HABEAS CORPUS. 



483 



"I am a citizen of Ohio, and of the United States. I am 

 here within your lines by force, and against my will. I 

 therefore surrender myself to you as a prisoner of war." 



The bearing of Mr. Vallandigham, throughout the 

 whole affair, was modest, sensible, and dignified. 



At the next session of the Supreme Court 

 of the United States an application was made 

 by the Hon. George E. Pugh, counsel for Mr. 

 Vallandigham, for a writ of certiorari to bring 

 up the proceedings of the military commission 

 before which he was tried for review in that 

 court. The motion was subsequently denied, 

 on the ground that no writ of certiorari could 

 be issued by the Supreme Court to a military 

 commission, the court not having jurisdiction 

 over the proceedings of such a body. 



The arrest, trial, and banishment of Mr. Val- 

 landigham, as has been stated, occasioned much 

 discussion both in public assemblies and in the 

 papers of the day. Without an exception 

 among the Democratic newspapers, the whole 

 transaction was denounced as a violation of the 

 rights of free speech, personal liberty, and trial 

 by the constituted tribunals of the country. 

 The papers in the support of the Adminis- 

 tration took different views of the case ; some 

 maintained that the necessities of the case jus- 

 tified the measure, while others deprecated the 

 act of Gen. Burnside and the military commis- 

 sion. The "Evening Post," of New York, 

 says: 



i Nothing can be clearer or more explicit than this; 

 nothing snows a more tender regard for the rights 

 of the citizen, or a stronger determination on the 

 part of the lawgiver to keep the military power sub- 

 ordinate to the civil power. 



Under the provisions of these statutes Vallandig- 

 ham is a prisoner of State, and the Secretary of War 

 is bound to report him as such to the Circuit Judge 

 of the district in which his supposed offences were 

 committed, to be regularly tried by the civil tribunal. 

 There is no escape from the plain demands of the 

 law, even if there were a desire to do so, which we 

 cannot suppose, and we expect to hear in a few days 

 that the culprit has been handed over to the only le- 

 gitimate authorities. 



The Louisville "Journal" thus treats the 

 case : 



It is a great mistake, it is indeed an inexcusable 

 mistake, to suppose that the all but universal feeling, 

 which the arrest and trial of Vallandigham by the 

 military power has awakened, arises in any degree 

 from sympathy with his peculiar views ; on the con- 

 trary, it arises in spite of a decided antipathy to those 

 vie\ys, as is shown conclusively by the fact that the 

 feeling is shared by such Republican champions as 

 the New York "Tribune," the New York "Evening 

 Post," the New York " Commercial Advertiser," the 

 Albany " Statesman," the Boston" Advertiser," the 

 Boston "Traveller," the Springfield "Republican," 

 and, in short, by the ablest and most influential cham- 

 pions of the Republican party, backed, as the New 

 York "EveningPost" avows, by at least three-fourths 

 of the Republican party itself. 



The feeling under notice arises clearly not in con- 

 sequence of Vallandigham' s peculiar views, but in 

 spite of them; it arises in spite of them and in spite 

 of many other things, from an irrepressible sense of 

 the value and sacredness of the rights which have 

 been violated in his person. In other words, it arises 

 from a rooted and solemn conviction of the truth 

 of the principle which the General Assembly of Ken- 



tucky declared a few months ago, as follows: "That 

 the General Assembly of Kentucky declares that 

 the power which has recently been assumed by the 

 President of the United States, whereby under the 

 guise of military necessity, he has proclaimed and 

 extended martial law over the State where war does 

 not exist, and has suspended the writ of habeas cor- 

 pits, is unwarranted by the constitution, and its ten- 

 dency is to subordinate civil to military authority, 

 and to subvert constitutional and free government. 

 This declaration a few weeks afterward was adopt- 

 ed by the Union State Convention of Kentucky, 

 and has since been adopted in like manner by the 

 Democracy of Pennsylvania and of New York. The 

 principle itself formed a conspicuous part of the 

 platform on which the conservatives of the North won 

 their great triumph at the ballot box last fall. It is a 

 principle dear as life to the whole people. It is one 

 they never will surrender one they never can sur- 

 render without ceasing to be freemen. And the all 

 but universal protest against the arrest and trial of 

 Vallandigham by the military power is simply the 

 expression of his vital devotion. 



The peculiar views of Vallandigham have no ne- 

 cessary relation to the question. Such relation as 

 they have but serves to place in yet stronger relief 

 the affecting and inextinguishable devotion of the 

 people to this great principle. "As in the celebrated 

 case of John Wilkes, in the last century," to quote 

 the language of Judge Parker in his letter to the 

 New York meeting, "thousands, many thousands, 

 who differ from the individual, will rally around him 

 in defence of a great principle of constitutional liber- 

 ty." This natural effect is one of the many witness- 

 es that attest the culpable folly of the proceeding, 

 tending, as the proceeding does, speaking hyperboft- 

 cally to turn "a monkey" into a "god," as Dr. 

 Johnson fiercely said of Wilkes. Judge Parker is 

 right. " I earnestly hope," adds this eminent jurist 

 and patriot, "that the national administration will 

 be prompt to repudiate the act, and to forbid all ar- 

 bitrary arrests hereafter in the Northern States. To 

 fail to do so would go far to discourage the efforts 

 now being made to strengthen the arm of the Govern- 

 ment in the suppression of the rebellion." These 

 are words of wisdom and of patriotism. They are 

 the words of one whose loyalty is fervent and un- 

 spotted. We entreat the President to heed them. 

 And because they signalize a mighty truth, and are 

 supported by the bulk of the President's own party 

 as well as by the solid body of the conservative op- 

 position, we cannot doubt that he will heed them. 

 It is impossible that the President can deliberately 

 set at defiance the voice of the whole people thus 

 unequivocally and impressively uttered in behalf of 

 what he must own up to be the right. There is not 

 at present on the face of the globe a monarch who 

 would even dream of defying such monitions as Pres- 

 ident Lincoln is now receiving in this grave matter 

 from the free and loyal people whose Chief Magis- 

 trate he is. Let him at 'once respect these monitions, 

 if he would serve and not freshly imperil his coun- 

 try, to say nothing of his own future renown. 



On the other hand, those holding that it was 

 a necessity to proceed in this manner, say : 



I think you are wrong about Vallandigham. His 

 offence was essentially a military one, in this as- 

 pect, that it demoralized the army, prevented re- 

 cruiting, encouraged desertion, incited men to re- 

 sist the arrest of deserters, and tended to make 

 trouble about the increase of the army by conscrip- 

 tion, by inciting resistance to the execution of that 

 law. These, mind you, are not problematical re- 

 sults of his course, but actual. Specific cases of all 

 of them, except the last, are continually occurring, 

 invariably among men who call themselves demo- 

 crats and swear by Vallandigham. The only reme- 

 dy was by sudden and short stoppage. 



This could not possible be effected by the civil law. 



