippi:

They are having a stampede in Kentucky.  Please look to it.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL J. T. BOYLE.

WASHINGTON, July 13, 1862.

GENERAL J. T. BOYLE, Louisville, Kentucky:

Your several despatches received.  You should call on General
Halleck.  Telegraph him at once.  I have telegraphed him that you are
in trouble.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL J. T. BOYLE.

WAR DEPARTMENT, July 13, 1862.

GENERAL J. T. BOYLE, Louisville, Kentucky:

We cannot venture to order troops from General Buell.  We know not
what condition he is in.  He maybe attacked himself.  You must call
on General Halleck, who commands, and whose business it is to
understand and care for the whole field If you cannot telegraph to
him, send a messenger to him.  A dispatch has this moment come from
Halleck at Tuscombia, Alabama.

A. LINCOLN.




ACT OF COMPENSATED EMANCIPATION

MESSAGE TO CONGRESS.

July 4, 1862.

FELLOW-CITIZENS OF THE SENATE AND HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES:

Herewith is the draft of the bill to compensate any State which may
abolish slavery within its limits, the passage of which,
substantially as presented, I respectfully and earnestly recommend.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.


Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the
United States of America in Congress assembled:--That whenever the
President of the United States shall be satisfied that any State
shall have lawfully abolished slavery within and through-out such
State, either immediately or gradually, it shall be the duty of the
President, assisted by the Secretary of the Treasury, to prepare and
deliver to each State an amount of six per cent. interest-bearing
bonds of the United States equal to the aggregate value at ______
dollars per head of all the slaves within such State, as reported by
the census of 1860; the whole amount for any one State to be
delivered at once if the abolishment be immediate, or in equal annual
instalments if it be gradual, interest to begin running on each bond
at the time of delivery, and not before.

And be it further enacted, That if any State, having so received any
such bonds, shall at any time afterwards by law reintroduce or
tolerate slavery within its limits, contrary to the act of
abolishment upon which such bonds shall have been received, said
bonds so received by said State shall at once be null and void, in
whosesoever hands they may be, and such State shall refund to the
United States all interest which may have been paid on such bonds.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL H. W. HALLECK.

WAR DEPARTMENT, July 14, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL HALLECK, Corinth, Mississippi:

I am very anxious--almost impatient--to have you here.  Have due
regard to what you leave behind.  When can you reach here?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON CITY, July 14, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

General Burnside's force is at Newport News, ready to move, on short
notice, one way or the other, when ordered.

A. LINCOLN.




TO SOLOMON FOOT.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, July 15, 1862.

HON. SOLOMON FOOT,  President pro tempore of the Senate.

SIR:- Please inform the Senate that I shall be obliged if they will
postpone the adjournment at least one day beyond the time which I
understand to be now fixed for it.

Your obedient servant,

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

[The same message was addressed to Hon. Galusha A. Grow Speaker of
the House of Representatives.]




MESSAGE TO CONGRESS.

July 17, 1862.

FELLOW-CITIZENS OF THE SENATE AND HOUSE OF
REPRESENTATIVES:

I have inadvertently omitted so long to inform you that in March last
Mr. Cornelius Vanderbilt, of New York, gratuitously presented to the
United States the ocean steamer Vanderbilt, by many esteemed the
finest merchant ship in the world.  She has ever since been and still
is doing valuable service to the government.  For the patriotic act
of making this magnificent and valuable present to the country I
recommend that some suitable acknowledgment be made.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.




MESSAGE TO CONGRESS.

July 17, 1862.

FELLOW-CITIZENS OF THE SENATE AND HOUSE OF
REPRESENTATIVES:

Considering the bill for "An act to suppress insurrection, to punish
treason and rebellion, to seize and confiscate the property of
rebels, and for other purposes," and the joint resolution explanatory
of said act as being substantially one, I have approved and signed
both.

Before I was informed of the passage of the resolution I had prepared
the draft of a message stating objections to the bill becoming a law,
a copy of which draft is herewith transmitted.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.




FELLOW-CITIZENS OF THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES:

I herewith return to your honorable body, in which it originated, the
bill for an act entitled "An act to suppress treason and rebellion,
to seize and confiscate the property of rebels, and for other
purposes," together with my objections to its becoming a law.

There is much in the bill to which I perceive no objection.  It is
wholly prospective, and touches neither person nor property of any
loyal citizen, in which particulars it is just and proper.  The first
and second sections provide for the conviction and punishment of
persons Who shall be guilty of treason and persons who shall "incite,
set on foot, assist, or  engage in any rebellion or insurrection
against the authority of the United States or the laws thereof, or
shall give aid and comfort thereto, or shall engage in or give aid
and comfort to any such existing rebellion or insurrection." By fair
construction persons within these sections are not to be punished
without regular trials in duly constituted courts, under the forms
and all the substantial provisions of law and of the Constitution
applicable to their several cases.  To this I perceive no objection,
especially as such persons would be within the general pardoning
power and also the special provision for pardon and amnesty contained
in this act.

It is also provided that the slaves of persons convicted under these
sections shall be free.  I think there is an unfortunate form of
expression rather than a substantial objection in this.  It is
startling to say that Congress can free a slave within a State, and
yet if it were said the ownership of the slave had first been
transferred to the nation and that Congress had then liberated him
the difficulty would at once vanish.  And this is the real case.  The
traitor against the General Government forfeits his slave at least as
justly as he does any other property, and he forfeits both to the
government against which be offends.  The government, so far as there
can be ownership, thus owns the forfeited slaves, and the question
for Congress in regard to them is, "Shall they be made free or be
sold to new masters?" I perceive no objection to Congress deciding in
advance that they shall be free.   To the high honor of Kentucky, as
I am informed, she is the owner of some slaves by escheat, and has
sold none, but liberated all.  I hope the same is true of some other
States.  Indeed, I do not believe it will be physically possible for
the General Government to return persons so circumstanced to actual
slavery.  I believe there would be physical resistance to it which
could neither be turned aside by argument nor driven away by force.
In this view I have no objection to this feature of the bill.
Another matter involved in these two sections, and running through
other parts of the act, will be noticed hereafter.

I perceive no objection to the third or fourth sections.

So far as I wish to notice the fifth and sixth sections, they may be
considered together.  That the enforcement of these sections would do
no injustice to the persons embraced within them, is clear.  That
those who make a causeless war should be compelled to pay the cost of
it, is too obviously just to be called in question.  To give
governmental protection to the property of persons who have abandoned
it, and gone on a crusade to overthrow the same government, is
absurd, if considered in the mere light of justice.  The severest
justice may not always be the best policy.  The principle of seizing
and appropriating the property of the persons embraced within these
sections is certainly not very objectionable, but a justly
discriminating application of it would be very difficult and, to a
great extent, impossible.  And would it not be wise to place a power
of remission somewhere, so that these persons may know they have
something to lose by persisting and something to gain by desisting?

[A man without hope is a most dangerous man--he has nothing to lose!]

I am not sure whether such power of remission is or is not in section
thirteen.  Without any special act of Congress, I think our military
commanders, when--in military phrase, "they are within the enemy's
country," should, in an orderly manner, seize and use whatever of
real or personal property may be necessary or convenient for their
commands; at the same time preserving, in some way, the evidence of
what they do.

What I have said in regard to slaves, while commenting on the first
and second sections, is applicable to the ninth, with the difference
that no provision is made in the whole act for determining whether a
particular individual slave does or does not fall within the classes
defined in that section.  He is to be free upon certain conditions
but whether those conditions do or do not pertain to him no mode of
ascertaining is provided.  This could be easily supplied.

To the tenth section I make no objection.  The oath therein required
seems to be proper, and the remainder of the section is substantially
identical with a law already existing.

The eleventh section simply assumes to confer discretionary power
upon the executive.   Without the law, I have no hesitation to go as
far in the direction indicated as I may at any time deem expedient.
And I am ready to say now--I think it is proper for our military
commanders to employ, as laborers, as many persons of African descent
as can be used to advantage.

The twelfth and thirteenth sections are something better than
unobjectionable; and the fourteenth is entirely proper, if all other
parts of the act shall stand.

That to which I chiefly object pervades most parts of the act, but
more distinctly appears in the first, second, seventh, and eighth
sections.  It is the sum of those provisions which results in the
divesting of title forever.

For the causes of treason and ingredients of treason, not amounting
to the full crime, it declares forfeiture extending beyond the lives
of the guilty parties; whereas the Constitution of the United States
declares that "no attainder of treason shall work corruption of blood
or forfeiture except during the life of the person attainted." True,
there is to be no formal attainder in this case; still, I think the
greater punishment cannot be constitutionally inflicted, in a
different form, for the same offence.

With great respect I am constrained to say I think this feature of
the act is unconstitutional.  It would not be difficult to modify it.

I may remark that the provision of the Constitution, put in language
borrowed from Great Britain, applies only in this country, as I
understand, to real or landed estate.

Again, this act in rem forfeits property for the ingredients of
treason without a conviction of the supposed criminal, or a personal
hearing given him in any proceeding.  That we may not touch property
lying within our reach, because we cannot give personal notice to an
owner who is absent endeavoring to destroy the government, is
certainly not satisfactory.  Still, the owner may not be thus
engaged; and I think a reasonable time should be provided for such
parties to appear and have personal hearings.  Similar provisions are
not uncommon in connection with proceedings in rem.

For the reasons stated, I return the bill to the House in which it
originated.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON CITY, D.C., July 21, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

This is Monday.  I hope to be able to tell you on Thursday what is to
be done with Burnside.

A. LINCOLN.




ORDER IN REGARD TO BEHAVIOR OF ALIENS
WAR DEPARTMENT, ADJUTANT-GENERAL'S OFFICE,

WASHINGTON, July 21, 1862.

The following order has been received from the President of the
United States:

Representations have been made to the President by the ministers of
various foreign powers in amity with the United States that subjects
of such powers have during the present insurrection been obliged or
required by military authorities to take an oath of general or
qualified allegiance to this government.  It is the duty of all
aliens residing in the United States to submit to and obey the laws
and respect the authority of the government.  For any proceeding or
conduct inconsistent with this obligation and subversive of that
authority they may rightfully be subjected to military restraints
when this may be necessary.  But they cannot be required to take an
oath of allegiance to this government, because it conflicts with the
duty they owe to their own sovereigns.  All such obligations
heretofore taken are therefore remitted and annulled.  Military
commanders will abstain from imposing similar obligations in future,
and will in lieu thereof adopt such other restraints of the character
indicated as they shall find necessary, convenient, and effectual for
the public safety.  It is further directed that whenever any order
shall be made affecting the personal liberty of an alien reports of
the same and of the causes thereof shall be made to the War
Department for the consideration of the Department of State.

By order of the Secretary of War:
L. THOMAS,  Adjutant-General.




ORDER AUTHORIZING EMPLOYMENT OF "CONTRABANDS."

WAR DEPARTMENT, July 22, 1862.

Ordered:
1.  That military commanders within the States of Virginia, South
Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas,
and Arkansas in an orderly manner seize and use any property, real or
personal, which may be necessary or convenient for their several
commands as supplies or for other military purposes; and that while
property may be destroyed for proper military objects, none shall be
destroyed in wantonness or malice.

2.  That military and naval commanders shall employ as laborers
within and from said States so many persons of African descent as can
be advantageously used for military or naval purposes, giving them
reasonable wages for their labor.

3.  That as to both property and persons of African descent accounts
shall be kept sufficiently accurate and in detail to show quantities
and amounts and from whom both property and such persons shall have
come, as a basis upon which compensation can be made in proper cases;
and the several departments of this government shall attend to and
perform their appropriate parts toward the execution of these orders.

By order of the President:
EDWIN M. STANTON,  Secretary of War.




WARNING TO REBEL SYMPATHIZERS

PROCLAMATION, JULY 25, 1862.

THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:

A Proclamation.

In pursuance of the sixth section of the act of Congress entitled "An
act to suppress insurrection and to punish treason and rebellion, to
seize and confiscate property of rebels, and for other purposes,"
approved July 17, 1862, and which act and the joint resolution
explanatory thereof are herewith published, I, Abraham Lincoln,
President of the United States, do hereby proclaim to and warn all
persons within the contemplation of said sixth section to cease
participating in, aiding, countenancing, or abetting the existing
rebellion or any rebellion against the Government of the United
States and to return to their proper allegiance to the United States,
on pain of the forfeitures and seizures as within and by said sixth
section provided.

In testimony whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal
of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the city of Washington, this twenty-fifth day of July, A.D.
1862, and of the independence of the United States the
eighty-seventh.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

By the President:
WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Secretary of State.




HOLD MY HAND WHILST THE ENEMY STABS ME

TO REVERDY JOHNSON.

(Private.)

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, July 26, 1862.

HON. REVERDY JOHNSON.

MY DEAR SIR:--Yours of the 16th is received...........

You are ready to say I apply to friends what is due only to enemies.
I distrust the wisdom if not the sincerity of friends who would hold
my hands while my enemies stab me.  This appeal of  professed friends
has paralyzed me more in this struggle than any other one thing.  You
remember telling me, the day after the Baltimore mob in April, 1861,
that it would crush all Union feeling in Maryland for me to attempt
bringing troops over Maryland soil to Washington.  I brought the
troops notwithstanding, and yet there was Union feeling enough left
to elect a Legislature the next autumn, which in turn elected a very
excellent Union United States senator! I am a patient man--always
willing to forgive on the Christian terms of repentance, and also to
give ample time for repentance.  Still, I must save this government,
if possible.  What I cannot do, of course, I will not do; but it may
as well be understood, once for all, that I shall not surrender this
game leaving any available card unplayed.

Yours truly,

A. LINCOLN.




TO CUTHBERT BULLITT.
(Private.)
WASHINGTON, D. C., July 28, 1862.


CUTHBERT BULLITT, Esq., New Orleans, Louisiana.

SIR:--The copy of a letter addressed to yourself by Mr. Thomas J.
Durant has been shown to me.  The writer appears to be an able, a
dispassionate, and an entirely sincere man.  The first part of the
letter is devoted to an effort to show that the secession ordinance
of Louisiana was adopted against the will of a majority of the
people.  This is probably true, and in that fact may be found some
instruction.  Why did they allow the ordinance to go into effect?
Why did they not assert themselves?  Why stand passive and allow
themselves to be trodden down by minority?  Why did they not hold
popular meetings and have a convention of their own to express and
enforce the true sentiment of the State?  If preorganization was
against them then, why not do this now that the United States army is
present to protect them?  The paralysis--the dead palsy--of the
government in this whole struggle is that this class of men will do
nothing for the government, nothing for themselves, except demanding
that the government shall not strike its open enemies, lest they be
struck by accident!

Mr. Durant complains that in various ways the relation of master and
slave is disturbed by the presence of our army, and he considers it
particularly vexatious that this, in part, is done under cover of an
act of Congress, while constitutional guaranties are suspended on the
plea of military necessity.  The truth is, that what is done and
omitted about slaves is done and omitted on the same military
necessity.  It is a military necessity to have men and money; and we
can get neither in sufficient numbers or amounts if we keep from or
drive from our lines slaves coming to them.   Mr. Durant cannot be
ignorant of the pressure in this direction, nor of my efforts to hold
it within bounds till he and such as he shall have time to help
themselves.

I am not posted to speak understandingly on all the police
regulations of which Mr. Durant complains.  If experience shows any
one of them to be wrong, let them be set right.  I think I can
perceive in the freedom of trade which Mr. Durant urges that he would
relieve both friends and enemies from the pressure of the blockade.
By this he would serve the enemy more effectively than the enemy is
able to serve himself.  I do not say or believe that to serve the
enemy is the purpose, of Mr. Durant, or that he is conscious of any
purpose other than national and patriotic ones.  Still, if there were
a class of men who, having no choice of sides in the contest, were
anxious only to have quiet and comfort for themselves while it rages,
and to fall in with the victorious side at the end of it without loss
to themselves, their advice as to the mode of conducting the contest
would be precisely such as his is.   He speaks of no duty--apparently
thinks of none--resting upon Union men.  He even thinks it injurious
to the Union cause that they should be restrained in trade and
passage without taking sides.  They are to touch neither a sail nor a
pump, but to be merely passengers--deadheads at that--to be carried
snug and dry throughout the storm, and safely landed right side up.
Nay, more: even a mutineer is to go untouched, lest these sacred
passengers receive an accidental wound.  Of course the rebellion will
never be suppressed in Louisiana if the professed Union men there
will neither help to do it nor permit the government to do it without
their help.  Now, I think the true remedy is very different from what
is suggested by Mr. Durant.  It does not lie in rounding the rough
angles of the war, but in removing the necessity for the war.  The
people of Louisiana who wish protection to person and property have
but to reach forth their hands and take it.  Let them in good faith
reinaugurate the national authority, and set up a State government
conforming thereto under the Constitution.  They know how to do it
and can have the protection of the army while doing it.  The army
will be withdrawn so soon as such State government can dispense with
its presence; and the people of the State can then, upon the old
constitutional terms, govern themselves to their own liking.  This is
very simple and easy.

If they will not do this--if they prefer to hazard all for the sake
of destroying the government--it is for them to consider whether it
is probable I will surrender the government to save them from losing
all.  If they decline what I suggest, you scarcely need to ask what I
will do.  What would you do in my position?  Would you drop the war
where it is?  Or would you prosecute it in future with elder-stalk
squirts charged with rose water?  Would you deal lighter blows rather
than heavier ones?  Would you give up the contest, leaving any
available means unapplied?  I am in no boastful mood.  I shall not do
more than I can, and I shall do all I can, to save the government,
which is my sworn duty as well as my personal inclination.  I shall
do nothing in malice.  What I deal with is too vast for malicious
dealing.

Yours truly,

A. LINCOLN.




TO LOYAL GOVERNORS.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, D.C.,

July 28, 1862.

