abeas corpus_, and the arrest of
traitorous abettors of the rebels.

As to the _Proclamation_--whether it is to be regarded as in its own
proper effect conferring the _legal_ right to freedom, or whether it is
to be taken simply as a notification to the rebels (and to the slaves
also, so far as it should get to their knowledge) of what the President,
in his supreme military capacity, was about to order and enforce, as our
armies might come into contact with the slaves--is a question not
necessary to determine here. But no intelligent man needs be told that
even in a war with a foreign enemy, with honorable belligerents, it is
always a matter lying rightfully in the discretion of the commander of
an invading army to proclaim and secure the emancipation of slaves; and
in a rebellion like this it is the height of absurdity, or of something
much worse than absurdity, to quarrel with the military policy of
depriving the rebels of the services of loyal men forced to dig trenches
and minister supplies to them. What constitutional right have rebels--in
arms for the overthrow of the Constitution--to be exempted from the
operation of the laws of war? Who but a rebel sympathizer would
challenge it for them?

As to the _Confiscation_ acts--it is enough to say that the Constitution
gives Congress power 'to declare the punishment of treason.'
Confiscation of property--as well as forfeiture of life--is a punishment
attached to this great crime in the practice, I believe, of every
Government that has existed. The rebels confiscate all the property of
men in the South loyal to the Union, on which they can lay their hands;
and their practice can be condemned by us only on the ground that the
crime of rebellion makes all their acts in support of it criminal. But
as you have no word of condemnation for the rebellion, so you have none
for their confiscation acts. You would throw the shield of the
Constitution only over the property of rebels. Loyal men, however, are
of opinion that as the hardship of paying the expenses entailed by this
accursed rebellion must fall somewhere, it is but just it should fall as
far as possible on the rebels, rather than on us. If confiscation of
rebel property chance to bear hard on the innocent children of traitors,
it is no more than what constantly chances in time of domestic peace, in
the pecuniary punishment of crimes far less heinous than treason; and
loyal men see no good reason why the hardship should