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I have been really, really distracted lately. Basically, it comes down to the executive order the our dear president signed last week(called National Defense Resources Preparedness) that allows for the cabinet members/department heads to take whatever they want from anyone they want whenever they want(Sec. 201). Really. That’s what it says. Well, it also says that the government can require you or I to work for them without compensation(Sec. 502). This is disgusting.
So I was busy ranting about it and posting links to the text on all my social networks when someone mentioned that the US has been under a state of martial law for a long time, since Abraham Lincoln first signed a proclamation back in 1862 to be exact. My first reaction was, “yeah, ok. whatever.” But then, that person gave me a website to check with. Now, this peaked my curiosity. I am not one to take one website, though, and then proclaim it to be true. I need independent verification of things like this. So I did some research.
The first site that I found with any mention of this referred to the original website I was given so that can’t really be counted as independent verification. Here it is anyway.
I kept looking. I found the wikipedia page about martial law…no mention.
I found other proclamations, but had a very hard time locating one that was for the entire United States. The first one I found was for Kentucky.
Finally I stumbled across a site that had the actual text from the proclamation that President Lincoln issued for the entire United States.
Here is the proclamation that President Lincoln signed:
- BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A PROCLAMATION
- Whereas, it has become necessary to call into service not only
volunteers but also portions of the militia of the States by draft in
order to suppress the insurrection existing in the United States, and
disloyal persons are not adequately restrained by the ordinary processes
of law from hindering this measure and from giving aid and comfort in
various ways to the insurrection;
- Now, therefore, be it ordered, first, that during the existing
insurrection and as a necessary measure for suppressing the same, all
Rebels and Insurgents, their aiders and abettors within the United
States, and all persons discouraging volunteer enlistments, resisting
militia drafts, or guilty of any disloyal practice, affording aid and
comfort to Rebels against the authority of United States, shall be
subject to martial law and liable to trial and punishment by Courts
Martial or Military Commission:
Second. That the Writ of Habeas Corpus is suspended in respect to all
persons arrested, or who are now, or hereafter during the rebellion
shall be, imprisoned in any fort, camp, arsenal, military prison, or
other place of confinement by any military authority of by the sentence
of any Court Martial or Military Commission.
- In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand, and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.
- Done at the City of Washington this twenty fourth day of September, in
the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-two, and of
the Independence of the United States the 87th.
- ABRAHAM LINCOLN
By the President:
WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Secretary of State.
This order differs from other orders that President Lincoln signed in that there is no end date or expiration proclamation found within. From everything I can find, there was never any proclamation that lifted martial law. I found one site that claims President Lincoln tried to lift martial law, but that Congress would not agree and so it was never done.
In the Kentucky proclamation there was a specific decree for when martial law would end there:
“the said suspension and establishment of
martial law to continue until this proclamation shall be revoked or
modified, but not beyond the period when the said rebellion shall have
been suppressed or come to an end.”
Okay, it’s not super specific, but it does mention an end.
I am still trying to find when and IF martial law ever ended nationwide. So far, I have come up with nothing.
Is it possible that all of the United States, except perhaps Kentucky, is still under martial law by way of a proclamation by President Lincoln from 1862? Or have I missed something completely?
Copied from my blog.
34 Comments
Great post!
I think this is the pivotal section, where the actual discretion and guidelines for resource appropriation are outlined:
This section also seems relevant to the actual mechanism of decision-making:
This is a most important issue which you have raised, kristen.
Every American citizen should ask and is, by virtue of being an American citizen, entitled to know why this Executive Order was signed and what it, specifically and in precise detail, means and may actually be taken to mean.
It does NOT reflect a broad concern with available resources, it is NOT a resource “inventory”, nor is it even a reflection of actual reality.
What it is, and appears to be … is, simply, a blueprint for a nation at war. And, not a little war, but a very big war, a world war, akin to World War Two.
If this nation, legitimately, faces such a war, or the rationally perceived threat of such a war, then the honorable, proper, and reasonable thing for a President to do is to apprise the citizens of this nation of the actual facts, to engage discussion, and to seek to further reasonable and rational understanding.