GOVERNORS OF ALL LOYAL STATES:

It would be of great service here for us to know, as fully as you can
tell, what progress is made and making in recruiting for old
regiments in your State.  Also about what day the first regiments can
move with you, what the second, what the third, and so on.  This
information is important to us in making calculations.   Please give
it as promptly and accurately as you call.

A. LINCOLN.




BROKEN EGGS CANNOT BE MENDED

EXTRACT FROM LETTER TO AUGUST BELMONT.

July 31, 1862.

Broken eggs cannot be mended; but Louisiana has nothing to do now but
to take her place in the Union as it was, barring the already broken
eggs.  The sooner she does so, the smaller will be the amount of that
which will be past mending.  This government cannot much longer play
a game in which it stakes all, and its enemies stake nothing.  Those
enemies must understand that they cannot experiment for ten years
trying to destroy the government, and if they fail, still come back
into the Union unhurt.  If they expect in any contingency to ever
have the Union as it was, I join with the writer in saying, "Now is
the time."

How much better it would have been for the writer to have gone at
this, under the protection of the army at New Orleans, than to have
sat down in a closet writing complaining letters northward!

Yours truly,
A. LINCOLN.




TO COUNT GASPARIN.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,

August 4, 1863.

TO COUNT A. DE GASPARIN.

DEAR SIR -Your very acceptable letter, dated Orbe, Canton de Vaud,
Switzerland, 18th of July, 1862, is received.  The moral effect was
the worst of the affair before Richmond, and that has run its course
downward.  We are now at a stand, and shall soon be rising again, as
we hope.  I believe it is true that, in men and material, the enemy
suffered more than we in that series of conflicts, while it is
certain that he is less able to bear it.

With us every soldier is a man of character, and must be treated with
more consideration than is customary in Europe.  Hence our great
army, for slighter causes than could have prevailed there, has
dwindled rapidly, bringing the necessity for a new call earlier than
was anticipated.  We shall easily obtain the new levy, however.  Be
not alarmed if you shall learn that we shall have resorted to a draft
for part of this.  It seems strange even to me, but it is true, that
the government is now pressed to this course by a popular demand.
Thousands who wish not to personally enter the service are
nevertheless anxious to pay and send substitutes, provided they can
have assurance that unwilling persons, similarly situated, will be
compelled to do likewise.  Besides this, volunteers mostly choose to
enter newly forming regiments, while drafted men can be sent to fill
up the old ones, wherein man for man they are quite doubly as
valuable.

You ask, "Why is it that the North with her great armies so often is
found with inferiority of numbers face to face with the armies of the
South?" While I painfully know the fact, a military man, which I am
not, would better answer the question.  The fact I know has not been
overlooked, and I suppose the cause of its continuance lies mainly in
the other facts that the enemy holds the interior and we the exterior
lines, and that we operate where the people convey information to the
enemy, while he operates where they convey none to us.

I have received the volume and letter which you did me the honor of
addressing to me, and for which please accept my sincere thanks.  You
are much admired in America for the ability of your writings, and
much loved for your generosity to us and your devotion to liberal
principles generally.

You are quite right as to the importance to us, for its bearing upon
Europe, that we should achieve military successes, and the same is
true for us at home as well as abroad.  Yet it seems unreasonable
that a series of successes, extending through half a year, and
clearing more than 100,000 square miles of country, should help us so
little, while a single half-defeat should hurt us so much.  But let
us be patient.

I am very happy to know that my course has not conflicted with your
judgment of propriety and policy I can only say that I have acted
upon my best convictions, without selfishness or malice, and that by
the help of God I shall continue to do so.

Please be assured of my highest respect and esteem.

A. LINCOLN.




SPEECH AT A WAR MEETING,

WASHINGTON, AUGUST 6, 1862

FELLOW CITIZENS: I believe there is no precedent for my appearing
before you on this occasion, but it is also true that there is no
precedent for your being here yourselves, and I offer in
justification of myself and of you that, upon examination, I have
found nothing in the Constitution against it.  I, however, have an
impression that; there are younger gentlemen who will entertain you
better and better address your understanding than I will or could,
and therefore I propose but to detain you a moment longer.  I am very
little inclined on any occasion to say anything unless I hope to
produce some good by it.  The only thing I think of just now not
likely to be better said by some one else is a matter in which we
have heard some other persons blamed for what I did myself There has
been a very widespread attempt to have a quarrel between General
McClellan and the Secretary of War  Now, I occupy a position that
enables me to believe that these two gentlemen are not nearly so deep
in the quarrel as some presuming to be their friends.  General
McClellan's attitude is such that in the very selfishness of his
nature he cannot but wish to be successful--and I hope he will--and
the Secretary of War is precisely in the same situation.  If the
military commanders in the field cannot be successful, not only the
Secretary of War, but myself, for the time being the master of both,
cannot but be failures.  I know General McClellan wishes to be
successful, and I know he does not wish it any more than the
Secretary of War for him, and both of them together no more than I
wish it.  Sometimes we have a dispute about how many men General
McClellan has had, and those who would disparage him say he has had a
very large number, and those who would disparage the Secretary of War
insist that General McClellan has had a very small number.  The basis
for this is, there is always a wide difference, and on this occasion
perhaps a wider one, between the grand total on McClellan's rolls and
the men actually fit for duty; and those who would disparage him talk
of the grand total on paper, and those who would disparage the
Secretary of War talk of those at present fit for duty.  General
McClellan has sometimes asked for things that the Secretary of War
did not give him.  General McClellan is not to blame for asking for
what he wanted and needed, and the Secretary of War is not to blame
for not giving when he had none to give.  And I say here, so far as I
know, the Secretary of War has withheld no one thing at any time in
my power to give him.  I have no accusation against him.  I believe
he is a brave and able man, and I stand here, as justice requires me
to do, to take upon myself what has been charged on the Secretary of
War as withholding from him.  I have talked longer than I expected to
do, and now I avail myself of my privilege of saying no more.




TELEGRAM TO GOVERNOR ANDREW.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON CITY, D.C., August 12, 1862.

GOVERNOR ANDREW, Boston, Mass.:

Your despatch saying "I can't get those regiments off because I can't
get quick work out of the V. S. disbursing officer and the paymaster"
is received.  Please say to these gentlemen that if they do not work
quickly I will make quick work with them.  In the name of all that is
reasonable, how long does it take to pay a couple of regiments?  We
were never more in need of the arrival of regiments than now--even
to-day.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GOVERNOR CURTIN.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, D.C., August 12, 1862.

GOVERNOR CURTIN, Harrisburg, Penn.:

It is very important for some regiments to arrive here at once.  What
lack you from us?  What can we do to expedite matters?  Answer.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL S. R. CURTIS.

WASHINGTON, D. C., August 12, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL CURTIS, St.  Louis, Missouri:

Would the completion of the railroad some distance farther in the
direction of Springfield, Mo., be of any military advantage to you?
Please answer.

A. LINCOLN.




ADDRESS ON COLONIZATION TO A DEPUTATION OF COLORED MEN.

WASHINGTON,  Thursday, August 14, 1862.

This afternoon the President of the United States gave an audience to
a committee of colored men at the White House.  They were introduced
by Rev.  J. Mitchell, Commissioner of Emigration,  E. M. Thomas, the
chairman, remarked that they were there by invitation to hear what
the Executive had to say to them.

Having all been seated, the President, after a few preliminary
observations, informed them that a sum of money had been appropriated
by Congress, and placed at his disposition, for the purpose of aiding
the colonization, in some country, of the people, or a portion of
them, of African descent, thereby making it his duty, as it had for a
long time been his inclination, to favor that cause.  And why, he
asked, should the people of your race be colonized, and where?  Why
should they leave this country?  This is, perhaps, the first question
for proper consideration.  You and we are different races.  We have
between us a broader difference than exists between almost any other
two races.  Whether it is right or wrong I need not discuss; but this
physical difference is a great disadvantage to us both, as I think.
Your race suffer very greatly, many of them, by living among us,
while ours suffer from your presence.  In a word, we suffer on each
side.  If this is admitted, it affords a reason, at least, why we
should be separated.  You here are free men, I suppose.

[A voice -"Yes, sir!"]

Perhaps you have long been free, or all your lives.  Your race are
suffering, in my judgment, the greatest wrong inflicted on any
people.  But even when you cease to be slaves, you are yet far
removed from being placed on an equality with the white race.  You
are cut off from many of the advantages which the other race enjoys.
The aspiration of men is to enjoy equality with the best when free,
but on this broad continent not a single man of your race is made the
equal of a single man of ours.  Go where you are treated the best,
and the ban is still upon you.  I do not propose to discuss this, but
to present it as a fact, with which we have to deal.  I cannot alter
it if I would.  It is a fact about which we all think and feel alike,
I and you.  We look to our condition.  Owing to the existence of the
two races on this continent, I need not recount to you the effects
upon white men, growing out of the institution of slavery.

I believe in its general evil effects on the white race.  See our
present condition--the country engaged in war--white men cutting one
another's throats--none knowing how far it will extend--and then
consider what we know to be the truth: But for your race among us
there could not be war, although many men engaged on either side do
not care for you one way or the other.  Nevertheless I repeat,
without the institution of slavery and the colored race as a basis,
the war could not have an existence.   It is better for us both,
therefore, to be separated.  I know that there are free men among
you, who, even if they could better their condition, are not as much
inclined to go out of the country as those who, being slaves, could
obtain their freedom on this condition.  I suppose one of the
principal difficulties in the way of colonization is that the free
colored man cannot see that his comfort would be advanced by it.  You
may believe that you can live in WASHINGTON, or elsewhere in the
United States, the remainder of your life, as easily, perhaps more
so, than you can in any foreign Country; and hence you may come to
the conclusion that you have nothing to do with the idea of going to
a foreign country.

This is (I speak in no unkind sense) an extremely selfish view of the
case.  You ought to do something to help those who are not so
fortunate as yourselves.  There is an unwillingness on the part of
our people, harsh as it may be, for you free colored people to remain
with us.  Now, if you could give a start to the white people, you
would open a wide door for many to be made free.  If we deal with
those who are not free at the beginning, and whose intellects are
clouded by slavery, we have very poor material to start with.  If
intelligent colored men, such as are before me, would move in this
matter, much might be accomplished.

It is exceedingly important that we have men at the beginning capable
of thinking as white men, and not those who have been systematically
oppressed.  There is much to encourage you.  For the sake of your
race you should sacrifice something of your present comfort for the
purpose of being as grand in that respect as the white people.  It is
a cheering thought throughout life that something can be done to
ameliorate the condition of those who have been subject to the hard
usages of the world.  It is difficult to make a man miserable while
he feels he is worthy of himself and claims kindred to the great God
who made him.  In the American Revolutionary war sacrifices were made
by men engaged in it, but they were cheered by the future.  General
WASHINGTON himself endured greater physical hardships than if he had
remained a British subject, yet he was a happy man because he had
engaged in benefiting his race, in doing something for the children
of his neighbors, having none of his own.

The colony of Liberia has been in existence a long time.  In a
certain sense it is a success.  The old President of Liberia,
Roberts, has just been with me--the first time I ever saw him.  He
says they have within the bounds of that colony between three and
four hundred thousand people, or more than in some of our old States,
such as Rhode Island or Delaware, or in some of our newer States, and
less than in some of our larger ones.  They are not all American
colonists or their descendants.  Something less than 12,000 have been
sent thither from this country.  Many of the original settlers have
died; yet, like people else-where, their offspring outnumber those
deceased.  The question is, if the colored people are persuaded to go
anywhere, why not there?

One reason for unwillingness to do so is that some of you would
rather remain within reach of the country of your nativity.  I do not
know how much attachment you may have toward our race.  It does not
strike me that you have the greatest reason to love them.  But still
you are attached to them, at all events.

The place I am thinking about for a colony is in Central America.  It
is nearer to us than Liberia not much more than one fourth as far as
Liberia, and within seven days' run by steamers.  Unlike Liberia, it
is a great line of travel--it is a highway.  The country is a very
excellent one for any people, and with great natural resources and
advantages, and especially because of the similarity of climate with
your native soil, thus being suited to your physical condition.  The
particular place I have in view is to be a great highway from the
Atlantic or Caribbean Sea to the Pacific Ocean, and this particular
place has all the advantages for a colony.  On both sides there are
harbors--among the finest in the world.  Again, there is evidence of
very rich coal-mines.  A certain amount of coal is valuable in any
country.  Why I attach so much importance to coal is, it will afford
an opportunity to the inhabitants for immediate employment till they
get ready to settle permanently in their homes.  If you take
colonists where there is no good landing, there is a bad show; and so
where there is nothing to cultivate and of which to make a farm.  But
if something is started so that you can get your daily bread as soon
as reach you there, it is a great advantage.  Coal land is the best
thing I know of with which to commence an enterprise.  To return--you
have been talked to upon this subject, and told that a speculation is
intended by gentlemen who have an interest in the country, including
the coal-mines.  We have been mistaken all our lives if we do not
know whites, as well as blacks, look to their self-interest.  Unless
among those deficient of intellect, everybody you trade with makes
something.  You meet with these things here and everywhere.  If such
persons have what will be an advantage to them, the question is
whether it cannot be made of advantage to you.   You are intelligent,
and know that success does not so much depend on external help as on
self-reliance.  Much, therefore, depends upon yourselves.  As to the
coal-mines, I think I see the means available for your self-reliance.
I shall, if I get a sufficient number of you engaged, have provision
made that you shall not be wronged.  If you will engage in the
enterprise, I will spend some of the money intrusted to me.  I am not
sure you will succeed.  The government may lose the money; but we
cannot succeed unless we try, and we think with care we can succeed.
The political affairs in Central America are not in quite as
satisfactory a condition as I wish.  There are contending factions in
that quarter, but it is true all the factions are agreed alike on the
subject of colonization, and want it, and are more generous than we
are here.

To your colored race they have no objection  I would endeavor to have
you made the equals, and have the best assurance that you should be
the equals, of the best.

The practical thing I want to ascertain is whether I can get a number
of able-bodied men, with their wives and children, who are willing to
go when I present evidence of encouragement and protection.  Could I
get a hundred tolerably intelligent men, with their wives and
children, and able to "cut their own fodder," so to speak?  Can I
have fifty?  If I could find twenty-five able-bodied men, with a
mixture of women and children--good things in the family relation, I
think,--I could make a successful commencement.  I want you to let me
know whether this can be done or not.  This is the practical part of
my wish to see you.  These are subjects of very great importance,
worthy of a month's study, instead of a speech delivered in an hour.
I ask you, then, to consider seriously, not pertaining to yourselves
merely, nor for your race and ours for the present time, but as one
of the things, if successfully managed, the good of mankind--not
confined to the present generation, but as

   "From age to age descends the lay
    To millions yet to be,
    Till far its echoes roll away
    Into eternity."

The above is merely given as the substance of the President's
remarks.

The chairman of the delegation briefly replied that they would hold a
consultation, and in a short time give an answer.

The President said: Take your full time-no hurry at all.

The delegation then withdrew.




TELEGRAM TO OFFICER AT CAMP CHASE, OHIO.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, D. C., August 14, 1862.

OFFICER in charge of Confederate prisoners at Camp Chase, Ohio:

It is believed that a Dr. J. J. Williams is a prisoner in your
charge, and if so tell him his wife is here and allow him to
telegraph to her.

A. LINCOLN.




TO HIRAM BARNEY.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, August 16, 1862.

HON. HIRAM BARNEY, New York:

Mrs. L. has $1000 for the benefit of the hospitals and she will be
obliged, and send the pay, if you will be so good as to select and
send her $200 worth of good lemons and $100 worth of good oranges.

A. LINCOLN.




NOTE OF INTRODUCTION.

The Secretary of the Treasury and the Commissioner of Internal
Revenue will please see Mr. Talcott, one of the best men there is,
and, if any difference, one they would like better than they do me.

August 18, 1862

A. LINCOLN



TELEGRAM TO S. B. MOODY

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON
August 18, 1862

S. B. MOODY, Springfield, Ill.:

Which do you prefer--commissary or quartermaster?  If appointed it
must be without conditions.

A. LINCOLN.

Operator please send above for President.
JOHN HAY




TO Mrs. PRESTON.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, D. C., August 21, 1862.

Mrs. MARGARET PRESTON, Lexington, Ky.:

Your despatch to Mrs. L. received yesterday.  She is not well.  Owing
to her early and strong friendship for you, I would gladly oblige
you, but I cannot absolutely do it.  If General Boyle and Hon. James
Guthrie, one or both, in their discretion see fit to give you the
passes, this is my authority to them for doing so.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL BURNSIDE OR GENERAL PARKE.

WASHINGTON, August 21.

TO GENERAL BURNSIDE OR GENERAL PARKE:

What news about arrival of troops?

A. LINCOLN.




TO G. P. WATSON.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, D. C.,
August 21, 1862.

GILLET F. WATSON, Williamsburg, Va.:

Your telegram in regard to the lunatic asylum has been received.  It
is certainly a case of difficulty, but if you cannot remain, I cannot
conceive who under my authority can.  Remain as long as you safely
can and provide as well as you can for the poor inmates of the
institution.

A. LINCOLN.




TO HORACE GREELEY.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,
August 22, 1862.

HON. HORACE GREELEY.

DEAR SIR:--I have just read yours of the 19th, addressed to myself
through the New York Tribune.  If there be in it any statements or
assumptions of fact which I may know to be erroneous, I do not now
and here controvert them.  If there be in it any inferences which I
may believe to be falsely drawn, I do not now and here argue against
them.  If there be perceptible in it an impatient and dictatorial
tone, I waive it in deference to an old friend, whose heart I have
always supposed to be right.

