reporting Federal losses were shut up until their columns promised to be entirely colorless. The Delta, "noted for the virulence of its treason," was seized and became Butler's own organ. The schools were reorganized after the model of Boston; all secession teachers and books were banished. Churches where the clergymen omitted to pray for the president of the United States were promptly closed; numerous arrests were made of those who, to avoid passing under the United States flag hanging over the banquettes, preferred to walk in the middle of the street; and some of the leading citizens were put in close confinement at Ship Island or at Fort Lafayette, New York. Finally, when some of his agents complained that the ladies of New Orleans insisted on playing secession airs on the piano, and even feigned nausea when Federal officers passed by, Butler, acting on his maxim that "the venom of the she-adder is as dangerous as that of the he-adder," issued his notorious Order No. 28.1 This order was condemned in the British House of Peers as without a precedent in the annals of war; but Butler no less strenuously defended it on the ground that it effectually stopped all insults to his soldiers, and that no lady would be guilty of the misdemeanors which the order was intended to punish.

Butler's eulogist, Parton, praises Butler's honesty, his lofty sense of honor, and his splendidly efficient service in the city. His brother, according to Parton, made a fortune in New Orleans, but General Butler himself speculated only for the benefit of the United States government, whose

1The order was as follows:

"Headquarters, Department of Gulf, New Orleans.

66

As officers and soldiers of the United States have been subject to repeated insults from women, calling themselves ladies, of New Orleans, in return for the most scrupulous non-interference and courtesy on our part, it is ordered hereafter, when any female shall by mere gesture or movement, insult, or show contempt for any officers or soldiers of the United States, she shall be regarded and held liable to be treated as a woman about town plying her avocation."

Annual Cyclopaedia, 1862, subject "New Orleans," p. 647.

coffers were enriched by his sagacious seizure of commercial opportunities.1 Denison, however, seems convinced that Butler speculated on his own account and obtained large profits from the sale of salt and other articles to the Confederates.2 The better classes in New Orleans generally condemned him as a petty tyrant, who insulted ladies and gentlemen alike, and who even descended to the appropriation of silver spoons in order to increase his private fortune.3 To them, his forcing the oath of allegiance on men and women alike was an act of oppression, and his general behavior to the inhabitants of the conquered city justified his soubriquet of "Beast Butler." The same view seems to be taken by a northern historian who says: "In one way or another Butler laid here [in New Orleans] the foundation of wealth which subserved his later ambition in politics. Il fitted for conqueror, he posed as avenger." No finer opportunity for the humiliation of rebels was ever vouchsafed to a northern general than was presented by the passage of the so-called confiscation act, and perhaps by none was it more thoroughly appreciated than by General Butler. This act was passed by the Federal Congress against vigorous opposition, and was approved by the president July 12, 1862. After declaring that the property of five classes of rebels-the various classes holding civil or military offices under the Confederate government-should be confiscated, the act goes on further to provide that the property should be seized of all those who "aiding, countenancing, or abetting the Rebellion should not return to their

1 Butler in New Orleans, pp. 408-411.

2 Diary and Correspondence of S. P. Chase, Ann. Rept. Amer. Hist. Assn., 1902, II, 320-327.

The receipt given Butler for a box of silver deposited in the Citizens' Bank is still shown in Memorial Hall, New Orleans. It is related that when Butler left New Orleans, an old negro mammy shouted after him, "Good-bye, honey, you never stole nothing from me!"

By means of the negroes Butler had " a spy in every house, behind every rebel's chair as he sat at table." Parton, Butler in New Orleans, p. 493.

Schouler, History of United States, VI, 259.

• Annual Cyclopaedia, 1862, subject "Congress, U. S.," pp. 349–374.

allegiance in sixty days." As the belligerency of the Southern Confederacy was acknowledged in 1861 by several foreign nations and in many respects by the Federal government itself, the South resented bitterly any action that seemed to regard her as merely a rebellious section of the country.

In fact, before the passage of the confiscation act the feeling between the two sections had been exacerbated by two measures, adopted, one by the Federal and the other by the Confederate Congress. By act of August 3, 1861, the Federal government confiscated all property used in aid of the insurrection and declared that owners should forfeit all claims to slaves whose labor was used in any service against the United States. Crittenden, of Kentucky, opposed this measure, declaring that such a policy would only stimulate the adversary to still more desperate measures. In fact, retaliation followed quickly. Later in the same month the Confederate Congress passed an act declaring that all lands, goods, and credits owned by any alien enemy were sequestrated by the Confederate States, and held as an indemnity for all who should suffer under the Federal confiscation act.2 This retaliatory act, though it could be justified by the rules of international law, was regarded with great bitterness in the North; and, of course, Butler, when he was in com

'Much international law can be quoted against this act; but except in ordinary operations in the field, the United States did not give the "States in rebellion" the benefit of international law. Cox says: "The confiscation acts of the Thirty-seventh Congress, and certain other acts, were in effect bills of attainder as the term is understood in the Constitution. The radicals sought by these acts, to impose pains and penalties on certain classes of the people of the South without previous ascertainment of criminal guilt in the judicial courts. . . . There must first be a criminal conviction as a foundation for confiscation. . . . The utmost extent of their vindictive policy was confined to seizure of property, and to proceeding in rem for its condemnation." Proceedings in rem require no jury. Three Decades, p. 249.

