bill became a law. The Richmond Enquirer, of April 23, gives this abstract of it:

To the law of Congress, as published, there were subsequently passed several amendments or auxiliary laws. We present the following synopsis of the law as thus

modified:

The conscription law places in the service of the Confederate States, for three years, unless the war sooner ends, all white men between eighteen and thirty-five years of age, resident in the Confederate States, and not legally exempt from service.

The law is silent as to exemptions; but an act defining the class of exempts has since been passed, which embraces generally those hitherto exempt, with some additions.

All twelve months' men between the prescribed ages, are continued in service for two years from the expiration of their present term, should the war continue so long; and all those under eighteen and over thirty-five, are to be retained for ninety days after their term expires, unless their places are sooner supplied by recruits.

The twelve months' men between eighteen and thirtyfive, who are retained beyond their term of enlistment, and who have not yet received bounty and furlough, shall ceive both; the furloughs, however, to be granted in such

numbers and at such times as the Secretary of War may deem most compatible with the public interest; and the men may receive in licu of furlough, the commutation value in money of the transportation granted to furloughed The term of service of those who originally enlisted for the war, or who have since re-enlisted for that period, is not affected by the law.

men by the act.

Men now in service are not permitted to re-enlist in

other organizations than those to which they now belong; and all re-enlistments that have been made from one exist ing company to another, or into a new company, where the re-enlistment has not been perfected by actual transfer, are in effect canceled.

Companies, battalions, and regiments of twelve months' men, retained in service by the act, shall be entitled, within forty days from the date of the act, on a day to be fixed by the commander of the brigade, to reorganize by electing all their officers whom they had a right heretofore to elect. Companies, battalions, squadrons, or regiments organized, or in process of organization, by authority from the Secretary of War, which may, within thirty days from the pass

age of the act, have the whole number of men necessary to

complete their organization actually enrolled, not including, however, in that number persons now in service, shall be

mustered into the service of the Confederate States, and be received in that arm of the service in which they were authorized to organize, and elect their company, battalion, and regimental officers.

To enroll the persons contemplated by the act, and not now in service, the President may, with the consent of the Governors of the States, employ State officers; if such consent cannot be obtained, Confederate officers shall be appointed by the President.

Persons not now in service, who shall be enrolled, shall be assigned by the Secretary of War to the different companies of the State from which such persons are drawn, until each company is filled to its maximum number.

Seamen and ordinary seamen, enrolled under the act, may, on application of the Secretary of the Navy, be transferred to the naval service.

If, after filling up the companies, regiments, battalions,

and squadrons from any State, there shall remain any of the enrolled men, the excess shall be kept as a reserve; and at stated intervals, not exceeding three months, details, to be made by lot, shall be drawn from the reserve to keep the companies as nearly full as practicable. The persons so reserved remain at home until called into service, and receive no pay until actually mustered in.

They are not, while at home in reserve, subject to the rules and articles of war, except that if they wilfully refuse to obey a call of the President, they shall be held as deserters, and punished as such.

Whenever the President shall think that the exigencies of the service require it, he may call into active service the entire reserve, or as much as may be necessary, and they shall be organized under such rules as the Secretary of War may adopt, and shall elect their field and company officers. The reserves from each State, when thus called out, shall

be organized separately.

Every man mustered into service, who shall bring with him a musket, shot gun, rifle or carbine accepted as an efficient weapon, shall receive the value of it as ascertained by the mustering officer under such regulations as the Secretary of War may prescribe, or if the owner be unwilling to sell, he shall receive $1 a month for the use of such

tutes, under such regulations as the Secretary of War may prescribe.

Vacancies may be filled by the President from the company, battalion, squadron or regiment in which such vacancies occur, by promotion according to seniority, except in cases of disability or other incompetency.

The President may, however, fill a vacancy by promoting any officer of the company, battalion, squadron, or regiment, who may have been distinguished in the service by valor and skill, without reference to seniority. Vacancies in the lowest grade of commissioned officers of a company shall be filled by election, or the President may promote to such vacancies non-commissioned officers who have distinguished themselves by skill and valor in the service. Persons not now in service may, before being enrolled, volunteer with existing companies now in service.