As to the policy I "seem to be pursuing," as you say, I have not
meant to leave any one in doubt.

I would save the Union.  I would save it the shortest way under the
Constitution.  The sooner the national authority can be restored, the
nearer the Union will be, "the Union as it was."  If there be those
who would not save the Union unless they could at the same time save
slavery, I do not agree with them.  If there be those who would not
save the Union unless they could at the same time destroy slavery, I
do not agree with them.  My paramount object in this struggle is to
save the Union, and is not either to save or destroy slavery.  If I
could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it; and if
I could save it by freeing all the slaves, I would do it; and if I
could do it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do
that.  What I do about slavery and the colored race, I do because I
believe it helps to save this Union; and what I forbear, I forbear
because I do not believe it would help to save the Union.  I shall do
less whenever I shall believe what I am doing hurts the cause, and I
shall do more whenever I shall believe doing more will help the
cause.  I shall try to correct errors when shown to be errors; and I
shall adopt new views so fast as they shall appear to be true views.
I have here stated my purpose according to my view of official duty,
and I intend no modification of my oft expressed personal wish that
all men, everywhere, could be free.

Yours,

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GOVERNOR YATES.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, D.C., August 13.1862.  8 A.M.

HON. R. YATES, Springfield, Ill.:

I am pained to hear that you reject the service of an officer we sent
to assist in organizing and getting off troops.  Pennsylvania and
Indiana accepted such officers kindly, and they now have more than
twice as many new troops in the field as all the other States
together.  If Illinois had got forward as many troops as Indiana,
Cumberland Gap would soon be relieved from its present peril.  Please
do not ruin us on punctilio.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GOVERNOR RAMSEY.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, August 27, 1862

GOVERNOR RAMSEY, St.  Paul, Minnesota:

Yours received.  Attend to the Indians.  If the draft cannot proceed,
of course it will not proceed.  Necessity knows no law.  The
government cannot extend the time.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON CITY, August 27, 1862  4 P.M.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN, Alexandria, Virginia:

What news from the front?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL A. E. BURNSIDE.

August 27, 1862 4.30 p.m.

MAJOR-GENERAL BURNSIDE, Falmouth, Virginia:

Do you hear anything from Pope?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL A. E. BURNSIDE.

August 28, 1862.  2.40 P. M.

MAJOR-GENERAL BURNSIDE, Falmouth, Virginia:

Any news from General Pope?

A. LINCOLN




TELEGRAM TO COLONEL HAUPT.

August 28, 1862.  2.40 p. m.

COLONEL HAUPT, Alexandria, Virginia:

Yours received. How do you learn that the rebel forces at Manassas
are large and commanded by several of their best generals?

A. LINCOLN,




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL A. E. BURNSIDE.

WASHINGTON, D. C., August 29, 1862.  2.30 P.M.

MAJOR-GENERAL BURNSIDE, Falmouth, Virginia:

Any further news? Does Colonel Devon mean that sound of firing was
heard in direction of Warrenton, as stated, or in direction of
Warrenton Junction?

A. LINCOLN




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON, August 29, 1862.  2.30 p.m.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN

What news from direction of Manassas Junction?
What generally?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON, August 29, 1862.  4.10 P.M.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:
Yours of to-day just received. I think your first alternative--to
wit, "to concentrate all our available forces to open communication
with Pope"--is the right one, but I wish not to control.  That I now
leave to General Halleck, aided by your counsels.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO COLONEL HAUPT.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, D. C.,
August 30, 1862. 10.20 A.M.

COLONEL HAUPT Alexandria, Virginia:

What news?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO COLONEL HAUPT.

WAR DEPARTMENT, August 30, 1862. 3.50 P.M.
COLONEL HAUPT, Alexandria, Virginia

Please send me the latest news.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL BANKS.

August 30, 1862. 8.35 P.M.

MAJOR-GENERAL BANKS, Manassas Junction, Virginia:

Please tell me what news.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL J. T. BOYLE.

WAR DEPARTMENT, August 31, 1862.

GENERAL BOYLE, Louisville, Kentucky:

What force, and what the numbers of it, which General Nelson had in
the engagement near Richmond yesterday?

A. LINCOLN.




ORDER TO GENERAL H. W. HALLECK.

WASHINGTON, D. C., September 3, 1862.

Ordered, That the general-in-chief, Major-General Halleck,
immediately commence, and proceed with all possible despatch; to
organize an army, for active operations, from all the material within
and coming within his control, independent of the forces he may deem
necessary for the defense of Washington when such active army shall
take the field.

By order of the President:

EDWIN M. STANTON,
Secretary of War.

[Indorsement.]

Copy delivered to Major-General Halleck, September 3, 1862,
at 10 p.m.

E. D. TOWNSEND,
Assistant-Adjutant General.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL H. G. WRIGHT.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, D. C.,
September 7, 1862.

GENERAL WRIGHT, Cincinnati, Ohio:

Do you know to any certainty where General Bragg is?  May he not be
in Virginia?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL J. T. BOYLE.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, D. C.,
September 7, 1862.

GENERAL BOYLE, Louisville, Kentucky:

Where is General Bragg?  What do you know on the subject?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL J. E. WOOL.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, D.C.

September 7, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL Wool, Baltimore:

What about Harper's Ferry?  Do you know anything about it?  How
certain is your information about Bragg being in the valley of the
Shenandoah?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B, McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON, September 8, 1862.  5 P.M.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN, Rockville, Maryland:

How does it look now?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL D. C. BUELL.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON,
September 8, 1862. 7.20 P.M.

GENERAL BUELL:

What degree of certainty have you that Bragg, with his command, is
not now in the valley of the Shenandoah, Virginia?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO T. WEBSTER.

WASHINGTON, September 9, 1862.

THOMAS WEBSTER, Philadelphia:

Your despatch received, and referred to General Halleck, who must
control the questions presented.  While I am not surprised at your
anxiety, I do not think you are in any danger.  If half our troops
were in Philadelphia, the enemy could take it, because he would not
fear to leave the other half in his rear; but with the whole of them
here, he dares not leave them in his rear.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON CITY, September 10, 1862.  10.15 AM.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN, Rockville, Maryland:

How does it look now?

A. LINCOLN.




TO GOVERNOR CURTIN.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, D.C.,

September 11, 1862.

HIS EXCELLENCY ANDREW G. CURTIN, Governor of Pennsylvania,
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

SIR:--The application made to me by your adjutant general for
authority to call out the militia of the State of Pennsylvania has
received careful consideration.   It is my anxious desire to afford,
as far as possible, the means and power of the Federal Government to
protect the State of Pennsylvania from invasion by the rebel forces;
and since, in your judgment, the militia of the State are required,
and have been called upon by you, to organize for home defense and
protection, I sanction the call that you have made, and will receive
them into the service and pay of the United States to the extent they
can be armed, equipped, and usefully employed.  The arms and
equipments now belonging to the General Government will be needed for
the troops called out for the national armies, so that arms can only
be furnished for the quota of militia furnished by the draft of nine
months' men, heretofore ordered.  But as arms may be supplied by the
militia under your call, these, with the 30,000 in your arsenal, will
probably be sufficient for the purpose contemplated by your call.
You will be authorized to provide such equipments as may be required,
according to the regulations of the United States service, which,
upon being turned over to the United States Quartermaster's
Department, will be paid for at regulation prices, or the rates
allowed by the department for such articles.  Railroad transportation
will also be paid for, as in other cases.  Such general officers will
be supplied as the exigencies of the service will permit.

Yours truly,

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GOVERNOR CURTIN.

WASHINGTON, September 11, 1862   12M

HON. ANDREW G. CURTIN:

Please tell me at once what is your latest news from or toward
Hagerstown, or of the enemy's movement in any direction.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL C. B. McCLELLAN.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, SEPTEMBER 11, 1862.    6 PM

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

This is explanatory.  If Porter, Heintzelman, and Sigel were sent
you, it would sweep everything from the other side of the river,
because the new troops have been distributed among them, as I
understand.  Porter reports himself  21,000 strong, which can only be
by the addition of new troops.  He is ordered tonight to join you as
quickly as possible.  I am for sending you all that can be spared,
and I hope others can follow Porter very soon,

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON CITY, D.C., SEPTEMBER 12, 1862

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN, Clarksburg, Maryland:

How does it look now?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GOVERNOR CURTIN.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON D.C.,
SEPTEMBER 12, 1862    10.35 AM

HON. ANDREW G. CURTIN, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania:

Your despatch asking for 80,000 disciplined troops to be sent to
Pennsylvania is received.  Please consider we have not to exceed
80,000 disciplined troops, properly so called, this side of the
mountains; and most of them, with many of the new regiments, are now
close in the rear of the enemy supposed to be invading Pennsylvania.
Start half of them to Harrisburg, and the enemy will turn upon and
beat the remaining half, and then reach Harrisburg before the part
going there, and beat it too when it comes.  The best possible
security for Pennsylvania is putting the strongest force possible in
rear of the enemy.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL H. G. WRIGHT.

MILITARY TELEGRAPH,
WASHINGTON, September 12, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL WRIGHT, Cincinnati, Ohio:

I am being appealed to from Louisville against your withdrawing
troops from that place.  While I cannot pretend to judge of the
propriety of what you are doing, you would much oblige me by
furnishing me a rational answer to make to the governor and others at
Louisville.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL J. T. BOYLE.

WASHINGTON, September 12, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL BOYLE, Louisville, Kentucky:

Your despatch of last evening received.  Where is the enemy which you
dread in Louisville?  How near to you?  What is General Gilbert's
opinion?  With all possible respect for you, I must think General
Wright's military opinion is the better.  He is as much responsible
for Louisville as for Cincinnati.  General Halleck telegraphed him on
this very subject yesterday, and I telegraph him now; but for us here
to control him there on the ground would be a babel of confusion
which would be utterly ruinous.  Where do you understand Buell to be,
and what is he doing?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO A. HENRY.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, D. C, September 12, 1862.

HON. ALEXANDER HENRY, Philadelphia:

Yours of to-day received.  General Halleck has made the best
provision he can for generals in Pennsylvania.  Please do not be
offended when I assure you that in my confident belief Philadelphia
is in no danger.  Governor Curtin has just telegraphed me:
"I have advices that Jackson is crossing the Potomac at Williamsport,
and probably the whole rebel army will be drawn from Maryland."
At all events, Philadelphia is more than 150 miles from Hagerstown,
and could not be reached by the rebel army in ten days, if no
hindrance was interposed.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WASHINGTON CITY, D.C., September 12, 1862.  5.45 PM

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

Governor Curtin telegraphs me:
"I have advices that Jackson is crossing the Potomac at Wiliiamsport,
and probably the whole rebel army will be down from Maryland."

Receiving nothing from Harper's Ferry or Martinsburg to-day, and
positive information from Wheeling that the line is cut, corroborates
the idea that the enemy is crossing the Potomac.  Please do not let
him get off without being hurt.

A. LINCOLN.

[But he did!  D.W.]




REPLY TO A COMMITTEE FROM THE RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS  OF  CHICAGO,
ASKING  THAT THE PRESIDENT ISSUE A PROCLAMATION OF EMANCIPATION.

September 13,1862.

The subject presented in the memorial is one upon which I have
thought much for weeks past, and I may even say for months.  I am
approached with the most opposite opinions and advice, and that by
religious men, who are equally certain that they represent the Divine
will.  I am sure that either the one or the other class is mistaken
in that belief, and perhaps in some respects both.  I hope it will
not be irreverent for me to say that if it is probable that God would
reveal his will to others, on a point so connected with my duty, it
might be supposed he would reveal it directly to me; for, unless I am
more deceived in myself than I often am, it is my earnest desire to
know the will of Providence in this matter.  And if I can learn what
it is I will do it!  These are not, however, the days of miracles,
and I suppose it will be granted that I am not to expect a direct
revelation.  I must study the plain physical facts of the case,
ascertain what is possible, and learn what appears to be wise and
right.

The subject is difficult, and good men do not agree.  For instance,
the other day, four gentlemen of standing and intelligence from New
York called as a delegation on business connected with the war; but
before leaving two of them earnestly besought me to proclaim general
emancipation, upon which the other two at once attacked them.  You
know also that the last session of Congress had a decided majority of
antislavery men, yet they could not unite on this policy.  And the
same is true of the religious people.  Why, the rebel soldiers are
praying with a great deal more earnestness, I fear, than our own
troops, and expecting God to favor their side: for one of our
soldiers who had been taken prisoner told Senator Wilson a few days
since that he met nothing so discouraging as the evident sincerity of
those he was among in their prayers.  But we will talk over the
merits of the case.

What good would a proclamation of emancipation from me do, especially
as we are now situated?  I do not want to issue a document that the
whole world will see must necessarily be inoperative, like the Pope's
bull against the comet!  Would my word free the slaves, when I cannot
even enforce the Constitution in the rebel States?  Is there a single
court, or magistrate or individual that would be influenced by it
there?  And what reason is there to think it would have any greater
effect upon the slaves than the late law of Congress, which I
approved, and which offers protection and freedom to the slaves of
rebel masters who come within our lines?  Yet I cannot learn that
that law has caused a single slave to come over to us.  And suppose
they could be induced by a proclamation of freedom from me to throw
themselves upon us, what should we do with them?  How can we feed and
care for such a multitude?  General Butler wrote me a few days since
that he was issuing more rations to the slaves who have rushed to him
than to all the white troops under his command.  They eat, and that
is all; though it is true General Butler is feeding the whites also
by the thousand; for it nearly amounts to a famine there.  If, now,
the pressure of the war should call off our forces from New Orleans
to defend some other point, what is to prevent the masters from
reducing the blacks to slavery again?  for I am told that whenever
the rebels take any black prisoners, free or slave, they immediately
auction them off.  They did so with those they took from a boat that
was aground in the Tennessee River a few days ago.  And then I am
very ungenerously attacked for it!  For instance, when, after the
late battles at and near Bull Run, an expedition went out from
Washington under a flag of truce to bury the dead and bring in the
wounded, and the rebels seized the blacks who went along to help, and
sent them into slavery, Horace Greeley said in his paper that the
government would probably do nothing about it.  What could I do?

Now, then, tell me, if you please, what possible result of good would
follow the issuing of such a proclamation as you desire?  Understand,
I raise no objections against it on legal or constitutional grounds;
for, as commander-in-chief of the army and navy, in time of war I
suppose I have a right to take any measure which may best subdue the
enemy; nor do I urge objections of a moral nature, in view of
possible consequences of insurrection and massacre at the South.  I
view this matter as a practical war measure, to be decided on
according to the advantages or disadvantages it may offer to the
suppression of the rebellion.

I admit that slavery is the root of the rebellion, or at least its
sine qua non.  The ambition of politicians may have instigated them
to act, but they would have been impotent without slavery as their
instrument.  I will also concede that emancipation would help us in
Europe, and convince them that we are incited by something more than
ambition.  I grant, further, that it would help somewhat at the
North, though not so much, I fear, as you and those you represent
imagine.  Still, some additional strength would be added in that way
to the war, and then, unquestionably, it would weaken the rebels by
drawing off their laborers, which is of great importance; but I am
not so sure we could do much with the blacks.  If we were to arm
them, I fear that in a few weeks the arms would be in the hands of
the rebels; and, indeed, thus far we have not had arms enough to
equip our white troops.  I will mention another thing, though it meet
only your scorn and contempt.  There are fifty thousand bayonets in
the Union armies from the border slave States.  It would be a serious
matter if, in consequence of a proclamation such as you desire, they
should go over to the rebels.  I do not think they all would--not so
many, indeed, as a year ago, or as six months ago--not so many to-day
as yesterday.  Every day increases their Union feeling.  They are
also getting their pride enlisted, and want to beat the rebels.  Let
me say one thing more:  I think you should admit that we already have
an important principle to rally and unite the people, in the fact
that constitutional government is at stake.  This is a fundamental
idea going down about as deep as anything.

Do not misunderstand me because I have mentioned these objections.
They indicate the difficulties that have thus far prevented my action
in some such way as you desire.  I have not decided against a
proclamation of liberty to the slaves, but hold the matter under
advisement; and I can assure you that the subject is on my mind, by
day and night, more than any other.  Whatever shall appear to be
God's will, I will do.  I trust that in the freedom with which I have
canvassed your views I have not in any respect injured your feelings.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL H. G. WRIGHT.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, D. C., September 14, 1862.

GENERAL WRIGHT, Cincinnati, Ohio:

Thanks for your despatch.  Can you not pursue the retreating enemy,
and relieve Cumberland Gap?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON,

September 15, 1862.  2.45 P.M.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

Your despatch of to-day received.  God bless you, and all with you.
Destroy the rebel army if possible.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO J. K. DUBOIS. WASHINGTON, D.C.,

September 15, 1862.   3 P.M.

HON. K. DUBOIS, Springfield, Illinois:

I now consider it safe to say that General McClellan has gained a
great victory over the great rebel army in Maryland, between
Fredericktown and Hagerstown.  He is now pursuing the flying foe.

A. LINCOLN.

[But not very fast--and he did not catch them!  D.W.]




TELEGRAM TO GOVERNOR CURTIN,

WASHINGTON, D. C., September 16, 1862.  Noon.

GOVERNOR CURTIN, Harrisburg:

What do you hear from General McClellan's army?  We have nothing from
him to-day.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GOVERNOR MORTON.

WASHINGTON, D.C., September 17, 1862.

GOVERNOR O. P. MORTON, Indianapolis, Indiana:

I have received your despatch in regard to recommendations of General
Wright.  I have received no such despatch from him, at least not that
I can remember.   I refer yours for General Halleck's consideration.
A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL KETCHUM.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, September 20, 1862.

GENERAL KETCHUM, Springfield, Illinois:

How many regiments are there in Illinois, ready for service but for
want of arms?  How many arms have you there ready for distribution?

