72 



BLOCKADE. 



The facts set forth in the President's proclama- 

 tion, with the assertion of the right of blockade, 

 amount to a declaration that civil war exists. 



Blockade itself is a belligerent right, and can 

 only legally have place in a state of war ; and 

 the notorious fact that immense armies are in 

 hostile array against each other in the Federal 

 and Confederate States, the latter having or- 

 ganized a Government and elected officers^to 

 administer it, attests the Executive declaration 

 that civil war exists ; which, if it must go on, 

 can only be governed by the laws of war. 



The right to proceed against privateers, under 

 the laws of the United States, as pirates, does 

 not militate with these views. A sovereign 

 nation, engaged in the duty of suppressing an 

 insurrection of its citizens, may, with entire 

 consistency, act in the twofold capacity of sov- 

 ereign and belligerent, according to the several 

 measures resorted to for the accomplishment 

 of its purpose. By inflicting, through its agent 

 the judiciary, the penalty which the law affixes 

 to the capital crimes of treason and piracy, 

 upon those who shall be found guilty of levying 

 war against the nation, or of committing depre- 

 dations upon its commerce, it acts in its capac- 

 ity as a sovereign, and its courts are but enforc- 

 ing its municipal regulations. By instituting a 

 blockade of the ports of its rebellious subjects, 

 and thereby interdicting their commercial in- 

 tercourse with the world, and enforcing this 

 measure by capturing its vessels and cargoes 

 wheresoever found, and by capturing the ves- 

 sels of all nations that shall violate or attempt 

 to violate the blockade imposed, or shall sup- 

 ply or attempt to supply them with any means 

 whatever to enable them to continue their re- 

 bellion, the nation is exercising the right of a 

 belligerent, and its courts, in their adjudications 

 upon the captures made in the enforcement of, 

 this measure, are organized as courts of prize, 

 governed by and administering the law of na- 

 tions. 



The question was also separately raised, 

 whether the public disturbances existing, con- 

 stituted a state of war under the law of nations. 

 In the District Court of New York it was 

 maintained that a state of war did exist, and, 

 under the law of nations, the rights in a war 

 waged by a Government to subdue an insur- 

 rection or revolt of its own citizens or subjects, 

 were the same in regard to neutral Powers as 

 if hostilities were carried on between inde- 

 pendent nations, and applied equally in cap- 

 tures of property for municipal offences or as 

 prizes of war. It is sufficient to establish the 

 legality of the blockade to show that the ports 

 blockaded were under the power and use of the 

 enemies of the United States. So far as their 

 own acts could make them so, the insurgents 

 who held these ports were as alien and foreign 

 to the United States Government as if they had 

 declared themselves citizens and subjects of 

 various South American States. They thus 

 made themselves avowed enemies of the United 

 States, and were waging a war for the dis- 



BOSQUET, P. F. J. 



memberment of the nation and destruction of 

 the Government. No pretension on their part, 

 however, can change the intrinsic nature of 

 things, and transform the residents of particu- 

 lar States into any thing else than citizens and 

 subjects of the United States. As such they 

 were subordinate to its Constitution and laws, 

 in regard to which there were no State lines. 

 State sovereignty was a nonentity. The whole 

 extent of the country was one nation and one 

 Government. The outbreak in the Southern 

 States, therefore, the Judge considered an open 

 and flagrant act of civil war against the United 

 States. " The President possessed full compe- 

 tency, under the Constitution and existing 

 laws, to call into service and employ the land 

 and naval forces of the United States to put 

 down this rebellion, and had rightly the power 

 to establish blockades of ports held by the in- 

 surgent enemies, and enforce those blockades 

 according to the law of nations." 



A question was also raised, whether a citizen 

 of the Confederate States, being also a citizen 

 of the United States, had a right to come into 

 a prize court and make claim to a vessel and 

 cargo, and establish that the vessel was not at- 

 tempting to run the blockade. This was de- 

 nied on the ground, that the object of all hos- 

 tilities was to cripple the resources of the op- 

 posing party, whereas the return of the vessel 

 to the owners in such case would be adding 

 wealth to them, and thereby add to their pow- 

 er to cripple the resources of the Government. 

 (Fou STOKE BLOCKADE, see CHAKLXSTON.) 



BOONE COUET HOUSE. At this little 

 village, the capital of Boone Co., Virginia, on 

 the Little Coal Eiver, 245 miles west of Eich- 

 mond, a skirmish took place on the 1st of Sep- 

 tember, between the Confederate and Federal 

 troops, which resulted in the rout of the former, 

 with a loss of 30 killed, a large number wound- 

 ed, and forty taken prisoners. None of the 

 Federal troops were killed, and but six wound- 

 ed. The village was burned by the United 

 States troops. 



BOSQUET, PIEEEE FEAugois JOSEPH, a mar- 

 shal of France, born at Mont de Marsan, in the 

 department of Landes, France, Nov. 8, 1810, 

 died at Pan, Feb. 4, 1861. Marshal Bosquet was 

 educated at the Polytechnic schools of St. Cyr 

 and Metz, and in 1834 sent as second lieuten- 

 ant in the 10th Eegiment of Artillery to Algeria. 

 In that country he served in twenty campaigns, 

 rising by successive promotions to the rank of 

 general of division. The Zouaves, or chasseur* 

 d'Afrique, that formidable corps which accom- 

 plished so much in the Crimea and in the Ital- 

 ian war, were first organized by him, in part 

 from natives of Algeria, and instructed in a 

 system of tactics which enabled them to cope 

 successfully with the Arab and Berber bands 

 of the mountains of Algeria. He returned to 

 France in 1853. In the Crimean war he was 

 placed in charge of the 2d division of infantry, 

 in the " army of the Orient," and Marshal St. 

 Arnaud testified that his skill decided the bat- 



