men, and even by those of our sons and brothers who may suffer in prison because of the stand we take, as well as by our own conscience, in refusing for a moment to permit those black men whom we have made free, uniformed, and armed, and put in our service, when captured, from being treated as slaves.

And I desire, therefore, that this point of difference between the United States Government and the Confederate authorities shall stand out alone as full justification, if not yielded by them, for setting aside the cartel, because of a gross violation of it by the Confederate authorities.

It will be remembered that by the declaration and proclamation of Jefferson Davis of December 23, 1862, all officers commanding colored troops were to be delivered over to the Governors of States, to be punished under their laws for inciting negro insurrections, which is a paraphrase for punishment by ignominious death, and that the colored soldiers so commanded were not to be treated as prisoners of war, but were to be turned over to their masters to hard labor as slaves, and that this was substantially the recommendation of Mr. Davis' message to the Confederate Congress, and that an act was passed substantially in accordance with this recommendation.

Now, while it may be conceded as a usage of civilized warfare that prisoners of war necessarily supported by the capturing government may be employed by that government to labor upon public work, yet it has never been, among nations making professions of Christianity, held that captives of war, either by land or sea, could be made slaves. And it will also be remembered that the United States Government went to war with Tripoli and other Barbary powers in 1804 to force them at the cannon's mouth to repudiate this doctrine. It will be seen that the Confederate commissioner, however, has so far modified his claim that officers in command of colored troops and free negroes, although both may be serving in company with slaves as soldiers in United States, are to be treated as prisoners of war, so that the question of difference between us now is not one of color, because it is admitted now that free black men of the loyal States are to be treated as prisoners of war.

But the claim is that every person of color who ever was a slave in any of the eleven Confederate States shall not be treated as a prisoner of war, but when captured are to be deemed to be slaves, and may be turned over to their masters as such by the Confederate Government.

Now, as the United States Government has, by the proclamation of the President and by the law of Congress, emancipated all slaves that have sought refuge within the lines of the Union Army, and declared that they shall never be returned to their master, and as men heretofore slaves, when duly enrolled in the U. S. Army, must be deemed and taken to be within the Union lines, therefore we have no slaves in our army; and the question is, whether we shall permit the belligerents opposed to us to make slaves of the free men that they capture in our uniform simply because of their color. Because, upon no ground of national law, so far as I am advised, can it be claimed for a moment that to any slave from any State, when found within our lines, any right of property can attach in behalf of his former master; because, treating the slave as property only, his capture by us from a belligerent would give the captor the right of property, the "jus disponendi," and we have exercised that right of disposition by making him free.

3 R - SERIES II, VOL VII