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SUSPENSION OF THE WRIT OF HABEAS CORPUS.

The next day, September 25, as a war measure essential to the preservation of the Union, the President, by proclamation, declared: First. That during the existing insurrection, and as a necessary measure for suppressing the same, all rebels and insurgents, their aids 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 commission.

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 confinment by any military authority, or by the sentence of any court-martial or military commission.

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The preceding order, which was far more dangerous to liberty than to deserters, closed the series of futile attempts to suppress evils, which would never have befallen the country but for the unwise determination to carry on the war as a confederacy instead of as a nation. Whether we consider them as dictated in ignorance, or as based on a thorough knowledge of our military history, it is evident that the laws and the orders from the War Department, up to the close of the year 1862, had scarcely any other effect than to threaten the collapse of the Government, through inability, first to raise, and afterwards to prevent, the dissolution of our armies.

In foreign armies, it is the duty of the General Staff to draw up the bills relating to military organization, which, after approval by the War Minister, are presented to the representatives of the people. The latter may refuse to incur the expense of reforms, but do not question the wisdom of the details. They know that they have been wrought out, not by recluses walled in by the archives of the War Department, but by officers who in every grade have exercised command in the line, and know the wants of the service. Such was the case with some of our adjutants-general in 1862. They could draw up orders, call offcers to account for errors in their muster rolls, etc., but having given but little, if any, attention to the means of raising and supporting armies, they could do but little to check the progress of the Government toward bankruptcy and ruin.

For want of such a simple device as territorial recruitment and regimental depots, we see that at first. but four officers were designated to correct the evils and irregularities arising from the peculiar state of the service," in a territory embracing 758,000 square miles. For paroled prisoners in the Eastern and Middle States, one depot was designated for a territory of 168,000 square miles. Camp Chase was made the sole depot for an area of 274,000 square miles; Jefferson Barracks for a yet larger territory of 315,000 square miles. Many other orders, not yet quoted, show that the evils to be corrected had their immediate origin in the State Hospitals, but in no instance was the regimental depot suggested as a means of diminishing the frequency of desertion.

SUPPRESSION OF RECRUITING.

Those who, on the ground of the inexperience of our leaders, would excuse or cover up the blunders committed during the Rebellion, unwittingly furnish the best arguments that can be adduced in favor

of adopting a wise and strong military system in time of peace. The dispersion of our armies East and West, and the order making the Surgeon-General and the medical officers in charge of General Hospitals, independent of commanding generals in the field, were not the only vital mistakes in command and administration, committed during the three months' supremacy of the Secretary of War."

Many a Roman general, refusing to engage his raw levies till he had prepared them for battle, was in time accorded the honors of a triumph, but this policy, always successful in the provinces, was never safe for the general when operating near the capital.

The same was true with us in 1862. Bull Run had been forgotten, the General in Chief, accused of having no plan, was considered an obstructor, military advice was at a discount. The opinion prevailed in Congress that 200,000 men could march from Washington to New Orleans without opposition. All that was wanted was for someone to command, "forward." Imbued with false confidence, the spirit of economy again triumphed. The great Army of 1861, having swollen above 600,000, it seemed preposterous to ask for more men. From all quarters, save the army, came the demand to stop recruiting. The Secretary of War, if he did not share the popular opinions at least yielded to it. To the unwise orders issued during the first week in April, another was added, equally fatal to a speedy suppression of the rebellion.

By General Orders, No. 33, dated April 3, the Secretary of War directed that in every State the recruiting service for volunteers be discontinued; that the officers and men on recruiting duty return to their regiments; that the superintendents of the volunteer recruiting service close their offices, and that the public property belonging to the recruiting service be sold to the best advantage possible, the proceeds to be credited to the fund for "collecting, drilling, and organizing volunteers."b

To understand the scope of this order, it is necessary to go back for a moment to the year 1861.

After the fall of Fort Sumter, the need of troops was so urgent, that no thought was given to physical examinations until quite 300,000 men had been received into the service. As a natural consequence, many men unfit for duty immediately applied for discharge. To prevent the recurrence of such enlistments, an order was issued on the 3d of August directing a physical examination of volunteers previous to their future muster and acceptance. The same order, No. 51, also prescribed that when the discharge was granted within three months after his enlistment, the soidier should receive no pay nor allowances, except subsistence and transportation to his home. Discharges thus became the first visible cause of depletion, to which were speedily added detached service, sickness, absenteeism, and desertion.