Instead we see a “claim” of broad and sweeping powers, a supposedly legal “justification” for, as you have aptly stated, Martial Law.
The silence which has greeted this “announcement” is stunning, even if it is claimed to be but an updating of an earlier Clinton Executive Order, or more honestly, “Doctrine”, it is an assertion of unchecked and unrestrained power, and the current Administration has made NO effort to either elaborate OR explain either the meaning or the context of this most disturbing “announcement”.
I thank you for placing it before our consideration, kristen, and hope that this diary might be front paged. It’s topic and concern deserve no less.
Recommended to the very serious attention, concern, and discussion of everyone at FDL.
DW
I thought this too, initially, David. The executive order repeatedly mentions ‘peace time’, though. This is what concerns me.
What the way things have been heading over the last 10 years, how far are we really from the Department of Agriculture saying “Monstanto needs more acreage. Hey you there, Farmer, give me 80 acres.”, or from the Department of Education saying “you there, Reader, give me your books. I think we need those”.
Many of the laws we’ve seen in the last 11 years have been disguised as being beneficial to us, whether to protect us, give us additional freedoms, give us healthcare, more disposable income, etc. But all of them, down to the smallest bill, has in some way actually served to screw us.
I can’t help but think this order will end up being used against us, to transfer wealth or to stifle dissent.
“The silence which has greeted this “announcement” is stunning”
My inner optimist hopes that this silence is because no one quite knows what to say. That it’s shock. My inner realist, who is coming out more and more everyday, fears that the silence is indicative of a lack of concern. Or even a lack of knowledge. People are simply not as involved as they used to be. I mean, sure we and many others have our eyes open, but unfortunately our numbers don’t make up enough of the population yet.
My hope is that our continued discussion with each other and other people will bring about a long overdue return of the people to American politics.
I consider that your well stated concerns, Kris, illuminate the darkness surrounding this “announcement”, and further, that it is, first, to be taken as an announcement of “intent” as regards the rest of the world’s resources and a veiled “suggestion” of “our” primary claim upon those resources. However, its deeper import and actual intended “application” is, I surmise, contained in your last chilling and very significant sentence …
The ONLY “plan” that the “astute” elite, and the political class, which includes the media, actually possess and firmly rely upon, is the merciless application of brute and awful power … and the American people, the human beings who live “here”, in the intentionally named “Homeland” are never to forget, for a moment, that obvious lesson, that evermore clear “fact” … and this Executive Order, as well as other congruent and already existing Executive Orders “allowing” the incarceration and internment of the populace … under “conditions” and “circumstances” to be “determined” at the sole “discretion” of the Executive, must be made public and challenged at every opportunity and in every venue possible.
That such “laws” are on the “books” is an insult and an affront to reason, to justice, to the Rule of Law, and to humanity everywhere and every when.
DW
Finally! They have an answer for “What if we had a war and nobody came.”
Comrade Bartoo, JC already tried to declare the moral equivalent of war. Not enough money in that.
So we get the immoral equivalent of society instead.
We have met the enemy and he is us.
Your inner optimist and your inner pessimist are both correct, kristen, as their relative “positions” or perceptions are not mutually exclusive. “The people” do not know and, because they do not know, they cannot realize just how concerned they should be.
As I said above, the media are, now, an integral part, quite by monied intent and design, of the political and ruling classes.
We are in grave need of a Thomas Paine, who might encourage “Common Sense” and an understanding of what we all face, not enemies, “foreign” now, but ruthless and powerful enemies “domestic” …
What the citizenry face is not merely the oppression this Executive Order codifies, but individuals who are engaged in “high crimes and misdemeanors” as well as treason … as it is said, “most foul”.
At this time, our time, it is not merely “facts” which “the people” are in great need of, it is also narratives which explain what has happened for many decades, since, in my opinion, before the beginning of WW II, when it was “decided”, in “certain circles”, and among specific business, military, and “intellectual” … “interests”, that America would dominate and control the world, primarily to the direct “benefit” of those elite “interests”.
