Page:A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Confederacy, Including the Diplomatic Correspondence, 1861-1865, Volume I.djvu/574

542 the superintendent of the manufacturing establishments of the Government which supply shoes, harness, wagons, ambulances, &c., for the Army; the employees who have been specially trained in the distribution and subdivision of mail matter among the various routes by which it is to reach its destination, are among the instances that are afforded by the daily experience of executive officers. To withdraw from the public service at once, and without any means of replacing them, the very limited number of experts, believed to be less than 100, who are affected by the bill, is to throw the whole machinery of Government into confusion and disorder, at a period when none who are not engaged in executive duties can have an adequate idea of the difficulties by which they are already embarrassed.

The desire of the Executive and the Secretary of War to obtain for the Army the services of every man available for the public defense can hardly be doubted, and Congress may be assured that nothing but imperative public necessity could induce the exercise of any discretion vested in them to retain men out of the Army. But no Government can be administered without vesting some discretion in executive officers in the application of general rules to classes of the population. Individual exceptions exist to all such rules, in the very nature of things, and these exceptions cannot be provided for by legislation in advance.

I earnestly hope that Congress will pass an amendment to the act now under consideration, in accordance with the foregoing recommendations, so that I may be able by signing both the act and amendment to secure unimpaired benefit from the proposed legislation.

 March 13, 1865.

To the Senate and House of Representatives of the Confederate States.

I have returned with my approval an act entitled "An Act to regulate the business of conscription." There is, however, one section of the act which seems to me to threaten injury to the service unless essentially modified.

The eighth section provides that there shall be in each Congressional district "a medical board composed of three surgeons, who, after due notice of the time and place of their meeting, shall 