A. LINCOLN.




PRELIMINARY EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION,
SEPTEMBER 22, 1862.

THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:

A Proclamation.

I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States of America and
Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy thereof, do hereby proclaim
and declare that hereafter, as heretofore, the war will be prosecuted
for the object of practically restoring the constitutional relation
between the United States and each of the States and the people
thereof in which States that relation is or may be suspended or
disturbed.

That it is my purpose, upon the next meeting of Congress, to again
recommend the adoption of a practical measure tendering pecuniary aid
to the free acceptance or rejection of all slave States, so called,
the people whereof may not then be in rebellion against the United
States, and which States may then have voluntarily adopted, or
thereafter may voluntarily adopt, immediate or gradual abolishment of
slavery within their respective limits; and that the effort to
colonize persons of African descent with their consent upon this
continent or elsewhere, with the previously obtained consent of the
governments existing there, will be continued.

That on the 1st day of January, A.D. 1863, all persons held as slaves
within any State or designated part of a State the people whereof
shall then be in rebellion against the United States shall be then,
thenceforward, and forever free; and the executive government of the
United States, including the military and naval authority thereof,
will recognize and maintain the freedom of such persons and will do
no act or acts to repress such persons, or any of them, in any
efforts they may make for their actual freedom.


That the Executive will on the 1st day of January aforesaid, by
proclamation, designate the States and parts of States, if any, in
which the people thereof, respectively, shall then be in rebellion
against the United States; and the fact that any State or the people
thereof shall on that day be in good faith represented in the
Congress of the United States by members chosen thereto at elections
wherein a majority of the qualified voters of such State shall have
participated shall, in the absence of strong countervailing
testimony, be deemed conclusive evidence that such State and the
people thereof are not then in rebellion against the United States.

That attention is hereby called to an act of Congress entitled "An
act to make an additional article of war," approved March 13, 1862,
and which act is in the words and figure following:

"Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the
United States of America in Congress assemb1ed, That hereafter the
following shall be promulgated as an additional article of war for
the government of the Army of the United States and shall be obeyed
and observed as such.

"ART.    All officers or persons in the military or naval service of
the United States are prohibited from employing any of the forces
under their respective commands for the purpose of returning
fugitives from service or labor who may have escaped from any person,
to whom such service or labor is claimed to be due, and any officer
who shall be found guilty by a court-martial of violating this
article shall be dismissed from the service.

SEC. 2.  And be it further enacted, That this act shall take effect
from and after its passage."

Also to the ninth and tenth sections of an act entitled "An act to
suppress insurrection, to punish treason and rebellion, to seize and
confiscate the property of rebels, and for other purposes," approved
July 17, 1862, and which sections are in the words and figures
following:


"SEC. 9.  And be it further enacted, That all slaves of persons who
shall hereafter be engaged in rebellion against the Government of the
United States, or who shall in any way give aid or comfort thereto,
escaping from such persons and taking refuge within the lines of the
army, and all slaves captured from such persons or deserted by them
and coming under the control of the Government of the United States,
and all slaves of such persons found on (or) being within any place
occupied by rebel forces and afterwards occupied by the forces of the
United States, shall be deemed captives of war and shall be forever
free of their servitude and not again held as slaves.

"SEC. 9.  And be it further enacted, That no slave escaping into any
State, Territory, or the District of Columbia from any other State
shall be delivered up or in any way impeded or hindered of his
liberty, except for crime, or some offence against the laws, unless
the person claiming said fugitive shall first make oath that the
person to whom the labor or service of such fugitive is alleged to be
due is his lawful owner, and has not borne arms against the United
States in the present rebellion, nor in any way given aid and comfort
thereto; and no person engaged in the military or naval service of
the United States shall, under any pretense whatever, assume to
decide on the validity of the claim of any person to the service or
labor of any other person, or surrender up any such person to the
claimant, on pain of being dismissed from the service."

And I do hereby enjoin upon and order all persons engaged in the
military and naval service of the United States to observe, obey, and
enforce, within their respective spheres of service, the act and
sections above recited.

And the Executive will in due time recommend that all citizens of the
United States who shall have remained loyal thereto throughout the
rebellion shall (upon the restoration of the constitutional relation
between the United States and their respective States and people, if
that relation shall have been suspended or disturbed) be compensated
for all losses by acts of the United States, including the loss of
slaves.

In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal
of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the City of Washington, this twenty-second day of September,
in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-two, and
of the independence of the United States the eighty-seventh.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

By the President:
WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Secretary of State.




PROCLAMATION SUSPENDING THE WRIT OF HABEAS CORPUS, SEPTEMBER 24,
1862.

THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

A Proclamation

Whereas it has become necessary to call into service not only
volunteers, but also portions of the militia of the States by draft,
in order to suppress the insurrection existing in the United States,
and disloyal persons are not adequately restrained by the ordinary
processes of law from hindering this measure, and from giving aid and
comfort in various ways to the insurrection:

Now, therefore, be it ordered

First.  That during the existing insurrection, and as a necessary
measure for suppressing the same, all rebels and insurgents, their
aiders and abettors within the United States, and all persons
discouraging volunteer enlistments, resisting militia drafts, or
guilty of any disloyal practice affording aid and comfort to rebels
against the authority of the United States, shall be subject to
martial law, and liable to trial and punishment by courts-martial or
military commissions.

Second.   That the writ of habeas corpus is suspended in respect to
all persons arrested, or who are now, or hereafter during the
rebellion shall be, imprisoned in any fort camp, arsenal, military
prison or other place of confinement by any military authority or by
the sentence of any court-martial or military commission.

In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of
the United States to be affixed.

Done at the city of WASHINGTON, this twenty-fourth day of September.
A.D. eighteen hundred and sixty-two, and of the independence of the
United States the eighty-seventh.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

By the President:
WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Secretary of State.




REPLY TO SERENADE, SEPTEMBER 24, 1862.

I appear before you to do little more than acknowledge the courtesy
you pay me, and to thank you for it.  I have not been distinctly
informed why it is that on this occasion you appear to do me this
honor, though I suppose it is because of the proclamation.  What I
did, I did after a very full deliberation, and under a very heavy and
solemn sense of responsibility.  I can only trust in God I have made
no mistake.  I shall make no attempt on this occasion to sustain what
I have done or said by any comment.  It is now for the country and
the world to pass judgment and, maybe, take action upon it.

I will say no more upon this subject.  In my position I am environed
with difficulties.  Yet they are scarcely so great as the
difficulties of those who upon the battle-field are endeavoring to
purchase with their blood and their lives the future happiness and
prosperity of this country.  Let us never forget them.  On the
fourteenth and seventeenth days of this present month there have been
battles bravely, skillfully, and successfully fought.  We do not yet
know the particulars.  Let us be sure that, in giving praise to
certain individuals, we do no injustice to others.  I only ask you,
at the conclusion of these few remarks, to give three hearty cheers
for all good and brave officers and men who fought those successful
battles.




RECORD EXPLAINING THE DISMISSAL  OF MAJOR JOHN J. KEY FROM THE
MILITARY SERVICE OF THE UNITED STATES.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,

September 26, 1862.

MAJOR JOHN J. KEY:

I am informed that, in answer to the question, "Why was not the rebel
army bagged immediately after the battle near Sharpsburg?" propounded
to you by Major Levi C. Turner, Judge Advocate, etc., you said:
"That is not the game.  The object is, that neither army shall get
much advantage of the other; that both shall be kept in the field
till they are exhausted, when we will make a compromise and save
slavery."

I shall be very happy if you will, within twenty-four hours from the
receipt of this, prove to me by Major Turner that you did not, either
literally or in substance, make the answer stated.

[Above delivered to Major Key at 10.25 a.m.  September 27th.]

At about 11 o'clock A.M., September27, 1862, Major Key and Major
Turner appeared before me.  Major Turner says:
"As I remember it, the conversation was: 'Why did we not bag them
after the battle of Sharpsburg?'  Major Key's reply was: 'That was
not the game; that we should tire the rebels out and ourselves; that
that was the only way the Union could be preserved, we come together
fraternally, and slavery be saved.'"

On cross-examination, Major Turner says he has frequently heard Major
Key converse in regard to the present troubles, and never heard him
utter a sentiment unfavorable to the maintenance of the Union.  He
has never uttered anything which he, Major T., would call disloyalty.
The particular conversation detailed was a private one.

                    [Indorsement on the above.]

In my view, it is wholly inadmissible for any gentleman holding a
military commission from the United States to utter such sentiments
as Major Key is within proved to have done.  Therefore, let Major
John J. Key be forthwith dismissed from the military service of the
United States.

A. LINCOLN.




TO HANNIBAL HAMLIN.
(Strictly private.)

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,
September 28, 1862.

HON. HANNIBAL HAMLIN.

MY DEAR SIR:  Your kind letter of the 25th is just received.  It is
known to some that, while I hope something from the proclamation, my
expectations are not as sanguine as are those of some friends.  The
time for its effect southward has not come; but northward the effect
should be instantaneous.  It is six days old, and, while commendation
in newspapers and by distinguished individuals is all that a vain man
could wish, the stocks have declined, and troops come forward more
slowly than ever.  This, looked soberly in the face, is not very
satisfactory.  We have fewer troops in the field at the end of the
six days than we had at the beginning--the attrition among the old
outnumbering the addition by the new.  The North responds to the
proclamation sufficiently in breath; but breath alone kills no
rebels.

I wish I could write more cheerfully; nor do I thank you the less for
the kindness of your letter.

Yours very truly,

A. LINCOLN.




TO GENERAL HALLECK.

McCLELLAN'S HEADQUARTERS, October 3, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL HALLECK:

General Stuart, of the rebel army, has sent in a few of our prisoners
under a flag of truce, paroled with terms to prevent their fighting
the Indians, and evidently seeking to commit us to their right to
parole prisoners in that way.  My inclination is to send the
prisoners back with a definite notice that we will recognize no
paroles given to our prisoners by the rebels as extending beyond a
prohibition against fighting them, though I wish your opinion upon
it, based both upon the general law and our cartel.  I wish to avoid
violations of the law and bad faith.  Answer as quickly as possible,
as the thing, if done at all, should be done at once.

A. LINCOLN,  President




REMARKS TO THE ARMY OF THE POTOMAC AT
FREDERICK, MARYLAND, OCTOBER, 4, 1862.

I am surrounded by soldiers and a little farther off by the citizens
of this good City of Frederick.  Nevertheless I can only say, as I
did five minutes ago, it is not proper for me to make speeches in my
present position.  I return thanks to our soldiers for the good
services they have rendered, the energy they have shown, the
hardships they have endured, and the blood they have shed for this
Union of ours; and I also return thanks, not only to the soldiers,
but to the good citizens of Frederick, and to the good men, women,
and children in this land of ours, for their devotion to this
glorious cause; and I say this with no malice in my heart towards
those who have done otherwise.  May our children and children's
children, for a thousand generations, continue to enjoy the benefits
conferred upon us by a united country, and have cause yet to rejoice
under these glorious institutions, bequeathed to us by WASHINGTON and
his compeers.  Now, my friends, soldiers and citizens, I can only say
once more-farewell.




TELEGRAM FROM GENERAL HALLECK

TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.,
WASHINGTON, D. C., October 6, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

I am instructed to telegraph you as follows: The President directs
that you cross the Potomac and give battle to the enemy, or drive him
south.  Your army must move now, while the roads are good.  If you
cross the river between the enemy and Washington, and cover the
latter by your operation, you can be reinforced by thirty thousand
men.  If you move up the valley of the Shenandoah, not more than
twelve or fifteen thousand can be sent you.  The President advises
the interior line between Washington and the enemy, but does not
order it.  He is very desirous that your army move as soon as
possible.  You will immediately report what line you adopt, and when
you intend to cross the river; also to what point the reinforcements
are to be sent.  It is necessary that the plan of your operations be
positively determined on, before orders are given for building
bridges and repairing railroads.  I am directed to add that the
Secretary of War and the General-in-chief fully concur with the
President in these directions.

H. W. HALLECK,  General-in-Chief.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL McCLELLAN.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, October 7, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN, Hdqs. Army of the Potomac:

You wish to see your family and I wish to oblige you.  It might be
left to your own discretion; certainly so, if Mrs. M. could meet you
here at Washington.

A. LINCOLN.




TO T. H. CLAY.

WAR DEPARTMENT, October 8, 1862.

THOMAS H. CLAY, Cincinnati, Ohio:

You cannot have reflected seriously when you ask that I shall order
General Morgan's command to Kentucky as a favor because they have
marched from Cumberland Gap.  The precedent established by it would
evidently break up the whole army.  Buell's old troops, now in
pursuit of Bragg, have done more hard marching recently; and, in
fact, if you include marching and fighting, there are scarcely any
old troops east or west of the mountains that have not done as hard
service.  I sincerely wish war was an easier and pleasanter business
than it is; but it does not admit of holidays.  On Morgan's command,
where it is now sent, as I understand, depends the question whether
the enemy will get to the Ohio River in another place.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL U. S. GRANT.

WASHINGTON, D.C., October 8, 1862

MAJOR-GENERAL GRANT:

I congratulate you and all concerned in your recent battles and
victories.  How does it all sum up?  I especially regret the death of
General Hackleman, and am very anxious to know the condition of
General Oglesby, who is an intimate personal friend.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL J. T. BOYLE.

WAR DEPARTMENT, October 11,1862.   4 P.M.

GENERAL BOYLE, Louisville, Kentucky:

Please send any news you have from General Buell to-day.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL J. T. BOYLE.

WAR DEPARTMENT, October 12, 1862.   4.10 P.M.

GENERAL BOYLE, Louisville, Kentucky:

We are anxious to hear from General Buell's army.  We have heard
nothing since day before yesterday.  Have you anything?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL CURTIS.

WASHINGTON, D. C., October 12, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL CURTIS, Saint Louis, Missouri:

Would the completion of the railroad some distance further in the
direction of Springfield, Mo., be of any military advantage to you?
Please answer.

A. LINCOLN.




TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,
October 13, 1862.

MY DEAR SIR -You remember my speaking to you of what I called your
over-cautiousness.   Are you not over-cautious when you assume that
you cannot do what the enemy is constantly doing?  Should you not
claim to be at least his equal in prowess, and act upon the claim?

As I understand, you telegraphed General Halleck that you cannot
subsist your army at Winchester unless the railroad from Harper's
Ferry to that point be put in working order.  But the enemy does now
subsist his army at Winchester, at a distance nearly twice as great
from railroad transportation as you would have to do, without the
railroad last named.  He now wagons from Culpepper Court-House, which
is just about twice as far as you would have to do from Harper's
Ferry.  He is certainly not more than half as well provided with
wagons as you are.  I certainly should be pleased for you to have the
advantage of the railroad from Harper's Perry to Winchester; but it
wastes an the remainder of autumn to give it to you, and, in fact,
ignores the question of time, which cannot and must not be ignored.

Again, one of the standard maxims of war, as you know, is "to operate
upon the enemy's communications as much as possible, without exposing
your own."  You seem to act as if this applies against you, but
cannot apply in your favor.  Change positions with the enemy, and
think you not he would break your communication with Richmond within
the next twenty-four hours?  You dread his going into Pennsylvania.
But if he does so in full force, he gives up his communications to
you absolutely, and you have nothing to do but to follow and ruin
him; if he does so with less than full force, fall upon and beat what
is left behind all the easier.


Exclusive of the water line, you are now nearer to Richmond than the
enemy is, by the route that you can and he must take.  Why can you
not reach there before him, unless you admit that he is more than
your equal on a march?  His route is the arc of a circle, while yours
is the chord.  The roads are as good on yours as on his.

You know I desired, but did not order, you to cross the Potomac below
instead of above the Shenandoah and Blue Ridge.  My idea was, that
this would at once menace the enemy's communications, which I would
seize if he would permit.  If he should move northward, I would
follow him closely, holding his communications.  If he should prevent
our seizing his communications, and move toward Richmond, I would
press closely to him, fight him if a favorable opportunity should
present, and at least try to beat him to Richmond on the inside
track.  I say try;" if we never try, we shall never succeed.  If he
makes a stand at Winchester, moving neither north or south, I would
fight him there, on the idea that if we cannot beat him when he bears
the wastage of coming to us, we never can when we bear the wastage of
going to him.  This proposition is a simple truth, and is too
important to be lost sight of for a moment.  In coming to us he
tenders us an advantage which we should not waive.  We should not so
operate as to merely drive him away.  As we must beat him somewhere
or fail finally, we can do it, if at all, easier near to us than far
away.  If we cannot beat the enemy where he now is, we never can, he
again being within the entrenchments of Richmond.

[And, indeed, the enemy was let back into Richmond and it took
another two years and thousands of dead for McClelland cowardice--if
that was all that it was.   I still suspect, and I think the evidence
is overwhelming that he was, either secretly a supporter of the
South, or, what is more likely, a politician readying for a different
campaign:  that of the Presidency of the United States.]

Recurring to the idea of going to Richmond on the inside track, the
facility of supplying from the side away from the enemy is
remarkable, as it were, by the different spokes of a wheel extending
from the hub toward the rim, and this whether you move directly by
the chord or on the inside arc, hugging the Blue Ridge more closely.
The chord line, as you see, carries you by Aldie, Hay Market, and
Fredericksburg; and you see how turnpikes, railroads, and finally the
Potomac, by Aquia Creek, meet you at all points from WASHINGTON; the
same, only the lines lengthened a little, if you press closer to the
Blue Ridge part of the way.