DAVIS'S CONSCRIPTION PROCLAMATION.
[From the Richmond Enquirer, July 18, 1863.]

PROCLAMATION BY THE PRESIDENT.

Whereas, It is provided by an act of Congress, entitled "An Act to further provide for the public defence," approved on the 16th day of April, 1862, and by another act of Congress, approved on the 27th September, 1862, entitled "An Act to amend an act antitled 'An Act to provide further for the public defence," approved 16th April, 1862, that the President be authorized to call out and place

in the military service of the Confederate States, for threo years, unless the war shall have been sooner ended, all

white men who are residents of the Confederate States be tween the ages of 18 and 45 years, at the time the call may be made, and who are not at such time legally exempted from military service, or such part thereof as in his judgment may be necessary to the public defence; and

Whereas, in my judgment the necessities of the publie defence require that every man capable of bearing arms, between the ages aforesaid, should now be called out to do his duty in the defence of his country, and in driving back the invaders now within the limits of the Confederacy:

Now, therefore, I, Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederate States of America, do, by virtue of the powers vested in me as aforesaid, call out and place in the military service of the Confederate States all white men residents

of said States, between the ages of eighteen and forty-five years, not legally exempted from military service; and I do hereby order and direct that all persons subject to this call, and not now in the military service, do, upon being enrolled, forthwith repair to the conscript camps established in the respective States of which they may be residents, under pain of being held and punished as deserters in the event of their failure to obey this call, as provided in said laws.

And I do further order and direct that the enrolling officers of the several States procced at once to enroll all persons embraced within the terms of this proclamation, and not heretofore enrolled.

And I do further order that it shall be lawful for any

person embraced within this call to volunteer for service before enrollment, and that persons so volunteering be allowed to select the arm of service and the company which they desire to join, provided such company be deficient in the full number of men allowed by law for its organization.

Given under my hand and the seal of the Confederate States of America, at the City of Richmond, on this 15th day of July, in the year of our Lord 1803. JEFFERSON DAVIS.

By the President: J. P. BENJAMIN, Sec. of State.

ORDERS UNDER THE CONSCRIPTION ACT.

ADJUTANT AND INSPECTOR GENERAL'S OFFICE, RICHMOND, July 20, 1863. General Orders, No. 98.-I. All white malo residents of the Confederate States, between the ages of eighteen and forty-five, not exempted by law, and not already in the service, will be enrolled. Persons liable to enrollment may be enrolled wherever they may be

found.

II. The first paragraph of General Order No. 86, current series, is so amended as to read as follows: companies, battalions and regiments composed of persons not within the age of conscription, (eighteen and forty-five,) will be uccepted as volunteers throughout the Confederacy, under the act of August 21, 1861, (No. 209,) for local defence and special service. Those persons belonging to such organizations, who are of conscript age, and neither exempted by law, nor already in the service, will be discharged, and reported to the bureau of conscription for enrollment.

III. The following regulation will be in addition to those heretofore published in regard to substitutes: Hereafter every person furnishing a substitute, in accordance with existing regulations, shall become liable to, and be immediately enrolled for military duty, upon the loss of the ser

vices of the substitute furnished by him from any cause other than the casualties of war.

By order,

S. COOPER,

Adjutant and Inspector General.

1864, February. The second conscription bill became a law.

The Richmond Sentinel of February 17, 1864, contains a synopsis of what is called the military bill, heretofore forbidden to be printed:

The first section provides that all white men residents of the Confederate States, between the ages of seventeen and fifty, shall be in the military service for the war.

The second section provides that all between eighteen and forty-five, now in service, shall be continued during the war in the same regiments, battalions, and companies to which they belong at the passage of this act, with the organization, officers, &c. provided that companies from one State organized against their consent, expressed at the time, with regrets, &c., from another State, shall have the privilege of being transferred to the same arm in a regiment from their own State, and men can be transferred to a company from their own State.