Frankly, most Americans have not the slightest or even most vague of understandings of what has been done, in the NAME of the American people, in your name and mine, all over this world since the end of WW II, to people and to nations, to societies who NEVER, ever, presented the slightest of threats to “the people” , but only stood in the way of those … “certain” … “interests” …
For “the people” to fully grasp the implications of this Executive Order, and the full impact of it’s actual “meaning”, this whole sordid and violent history must be, somehow, made available to them. Artists and writers, singers of song, all of those who have voices and the ability of expression shall have to consider not their own “fame”, not their own financial well-being, but the value and worth of their capacity to affect and reach other human beings.
The “Great Educational Outreach”, as I have long termed it, needs all of the help and support it may possibly get, and I thank you, kristen for understanding and manifesting that truth, in your words and in your life.
Namaste
DW
I have several reflections on this topic Kristen , which I thank you for raising here .
Firstly , I like you , came across this on a social network and because I was busy re posted it and only returned later to view it’s effect on my network of friends . Many took it at face value , as I had after only skim reading it,because another two friends I trusted have posted links .
I was then greeted by refutations from a few of my more partisan democratic friends and links to snopes analysis, which seemed fairly reasonable .
Then I saw a post on this executive order from the Huffpo which lent it a bit more credibility . I came across Clinton’s previous order , which the latest from Obama is supposed to be an update to and compared the two as best I could as a layman .I noticed that the phrase in peacetime , which seemed to trouble some of the other bloggers was also in the order from the Clinton administrations and decided that they essentially said the same thing , outside revisions to make room for a new dept , homeland security .
I disagree with the “silence is appalling” analysis . From what I could see by the number of shares this story received on facebook in such a short time after it’s release, largely as a result of the previous NDAA and the administrations abysmal record on civil liberties, it looked as though it could go viral in record time .
I now wonder whether this is a calculated release of a routine procedure to work the blogosphere up into a half informed frenzy so as to embarrassment those, such as ourselves , who have been concerned about the loss of basic constitutional rights and thereby diffuse the heavy criticism of the administration before the elections.
The other possibility is that it is meant to further whip up distrust by posting what seems ( and is ) at face value very unconstitutional concepts already enshrined in American politics to make it seem new under Obama to help the republicans in November .
Ah, comrade Bartoo, this era’s CCC, were it even a glimmer, would not support such educational outreach.
There was no question that “America would dominate and control the world.” If not us, who?
We are a nation of compradors and words on some goddamned piece of paper will not save us.
You are correct, Ludwig, words on a piece of paper will not save us.
We shall have to save ourselves.
If one thing is “ever thus”, then it is that truth.
What gives me actual hope, is … you, Ludwig, and kristen, and kris, you who are younger, and care, you who have words that convince and enlighten, words and passions that all of you share.
I add, proudly, I confess, my four daughters to that cohort of compassionate, talented, and articulate souls …
When,’tis my time to shuffle off, I have the honest conviction and certain knowledge that the world and the beings which and whom I care about … are in the very best, and most capable hands that I know.
However long it may take, humanity shall prevail.
DW
Great post! Recommended. Thanks for doing the research. Now to read the comments.
So I haven’t read the links yet, but what I get from the body of this post is that our government has been at war with insurrectionists since the time of the civil war. Sadly, our government sees you and me as potential insurrectionists today. Just sayin’
Hundreds of people in this country have been jailed simply for stating opinions opposed to wars and for stating opinions in opposition to capitalism. The great socialist leader Eugene Debs spent many years in prison simply for making a speech against World War I. Leaders of the Communist Party USA including Gus Hall and Henry Winston served long prison sentences simply for suggesting people might want to consider the socialist alternative to capitalism. Over the years as the FBI created MILLIONS of “subversive files” on anyone and everyone working for peace, social and economic justice hundreds of thousands of people have been imprisoned for simply expressing their views and opinions.
With the capitalist economy in a free-fall collapse with no end in sight it is common sense people will begin to demand the real change they were promised. Obama and the Democrats have shown they are every bit as nasty as the Republicans.