The gaps through the Blue Ridge I understand to be about the
following distances from Harper's Ferry, to wit: Vestal's, 5 miles;
Gregory's, 13; Snicker's, 18; Ashby's, 28; Manassas, 38; Chester, 45;
and Thornton's, 53.  I should think it preferable to take the route
nearest the enemy, disabling him to make an important move without
your knowledge, and compelling him to keep his forces together for
dread of you.  The gaps would enable you to attack if you should
wish.  For a great part of the way you would be practically between
the enemy and both WASHINGTON and Richmond, enabling us to spare you
the greatest number of troops from here.  When at length running for
Richmond ahead of him enables him to move this way, if he does so,
turn and attack him in rear.  But I think he should be engaged long
before such a point is reached.  It is all easy if our troops march
as well as the enemy, and it is unmanly to say they cannot do it.
This letter is in no sense an order.

Yours truly,

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GOVERNOR PIERPOINT.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON CITY, D. C.,
October 16, 1862.

GOVERNOR PIERPOINT, Wheeling, Virginia:

Your despatch of to-day received.  I am very sorry to have offended
you.  I appointed the collector, as I thought, on your written
recommendation, and the assessor also with your testimony of
worthiness, although I know you preferred a different man.  I will
examine to-morrow whether I am mistaken in this.

A. LINCOLN.




EXECUTIVE ORDER ESTABLISHING A PROVISIONAL COURT IN LOUISIANA.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON CITY,

October 20, 1862.

The insurrection which has for some time prevailed in several of the
States of this Union, including Louisiana, having temporarily
subverted and swept away the civil institutions of that State,
including the judiciary and the judicial authorities of the Union, so
that it has become necessary to hold the State in military
Occupation, and it being indispensably necessary that there shall be
some judicial tribunal existing there capable of administering
justice, I have therefore thought it proper to appoint, and I do
hereby constitute, a provisional court, which shall be a court of
record, for the State of Louisiana; and I do hereby appoint Charles A
Peabody, of New York, to be a provisional judge to hold said court,
with authority to hear, try, and determine all causes, civil and
criminal, including causes in law, equity, revenue, and admiralty,
and particularly all such powers and jurisdiction as belong to the
district and circuit courts of the United States, conforming his
proceedings so far as possible to the course of proceedings and
practice which has been customary in the courts of the United States
and Louisiana, his judgment to be final and conclusive.  And I do
hereby authorize and empower the said judge to make and establish
such rules and regulations as may be necessary for the exercise of
his jurisdiction, and empower the said judge to appoint a prosecuting
attorney, marshal, and clerk of the said court, who shall perform the
functions of attorney, marshal, and clerk according to such
proceedings and practice as before mentioned and such rules and
regulations as may be made and established by said judge.  These
appointments are to continue during the pleasure of the President,
not extending beyond the military occupation of the city of New
Orleans or the restoration of the civil authority in that city and in
the State of Louisiana.  These officers shall be paid, out of the
contingent fund of the War Department, compensation as follows:

The judge at the rate of  $3500 per annum; the prosecuting attorney,
including the fees, at the rate of  $3000 per annum; the marshal,
including the fees, at the rate of $3000 per annum; and the clerk,
including the fees, at the rate of $2500 per annum; such
compensations to be certified by the Secretary of War.  A copy of
this order, certified by the Secretary of War and delivered to such
judge, shall be deemed and held to be a sufficient commission.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN,
President of the United States.




TO GENERAL U.S. GRANT.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,
October 21, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL U. S. GRANT:

The bearer of this, Thomas R. Smith, a citizen of Tennessee, goes to
that State seeking to have such of the people thereof as desire to
avoid the unsatisfactory prospect before them, and to have peace
again upon the old terms, under the Constitution of the United
States, to manifest such desire by elections of members to the
Congress of the United States particularly, and perhaps a
Legislature, State officers, and a United States senator friendly to
their object.

I shall be glad for you and each of you to aid him, and all others
acting for this object, as much as possible.  In all  available ways
give the people a show to express their wishes at these elections.

Follow law, and forms of law, as far as convenient, but at all events
get the expression of the largest number of the people possible.  All
see how such action will connect with and affect the proclamation of
September 22.  Of course the men elected should be gentlemen of
character, willing to swear support to the Constitution as of old,
and known to be above reasonable suspicion of duplicity.

Yours very respectfully,

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL JAMESON.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,  October 21, 1862.

GENERAL JAMESON, Upper Stillwater, Me.:
How is your health now?  Do you or not wish Lieut.  R. P. Crawford to
be restored to his office?

A. LINCOLN.




GENERAL McCLELLANS TIRED HORSES

TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON CITY, October 24 [25?], 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

I have just read your despatch about sore-tongued and fatigued
horses.  Will you pardon me for asking what the horses of your army
have done since the battle of Antietam that fatigues anything?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

EXECUTIVE MANSION WASHINGTON, October 26, 1862.   11.30am

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

Yours, in reply to mine about horses, received.  Of course you know
the facts better than I; still two considerations remain: Stuart's
cavalry outmarched ours, having certainly done more marked service on
the Peninsula and everywhere since.  Secondly, will not a movement of
our army be a relief to the cavalry, compelling the enemy to
concentrate instead of foraging in squads everywhere?  But I am so
rejoiced to learn from your despatch to General Halleck that you
begin crossing the river this morning.

A. LINCOLN.




TO GENERAL DIX.
(Private and confidential.)

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON
October 26, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL Dix, Fort Monroe, Virginia:

Your despatch to Mr. Stanton, of which the enclosed is a copy, has
been handed me by him.  It would be dangerous for me now to begin
construing and making specific applications of the proclamation.

It is obvious to all that I therein intended to give time and
opportunity.  Also, it is seen I left myself at liberty to exempt
parts of States.  Without saying more, I shall be very glad if any
Congressional
district will, in good faith, do as your despatch contemplates.

Could you give me the facts which prompted you to telegraph?

Yours very truly,

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, October 27, 1862, 12.10

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

Yours of yesterday received.  Most certainly I intend no injustice to
any, and if I have done any I deeply regret it.  To be told, after
more than five weeks' total inaction of the army, and during which
period we have sent to the army every fresh horse we possibly could,
amounting in the whole to 7918, that the cavalry horses were too much
fatigued to move, presents a very cheerless, almost hopeless,
prospect for the future, and it may have forced something of
impatience in my despatch.  If not recruited and rested then, when
could they ever be?  I suppose the river is rising, and I am glad to
believe you are crossing.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, October 27, 1862.  3.25pm

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

Your despatch of 3 P.M. to-day, in regard to filling up old regiments
with drafted men, is received, and the request therein shall be
complied with as far as practicable.

And now I ask a distinct answer to the question, Is it your purpose
not to go into action again until the men now being drafted in the
States are incorporated into the old regiments?

A. LINCOLN




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, October 29, 1863.

MAJOR-GENERAL McCLELLAN:

Your despatches of night before last, yesterday, and last night all
received.  I am much pleased with the movement of the army.  When you
get entirely across the river let me know.  What do you know of the
enemy?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GOVERNOR CURTIN.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, October 30, 1862.

GOVERNOR CURTIN, Harrisburg:

By some means I have not seen your despatch of the 27th about order
No.154 until this moment.  I now learn, what I knew nothing of
before, that the history of the order is as follows:
When General McClellan telegraphed asking General Halleck to have the
order made, General Halleck went to the Secretary of War with it,
stating his approval of the plan.  The Secretary assented and General
Halleck wrote the order.  It was a military question, which the
Secretary supposed the General understood better than he.

I wish I could see Governor Curtin.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GOVERNOR JOHNSON.

WAR DEPARTMENT, October 31, 1862.

GOV. ANDREW JOHNSON, Nashville, Tenn., via Louisville, Ky.:

Yours of the 29th received.  I shall take it to General Halleck, but
I already know it will be inconvenient to take General Morgan's
command from where it now is.  I am glad to hear you speak hopefully
of Tennessee.  I sincerely hope Rosecrans may find it possible to do
something for her.  David Nelson, son of the M. C. of your State,
regrets his father's final defection, and asks me for a situation.
Do you know him?   Could he be of service to you or to Tennessee in
any capacity in which I could send him?

A. LINCOLN.




MEMORANDUM.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,

November 1, 1862.

TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN : Captain Derrickson, with his company, has
been for some time keeping guard at my residence, now at the
Soldiers' Retreat.  He and his company are very agreeable to me, and
while it is deemed proper for any guard to remain, none would be more
satisfactory than Captain Derrickson and his company.

A. LINCOLN.




ORDER RELIEVING GENERAL G. B. McCLELLAN AND
MAKING OTHER CHANGES.

EXECUTIVE MANSION WASHINGTON, November 5, 1862.

By direction of the President, it is ordered that Major-General
McClellan be relieved from the command of the Army of the Potomac,
and that Major-General Burnside take the command of that army.  Also
that Major-General Hunter take command of the corps in said army
which is now commanded by General Burnside.  That Major-General Fitz.
John Porter be relieved from command of the corps he now commands in
said army, and that Major-General Hooker take command of said corps.

The general-in-chief is authorized, in [his] discretion, to issue an
order substantially as the above forthwith, or so soon as he may deem
proper.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO M. F. ODELL.

EXECUTIVE MANSION WASHINGTON, November 5, 1862.

HON. M. F. ODELL, Brooklyn, New York:

You are re-elected.  I wish to see you at once will you come?  Please
answer.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO COLONEL LOWE.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, November 7,1862.

COL. W. W. LOWE, Fort Henry, Tennessee:

Yours of yesterday received.  Governor Johnson, Mr. Ethridge, and
others are looking after the very thing you telegraphed about.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL J. POPE.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, November 10, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL POPE, St.  Paul, Minnesota:

Your despatch giving the names of 300 Indians condemned to death is
received.  Please forward as soon as possible the full and complete
record of their convictions; and if the record does not fully
indicate the more guilty and influential of the culprits, please have
a careful statement made on these points and forwarded to me.  Send
all by mail.

A. LINCOLN.




TO COMMODORE FARRAGUT.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,
November 11, 1862.

COMMODORE FARRAGUT:

DEAR SIR:--This will introduce Major-General Banks.  He is in command
of a considerable land force for operating in the South, and I shall
be glad for you to co-Operate with him and give him such assistance
as you can consistently with your orders from the Navy Department.

Your obedient servant,

A. LINCOLN.




ORDER CONCERNING BLOCKADE.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,
November 12, 1862.

Ordered, First: that clearances issued by the Treasury Department for
vessels or merchandise bound for the port of Norfolk, for the
military necessities of the department, certified by the military
commandant at Fort Monroe, shall be allowed to enter said port.

Second: that vessels and domestic produce from Norfolk, permitted by
the military commandant at Fort Monroe for the military purposes of
his command, shall on his permit be allowed to pass from said port to
their destination in any port not blockaded by the United States.

A. LINCOLN




ORDER CONCERNING THE CONFISCATION ACT.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, November 13, 1862.

Ordered, by the President of the United States, That the
Attorney-General be charged with the superintendence and direction of
all proceedings to be had under the act of Congress of the 17th of
July, 1862, entitled "An act to suppress insurrection, to punish
treason and rebellion, to seize and confiscate the property of
rebels, and for other purposes," in so far as may concern the
seizure, prosecution, and condemnation of the estate, property, and
effects of rebels and traitors, as mentioned and provided for in the
fifth, sixth, and seventh sections of the said act of Congress.  And
the Attorney-General is authorized and required to give to the
attorneys and marshals of the United States such instructions and
directions as he may find needful and convenient touching all such
seizures, prosecutions, and condemnations, and, moreover, to
authorize all such attorneys and marshals, whenever there may be
reasonable ground to fear any forcible resistance to them in the
discharge of their respective duties in this behalf, to call upon any
military officer in command of the forces of the United States to
give to them such aid, protection, and support as may be necessary to
enable them safely and efficiently to discharge their respective
duties; and all such commanding officers are required promptly to
obey such call, and to render the necessary service as far as may be
in their power consistently with their other duties.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

By the President:
EDWARD BATES, Attorney-General




TELEGRAM TO GOVERNOR JOHNSON.

WAR DEPARTMENT, November 14, 1862.

GOV. ANDREW JOHNSON, Nashville, Tennessee:

Your despatch of the 4th, about returning troops from western
Virginia to Tennessee, is just received, and I have been to General
Halleck with it.  He says an order has already been made by which
those troops have already moved, or soon will move, to Tennessee.

A. LINCOLN.




GENERAL ORDER RESPECTING THE OBSERVANCE OF
THE SABBATH DAY IN THE ARMY AND NAVY.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,
November 15, 1862.


The President, Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy, desires and
enjoins the orderly observance of the Sabbath by the officers and men
in the military and naval service.  The importance for man and beast
of the prescribed weekly rest, the sacred rights of Christian
soldiers and sailors, a becoming deference to the best sentiment of a
Christian people, and a due regard for the divine will demand that
Sunday labor in the army and navy be reduced to the measure of strict
necessity.

The discipline and character of the national forces should not suffer
nor the cause they defend be imperilled by the profanation of the day
or name of the Most High.  "At this time of public distress,"
adopting the words of Washington in 1776, "men may find enough to do
in the service of God and their country without abandoning themselves
to vice and immorality." The first general order issued by the Father
of his Country after the Declaration of Independence indicates the
spirit in which our institutions were founded and should ever be
defended:

"The General hopes and trusts that every officer and man will
endeavor to live and act as becomes a Christian soldier defending the
dearest rights and liberties of his country."

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL BLAIR

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, November 17,1862.

HON. F. P. BLAIR:

Your brother says you are solicitous to be ordered to join General
McLernand.  I suppose you are ordered to Helena; this means that you
are to form part of McLernand's expedition as it moves down the
river; and General McLernand is so informed.  I will see General
Halleck as to whether the additional force you mention can go with
you.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL J. A. DIX.

WASHINGTON, D. C., November 18, 1861.

MAJOR-GENERAL Dix, Fort Monroe:

Please give me your best opinion as to the number of the enemy now at
Richmond and also at Petersburg.

A. LINCOLN.




TO GOVERNOR SHEPLEY.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,
November 21, 1862.

HON. G. F. SHEPLEY.

DEAR SIR:--Dr. Kennedy, bearer of this, has some apprehension that
Federal officers not citizens of Louisiana may be set up as
candidates for Congress in that State.  In my view there could be no
possible object in such an election.  We do not particularly need
members of Congress from there to enable us to get along with
legislation here.  What we do want is the conclusive evidence that
respectable citizens of Louisiana are willing to be members of
Congress and to swear support to the Constitution, and that other
respectable citizens there are willing to vote for them and send
them.  To send a parcel of Northern men here as representatives,
elected, as would be  understood (and perhaps really so), at the
point of the bayonet, would be disgusting and outrageous; and were I
a member of Congress here, I would vote against admitting any such
man to a seat.

Yours very truly,

A. LINCOLN,




ORDER PROHIBITING THE EXPORT OF ARMS AND
MUNITIONS OF WAR.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,

November 21, 1862.

Ordered, That no arms, ammunition, or munitions of war be cleared or
allowed to be exported from the United States until further orders.
That any clearance for arms, ammunition, or munitions of war issued
heretofore by the Treasury Department be vacated, if the articles
have not passed without the United States, and the articles stopped.
That the Secretary of War hold possession of the arms, etc., recently
seized by his order at Rouse's Point, bound for Canada.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.




DELAYING TACTICS OF GENERALS

TO GENERAL N. P. BANKS.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,
November 22, 1862.

MY DEAR GENERAL BANKS:--Early last week you left me in high hope with
your assurance that you would be off with your expedition at the end
of that week, or early in this.  It is now the end of this, and I
have just been overwhelmed and confounded with the sight of a
requisition made by you which, I am assured, cannot be filled and got
off within an hour short of two months.  I enclose you a copy of the
requisition, in some hope that it is not genuine--that you have never
seen it.  My dear General, this expanding and piling up of
impedimenta has been, so far, almost our ruin, and will be our final
ruin if it is not abandoned.  If you had the articles of this
requisition upon the wharf, with the necessary animals to make them
of any use, and forage for the animals, you could not get vessels
together in two weeks to carry the whole, to say nothing of your
twenty thousand men; and, having the vessels, you could not put the
cargoes aboard in two weeks more.  And, after all, where you are
going you have no use for them.  When you parted with me you had no
such ideas in your mind.  I know you had not, or you could not have
expected to be off so soon as you said.  You must get back to
something like the plan you had then, or your expedition is a failure
before you start.  You must be off before Congress meets.   You would
be better off anywhere, and especially where you are going, for not
having a thousand wagons doing nothing but hauling forage to feed the
animals that draw them, and taking at least two thousand men to care
for the wagons and animals, who otherwise might be two thousand good
soldiers.   Now, dear General, do not think this is an ill-natured
letter; it is the very reverse.   The simple publication of this
requisition would ruin you.

Very truly your friend,

A. LINCOLN.




TO CARL SCHURZ.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,
November 24, 1862.

GENERAL CARL SCHURZ.

MY DEAR SIR -I have just received and read your letter of the 20th.
The purport of it is that we lost the late elections and the
administration is failing because the war is unsuccessful, and that I
must not flatter myself that I am not justly to blame for it.  I
certainly know that if the war fails the administration fails, and
that I will be blamed for it, whether I deserve it or not.  And I
ought to be blamed if I could do better.  You think I could do
better; therefore you blame me already.  I think I could not do
better; therefore I blame you for blaming me.  I understand you now
to be willing to accept the help of men who are not Republicans,
provided they have "heart in it." Agreed.  I want no others.  But who
is to be the judge of hearts, or of "heart in it"?  If I must discard
my own judgment and take yours, I must also take that of others and
by the time I should reject all I should be advised to reject, I
should have none left, Republicans or others not even yourself.  For
be assured, my dear sir, there are men who have "heart in it" that
think you are performing your part as poorly as you think I am
performing mine.  I certainly have been dissatisfied with the
slowness of Buell and McClellan; but before I relieved them I had
great fears I should not find successors to them who would do better;
and I am sorry to add that I have seen little since to relieve those
fears.