Section three gives a bounty eight months hence of $100 in rebel bonds.

Section four provides that no person shall be relieved from the operations of this act heretofore discharged for disability, nor shall those who furnished substitutes be exempted, where no disability now exists; but exempts religious persons who have paid an exemption tax.

Section five provides for the enrolling of all white male eighteen, and forty-five and fifty, at such time and under such regulations as the President may prescribe; time allowed east of the Mississippi thirty, and west sixty days; any person failing to enroll without good excuse shall be placed in the field for the war as if he were between eighteen and forty-five. Persons mentioned in this section shall constitute a reserve for State defence and detail duty, and not required to perform service out of the State in which they reside.

residents of the Confederate States between seventeen and

Section seven provides that any person who shall fail to attend at the place of rendezvous appointed by the President, and not excused by him, shall be liable to be placed

in the field service for the war.

Section eight declares that hereafter all positions as

elerks, guards, agents, employees, or laborers on provost, hospital, or ordnance duty, or in the Quartermaster or Commissary Departments, and all similar duties, shall be filled by such persons between the ages of eighteen and forty-five as may be declared by a board of examining surgeons to be unfit for active field service, and when these are exhausted, then from those between seventeen and eighteen, and fortyfive and fiity: provided that the President may detail artisans, mech nics, or persons of scientific skill to perform indispensable duties in the bureaux herein named. The tenth section provides that no person shall be exerapt except the following: ministers, superintendents of deid, dumb, and blind, or insane asylums; one editor to each newspaper, and such employees as he may swear to be indispensable; the Confederate and State public printers, and the journeymen printers necessary to perform the public printing; one apothecary to each drug store, who was and has been continuously doing business as such since October 10, 1502; physicians over 30 years of age of seven years' practice, not including dentists; presidents and teachers of colleges, academies, and schools, who have not less than 30 pupils; superintendents of public hospitals establi-hed by law, and such physicians and nurses as may be indispensable for their efficient management.

One acriculturist on each farm where there is no white male adult not liable to duty employing fifteen able-bodied slaves, between 16 and 50 years of age, upon the following

conditions:

The party exempted shall give bonds to deliver to the Government in the next twelve months, 100 pounds of Laon, or its equivalent in salt pork, at Government selection, and 100 pounds of beef for each such able-bodied slave employel on said farm, at commissioner's rates.

In certain cases this may be commuted in grain or other provisions.

The person shall further bind himself to sell all surplus provisons now on hand, or which he may raise, to the Government, or the families of soldiers, at commissioner's rates, the person to be allowed a credit of 25 per cent, on any amount he may deliver in three months from the pas sage of this act; Provided that no enrollment since Feb. 1, 1554, shall deprive the person enrolled from the benefit of this exemption.

In addition to the above, the Secretary of War is authorized to make such details as the public security re

The officers and employees of railroad companies engaged in military transportation, not beyond one for each mile used in such transportation, and under certain restrictions. Also, exempts mail contractors and carriers.

The eleventh section authorizes the President to detail

either from between 45 and 50 or from the army in the field when necessity requires it, and may, when he thinks revoke such details. Provided, that he shall not

exempt or detail any contractor for furnishing supplies, &c., by reason of such contract, except the head of a department shall certify that such exemption is indispensable; the exemption to cease if the contractor fails to com

ply with his contract.

The twefth section declares that the Board of Surgeons shall not be appointed from the county or district in which they are required to make examinations.

The vote in the House of Respresentatives was-yeas, 41; nays, 31.

GUERRILLAS.

1862, April 21-The President was authorized to commission such officers as he may deem proper, with authority to form bands of partisan rangers, in companies, battalions or regiments, either as infantry or cavalry, to receive the same pay, rations, and quarters, and be subject to the same regulations as other soldiers. For any arms and munitions of war captured from the enemy by any body of partisan rangers, and delivered to any quartermaster at designated place, the rangers shall be paid their full value.*

The following resolution, in relation to parti-, san service, was adopted by the Virginia Legislature, May 17, 1862 :

Whereas, this General Assembly places a high estimate upon the value of the ranger or partisan service in prosecuting the present war to a successful issue, and regards it as perfectly legitimate; and it being understood that a Federal commander on the northern border of Virginia has

intimated his purpose, if such service is not discontinued, to lay waste by fire the portion of our territory at present

under his power.