The War Department soon saw the importance of maintaining the regiments at their maximum standard. Regular officers were appointed mustering officers, as also disbursing officers of the funds appropriated by Congress for collecting, drilling, and organizing volunteers.

"This was also done during the Spanish-American War and resulted from paragraph 1433, Army Regulations, 1895.-EDITORS.

General Orders, No. 33, contained three paragraphs. The first, issued by direction of the President, dismissed an officer from the volunteer service. The other two were evidently issued by the authority of the Secretary of War, no reference being made to the President.

As early as the 15th of August, camps of rendezvous and instruction for volunteers, under officers of the regular service, were established in the vicinity of New York, Elmira, Harrisburg, and Cincinnati. The next step was to get recruiting agents; and here again it was a misfortune that no one advised or prevailed upon the Secretary of War to establish regimental depots. The device would have been simple, and in the end proved the most ecomomical, but instead of adopting it, General Orders, No. 69, of August 28, 1861, sought to remedy one evil by increasing another. Commanding officers of volunteer regiments, subject to the approval of brigade, division, and corps or departmental commanders, were authorized to detach or

detail from time to time, as required, one commissioned officer, or two if necessary, with one or two noncommissioned officers or privates, to recruit in the districts in which the regiments or companies were raised.

The officers in charge of these recruiting parties received their instructions from the regular mustering officers.

December 3, 1861, a general system for recruiting was promulgated in General Orders, No. 105. A regular officer was appointed general superintendent of each State, with headquarters and general depots at Augusta, Maine; Burlington, Vermont; Concord, New Hampshire; Cambridge, Massachusetts; Providence, Rhode Island; Fort Trumbull, Connecticut; Elmira and Albany, New York (headquarters at Albany); Trenton, New Jersey; Harrisburg, Pennsylvania; Wilmington, Delaware; Annapolis, Maryland; Wheeling, Virgnia: Columbus, Ohio; Louisville, Kentucky; Indianapolis, Indiana; Springfield, Illinois: Detroit, Michigan: Madison, Wisconsin; Fort Snelling, Minnesota: Davenport, Iowa; Jefferson Barracks, Missouri; and Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.

On the requisition of the superintendents, a suitable number of volunteer officers, noncommissioned officers, and privates were detailed. for duty in the staff departments, and as drill masters at the respective depots.

The recruiting parties for each regiment, now consisting of two commissioned officers and four noncommissioned officers or privates, detailed for a tour of six months, were assigned to rendezvous by the superintendents.

One advantage of territorial and regimental recruiting is, that when a man is asked to enlist he can be told that in the service he will be among his friends. But this, although it was the system adopted by England and all other civilized countries except our own, was not the system promulgated in the order. The men recruited at the regimental rendezvous were sent in small squads to the general depots, upon which (Paragraph X) commanders of volunteer regiments, batteries, and independent companies, made their requisitions for such recruits as might be required. The State thus again became the territorial limit, instead of a regimental or Congressional district."

In establishing the various rendezvous, the superintendents were authorized to arrange for rent of buildings, subsistence, and other expenses; they were also charged with keeping on hand clothing for recruits and the arms necessary for their instruction. It was this elaborate and expensive system of recruiting, scarcely in operation more

a By General Orders, No. 3, 1862, officers were directed to recruit for their own regiments instead of for the general service.

than three months, which the new Secretary of War demolished by an order issued the same day McDowell's corps was detached from the Army of the Potomac.

The gravity of this mistake in administration was soon perceived to be nearly as great as the one relating to command. The first effort to retrieve it shows how thoroughly the Government was committed to the Confederate system, so tenaciously adhered to during the Revolution. The Government agents, regular and volunteer, had been scattered; there were no longer any general or regimental rendezvous; but the governors remained, and to them the Secretary turned for

assistance.

May 1 he therefore issued War Department General Orders, No. 49, as follows:

Upon requisitions made by commanders of armies in the field authority will be given by the War Department to the governors of the respective States to recruit regiments now in service.