I do not see clearly the prospect of any more rapid movements.  I
fear we shall at last find out that the difficulty is in our case
rather than in particular generals.  I wish to disparage no one
certainly not those who sympathize with me; but I must say I need
success more than I need sympathy, and that I have not seen the so
much greater evidence of getting success from my sympathizers than
from those who are denounced as the contrary.  It does seem to me
that in the field the two classes have been very much alike in what
they have done and what they have failed to do.  In sealing their
faith with their blood, Baker and Lyon and Bohien and Richardson,
Republicans, did all that men could do; but did they any more than
Kearny and Stevens and Reno and Mansfield, none of whom were
Republicans, and some at least of whom have been bitterly and
repeatedly denounced to me as secession sympathizers?  I will not
perform the ungrateful task of comparing cases of failure.

In answer to your question, "Has it not been publicly stated in the
newspapers, and apparently proved as a fact, that from the
commencement of the war the enemy was continually supplied with
information by some of the confidential subordinates of as important
an officer as Adjutant-General Thomas?" I must say "No," as far as my
knowledge extends.  And I add that if you can give any tangible
evidence upon the subject, I will thank you to come to this city and
do so.

Very truly your friend,

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL A. E. BURNSIDE.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, November 25, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL BURNSIDE, Falmouth, Virginia:

If I should be in boat off Aquia Creek at dark tomorrow (Wednesday)
evening, could you, without inconvenience, meet me and pass an hour
or two with me?

A. LINCOLN.




TO ATTORNEY-GENERAL BATES.
EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,
November 29, 1862.

HON. ATTORNEY-GENERAL.

MY DEAR SIR:--Few things perplex me more than this question between
Governor Gamble and the War Department, as to whether the peculiar
force organized by the former in Missouri are State troops or United
States troops.  Now, this is either an immaterial or a mischievous
question.  First, if no more is desired than to have it settled what
name the force is to be called by, it is immaterial.  Secondly, if it
is desired for more than the fixing a name, it can only be to get a
position from which to draw practical inferences; then it is
mischievous.  Instead of settling one dispute by deciding the
question, I should merely furnish a nest-full of eggs for hatching
new disputes.  I believe the force is not strictly either "State
troops" or "United States troops." It is of mixed character.  I
therefore think it is safer, when a  practical question arises, to
decide that question directly, and not indirectly by deciding a
general abstraction supposed to include it, and also including a
great deal more.  Without dispute Governor Gamble appoints the
officers of this force, and fills vacancies when they occur.  The
question now practically in dispute is: Can Governor Gamble make a
vacancy by removing an officer or accepting a resignation?  Now,
while it is proper that this question shall be settled, I do not
perceive why either Governor Gamble or the government here should
care which way it is settled.  I am perplexed with it only because
there seems to be pertinacity about it.  It seems to me that it might
be either way without injury to the service; or that the offer of the
Secretary of War to let Governor Gamble make vacancies, and he (the
Secretary) to ratify the making of them, ought to be satisfactory.

Yours truly,
A. LINCOLN




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL CURTIS.
[Cipher.]
WASHINGTON, November 30, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL CURTIS, Saint Louis, Missouri:

Frank Blair wants Manter's Thirty-second, Curly's Twenty seventh,
Boyd's Twenty-fourth and the Ninth and Tenth Cavalry to go with him
down the river.  I understand it is with you to decide whether he
shall have them and if so, and if also it is consistent with the
public service, you will oblige me a good deal by letting him have
them.

A. LINCOLN.




ON EXECUTING 300 INDIANS

LETTER TO JUDGE-ADVOCATE-GENERAL.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,
December 1, 1862.

JUDGE-ADVOCATE-GENERAL.

SIR:--Three hundred Indians have been sentenced to death in Minnesota
by a military commission, and execution only awaits my action.  I
wish your legal opinion whether if I should conclude to execute only
a part of them, I must myself designate which, or could I leave the
designation to some officer on the ground?

Yours very truly,

A. LINCOLN.




ANNUAL MESSAGE TO CONGRESS,
DECEMBER 1, 1862.

FELLOW-CITIZENS OF THE SENATE AND HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES-- Since
your last annual assembling another year of health and bountiful
harvests has passed; and while it has not pleased the Almighty to
bless us with a return of peace, we can but press on, guided by the
best light he gives us, trusting that in his own good time and wise
way all will yet be well.

The correspondence touching foreign affairs which has taken place
during the last year is herewith submitted, in virtual compliance
with a request to that effect, made by the House of Representatives
near the close of the last session of Congress.

If the condition of our relations with other nations is less
gratifying than it has usually been at former periods, it is
certainly more satisfactory than a nation so unhappily distracted as
we are might reasonably have apprehended.  In the month of June last
there were some grounds to expect that the maritime powers which, at
the beginning of our domestic difficulties, so unwisely and
unnecessarily, as we think, recognized the insurgents as a
belligerent, would soon recede from that position, which has proved
only less injurious to themselves than to our own country.  But the
temporary reverses which afterward befell the national arms, and
which were exaggerated by our own disloyal citizens abroad, have
hitherto delayed that act of simple justice.

The civil war, which has so radically changed, for the moment, the
occupations and habits of the American people, has necessarily
disturbed the social condition, and affected very deeply the
prosperity, of the nations with which we have carried on a commerce
that has been steadily increasing throughout a period of half a
century.  It has, at the same time, excited political ambitions and
apprehensions which have produced a profound agitation throughout the
civilized world.  In this unusual agitation we have forborne from
taking part in any controversy between foreign states, and between
parties or factions in such states.  We have attempted no
propagandism and acknowledged no revolution, but we have left to
every nation the exclusive conduct and management of its own affairs.
Our struggle has been, of course, contemplated by foreign nations
with reference less to its own merits than to its supposed and often
exaggerated effects and consequences resulting to those nations
themselves, nevertheless, complaint on the part of this government,
even if it were just, would certainly be unwise.

The treaty with Great Britain for the suppression of the slave trade
has been put into operation with a good prospect of complete success.
It is an occasion of special pleasure to acknowledge that the
execution of it on the part of her Majesty's government has been
marked with a jealous respect for the authority of the United States
and the rights of their moral and loyal citizens.

The convention with Hanover for the abolition of the state dues has
been carried into full effect under the act of Congress for that
purpose.

A blockade of 3000 miles of seacoast could not be established and
vigorously enforced in a season of great commercial activity like the
present without committing occasional mistakes and inflicting
unintentional injuries upon foreign nations and their subjects.

A civil war occurring in a country where foreigners reside and carry
on trade under treaty stipulations is necessarily fruitful of
complaints of the violation of neutral rights.  All such collisions
tend to excite misapprehensions, and possibly to produce mutual
reclamations between nations which have a common interest in
preserving peace and friendship.  In clear cases of these kinds I
have so far as possible heard and redressed complaints which have
been presented by friendly powers.  There is still, however, a large
and an augmenting number of doubtful cases upon which the government
is unable to agree with the governments whose protection is demanded
by the claimants.  There are, moreover, many cases in which the
United States or their citizens suffer wrongs from the naval or
military authorities of foreign nations which the governments of
those states are not at once prepared to redress.  I have proposed to
some of the foreign states thus interested mutual conventions to
examine and adjust such complaints.  This proposition has been made
especially to Great Britain, to France, to Spain, and to Prussia.  In
each case it has been kindly received, but has not yet been formally
adopted.

I deem it my duty to recommend an appropriation in behalf of the
owners of the Norwegian bark Admiral P. Tordenskiold, which vessel
was in May, 1861, prevented by the commander of the blockading force
off Charleston from leaving that port with cargo, notwithstanding a
similar privilege had shortly before been granted to an English
vessel.  I have directed the Secretary of State to cause the papers
in the case to be communicated to the proper committees.

Applications have been made to me by many free Americans of African
descent to favor their emigration, with a view to such colonization
as was contemplated in recent acts of Congress, Other parties, at
home and abroad--some from interested motives, others upon patriotic
considerations, and still others influenced by philanthropic
sentiments--have suggested similar measures, while, on the other
hand, several of the Spanish  American republics have protested
against the sending of such colonies to their respective territories.
Under these circumstances I have declined to move any such colony to
any state without first obtaining the consent of its government, with
an agreement on its part to receive and protect such emigrants in all
the rights of freemen; and I have at the same time offered to the
several states situated within the Tropics, or having colonies there,
to negotiate with them, subject to the advice and consent of the
Senate, to favor the voluntary emigration of persons of that class to
their respective territories, upon conditions which shall be equal,
just, and humane.  Liberia and Haiti are as yet the only countries to
which colonists of African descent from here could go with certainty
of being received and adopted as citizens; and I regret to say such
persons contemplating colonization do not seem so willing to migrate
to those countries as to some others, nor so willing as I think their
interest demands.  I believe, however, opinion among them in this
respect is improving, and that ere long there will be an augmented
and considerable migration to both these countries from the United
States.

The new commercial treaty between the United States and the Sultan of
Turkey has been carried into execution.

A commercial and consular treaty has been negotiated, subject to the
Senate's consent, with Liberia, and a similar negotiation is now
pending with the Republic of Haiti.  A considerable improvement of
the national commerce is expected to result from these measures.

Our relations with Great Britain, France, Spain, Portugal, Russia,
Prussia, Denmark, Sweden, Austria, the Netherlands, Italy, Rome, and
the other European states remain undisturbed.   Very favorable
relations also continue to be maintained with Turkey, Morocco, China,
and Japan.

During the last year there has not only been no change of our
previous relations with the independent states of our own continent,
but more friendly sentiments than have heretofore existed are
believed to be entertained by these neighbors, whose safety and
progress are so intimately connected with our own.  This statement
especially applies to Mexico, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Honduras, Peru,
and Chile.

The commission under the convention with the Republic of New Granada
closed its session without having audited and passed upon all the
claims which were submitted to it.  A proposition is pending to
revive the convention, that it may be able to do more complete
justice.   The joint commission between the United States and the
Republic of Costa Rica has completed its labors and submitted its
report.

I have favored the project for connecting the United States with
Europe by an Atlantic telegraph, and a similar project to extend the
telegraph from San Francisco to connect by a Pacific telegraph with
the line which is being extended across the Russian Empire.

The Territories of the United States, with unimportant exceptions,
have remained undisturbed by the civil war; and they are exhibiting
such evidence of prosperity as justifies an expectation that some of
them will soon be in a condition to be organized as States and be
constitutionally admitted into the Federal Union.

The immense mineral resources of some of those Territories ought to
be developed as rapidly as possible.  Every step in that direction
would have a tendency to improve the revenues of the government and
diminish the burdens of the people.  It is worthy of your serious
consideration whether some extraordinary measures to promote that end
cannot be adopted.  The means which suggests itself as most likely to
be effective is a scientific exploration of the mineral regions in
those Territories with a view to the publication of its results at
home and in foreign countries--results which cannot fail to be
auspicious.

The condition of the finances win claim your most diligent
consideration.  The vast expenditures incident to the military and
naval operations required for the suppression of the rebellion have
hitherto been met with a promptitude and certainty unusual in similar
circumstances, and the public credit has been fully maintained.  The
continuance of the war, however, and the increased disbursements made
necessary by the augmented forces now in the field demand your best
reflections as to the best modes of providing the necessary revenue
without injury to business and with the least possible burdens upon
labor.

The suspension of specie payments by the banks soon after the
commencement of your last session made large issues of United States
notes unavoidable.  In no other way could the payment of troops and
the satisfaction of other just demands be so economically or so well
provided for.  The judicious legislation of Congress, securing the
receivability of these notes for loans and internal duties and making
them a legal tender for other debts, has made them an universal
currency, and has satisfied, partially at least, and for the time,
the long-felt want of an uniform circulating medium, saving thereby
to the people immense sums in discounts and exchanges.

A return to specie payments, however, at the earliest period
compatible with due regard to all interests concerned should ever be
kept in view.  Fluctuations in the value of currency are always
injurious, and to reduce these fluctuations to the lowest possible
point will always be a leading purpose in wise legislation.
Convertibility, prompt and certain convertibility, into coin is
generally acknowledged to be the best and surest safeguard against
them; and it is extremely doubtful whether a circulation of United
States notes payable in coin and sufficiently large for the wants of
the people can be permanently, usefully, and safely maintained.

Is there, then, any other mode in which the necessary provision for
the public wants can be made and the great advantages of a safe and
uniform currency secured?

I know of none which promises so certain results and is at the same
time so unobjectionable as the organization of banking associations,
under a general act of Congress, well guarded in its provisions.  To
such associations the government might furnish circulating notes, on
the security of United States bonds deposited in the treasury.
These notes, prepared under the supervision of proper officers, being
uniform in appearance and security and convertible always into coin,
would at once protect labor against the evils of a vicious currency
and facilitate commerce by cheap and safe exchanges.

A moderate reservation from the interest on the bonds would
compensate the United States for the preparation and distribution of
the notes and a general supervision of the system, and would lighten
the burden of that part of the public debt employed as securities.
The public credit, moreover, would be greatly improved and the
negotiation of new loans greatly facilitated by the steady market
demand for government bonds which the adoption of the proposed system
would create.

It is an additional recommendation of the measure, of considerable
weight, in my judgment, that it would reconcile as far as possible
all existing interests by the opportunity offered to existing
institutions to reorganize under the act, substituting only the
secured uniform national circulation for the local and various
circulation, secured and unsecured, now issued by them.

The receipts into the treasury from all sources, including loans and
balance from the preceding year, for the fiscal year ending on the
30th June, 1862, were $583,885,247.06, of which sum $49,056,397.62
were derived from customs; $1,795,331.73 from the direct tax; from
public lands, $152,203.77; from miscellaneous sources, $931,787.64;
from loans in all forms, $529,692,460.50.   The remainder,
$2,257,065.80, was the balance from last year.

The disbursements during the same period were:  For congressional,
executive, and judicial purposes, $5,939,009.29; for foreign
intercourse, $1,339,710.35; for miscellaneous expenses, including the
mints, loans, post-office deficiencies, collection of revenue, and
other like charges, $14,129,771.50; for expenses under the Interior
Department, $3,102,985.52; under the War Department, $394,368,407.36;
under the Navy Department, $42,674,569.69; for interest on public
debt, $13,190,324.45; and for payment of public debt, including
reimbursement of temporary loan and redemptions, $96,096,922.09;
making an aggregate of $570,841,700.25, and leaving a balance in the
treasury on the 1st day of July, 1862, of $13,043,546.81.

It should be observed that the sum of $96,096,922.09, expended for
reimbursements and redemption of public debt, being included also in
the loans made, may be properly deducted both from receipts and
expenditures, leaving the actual receipts for the year
$487,788,324.97, and the expenditures $474,744,778.16.

Other information on the subject of the finances will be found in the
report of the Secretary of the Treasury, to whose statements and
views I invite your most candid and considerate attention.

The reports of the Secretaries of War and of the Navy are herewith
transmitted.  These reports, though lengthy, are scarcely more than
brief abstracts of the very numerous and extensive transactions and
operations conducted through those departments.  Nor could I give a
summary of them here upon any principle which would admit of its
being much shorter than the reports themselves.  I therefore content
myself with laying the reports before you and asking your attention
to them.

It gives me pleasure to report a decided improvement in the financial
condition of the Post-Office Department as compared with several
preceding years.  The receipts for the fiscal year 1861 amounted to
$8,349,296.40, which embraced the revenue from all the States of the
Union for three quarters of that year.  Notwithstanding the cessation
of revenue from the so-called seceded States during the last fiscal
year, the increase of the correspondence of the loyal States has been
sufficient to produce a revenue during the same year of
$8,299,820.90, being only $50,000 less than was derived from all the
States of the Union during the previous year.  The expenditures show
a still more favorable result.  The amount expended in 1861 was
$13,606,759.11.  For the last year the amount has been reduced to
$11,125,364.13, showing a decrease of about $2,481,000 in the
expenditures as compared with the preceding year, and about
$3,750,000 as compared with the fiscal year 1860.  The deficiency in
the department for the previous year was $4,551,966.98.  For the last
fiscal year it was reduced to $2,112,814.57.  These favorable results
are in part owing to the cessation of mail service in the
insurrectionary States and in part to a careful review of all
expenditures in that department in the interest of economy.  The
efficiency of the postal service, it is believed, has also been much
improved.  The Postmaster-General has also opened a correspondence
through the Department of State with foreign governments proposing a
convention of postal representatives for the purpose of simplifying
the rates of foreign postage and to expedite the foreign mails.  This
proposition, equally important to our adopted citizens and to the
commercial interests of this country, has been favorably entertained
and agreed to by all the governments from whom replies have been
received.

I ask the attention of Congress to the suggestions of the
Postmaster-General in his report respecting the further legislation
required, in his opinion, for the benefit of the postal service.

The Secretary of the Interior reports as follows in regard to the
public lands:

"The public lands have ceased to be a source of revenue.  From the
1st July, 1861, to the 3oth September, 1862, the entire cash receipts
from the sale of lands were $137,476.2--a sum much less than the
expenses of our land system during the same period.   The homestead
law, which will take effect on the 1st of January next, offers such
inducements to settlers that sales for cash cannot be expected to an
extent sufficient to meet the expenses of the General Land Office and
the cost of surveying and bringing the land into market."

The discrepancy between the sum here stated as arising from the sales
of the public lands and the sum derived from the same source as
reported from the Treasury Department arises, as I understand, from
the fact that the periods of time, though apparently were not really
coincident at the beginning point, the Treasury report including a
considerable sum now which had previously been reported from the
Interior, sufficiently large to greatly overreach the sum derived
from the three months now reported upon by the Interior and not by
the Treasury.