Resolved by the General Assembly, That in its opinion, the policy of employing such rangers and partisans ought to be carried out energetically, both by the authorities of

this State and of the Confederate States, without the slightest regard to such threats.

By another act, the President was authorized, in addition to the volunteer force authorized under existing laws, to accept the services of volunteers who may offer them, without regard

*1864, February 15-Repealed the above act, but provided for continuing organizations of partisan rangers ucting as regular cavalry and so to continue; and authorizing

the Secretary of War to provide for uniting all bands of partisan rangers with other organizations and bringing them under the general discipline of the provisional army. The act authorizes the Secretary of War, in his discretion, to exempt from its operation such companies as are serving within the lines of the enemy.

In a late cavalry raid by Col. Lowell, towards Upperville, Va., Lieut. Henry E. Alvord, of the Second Massachusetts Cavalry, captured Major Moseby's private papers, and found his commission as major of guerrillas, which is as follows:

CONFEDERATE STATES OF AMERICA, WAR DEPARTMENT, RICHMOND, March 26, 1863. You are hereby informed that the President has conferred upon you the rank of Major of Partisan Rangers, under the act approved April 21, 1862, in the Provisional Army of the Confederate States, to date as such from the 26th of March, 1863. Immediately on receipt thereof please communicato to this Department, to the Adjutant and Inspector General, announcing your acceptance of said appointment. With your letter of acceptance to the Adjutant and Inspector General, you will fill up properly the enclosed oath, and subscribe and swear to it; at the same time state your age, residence, and when appointed, and the State in which you were born. Should you accept, report for duty to General R. E. Lee. JAMES A. SEDDON, Secretary of War.

Major JOHN MOSEBY.

to the place of enlistment, to serve for and during the existing war.

1862, May 27-Maj. Gen. John B. Floyd was authorized by the Legislature of Virginia, to raise ten thousand men, not now in service or liable to draft, for twelve months.

1862, September 27 - The President was authorized to call out and place in the military service for three years, all white men who are residents, between the ages of thirty-five and forty-five, at the time the call may be made, not legally exempt. And such authority shall exist in the President, during the present war, as to all persons who now are, or hereafter may become eighteen years of age, and all persons between eighteen and forty-five, once enrolled, shall serve their full time.

THE TWENTY-NEGRO EXEMPTION LAW.

1862, October 11-Exempted certain classes, described in the repealing law of the next session, as follows:

The dissatisfaction of the people with an act passed by the Confederate Congress, at its last session, by which persons owning a certain number of slaves were exempted from the operation of the conscription law, has led the members at the present session to reconsider their work, and already one branch has passed a bill for the repeal of the obnoxious law. This bill provides as follows:

"The Congress of the Confederate States do enact, That so much of the act approved October 11, 1862, as exempts from miltary service 'one person, either as agent, owner, or overseer, on each plantation on which one white person is required to be kept by the laws or ordinances of any State,

and on which there is no white male adult not liable to military service, and in States having no such law, one person, as agent, owner, or overseer on such plantation of twenty negroes, and on which there is no white male adult not liable to military service; and also the following clause in said act, to wit: 'and furthermore, for additional police of every twenty negroes, on two or more plantations, within five miles of each other, and each having less than twenty negroos, and on which there is no white male adult not liable to military duty, one person, being the oldest of the owners or overseers on such plantations, be and the same are hereby repealed; and the persons so hitherto exempted by said clauses of said act are hereby made subject to military duty in the same manner that they would be had said

clauses never been embraced in said act."

JUDICIAL RULINGS UPON CONSCRIPTION.

