advisable for the objects proposed. Such legislation is recommended as may be necessary to enable the Executive to provide for a commissioner on behalf of the United States. ABRAHAM LINCOLN. To the House of Representatives: WASHINGTON, July 25, 1861. In answer to the resolution of the House of Representatives of the 22d instant, requesting a copy of the correspondence between this Government and foreign powers with reference to maritime rights, I transmit a report from the Secretary of State. ABRAHAM LINCOLN. To the House of Representatives: WASHINGTON, July 25, 1861. In answer to the resolution of the House of Representatives of the 15th instant, requesting a copy of the correspondence between this Government and foreign powers on the subject of the existing insurrection in the United States, I transmit a report from the Secretary of State. ABRAHAM LINCOLN. To the Senate: WASHINGTON, July 27, 1861. In answer to the resolution of the Senate of the 25th instant, relative to the instructions to the ministers of the United States abroad in reference to the rebellion now existing in the southern portion of the Union, I transmit a report from the Secretary of State. To the House of Representatives: ABRAHAM LINCOLN. WASHINGTON, July 27, 1861. In answer to the resolution of the House of Representatives of the 24th instant, asking the grounds, reasons, and evidence upon which the police commissioners of Baltimore were arrested and are now detained as prisoners at Fort McHenry, I have to state that it is judged to be incompatible with the public interest at this time to furnish the information called for by the resolution. ABRAHAM LINCOLN. Hon. H. HAMLIN, President of the Senate. EXECUTIVE OFFICE, July 29, 1861. SIR: I transmit herewith, to be laid before the Senate for its constitutional action thereon, articles of agreement and convention,* with accompanying papers. ABRAHAM LINCOLN. *With confederated tribes of Arapahoe and Cheyenne Indians of the Upper Arkansas River. M P-VOL VT-3 To the Senate of the United States: JULY 30, 1861. In answer to the resolution of the Senate of the 19th instant, requesting information concerning the quasi armistice alluded to in my message of the 4th instant,* I transmit a report from the Secretary of the Navy. ABRAHAM LINCOLN. To the Senate of the United States: JULY 30, 1861. In answer to the resolution of the Senate of the 23d instant, requesting information concerning the imprisonment of Lieutenant John J. Worden [John L. Worden], of the United States Navy, I transmit a report from the Secretary of the Navy. ABRAHAM LINCOLN. To the Senate of the United States: WASHINGTON, August 1, 1861. I submit herewith, for consideration with a view to ratification, a postal treaty between the United States of America and the United Mexican States, concluded by their respective plenipotentiaries on the 31st ultimo. ABRAHAM LINCOLN. To the House of Representatives: WASHINGTON, August 2, 1861. In answer to the resolution of the House of Representatives of yesterday, requesting information regarding the imprisonment of loyal citizens of the United States by the forces now in rebellion against this Government, I transmit a report from the Secretary of State and the copy of a telegraphic dispatch by which it was accompanied. ABRAHAM LINCOLN. To the Senate of the United States: AUGUST 2, 1861. The resolution of your honorable body which is herewith returned has been submitted to the Secretary of the Navy, who has made the report upon it which I have the honor to inclose herewith. I have the honor to add that the same rule stated by the Secretary of the Navy is found in section 5 of the Army Regulations published in 1861. It certainly is competent for Congress to change this rule by law, but it is respectfully suggested that a rule of so long standing and of so extensive application should not be hastily changed, nor by any authority less than the full lawmaking power. * See p. 22. ABRAHAM LINCOLN. The PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. NAVY DEPARTMENT, August 2, 1861. SIR: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of the resolution of the Senate of the 31st ultimo, in relation to the recent nominations of lieutenants of marines, which nominations were directed to “be returned to the President and he be informed that the Senate adhere to the opinion expressed in the resolution passed by them on the 19th of July instant, and that the Senate are of opinion that rank and position in the Army, Navy, or Marine Corps should not be decided by lot, but that, all other things being equal, preference should be given to age." If I understand correctly the resolution of the Senate, it is an expression of opinion on the part of that body against the Army Regulations, which are made applicable to the Marine Corps-regulations that have been in existence almost from the commencement of the Government. In the published edition of Army Regulations when Mr. Calhoun was Secretary of War, section 1, article 3, it is expressly stated that the questions respecting the rank of officers arising from the sameness of dates in commissions of the same grade shall be decided, first, by a reference to the relative rank of the parties in the regular forces (including the United States Marine Corps) at the time the present appointments or promotions were made; second, by reference to former rank therein taken away by derangement or disbandment; third, by reference to former rank therein given up by resignation; fourth, by lottery. And in the last edition of Army Regulations, before me, published in 1857, it is specified in article 2, section 5, that "when commissions are of the same date the rank is to be decided between officers of the same regiment or corps by the order of appointment; between officers of different regiments or corps, first, by rank in actual service when appointed; second, by former rank and service in the Army or Marine Corps; third, by lottery among such as have not been in the military service of the United States." The rule here laid down governed in the appointment of the lieutenants of marines who have been nominated the present session to the Senate. Their order of rank was determined by lottery, agreeably to the published Army Regulations, and applied by those regulations specifically