Page:Lincoln's Suspension of Habeas Corpus.djvu/7

 LINCOLN'S SUSPENSION OF HABEAS CORPUS.

INTRODUCTION.

The suspension of the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus by President Lincoln in 1861 gave rise to a considerable mass of pamphlets, periodical articles and more ephemeral writings, and to a large number of legal decisions. In these, considerations of law, history and expediency are marshalled in the main against but to some extent for the claim of the President to suspend under the Constitution. A careful working-over of this material led the writer to the conclusion that the Gordian knot of habeas corpus suspension in the United States is extremely difficult if not impossible to untie. Further investigation led to the belief that a detailed historical exposition of the attitude of Congress toward Lincoln's suspension of the privilege of the writ would not only cast light upon the psychology of Congress in war-time, but might show that the knot was cut while the pamphleteers were still at work.

The only possible federal depositories of the power to suspend are Congress and the President. Until 1861 the view that Congress alone could suspend was generally accepted, or