The Indian tribes upon our frontiers have during the past year
manifested a spirit of insubordination, and at several points have
engaged in open hostilities against the white settlements in their
vicinity.  The tribes occupying the Indian country south of Kansas
renounced their allegiance to the United States and entered into
treaties with the insurgents.  Those who remained loyal to the United
States were driven from the country.  The chief of the Cherokees has
visited this city for the purpose of restoring the former relations
of the tribe with the United States.  He alleges that they were
constrained by superior force to enter into treaties with the
insurgents, and that the United States neglected to furnish the
protection which their treaty stipulations required.

In the month of August last the Sioux Indians in Minnesota attacked
the settlements in their vicinity with extreme ferocity, killing
indiscriminately men, women, and children.  This attack was wholly
unexpected, and therefore no means of defense had been provided.  It
is estimated that not less than 800 persons were killed by the
Indians, and a large amount of property was destroyed.  How this
outbreak was induced is not definitely known, and suspicions, which
may be unjust, need not to be stated.  Information was received by
the Indian Bureau from different sources about the time hostilities
were commenced that a simultaneous attack was to be made upon white
settlements by all the tribes between the Mississippi River and the
Rocky Mountains.  The State of Minnesota has suffered great injury
from this Indian war.  A large portion of her territory has been
depopulated, and a severe loss has been sustained by the destruction
of property.  The people of that State manifest much anxiety for the
removal of the tribes beyond the limits of the State as a guaranty
against future hostilities.  The Commissioner of Indian Affairs will
furnish full details.  I submit for your especial consideration
whether our Indian system shall not be remodeled.  Many wise and good
men have impressed me with the belief that this can be profitably
done.

I submit a statement of the proceedings of commissioners, which shows
the progress that has been made in the enterprise of constructing the
Pacific Railroad.  And this suggests the earliest completion of this
road, and also the favorable action of Congress upon the projects now
pending before them for enlarging the capacities of the great canals
in New York and Illinois, as being of vital and rapidly increasing
importance to the whole nation, and especially to the vast interior
region hereinafter to be noticed at some greater length.  I purpose
having prepared and laid before you at an early day some interesting
and valuable statistical information upon this subject.  The military
and commercial importance of enlarging the Illinois and Michigan
Canal and improving the Illinois River is presented in the report of
Colonel Webster to the Secretary of War, and now transmitted to
Congress.  I respectfully ask attention to it.

To carry out the provisions of the act of Congress of the 15th of May
last, I have caused the Department of Agriculture of the United
States to be organized.

The Commissioner informs me that within the period of a few months
this department has established an extensive system of correspondence
and exchanges, both at home and abroad, which promises to effect
highly beneficial results in the development of a correct knowledge
of recent improvements in agriculture, in the introduction of new
products, and in the collection of the agricultural statistics of the
different States.

Also, that it will soon be prepared to distribute largely seeds,
cereals, plants, and cuttings, and has already published and
liberally diffused much valuable information in anticipation.  of a
more elaborate report, which will in due time be furnished, embracing
some valuable tests in chemical science now in progress in the
laboratory.

The creation of this department was for the more immediate benefit of
a large class of our most valuable citizens, and I trust that the
liberal basis upon which it has been organized will not only meet
your approbation, but that it will realize at no distant day all the
fondest anticipations of its most sanguine friends and become the
fruitful source of advantage to all our people.

On the 22d day of September last a proclamation was issued by the
Executive, a copy of which is herewith submitted.

In accordance with the purpose expressed in the second paragraph of
that paper, I now respectfully recall your attention to what may be
called "compensated emancipation."

A nation may be said to consist of its territory, its people, and its
laws.  The territory is the only part which is of certain durability.
"One generation passeth away and another generation cometh, but the
earth abideth forever." It is of the first importance to duly
consider and estimate this ever enduring part.  That portion of the
earth's surface which is owned and inhabited by the people of the
United States is well adapted to be the home of one national family,
and it is not well adapted for two or more.  Its vast extent and its
variety of climate and productions are of advantage in this age for
one people, whatever they might have been in former ages.   Steam,
telegraphs, and intelligence have brought these to be an advantageous
combination for one united people.

In the inaugural address I briefly pointed out the total inadequacy
of disunion as a remedy for the differences between the people of the
two sections.  I did so in language which I cannot improve, and
which, therefore, I beg to repeat:

"One section of our country believes slavery is right and ought to be
extended, while the other believes it is wrong and ought not to be
extended.  This is the only substantial dispute.  The fugitive-slave
clause of the Constitution and the laws for the suppression of the
foreign slave trade are each as well enforced, perhaps, as any law
can ever be in a community where the moral Sense of the people
imperfectly supports the law itself.  The great body of the people
abide by the dry legal obligation in both cases, and a few break over
in each.  This, I think, cannot be perfectly cured, and it would be
worse in both cases after the separation of the sections than before.
The foreign slave trade, now imperfectly suppressed, would be
ultimately revived without restriction in one section, while fugitive
slaves, now only partially surrendered, would not be surrendered at
all by the other.

"Physically speaking, we can not separate.  We can not remove our
respective sections from each other nor build an impassable wall
between them.  A husband and wife may be divorced and go out of the
presence and beyond the reach of each other, but the different parts
of our country cannot do this.  They cannot but remain face to face,
and intercourse, either amicable or hostile, must continue between
them.  Is it possible, then, to make that intercourse more
advantageous or more satisfactory after separation than before?  Can
aliens make treaties easier than friends can make laws?  Can treaties
be more faithfully enforced between aliens than laws can among
friends?  Suppose you go to war, you cannot fight always; and when,
after much loss on both sides and no gain on either, you cease
fighting, the identical old questions, as to terms of intercourse,
are again upon you."

There is no line, straight or crooked, suitable for a national
boundary upon which to divide.  Trace through, from east to west,
upon the line between the free and slave country, and we shall find a
little more than one third of its length are rivers, easy to be
crossed, and populated, or soon to be populated, thickly upon both
sides; while nearly all its remaining length are merely surveyors'
lines, over which people may walk back and forth without any
consciousness of their presence.  No part of this line can be made
any more difficult to pass by writing it down on paper or parchment
as a national boundary.  The fact of separation, if it comes, gives
up on the part of the seceding section the fugitive-slave clause
along with all other constitutional obligations upon the section
seceded from, while I should expect no treaty stipulation would ever
be made to take its place.

But there is another difficulty.  The great interior region bounded
east by the Alleghenies, north by the British dominions, west by the
Rocky Mountains, and south by the line along which the culture of
corn and cotton meets, and which includes part of Virginia, part of
Tennessee, all of Kentucky, Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin,
Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Iowa, Minnesota, and the Territories of
Dakota, Nebraska, and part of Colorado, already has above 10,000,000
people, and will have 50,000,000 within fifty years if not prevented
by any political folly or mistake.  It contains more than one third
of the country owned by the United States--certainly more than
1,000,000 square miles.   Once half as populous as Massachusetts
already is, it would have more than 75,000,000 people.  A glance at
the map shows that, territorially speaking, it is the great body of
the Republic.  The other parts are but marginal borders to it, the
magnificent region sloping west from the Rocky Mountains to the
Pacific being the deepest and also the richest in undeveloped
resources.  In the production of provisions, grains, grasses, and all
which proceed from them this great interior region is naturally one
of the most important in the world.  Ascertain from statistics the
small proportion of the region which has yet been brought into
cultivation, and also the large and rapidly increasing amount of
products, and we shall be overwhelmed with the magnitude of the
prospect presented.  And yet this region has no seacoast--touches no
ocean anywhere.  As part of one nation, its people now find, and may
forever find, their way to Europe by New York, to South America and
Africa by New Orleans, and to Asia by San Francisco; but separate our
common country into two nations, as designed by the present
rebellion, and every man of this great interior region is thereby cut
off from some one or more of these outlets, not perhaps by a physical
barrier, but by embarrassing and onerous trade regulations.

And this is true, wherever a dividing or boundary line may be fixed.
Place it between the now free and slave country, or place it south of
Kentucky or north of Ohio, and still the truth remains that none
south of it can trade to any port or place north of it, and none
north of it can trade to any port or place south of it, except upon
terms dictated by a government foreign to them.  These outlets, east,
west, and south, are indispensable to the well-being of the people
inhabiting and to inhabit this vast interior region.  Which of the
three may be the best is no proper question.  All are better than
either, and all of right belong to that people and to their
successors forever.  True to themselves, they will not ask where a
line of separation shall be, but will vow rather that there shall be
no such line.

Nor are the marginal regions less interested in these communications
to and through them to the great outside world.  They, too, and each
of them, must have access to this Egypt of the West without paying
toll at the crossing of any national boundary.

Our national strife springs not from our permanent part; not from the
land we inhabit; not from our national homestead.  There is no
possible severing of this but would multiply and not mitigate evils
among us.  In all its adaptations and aptitudes it demands union and
abhors separation.  In fact, it would ere long force reunion, however
much of blood and treasure the separation might have cost.

Our strife pertains to ourselves--to the passing generations of men--
and it can without convulsion be hushed forever with the passing of
one generation.

In this view I recommend the adoption of the following resolution and
articles amendatory to the Constitution of the United States:

Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United
States of America, in Congress assembled, (two thirds of both Houses
concurring), That the following articles be proposed to the
Legislatures (or conventions) of the several States as amendments to
the Constitution of the United States, all or any of which articles,
when ratified by three fourths of the said Legislatures (or
conventions), to be valid as part or parts of the said Constitution,
viz.

ART.--Every State wherein slavery now exists which shall abolish the
same therein at any time or times before the 1st day of January, A.D.
1900, shall receive compensation from the United States as follows,
to wit:

The President of the United States shall deliver to every such State
bonds of the United States bearing interest at the rate of ___ per
cent. per annum to an amount equal to the aggregate sum of ______
for each slave shown to have been therein by the Eighth Census of the
United States, said bonds to be delivered to such State by
instalments or in one parcel at the completion of the abolishment,
accordingly as the same shall have been gradual or at one time within
such State; and interest shall begin to run upon any such bond only
from the proper time of its delivery as aforesaid.  Any State having
received bonds as aforesaid and afterwards reintroducing or
tolerating slavery therein shall refund to the United States the
bonds so received, or the value thereof, and all interest paid
thereon.

ART.--All slaves who shall have enjoyed actual freedom by the chances
of the war at any time before the end of the rebellion shall be
forever free; but all owners of such who shall not have been disloyal
shall be compensated for them at the same rates as is provided for
States adopting abolishment of slavery, but in such way that no slave
shall be twice accounted for.

ART.--Congress may appropriate money and otherwise provide for
colonizing free colored persons with their own consent at any place
or places without the United States.

I beg indulgence to discuss these proposed articles at some length.
Without slavery the rebellion could never have existed; without
slavery it could not continue.

Among the friends of the Union there is great diversity of sentiment
and of policy in regard to slavery and the African race amongst us.
Some would perpetuate slavery; some would abolish it suddenly and
without compensation; some would abolish it gradually and with
compensation; some would remove the freed people from us, and some
would retain them with us; and there are yet other minor diversities.
Because of these diversities we waste much strength in struggles
among ourselves.  By mutual concession we should harmonize and act
together.  This would be compromise, but it would be compromise among
the friends and not with the enemies of the Union.  These articles
are intended to embody a plan of such mutual concessions.  If the
plan shall be adopted, it is assumed that emancipation will follow,
at least in several of the States.

As to the first article, the main points are, first, the
emancipation; secondly, the length of time for consummating it
(thirty-seven years); and, thirdly, the compensation.

The emancipation will be unsatisfactory to the advocates of perpetual
slavery, but the length of time should greatly mitigate their
dissatisfaction.  The time spares both races from the evils of sudden
derangement--in fact, from the necessity of any derangement--while
most of those whose habitual course of thought will be disturbed by
the measure will have passed away before its consummation.  They will
never see it.  Another class will hail the prospect of emancipation,
but will deprecate the length of time.  They will feel that it gives
too little to the now living slaves.  But it really gives them much.
It saves them from the vagrant destitution which must largely attend
immediate emancipation in localities where their numbers are very
great, and it gives the inspiring assurance that their posterity
shall be free forever.  The plan leaves to each State choosing to act
under it to abolish slavery now or at the end of the century, or at
any intermediate tune, or by degrees extending over the whole or any
part of the period, and it obliges no two States to proceed alike.
It also provides for compensation, and generally the mode of making
it.  This, it would seem, must further mitigate the dissatisfaction
of those who favor perpetual slavery, and especially of those who are
to receive the compensation.  Doubtless some of those who are to pay
and not to receive will object.  Yet the measure is both just and
economical.  In a certain sense the liberation of slaves is the
destruction of property--property acquired by descent or by purchase,
the same as any other property.  It is no less true for having been
often said that the people of the South are not more responsible for
the original introduction of this property than are the people of the
North; and when it is remembered how unhesitatingly we all use cotton
and sugar and share the profits of dealing in them, it may not be
quite safe to say that the South has been more responsible than the
North for its continuance.  If, then, for a common object this
property is to be sacrificed, is it not just that it be done at a
common charge?

And if with less money, or money more easily paid, we can preserve
the benefits of the Union by this means than we can by the war alone,
is it not also economical to do it?  Let us consider it, then.  Let
us ascertain the sum we have expended in the war Since compensated
emancipation was proposed last March, and consider whether if that
measure had been promptly accepted by even some of the slave States
the same sum would not have done more to close the war than has been
otherwise done.  If so, the measure would save money, and in that
view would be a prudent and economical measure.  Certainly it is not
so easy to pay something as it is to pay nothing, but it is easier to
pay a large sum than it is to pay a larger one.  And it is easier to
pay any sum when we are able than it is to pay it before we are able.
The war requires large sums, and requires them at once.  The
aggregate sum necessary for compensated emancipation of course would
be large.  But it would require no ready cash, nor the bonds even any
faster than the emancipation progresses.  This might not, and
probably would not, close before the end of the thirty-seven years.
At that time we shall probably have a hundred millions of people to
share the burden, instead of thirty-one millions as now.  And not
only so, but the increase of our population may be expected to
continue for a long time after that period as rapidly as before,
because our territory will not have become full.  I do not state this
inconsiderately.  At the same ratio of increase which we have
maintained, on an average, from our first national census, in 1790,
until that of 186o, we should in 1900 have a population of
103,208,415.  And why may we not continue that ratio far beyond that
period?  Our abundant room, our broad national homestead, is our
ample resource.  Were our territory as limited as are the British
Isles, very certainly our population could not expand as stated.
Instead of receiving the foreign born as now, we should be compelled
to send part of the native born away.  But such is not our condition.
We have 2,963,000 square miles.  Europe has 3,800,000, with a
population averaging 73 persons to the square mile.  Why may not our
country at some time average as many?  Is it less fertile?  Has it
more waste surface by mountains, rivers, lakes, deserts, or other
causes?  Is it inferior to Europe in any natural advantage?  If,
then, we are at some time to be as populous as Europe, how soon?  As
to when this may be, we can judge by the past and the present; as to
when it will be, if ever, depends much on whether we maintain the
Union...............

[a page of tables of projected statistics]

These figures show that our country may be as populous as Europe now
is at some point between 1920 and 1930, say about 1925--our
territory, at 73 persons to the square mile, being of capacity to
contain 217,186,000.

And we will reach this, too, if we do not ourselves relinquish the
chance by the folly and evils of disunion or by long and exhausting
war springing from the only great element of national discord among
us.  While it cannot be foreseen exactly how much one huge example of
secession, breeding lesser ones indefinitely, would retard
population, civilization, and prosperity, no one can doubt that the
extent of it would be very great and injurious.

The proposed emancipation would shorten the war, perpetuate peace,
insure this increase of population, and proportionately the wealth of
the country.  With these we should pay all the emancipation would
cost, together with our other debt, easier than we should pay our
other debt without it.  If we had allowed our old national debt to
run at six per cent. per annum, simple interest, from the end of our
revolutionary struggle until to-day, without paying anything on
either principal or interest, each man of us would owe less upon that
debt now than each man owed upon it then; and this because our
increase of men through the whole period has been greater than six
per cent.--has run faster than the interest upon the debt.  Thus time
alone relieves a debtor nation, so long as its population increases
faster than unpaid interest accumulates on its debt.

This fact would be no excuse for delaying payment of what is justly
due, but it shows the great importance of time in this connection--
the great advantage of a policy by which we shall not have to pay
until we number 100,000,000 what by a different policy we would have
to pay now, when we number but 31,000,000.  In a word, it shows that
a dollar will be much harder to pay for the war than will be a dollar
for emancipation on the proposed plan.   And then the latter will
cost no blood, no precious life.  It will be a saving of both.

As to the second article, I think it would be impracticable to return
to bondage the class of persons therein contemplated.  Some of them,
doubtless, in the property sense belong to loyal owners, and hence
Provision is made in this article for compensating such.

The third article relates to the future of the freed people.  It does
not oblige, but merely authorizes Congress to aid in colonizing such
as may consent.  This ought nut to be regarded as objectionable on
the one hand or on the other, insomuch as it comes to nothing unless
by the mutual consent of the people to be deported and the American
voters through their representatives in Congress.

I cannot make it better known than it already is that I strongly
favor colonization; and yet I wish to say there is an objection urged
against free colored persons remaining in the country which is
largely imaginary, if not sometimes malicious.