to the Marine Corps. The gentlemen thus appointed in conformity to regulations have been mustered into service and done duty under fire. One of the number has fallen in the rank and place assigned him according to those regulations, and to set them aside and make a new order in conflict with the regulations will, I apprehend, be deemed, if not ex post facto, almost invidious. In this matter the Department has no feeling, but it is desirable that it should be distinctly settled whether hereafter the Army Regulations are to govern in the question of rank in the Marine Corps or whether they are to be set aside by resolution of the Senate. I have the honor to return the papers and subscribe myself, very respectfully, your obedient servant, GIDEON WELLES. EXECUTIVE MANSION, August 5, 1861. To the Senate of the United States: In answer to the resolution of your honorable body of date July 31, 1861, requesting the President to inform the Senate whether the Hon. James H. Lane, a member of that body from Kansas, has been appointed a brigadier-general in the Army of the United States, and, if so, whether he has accepted such appointment, I have the honor to transmit herewi certain papers, numbered 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7, which taken together explain themselves, and which contain all the information I possess upon the questions propounded. It was my intention, as shown by my letter of June 20, 1861, to appoint Hon. James H. Lane, of Kansas, a brigadier-general of United States Volunteers, in anticipation of the act of Congress since passed for raising such volunteers; and I have no further knowledge upon the subject except as derived from the papers herewith inclosed. ABRAHAM LINCOLN. PROCLAMATIONS. BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. A PROCLAMATION. Whereas a joint committee of both Houses of Congress has waited on the President of the United States and requested him to "recommend a day of public humiliation, prayer, and fasting to be observed by the people of the United States with religious solemnities and the offering of fervent supplications to Almighty God for the safety and welfare of these States, His blessings on their arms, and a speedy restoration of peace;" and Whereas it is fit and becoming in all people at all times to acknowledge and revere the supreme government of God, to bow in humble submission to His chastisements, to confess and deplore their sins and transgressions in the full conviction that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and to pray with all fervency and contrition for the pardon of their past offenses and for a blessing upon their present and prospective action; and Whereas when our own beloved country, once, by the blessing of God, united, prosperous, and happy, is now afflicted with faction and civil war, it is peculiarly fit for us to recognize the hand of God in this terrible visitation, and in sorrowful remembrance of our own faults and crimes as a nation and as individuals to humble ourselves before Him and to pray for His mercy-to pray that we may be spared further punishment, though most justly deserved; that our arms may be blessed and made effectual for the reestablishment of law, order, and peace throughout the wide extent of our country; and that the inestimable boon of civil and religious liberty, earned under His guidance and blessing by the labors and sufferings of our fathers, may be restored in all its original excellence: Therefore I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, do appoint the last Thursday in September next as a day of humiliation, prayer, and fasting for all the people of the nation. And I do earnestly recommend to all the people, and especially to all ministers and teachers of religion of all denominations and to all heads of families, to observe and keep that day according to their several creeds and modes of worship in all humility and with all religious solemnity, to the end that the united prayer of the nation may ascend to the Throne of Grace and bring down plentiful blessings upon our country. In testimony whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed, this 12th day of August, [SEAL.] A. D. 1861, and of the Independence of the United States of America the eighty-sixth. By the President: ABRAHAM LINCOLN. WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Secretary of State. BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. A PROCLAMATION. Whereas on the 15th day of April, 1861, the President of the United States, in view of an insurrection against the laws, Constitution, and Government of the United States which had broken out within the States of South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Florida, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas, and in pursuance of the provisions of the act entitled "An act to provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the Union, suppress insurrections, and repel invasions, and to repeal the act now in force for that purpose," approved February 28, 1795, did call forth the militia to suppress said insurrection and to cause the laws of the Union to be duly executed, and the insurgents have failed to disperse by the time directed by the President; and Whereas such insurrection has since broken out, and yet exists, within. the States of Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Arkansas; and Whereas the insurgents in all the said States claim to act under the authority thereof, and such claim is not disclaimed or repudiated by the persons exercising the functions of government in such State or States or in the part or parts thereof in which such combinations exist, nor has such insurrection been suppressed by said States: Now, therefore, I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, in pursuance of an act of Congress approved July 13, 1861, do hereby declare that the inhabitants of the said States of Georgia, South Carolina, Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Alabama, Louisiana, Texas, Arkansas, Mississippi, and Florida (except the inhabitants of that part of the State of Virginia lying west of the Alleghany Mountains and of such other parts of that State and the other States hereinbefore named as may maintain a loyal adhesion to the Union and the Constitution |