Page:The Reminiscences of Carl Schurz (Volume Three).djvu/157

 generals of his army received the bloody news with utter consternation.

It was, indeed, high time the war should cease, but it did not cease without a by-play much to be regretted. On the 18th of April, General Sherman met General Johnston again, and agreed with him upon a treaty of surrender, intended to embrace all the Confederate armies in the field. Its provisions were astonishing to the last degree. It stipulated—subject to the approval of the President—that the Confederate armies should be “disbanded and conducted to their several State capitals, there to deposit their arms and public property in the State Arsenals”; that the Executive of the United States should “recognize the several State governments on their officers and legislatures taking the oaths prescribed by the Constitution of the United States, and where conflicting State governments had resulted from the war, the legitimacy of all should be submitted to the Supreme Court of the United States”; that “all the Federal Courts should be re-established in the several States, with powers as defined by the Constitution of the United States and of the States respectively”; that “the people and inhabitants of all the States be guaranteed, as far as the Executive can, their political rights and privileges, as well as their rights of person and property as defined by the Constitution of the United States and of the States respectively”; that “the Executive authority of the government of the United States should not disturb any of the people by reason of the late war, so long as they live in peace and quiet, and obey the laws in existence at the place of their residence”; in short, that “war was to cease, and general amnesty be granted on condition that the armies be disbanded, the arms distributed, and peaceful pursuits resumed.”

In an article contributed by General Slocum to the “War