It was none other than “Mr. Liberal” himself, Hubert H. Humphrey who had to go one better than Republican Joe McCarthy. And Humphrey authored the anti-democratic and fascist “Communist Control Act.”
Anyone working for peace, social and economic justice, for worker’s rights, civil rights and human rights who thinks this most reactionary piece of legislation won’t be used against them better consider the real history of this great bastion of democracy when it comes to trampling on our most basic and fundamental rights which are supposed to be protected by the United States Constitution and Bill of Rights.
I am wondering what will be Obama’s final step which causes the last liberal, progressive and leftists to stop supporting this reactionary creeps re-election— possibly when they are in a jail cell?
Maybe stifling dissent . . . but I wonder about how much ‘wealth’ is left to transfer up to the powers who understand that enough is never enough.
The myth of our “American freedoms”are so ingrain in us, that to acknowledge the myth is a kin to questioning ones very own religion/belief system.
“Nationalism is an infantile disease. It is the measles of mankind.” -Albert Einstein
“A nation is a society united by a delusion about its ancestry and by common hatred of its neighbours.”-William Ralph Inge
The childish fantasies that make up the American myth are thrown in the faces of Native Americans every Thanksgiving holiday. The tragedy of Trayvon Martin is not anything new in America, just the most recent. People with fascists worldviews are misogynistic.
Whether we as a nation are currently under martial law by edict is irrelevant when the actions of the government have proven this to be already true. Protesting is this country is tolerated to a limit and once the threshold is crossed, force is applied. American history is littered with incidents of U.S. armed forces/police suppressing insurrection. But so many, believe that that doesn’t happen here.
What is curious about economic depressions is that as conditions worsen and more middle class and in particular persons who once benefited from so called “white privelage” are dropped into crushing poverty, that is when they realize that the cause and struggle of the minorities is actually their cause as well. OWS 99%vs the 1%.
“We are Americans but we are also citizens of the world.”
Nationalism and patriotism are control mechanisms of the mind and skews the thinking of many individuals; religion is another. The majority of the world is controlled by these mechanisms and it is what allows those with power to make humans kill each other.
The mere happenstance of one’s birth locks most humans into their belief systems to include what country they will die for.
The lack of this fundamental awareness and denial of our mutual humanity is what turns a human to a soldier. Soldier to murderer is only a few degrees of separation and the demarcation line between the two is defined by the same sociopaths who send others to do their killing.
Americans like many citizens of the world have a long way to go before they can break these bonds. Rational thought free of these control mechanisms requires effort which inevitably means a true examination of what they have been taught since childhood.
excellent summary and incisive connection of the dots. I wholeheartedly agree with how you framed all of it.
I agree, but as I was telling someone(not here) earlier, this is the reason that the government can legally do what it’s been doing. The proclamation of martial law negates a lot(if not all) of the Constitution.
Learning/researching this, and seeing where it may have all started, has only shown me that we need to fight harder for the freedoms we grew up thinking we had.
I want a country I CAN be proud of. One that is not based on hatred of others and greed for money and power. I want a country where LOVE and CARING and DECENCY are the central themes.
Caps are not yelling…lol Just read that over and it seems a bit harsh. Just my way of emphasizing. =)
Thanks
Some things do … need to be writ large.
On with ye, kristen!!!
;~DW
It would seem that we both want the same thing. It begins with awareness then action.
Therefore I hold that:
The OWS/environmental/peace movement needs to recognize that it has a messaging problem. The message itself very good, but to convey the importance of that message across gender and ethnic lines will be instrumental in creating a much larger and wider based movement. At some point the movement will need to be able to talk to the minority kid growing up in a downtown ghetto and explain to him why environmental and political conscientiousness and attitudes of peace is the most important thing for himself and the whole world. If the wars ended and the world adopted a system that works within our environmental support system we could then use our resources for making life better for all humans on the planet not just a select few. Eventually this message will have to be spread on a global basis.