But under the volunteer system, the one element of success was lacking recruiting for depleted regiments carried with it no military patronage; however efficient he might be, no officer or man in procuring recruits was offered the reward of promotion. This effort having totally failed, but one course remained, and that, regardless of expense, was to return to the system so recently abolished. Accordingly, on the 6th of June, by General Orders, No. 60, the volunteer recruiting service was restored as it previously existed: but too late, for individual volunteering,-for the old regiments had practically ceased.

July 25, another effort was made to revive it by increasing the recruiting details to two officers from each regiment and one noncommissioned officer or private from each company; but, as we shall see, the old regiments, now ably commanded, were left to become skeletons, while under the patronage of the governors a new army sprang into existence, nearly all of whose officers were as destitute of skill and training as those who led the raw troops at Bull Run.

General Orders, No. 88, issued on the 25th of July, will bear further inspection. The cadre of a company as established by the law of July 22, 1861, consisted of 1 captain, 2 lieutenants, 5 sergeants, and 8 corporals-total, 16. The order referred to detached two officers and ten noncommissioned officers and men, which fell but four short of the cadre of a company in the field and but seven short of the cadre of a regular depot company in the French army. There being at

the time, more than six hundred regiments in the field belonging to the Army of 1861, it would have been possible, had the word "depot " again been suggested to the Secretary of War, to have established at least two regimental depots in each Congressional district.

Within each of these small territories there would have been 24 or more officers and noncommissioned officers in sympathy with the community, proud of their regiments, and subject to the direct orders of the Government, who would always have been on the alert to enlist recruits and to bring deserters to justice.

Had this system been adopted, the waiting rooms of the governors would no longer have been filled with absentees asking for transportation to the office of a quartermaster in some distant city; the sick soldier and emaciated prisoner of war, carried by their parents or relations to these regimental depots, would at once have been among

comrades and friends. The depots would have been so many centers toward which would have converged recruits, sick and wounded convalescents, absentees, and deserters, who, as soon as their numbers became sufficiently large, would have been conducted by intelligent officers or noncommissioned officers to their regiments in the field.

The plan, however, does not appear to have been suggested or entertained. The 8,000 or more officers and noncommissioned officers and men, detached under the order, were used only to recruit.

In the meantime, the Secretary, as we have seen, began the task of suppressing absenteeism with the aid at first of but four military commanders. Increasing this number, he next invoked the aid of governors, mayors, sheriffs, and chiefs of police. Appeals to the State agents proving fruitless, he at last, in place of regimental depots, established a corps of detectives, who, instead of arresting deserters, found employment in arresting such citizens as were denounced as disloyal, under the warrant of a judge advocate.

CAMPS OF INSTRUCTION.

Besides the advantages already referred to, regimental depots, had they been adopted, could have rendered another service equally important. They would have been the natural places for arming and equipping the recruits, and for instructing them in all the details of the school of the soldier.

In default of them, the orders just quoted directed that the recruits should be equipped and instructed at the general depot in each State. More than six months later an effort was made to establish at Annapolis a large camp of instruction for 50,000 men, composed in due proportions of infantry, cavalry, and artillery. The camp, by General Orders, No. 59, of June 5, 1862, was placed under the command of General Wool, assisted by chiefs of cavalry and artillery, and the necessary staff officers for all the administrative departments.

Impracticable from the beginning, the magnitude of the object was sufficient to defeat its accomplishment. It was not merely a question of assembling 50,000 men; the demand for reenforcements was so great that no body of troops, even 5,000 strong, could be suffered to remain together for the simple purpose of instruction. Raw regiments, as well as recruits, had to be sent at once to the field, where the only opportunities for drill were offered during the suspension of active operations.

Under a depot system, individual instruction, the real object of the camp, could easily have been secured without raising the cry that large commands were lying idle. The regimental depots would have exceeded 600; by recruiting and maintaining them at the small figure of 100 men each, there would have been available in the different States a trained reserve of no less than 60,000 men.

ARBITRARY ARRESTS.

To the discomfiture of the demagogue, the years 1861-62 proved that it is wars and not standing armies which are dangerous to liberty. As an exhibition of brute force, war in its nature makes both government and people despotic. During the Revolution the patriot applauded the arrest of the Tory, and with satisfaction saw his property either

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