The weekly north Iowa times. [volume] (McGregor, Iowa) 1857-1867, 1862-11-12

and is limited by them. 1t cannot assume
the function Of the statesman or legislator,
and make provision for future or distant
arrangement by which persons or proper
~ Tray be made Subscrvent to military
uses. 1t is the physical force of an army
In the field, and may control whatever is
80 near as to be actually reached by that
force, in order to remove Instructions to its
exercise. 70 -&|.
But when tn, military commander con
trolls the persons or property Of citizens,
who are beyond the sphere Of his actual
operations in the fitld, when he makes laws
% govern their conduct, he becomes le
gisla,or. Those laws may be made actual
~ operative; obedience to them may be
enforced by military power; their pun pose
aud effect may be solely to recruit or sup
port his armi.s, or to weaken the power of
the enemy with whom he is contending.
But h. is a legislator still; and whether
his edicts are clothed in the form Of proc
l,,nations, or Of military orders, by what.
ever name they may b. called, they are
laws II he have the legislative power,
conferred on him by the people, it is we'll
If not, he usurps it.
lie has no more authority to hold all the
citizens Of the entire country, outside Of
the sphere of his actual operations in the
field. amsnabc to his military edicts, than
h. has to hold all the property Of the coun
try subject to his military requsitions. He
Is not the military commander Of the cii
sens Of the u s., but Of it's soldiers.
Apply these principles to the proclana-
tons and orders Of the President They
arc not designed to meet an existing cmcr,
scncy in some particular military opera
ton in the field they prescribe future rules
Of action touching the persons and proper
tY Of citizens. They are to take effect, not
merely within the scope Of military opera
lions in the field, or in their ncighborhooa
but thror ghout the entire country, or great
portions thereof Tn ir subject-mattcr is
MT military offences, or military relations,
but civil offenccs AMI domestic relations
;l,e relation Of master and servant; the
Offences Of l''disloyalty or reasonable prac-
,iccs. Their purpose is not to meet some
existing and instant military emergency,
but to provide for distant events, which
may or may not occur; and whose connec-
tons, If they should coincide with any
particular military operations, arc indirect,
remote, casual, and possible merely.
1t Is manifest that in proclaimng those
cdicts, the President is not acting under
the authority o: military law first because
military laws extends only over the persons
actually enlisted in the military service
and second, because these persons are gov
crncd by laws enacted by the Legislative
power. 1t is equally manifest that he is
not acting under that implied authority
which grows out Of particular actual mill
tary operations; forIthese executive DEGREES
do not spring from the special emergencies
Of any particular military OPERATIONS and
are not limited to any field in which any
such operations arc carried on. .
Whence, then, do these edcts spring p
They spring from the assumed power to
extend MARTA. law over the whole territory
Of the U. S. a power, for the exercise OF
which by the President, there is no warrant
whatever in the Constitution; a power
which no free people could confer upon an
executive officer, and remain free people
For it would make him the absolute master
Of their lives, their liberties, and their pro-
perty, with power to delegate his master.
ship to such satraps as he might select, OF
rs might be imposed on his credulity, O,
his fears. Amidst the great dangers which
encompass us, in our struggles to encoun
ter them, in our natural cagerncss to lay
hold Of efficient means to accomplish oul
vast labors, let us beware how we borrow
weapons from the armory of arbitrary
power They cannot be welded by the
hands Of free people Their blows will
finally fall upon themselves.
Distracted councils, divided strength
al II r
to use them. What lies beyond, no patriol
is now willing to attempt to look upon.
A leading and influential newspaper
while expressing entire devotion to tn,
President, and appreciation of his procla
nation Of emancipation, says: ''Thc Dem
ocrats talk about unconstitutional acts.
Nobody pretcnds that this act is consttu
tional, and nobody cares whether it is o,
not"
think too we'll of the President, to be-
lieve he has done an act involving the lives
and fortunes of millions of human beings
and the entire social condition of grea
people, without caring whether it is con
formable to that Constitution which he has
many times, sworn to support.
Among all the causes of alarm which
now distress the public mind, there are few
more terrible to rejecting men, than tn,
tendency to lawlcssness which is manifest
ing itself in so many directions NJ
stronger evidence Of this could be afforded
than the declaration Of a respectable ant
widely circulated journal, that "nobod,
cares whether great public act of tn,
President of the U. S., is in conformity
With, or is subversivc Of the supreme Law
Of the land, only basis upon which
the government rests, that our public af
fairs have been SO desperate, and our abli
~ to retrieve them by the use of bones
means is SO distrusted, and our willingness.
to use other means SO undoubted that on,
great public servants may themselves breal
the fundamental laws of the country, an,
become usurpers of vast powers not in
trusted to them, in violation Of their solemn
oaths Of office; and nobody cares"
1t is not believed that this is Just to tn
people of the U. S. They do care an
the President cares, that he and all othc
public servants should obey the consti'u
ton. Partisan journals, their own homes
and proper desire to support the Presiden
ON whose wisdom and hrmness they rel,
TO relieve their country from its evils an,
dangers-and the difficulties which tn
mass OF the people encounter in foymin,
opinions on questions Of constitutions
law, may prevent them, for limited time
from arriving at just Judgment of sucl
questions, or the cast practical effects de
pendent upon them.
But the people, of the U. S. do not expec
national concord to spring from usurpato
Of power or national security from tn
violation of those great principles of pub
lie liberty, which are the only possibl
foundation, in this country, of private safe
II and of public order. Their instincts dc
mand purer and more COMPREHENSIVE
statesmanship than that which seizes upo
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