It is insisted that their presence would injure and displace white
labor and white laborers.  If there ever could be a proper time for
mere catch arguments that time surely is not now.  In times like the
present men should utter nothing for which they would not willingly
be responsible through time and in eternity.  Is it true, then, that
colored people can displace any more white labor by being free than
by remaining slaves?  If they stay in their old places, they jostle
no white laborers; if they leave their old places, they leave them
open to white laborers.  Logically, there is neither more nor less of
it.  Emancipation, even without deportation, would probably enhance
the wages of white labor, and very surely would not reduce them.
Thus the customary amount of labor would still have to be performed.
The freed people would surely not do more than their old proportion
of it, and very probably for a time would do less, leaving an
increased part to white laborers, bringing their labor into greater
demand, and consequently enhancing the wages of it.  With
deportation, even to a limited extent, enhanced wages to white labor
is mathematically certain.  Labor is like any other commodity in the
market-increase the demand for it and you increase the price of it.
Reduce the supply of black labor by colonizing the black laborer out
of the country, and by precisely so much you increase the demand for
and wages of white labor.

But it is dreaded that the freed people will swarm forth and cover
the whole land.  Are they not already in the land?  Will liberation
make them any more numerous?  Equally distributed among the whites of
the whole country, and there would be but one colored to seven
whites.  Could the one in any way greatly disturb the seven?  There
are many communities now having more than one free colored person to
seven whites, and this without any apparent consciousness of evil
from it.  The District of Columbia and the States of Maryland and
Delaware are all in this condition.  The District has more than one
free colored to six whites, and yet in its frequent petitions to
Congress I believe it has never presented the presence of free
colored persons as one of its grievances.  But why should
emancipation South send the free people North?  People of any color
seldom run unless there be something to run from.  Heretofore colored
people to some extent have fled North from bondage, and now, perhaps,
from both bondage and destitution.  But if gradual emancipation and
deportation be adopted, they will have neither to flee from.  Their
old masters will give them wages at least until new laborers can be
procured, and the freedmen in turn will gladly give their labor for
the wages till new homes can be found for them in congenial climes
and with people of their own blood and race.  This proposition can be
trusted on the mutual interests involved.  And in any event, cannot
the North decide for itself whether to receive them?

Again, as practice proves more than theory in any case, has there
been any irruption of colored people northward because of the
abolishment of slavery in this District last spring?

What I have said of the proportion of free colored persons to the
whites in the District is from the census of 1860, having no
reference to persons called contrabands nor to those made free by the
act of Congress abolishing slavery here.

The plan consisting of these articles is recommended, not but that a
restoration of the national authority would be accepted without its
adoption.

Nor will the war nor proceedings under the proclamation of September
22, 1862, be stayed because of the recommendation of this plan.  Its
timely adoption, I doubt not, would bring restoration, and thereby
stay both.

And notwithstanding this plan, the recommendation that Congress
provide by law for compensating any State which may adopt
emancipation before this plan shall have been acted upon is hereby
earnestly renewed.  Such would be only an advance part of the plan,
and the same arguments apply to both.

This plan is recommended as a means, not in exclusion of, but
additional to, all others for restoring and preserving the national
authority throughout the Union.  The subject is presented exclusively
in its economical aspect.  The plan would, I am confident, secure
peace more speedily and maintain it more permanently than can be done
by force alone, while all it would cost, considering amounts and
manner of payment and times of payment, would be easier paid than
will be the additional cost of the war if we rely solely upon force.
It is much, very much, that it would cost no blood at all.

The plan is proposed as permanent constitutional law.  It cannot
become such without the concurrence of, first, two thirds of
Congress, and afterwards three fourths of the States.  The requisite
three fourths of the States will necessarily include seven of the
slave States.  Their concurrence, if obtained, will give assurance of
their severally adopting emancipation at no very distant day upon the
new constitutional terms.  This assurance would end the struggle now
and save the Union forever.

I do not forget the gravity which should characterize a paper
addressed to the Congress of the nation by the chief magistrate of
the nation, nor do I forget that some of you are my seniors, nor that
many of you have more experience than I in the conduct of public
affairs.  Yet I trust that in view of the great responsibility
resting upon me you will perceive no want of respect to yourselves in
any undue earnestness I may seem to display.

Is it doubted, then, that the plan I propose, if adopted, would
shorten the war, and thus lessen its expenditure of money and of
blood?  Is it doubted that it would restore the national authority
and national prosperity and perpetuate both indefinitely?  Is it
doubted that we here--Congress and executive--can secure its
adoption?  Will not the good people respond to a united and earnest
appeal from us?  Can we, can they, by any other means so certainly or
so speedily assure these vital objects?  We can succeed only by
concert.  It is not "Can any of us imagine better?" but "Can we all
do better?" Object whatsoever is possible, still the question recurs,
"Can we do better?" The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to
the stormy present.  The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and
we must rise with the occasion.  As our case is new, so we must think
anew and act anew.  We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall
save our country.

Fellow-citizens, we can not escape history.  We of this Congress and
this administration will be remembered in spite of ourselves.  No
personal significance or insignificance can spare one or another of
us.  The fiery trial through which we pass will light us down in
honor or dishonor to the latest generation.  We say we are for the
Union.  The world will not forget that we say this.  We know how to
save the Union.  The world knows we do know how to save it.  We, even
we here, hold the power and bear the responsibility.  In giving
freedom to the slave we assure freedom to the free--honorable alike
in what we give and what we preserve.  We shall nobly save or meanly
lose the last, best hope of earth.  Other means may succeed; this
could not fail.  The way is plain, peaceful, generous, just--a way
which if followed the world will forever applaud and God must forever
bless.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.




MESSAGE TO CONGRESS.

WASHINGTON, December 3, 1862.

TO THE SENATE AND HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES:

On the 3d of November, 1861, a collision took place off the coast of
Cuba between the United States war steamer San Jacinto and the French
brig Jules et Marie, resulting in serious damage to the latter.  The
obligation of this Government to make amends therefor could not be
questioned if the injury resulted from any fault On the part of the
San Jacinto.  With a view to ascertain this, the subject was referred
to a commission of the United States and French naval officers at New
York, with a naval officer of Italy as an arbiter.  The conclusion
arrived at was that the collision was occasioned by the failure of
the San Jacinto seasonably to reverse her engine.   It then became
necessary to ascertain the amount of indemnification due to the
injured party.  The United States consul-general at Havana was
consequently instructed to confer with the consul of France on this
point, and they have determined that the sum of $9,500 is an
equitable allowance under the circumstances.

I recommend an appropriation of this sum for the benefit of the
owners of the Jules et Marie.

A copy of the letter of Mr. Shufeldt, the consul-general of the
United States at Havana, to the Secretary of State on the subject is
herewith transmitted.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO H. J. RAYMOND.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,
December 7, 1862.

Hon. H. J. RAYMOND, Times Office, New York:

Yours of November 25 reached me only yesterday. Thank you for it. I
shall consider and remember your suggestions.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO B. G. BROWN.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON December 7, 1862.

HON. B. GRATZ BROWN, Saint Louis, Missouri:

Yours of the 3d received yesterday. Have already done what I can in
the premises.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GOVERNOR JOHNSON.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,
December 8, 1862.
GOVERNOR ANDREW JOHNSON, Nashville, Tenn.:

Jesse H. Strickland is here asking authority to raise a regiment of
Tennesseeans.  Would you advise that the authority be given him?

A. LINCOLN.




MESSAGE TO CONGRESS.

WASHINGTON, D. C., December 8, 1862.

TO THE SENATE AND HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES:

In conformity to the law of July 16, 1862, I most cordially
recommend, that Commander John L. Worden, United States Navy, receive
a vote of thanks of Congress for the eminent skill and gallantry
exhibited by him in the late remarkable battle between the United
States ironclad steamer Monitor, under his command, and the rebel
ironclad steamer Merrimac, in March last.

The thanks of Congress for his services on the occasion referred to
were tendered by a resolution approved July 11, 1862, but the
recommendation is now specially made in order to comply with the
requirements of the ninth section of the act of July 16, 1862, which
is in the following words, viz.:

"That any line officer of the navy or marine corps may be advanced
one grade if upon recommendation of the President by name he receives
the thanks of Congress for highly distinguished conduct in conflict
with the enemy or for extraordinary heroism in the line of his
profession."

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.




TO GENERAL S. R. CURTIS.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,

December 10, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL CURTIS, St.  Louis, Missouri:

Please suspend, until further order, all proceeding on the order made
by General Schofield, on the twenty-eighth day of August last, for
assessing and collecting from secessionists and Southern sympathizers
the sum of five hundred thousand dollars, etc., and in the meantime
make out and send me a statement of facts pertinent to the question,
together with your opinion upon it.

A. LINCOLN.




TO J. K. DUBOIS.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,

December 10, 1862.

Hon. J. K. DuBois.

MY DEAR SIR:--In the summer of 1859, when Mr. Freeman visited
Springfield, Illinois, in relation to the McCallister and Stebbins
bonds I promised him that, upon certain conditions, I would ask
members of the Legislature to give him a full and fair hearing of his
case. I do not now remember, nor have I time to recall, exactly what
the conditions were, nor whether they were completely performed; but
there can be in no case any harm [in] his having a full and fair
hearing, and I sincerely wish it may be given him.

Yours truly,

A. LINCOLN.




MESSAGE TO THE SENATE.

December 11, 1862.

TO THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES:

In compliance with your resolution of December 5, 1862, requesting
the President "to furnish the Senate with all information in his
possession touching the late Indian barbarities in the State of
Minnesota, and also the evidence in his possession upon which some of
the principal actors and head men were tried and condemned to death,"
I have the honor to state that on receipt of said resolution, I
transmitted the same to the Secretary of the Interior, accompanied by
a note, a copy of which is herewith inclosed, marked A, and in
response to which I received, through that department, a letter of
the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, a copy of which is herewith
inclosed, marked B.

I further state that on the eighth day of November last I received a
long telegraphic despatch from Major-General Pope, at St.  Paul,
Minnesota, simply announcing the names of the persons sentenced to be
hanged.  I immediately telegraphed to have transcripts of the records
in all cases forwarded to me, which transcripts, however, did not
reach me until two or three days before the present meeting of
Congress.  Meantime I received, through telegraphic despatches and
otherwise, appeals in behalf of the condemned, appeals for their
execution, and expressions of opinion as to the proper policy in
regard to them and to the Indians generally in that vicinity, none of
which, as I understand, falls within the scope of your inquiry.
After the arrival of the transcripts of records, but before I had
sufficient opportunity to examine them, I received a joint letter
from one of the senators and two of the representatives from
Minnesota, which contains some statements of fact not found in the
records of the trials, and for which reason I herewith transmit a
copy, marked C. I also, for the same reason, inclose a printed
memorial of the citizens of St.  Paul, addressed to me, and forwarded
with the letter aforesaid.

Anxious to not act with so much clemency as to encourage another
outbreak on the one hand, nor with so much severity as to be real
cruelty on the other, I caused a careful examination of the records
of trials to be made, in view of first ordering the execution of such
as had been proved guilty of violating females.  Contrary to my
expectation, only two of this class were found.  I then directed a
further examination and a classification of all who were proven to
have participated in massacres, as distinguished from participation
in battles.  This class numbered forty, and included the two
convicted of female violation.  One of the number is strongly
recommended, by the commission which tried them, for commutation to
ten years imprisonment  I have ordered the other thirty-nine to be
executed on Friday the 19th instant.  The order was despatched from
here on Monday, the 8th instant, by a messenger to General Sibley,
and a copy of which order is herewith transmitted, marked D.

An abstract of the evidence as to the forty is herewith inclosed,
marked E.

To avoid the immense amount of copying, I lay before the Senate the
original transcripts of the records of trials, as received by me.

This is as full and complete a response to the resolution as it is in
my power to make.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.




MESSAGE TO CONGRESS.

December 12, 1862.

FELLOW-CITIZENS OF THE SENATE AND HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES:

I have in my possession three valuable swords, formerly the property
of General David E. Twiggs, which I now place at the disposal of
Congress.  They are forwarded to me from New Orleans by Major-General
Benjamin F. Butler.  If they or any of them shall be by Congress
disposed of in reward or compliment of military service, I think
General Butler is entitled to the first consideration.  A copy of the
General's letter to me accompanying the swords is herewith
transmitted.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.




TO FERNANDO WOOD.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON
DECEMBER 12, 1862.

HON. FERNANDO WOOD.

MY DEAR SIR:--Your letter of the 8th, with the accompanying note of
same date, was received yesterday.  The most important paragraph in
the letter, as I consider, is in these words:
"On the 25th of November last I was advised by an authority which I
deemed likely to be well informed, as well as reliable and truthful,
that the Southern States would send representatives to the next
Congress, provided that a full and general amnesty should permit them
to do so.  No guarantee or terms were asked for other than the
amnesty referred to."

I strongly suspect your information will prove to be groundless;
nevertheless, I thank you for communicating it to me.  Understanding
the phrase in the paragraph just quoted--"the Southern States would
send representatives to the next Congress"--to be substantially the
same as that "the people of the Southern States would cease
resistance, and would reinaugurate, submit to, and maintain the
national authority within the limits of such States, under the
Constitution of the United States," I say that in such case the war
would cease on the part of the United States; and that if within a
reasonable time "a full and general amnesty" were necessary to such
end, it would not be withheld.

I do not think it would be proper now to communicate this, formally
or informally, to the people of the Southern States.  My belief is
that they already know it; and when they choose, if ever, they can
communicate with me unequivocally.  Nor do I think it proper now to
suspend military operations to try any experiment of negotiation

I should nevertheless receive with great pleasure the exact
information you now have, and also such other as you may in any way
obtain.  Such information might be more valuable before the 1st of
January than afterwards.

While there is nothing in this letter which I shall dread to see in
history, it is, perhaps, better for the present that its existence
should not become public.  I therefore have to request that you will
regard it as confidential.

Your obedient servant,
A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL CURTIS.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, December 14, 1862

MAJOR-GENERAL CURTIS, St.  Louis, Missouri:

If my friend Dr. William Fithian, of Danville, Ill., should call on
YOU, please give him such facilities as you consistently can about
recovering the remains of a step-son, and matters connected
therewith.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL H. H. SIBLEY.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, December 16, 1862.

BRIG. GEN. H. H. SIBLEY, Saint Paul, Minn.:

As you suggest, let the executions fixed for Friday the 19th instant
be postponed to, and be done on, Friday the 26th instant.

A. LINCOLN.
(Private.)
Operator please send this very carefully and accurately.  A. L.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL CURTIS.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, December 16, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL CURTIS, Saint Louis, Missouri:

N. W. Watkins, of Jackson, Mo., (who is half brother to Henry Clay),
writes me that a colonel of ours has driven him from his home at
Jackson.  Will you please look into the case and restore the old man
to his home if the public interest will admit?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL BURNSIDE.

WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON CITY, D. C.,
December 16, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL BURNSIDE, Falmouth:

Your despatch about General Stahel is received. Please ascertain from
General Sigel and his old corps whether Stahel or Schurz is
preferable and telegraph the result, and I will act immediately.
After all I shall be governed by your preference.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL CURTIS.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,
December 17, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL CURTIS:

Could the civil authority be reintroduced into Missouri in lieu of
the military to any extent, with advantage and safety?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL BURNSIDE.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,
December 17, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL BURNSIDE

George Patten says he was a classmate of yours and was in the same
regiment of artillery.  Have you a place you would like to put him
in?  And if so what is it?

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GOVERNOR GAMBLE.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,
December 18, 1862.

GOVERNOR GAMBLE, Saint Louis, MO.:

It is represented to me that the enrolled militia alone would now
maintain law and order in all the counties of your State north of the
Missouri River.  If so all other forces there might be removed south
of the river, or out of the State. Please post yourself and give me
your opinion upon the subject.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL CURTIS.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,

December 19, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL CURTIS, Saint Louis, Mo.:

Hon. W. A. Hall, member of Congress here, tells me, and Governor
Gamble telegraphs me; that quiet can be maintained in all the
counties north of the Missouri River by the enrolled militia.  Confer
with Governor Gamble and telegraph me.

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GENERAL A. E. BURNSIDE.

WASHINGTON, December 19, 1862.

MAJOR-GENERAL BURNSIDE:

Come, of course, if in your own judgment it is safe to do so.

A. LINCOLN.




TO SECRETARIES SEWARD AND CHASE.
EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,

December 20, 1862.

HON. WILLIAM H. SEWARD AND HON. SALMON P. CHASE.

GENTLEMEN:--You have respectively tendered me your resignations as
Secretary of State and Secretary of the Treasury of the United
States.   I am apprised of the circumstances which may render this
course personally desirable to each of you; but after most anxious
consideration my deliberate judgment is that the public interest does
not admit of it.  I therefore have to request that you will resume
the duties of your departments respectively.

Your obedient servant,

A. LINCOLN.




TELEGRAM TO GOVERNOR ANDREW.

WASHINGTON, D. C., December 20, 1862.

GOVERNOR ANDREW, Boston, Mass.:

Neither the Secretary of War nor I know anything except what you tell
us about the "published official document" you mention.

A. LINCOLN.




TO T. J. HENDERSON.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, December 20, 1862.

HON. T. J. HENDERSON.

DEAR SIR:-Your letter of the 8th to Hon. William Kellogg has just
been shown me.  You can scarcely overestimate the pleasure it would
give me to oblige you, but nothing is operating so ruinously upon us
everywhere as "absenteeism." It positively will not do for me to
grant leaves of absence in cases not sufficient to procure them under
the regular rules.

It would astonish you to know the extent of the evil of
"absenteeism."  We scarcely have more than half the men we are paying
on the spot for service anywhere.

Yours very truly,

A. LINCOLN.




CONGRATULATIONS TO THE ARMY OF THE POTOMAC
EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON,

December 22, 1862.

TO THE ARMY OF THE POTOMAC:

I have just read your general's report of the battle of
Fredericksburg.   Although you were not successful, the attempt was
not an error, nor the failure other than accident.  The courage with
which you, in an open field, maintained the contest against an
intrenched foe, and the consummate skill and success with which you
crossed and recrossed the river in the face of the enemy, show that
you possess all the qualities of a great army, which will yet give
victory to the cause of the country and of popular government

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