Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1863-10-22

| hold them at all. If the statutes of Louis
| lana are enforced in New Orleans, it must be
| by the rebel executive and judicial autbori-
| ties of that State, because such are the re
| quirements of those statutes. With rebel
| judge in the seat Of justice, rebel sheriff
and rebel governor, | need hardly say that
| Gen. Banks and the Union army would
| speedily fill Louisiana prisons and dangle on
New Orleans gallows.
Every step Of an army off the highway is a
| trespass; every camp justities an ejectment
every mule seized may be replevied; every
citizen arrested on suspicion may have ha-
beas corpus and 60 loose; every stealthy guer-
rllla disarmed may plead an infraction Of his
constitutional right to bear arms: and every
harborer of rebels demand for bis house i'm
munity from search except upon warrant
unless there is a martial law applicable to
| such cases; unless war cOnfers powers I'M
| known to peace.
tits obvious that martial lar such as I have
described is a very different thing from the
code Of rules provided for the internal disci-
pine and management of military force. That
is military lar. 1t is administered mainly
through court martials. 1t is mostly written
and constant. The martial law is unwritten,
and varies with the will of the commander.
and the circumstances of the position.
To what we now call military law, the term
martial law was formerly applied by English
writer's, military law being formerly as loose
and underlined at least as martial law now.
The whole ground is covered by the article
on martial law in the New American Cyclic
pedia, to which | invite your attention:
Martial law is often COMPOUNDED with mil
itary law; but these terms are by no means
convertible. Military law, beside some Gus
tomary law, consists chiefly of the articles of
war; that is to say, Of the code enacted by
the supreme legislative authority, as in Eng
| land by parliament, and in the United States
by Congress, for the government of the army
and navy. 1t embraces also, the body of
rules and regulations which are prescribed
from time to time by competent military au-
thority for the preservation of the general
discipline and order. Military law does not
supersede the general municipal law. 1t is
rather branch of it, more limited indeed
in the range of its application than the ad-
miralty or the chancery law, for example ::
yet having a like authority with them In
this country, unlike some of the states in
continental Europe, the application of mill
tary law to the soldier is not exclusive Of
but coordinate with, the general civil law
Every soldier, as a citizen, is subject to the
common law OF the land but as a soldier
he Is amenable to the military law. The
special tribunals which administer this law
are named courts martial, and hence, perhaps,
has arisen in part the confusion of the mill
tary law with the law martial (See Court
| Martia). Martial law is, says Blackstone,
: in fact no law at all. Yet Stephens, an emf
nent commentator, defines the law as that,
whatever it may be, which is imposed by the
military power and says that, if it exists at
ali now in the institutions of England, it is
identical with the articles of war So in his
Law Dictionary Bouviersays martial law is
code established for the government Of the
army and navy. Its principal rules are to be
found In the articles Of war. It's object is to
subject the whole body to certain rules of
discipline essential to energetic and effective
action, and violations of it are to be tried by
court martial. These authorities define very
( well military, and in certain sense but not
well, martial law. 4 clearer idea is that fur
nishcd by an old writer, Smith, who in his En-
glish Republic says Martial law is the law of
war, that depends on the Just but arbitrary
power and pleasure of the king. For, though
he does not make any laws but by common
consent III parliament yet IN time of war, by
reason Of necessity of it, to guard against
dangers that often arise, useth absolute pow
Cr; SO that his word is a law However on
posed to other authorities, this expresses
what is distinctiyely meant, both in England
and III this country, by martial law. When
IN time OF extreme peril to the State, either
from without or within, the general safety
cannot be trusted to the ordinary administra-
ton, or the public welfare demands the adop-
ton and execution of extraordinary meas
ures, it may become necessary to declare the
existence of martial law. This is, indeed, no
law at all IN its ordinary sense; it is in fact
the abTOgation of it. That which is done
under martial law has not an immediate con-
stltutlOnaI or Legislative sanction as the mil
ltary or statute law for example, has. Itpro-
ceeds direct from the military power, which
has now become supreme. Yet, remotely
and indirectly, martial law expresses the will
of the people"
See also the definition on Military Law and
Court Martial.-(P. ~
And the recent admiralty decision of the
Supreme Court of the United States, upon
the subject of the war and the blockade, not
| vet reported.
These facts and principles may seem to you
| so evident, so obviously founded on simple
common sense, that you perhaps wonder that
| | take pains to demonstrate what no one can
| contradict. You doubtless call to mind in
stances where with an ill-iudged lenty, cruel
3,
| suspected of Partially towards 'our erring
| brethren" allowed to the inhabitants of Ten
| nessee and other rebel states overrun by our
| armies, the possession of all their personal
| property, including even arms and ammuni-
| ton, apparently thinking the observance of
| their statutes and customs of more conse-
| quence than the security of our armies. You
| remember, too, the fatal results of this policy
how every farmer turned guerrilla, murder
| ing our men with the very weapons they had
| been forced to restore to him how every
| house became a hostile rendezvous, every
woman spy, and the negroes, our only
| friends, being sent back into slavery under
| our malignant enemies, were carried off to
| build forts or raise corn for rebel armies
Those unhappy days, when Conservatism
| tlourished, and the cause of the Union pinned,
| are gone, thank God forever. We carry on
| war now war; and in the new order of
things thoroughly Rosecrans has entered
| chat very Chattanooga which feeble Buell.
| saw but would never grasp
Our northern opponents, who bewail the
| successes which under the new auspices
crown our heroes, who regard the triumph
| OF party as preferable to a victory in the
| field, who pour overf1owing measures of bit
| terness on our northern States and people, our
| government, our institutions, our soldiers,
and our fighting generals, who denounce Rose
Grams, and praise Fitz John Porter, who
curse Butler, and applaud Stonewall Jack
son, who would keep the blacks in slavery
lest their traitor owners should be irritated,
and yet are too humane to permit them to
| go IN regiments to fight for their country
who see no good in the North but the spirit
! OF Naliandigham and no wrong in the South
but the schlsm in the Democratic party
these men naturally set themselves to defeat