The Richmond papers of March. 1864, mention the following decision in reference to the conscription act:

"In the case of J. R. F. Borroughs vs. T. G. Peyton, and L. P. Abrahams vs. the same, the Court of Appeals of Virginia on yesterday rendered a decision. These cases came before the court on habeas corpus, the plaintiffs praying to be discharged from the custody of the conscript officer, on the ground that they had furnished substitutes the one under the State law of February, 1862, the other the Confederate States law.

"The court unanimously rejected the petitions in both cases, and remanded the parties to the military officer. The opinion was delivered by Judge William J. Robertson, and is able and elaborate. It brought under review the constitutionality both of the conscript law and that repealing the exemptions of such conscripts as have furnished substitutes, and it fully sustained the action of Congress in

both instances. The conscript law is a legitimate exercise of the power of Congress to raise armies, which is distinct from and additional to the power to employ the militia of the country. The privilege of putting in substitutes, until recently allowed, was an act of grace and favor to the citi zen, and not a contract in any respect to which the Government was a party.

"Nor would the Government have had a right to make such contract as in this caso is contended for. As an act of grace it was, of course, repealable at the will of Congress. Even if Congress had had the power to make such contract, and had exercised it, yet the conditions necessarily attaching would have rendered the contract repealable if, in the judgment of Congress, the exigencies of the country required it. Congress was the sole judge of a public neces sity of this nature, and the preamble to the law repealing substitutions recognized this."

STATE RIGHTS AND PERSONAL LIBERTY.

The Macon (Georgia) Telegraph gives the points of the first legal decision made in the State of Georgia under the act of the Confederate Congress repealing the substitute law, and compelling those who had furnished substitutes to go into the army. It is the judgment of Judge Lochrane, of the Superior Court for Macon Circuit, and was delivered on the 11th of February, in the case of Dennis Daley and Philip Fitzgerald, and is interesting as showing what are held to be State-rights and personal liberty in the Confederate States. We quote:

"Judge Lochrane held it was not only the right, but the duty of a nation to protect itself, and that any contract or

right flowing out of the operation of law which came in conflict with the preservation of the State, was an unconstitutional act-not obligatory on the law-making power, and within the constitutional power of the Government to repeal.

"That the act allowing substitutes was to be regarded as a contract discharging principals from being called into the service. It was then a contract that the principal should not fight in the defence of the country when it was endangered, and such contract was unauthorized by every principle of constitutional law. If our first Congress had agreed to exempt all men from taxation during the war who paid into the treasury $500, such exemption could have been set aside by any subsequent legislature, when the public safety and self-preservation of the Government

demand it.

"He held that the interest of every citizen was the same as that of the Government of which he formed a part, and the military service rendered by the substituto was just as much rendered to the principal as a citizen of the Government itself-his life, his honor, his property, and his liberty were defended by the act, and the consideration enured to him as a member of the society which composed the Gov ernment.

"Contracts and vested rights must all bend to the exigencies of the Government, of which the legislature was the judge, and any act of the Legislature contravening the public interest may be repealed when the safety of the people becomes the supreme law.

"The vested rights of fathers may be annulled over their minor children, to make them soldiers when the public interests demand it, and the law-making power has so declared.

"All rights, all property, all persons who are citizens of a Government, may be used by the Government in time of war, and it was the duty of courts to sustain the Government in the appropriation of the means exercised rightfully by the Legislature to protect the whole people from subjugation and ruin."

1864, March 22 - The Supreme Court of Georgia are reported as having, to-day, unanimously affirmed the constitutionality of the anti-substitute law.

IN NORTH CAROLINA.

[From Richmond Sentinel, March 8, 1864.]

HABEAS CORPUS WRITS REFUSED.-The Raleigh Confederate states that Judge Battle has lately refused to issue writs of habras corpus in a number of cases when applied for by persons who had placed substitutes in the army, on the ground that the writ was suspended in all such cases by the late act of Congress. It also learns that such is the opinion of Judge Manly. Judges Pearson, Battle, and Manly constitute the Supreme Court of North Carolina, and as two of the three judges sustain the Government in the suspension of the writ of habeas corpus, the final decision of the matter against the substitute men is only a question of time.

Judge Pearson is said to hold the contrary opinion.