Author: S. S. Nicholas

Publisher: Forgotten Books

Published: 2018-01-03

Total Pages: 42

ISBN-13: 9780428239657

Excerpt from A Review of the Argument of President Lincoln and Attorney General Bates, in Favor of Presidential Power to Suspend the Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus The argument endeavors to prove the President's power so to suspend the privilege of the writ, so to order such arrests, and that in so doing he is not controllable by the Judiciary; and perhaps, also, its true meaning is, that he is not controllable by Congress either. In other words, it seems to be con tended, that in the exercise of his executive functions, for the suppression of rebellion, at least, if not for all other purposes, he acts by his own arbitrary discretion, free from the control of Congress and the Judiciary - either, or both. The pretension to this power is not confined, either by argument or the President's acts, to such States or districts as may have been proclaimed to be in insurrection; but the power Operates all over the Union, and may be applied equally to a citizen of and in Maine, as to an inhabitant of a pro claimed State. This is a high pretension, now for the first time asserted in behalf of a President. In the existing state of things, and in view of what has already been done, it is a pretension of the most momentous importance. It places the personal liberty of every man in this nation within his arbitrary disere tion. He may arrest any one, without justifiable cause, transport him where he pleases, incarcerate him during the continuance of this war of probably many years' duration, subjecting him during the while to such deprivation, hardship, and humiliation, as the President may think proper to inflict. For all this the citizen is to have no redress. Against such atrocious, tyrannical outrage the law of his country can afford him no redress. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.