2 Statutes at Large of the Provisional Government of the Confederate States, p. 201.

3 Boyd's Wheaton condemns it, but the annotator is mistaken, it is not condemned by Wheaton himself. The custom is becoming obsolete, but "the right of the sovereign to confiscate debts is precisely the same with the right to confiscate other property." Wheaton, Elements of International Law (Boyd), p. 421.

mand in New Orleans, compelled the payment of all debts due to Northerners.1

It has been maintained that perhaps in no part of the South was the confiscation act so rigidly enforced as in Louisiana.2 Even before the confiscation act of July 17, 1862, was passed by Congress, Butler ventured to sequester the estates of such prominent rebels as Twiggs and Slidell on the ground that they were officers of the Confederate government. He made himself free with such private residences as he needed for his accommodation and that of his staff; and he forced rich merchants in New Orleans, who had contributed to the support of the Confederacy, to contribute a certain percentage of the same amounts to the support of the poor and indigent in the city.

Finally, on September 24, 1862, the sixty days prescribed in the congressional confiscation act having elapsed, Butler issued an order that all persons, male or female, eighteen years and over, must register, with a description of all property owned. This order included "all those who have ever been citizens of the United States and have not renewed their allegiance previously, or who now hold or pretend any

1 Cox says that as early as May 21, 1861, all goods and credits of citizens of the United States were sequestered by the Confederate Congress. Three Decades, p. 247. Debts were not confiscated

May 21; the debtors were authorized to pay them into the Confederate treasury, which was to pay the debts after the war; but August 8, 1861, the Confederate Congress passed an act not simply to suspend payment during the war, but to seize said debts for good. This was held to be unjust.

2 Cox, Three Decades, p. 434. As a clause of the Federal Constitution was interpreted to declare that forfeited property could be held only during the lifetime of the traitor or rebel, many of the Confederates on their return regained their real estate at a fair price from the purchasers.

Parton, Butler in New Orleans, p. 467. The first act of the Federal Congress authorizing the seizure of all property of rebels after sixty days' notice was passed July 17, 1862.

In order to give the inhabitants of New Orleans a visible reminder that the old hero of Chalmette would have condemned their present attitude on secession, Butler sent workmen to Jackson Square and caused to be engraved on the base of the statue the famous toast of Jackson in 1830, "Our Federal Union; it must be preserved."

allegiance or sympathy with the Confederacy." The latter class, on registering, were to receive certificates as claiming to be "enemies of the United States." Any person neglecting to register was to be subject to fine or to imprisonment at hard labor, or to both, and all his or her property confiscated by order, as punishment for such neglect.1 Thus compelled, somewhat less than 40002 registered themselves as enemies, and many of these left the city, while 61,382 took the required oath of allegiance. To force women to take the oath or declare themselves enemies of the United States was regarded as a great outrage. Many persons refused to take any oath at all, but " many took it," says a lady who was present in New Orleans at the time, "contrary to every conviction of honor and right, and were led to embrace the doctrine that a compulsory oath was not binding—the morality of which, to say the least, is somewhat doubtful." An Episcopal minister in the city wrote to Butler requesting him not to enforce the oath, as it was an inducement to perjury, but the commanding general refused to forego the right of insisting on the conscience test. A large amount of property belonging to persons who were absent in the Confederate army and who were thus unable to take or refuse the oath was promptly seized and sold.* Besides his con

'W. L. Robinson was a registered enemy of the United States in 1862, and his house in New Orleans was assigned to Federal officers. He returned in 1865, took the oath, and applied for the return of his furniture. But General Canby refused, because he had no right to take the oath. He needed pardon. Times, October 21. 1865. Judge Seymour says that property of registered enemies was not confiscated because they were mostly young men and had none. This seems to show that, as Miss King says, the property of registered enemies was not confiscated, though Annual Cyclopaedia says, "Furniture, gold, and silver plate. from houses of rich absentees and registered enemies of the United States were confiscated. 1865, subject Louisiana," p. 515. Dr. Mercer, a prominent physician, asked to remain neutral, but Butler said "No," and Mercer registered as an enemy of the United States."

2 Parton, Butler in New Orleans, p. 474.

Marion Southwood, Beauty and Booty, p. 159.

The Rules of War drawn up by Francis Lieber, a distinguished jurist, and issued in 1863, left it to the discretion of the commanding general whether to require an oath of allegiance or not. Though this might still be required in cases of rebellion, for international warfare The Hague Peace Conference of 1899 drew up the fol