The OWS movement can endure once it ties awareness to action. Protest marches and encampments raise awareness, creating a directed movement of millions of citizens, to include the sheeple, signing on to rescind the Patriot Act is action. Or a directed mass movement to end Citizens United and have publicly financed elections could be another singularly directed action. Even if these directed petitions to our government leaders fails, it further demonstrates how unresponsive our government is and how far down the rabbit hole we are and in the process wake up more fellow citizens.
It all begins with an actual representative democracy to bring change. Government, like art, reflect the views of the society and it is the physical representation of what we as a society of humans deem important.
The conscious resort; yes, Virginia, the chickens have come home to roost.
Occupy The Hood.
Compare Obama’s executive order to the 1994 executive order by Clinton. Seems that the only difference is that Obama extends delegation of control to systems “whether physical or cyber”.
See if you can find any other differences. Obama’s order supersedes Clinton’s order.
And the governing authority legislation that Harry Truman put in place before the Korean War, the labor section invalidated by the Supreme Court.
Thanks, its a start. “The journey of a thousand miles begin with a single step.”
Getting from Occupy Wall Street movements to representative democracy will take a long time. And runs counter to the operating philosophy of a number of people active in the movement.
In a lot of locations, Occupy organizers are doing more than organizing and networking protests. For example, Occupy Philly is doing some demonstration urban agriculture projects.
That’s what I was wondering. Thanks Tarheel Dem. I was posting what I thought (IMHO) were the pivotal trigger clauses, and I saw that it superceded some older Orders but not others, and some partially. Thanks for actually digging in to read those. I stopped there and hadn’t done the rest of it.
So, what are your thoughts in light of what you found? To me it seems we should either 1)level an equal amount of angst and frusration to Clinton, Truman and Lincoln as we do at Obama or 2)We should not be so mad since this is old hat…
I am trending towards the former, if only because I am not “anti-Obama.” I am anti-establishment. I voted for Obama, and I am just disappointed that he has been so easily rolled. I feel like I’m watching Michael talking to Fredo over cocktails in Havana when I see Obama talking about new things his administration is doing. He intends one thing, but the people around him have a plot in motion to intend quite a different outcome. And we can see it, but being so close to it, he is blinded by it.
I just wish the fishing trip would get here so that Candidate Obama can finally materialize and be the President he promised he would be!
My sense is that it is just a routine update to an executive delegation plan in time of some sort of national defense emergency just to keep the legal eagles happy about delegations of authority. I suspect this sort of executive order was what was invoked on 9/11.
There is the real potential for martial law in the US, but as I said in a previous comment elsewhere on FDL, LBJ invoked martial law in certain cities after the assassination of Martin Luther King in 1968 and sent the 82nd Airborne to DC and Baltimore among other deployments.
The character of the Obama executive order is like what FDR would have issued prior to World War II to permit quick contracting and commandeering necessary materials for defense.
The law that provides authority for this was passed by Congress before Truman entered the Korean War.
That is beside the fact that President Obama has shown a deaf ear to civil liberties.
Local action is key in gathering local support for the movement and is a force multiplier for an overall national movement. Democracy is messy. Time will tell how well this is executed.
I seem to recall reading that in fact, a state of emergency is declared EVERY YEAR, at least since 911, meaning that we have for that reason too been under martial law for a long time now.
one way or another
Those are good arguments if you want to normalize what shouldn’t be normalized, but you know very well that the existence of precedents don’t make something bad good, or something wrong right. You also know that there is a big difference between the absolute and absolutely broad powers claimed by Obama, and a temporally and geographically declared emergency and martial law, as in the case of a riot, however wrong that may be as well. You also know that Obama, following Bush’s lead, has been broadening his claims to power, using declarations like this, while also reducing the kind of emergency under which such claims might apply to the point where there is no meaningful limitation on it. Basically,this means that Obama is saying that any authority outside his own is AT HIS PLEASURE. This is, of course, precisely the essential principle of monarchy. As you also know, Obama has been moving even faster than Bush did to not only make reduction of civil liberties a fact, but to make preparations for actual martial law. On top of all this, Obama has taken this step in the looming shadow of possible global war, possible global depression, growing citizen unrest, etc..
And just think: the initial rationale for this was what to do in the case of all out nuclear war. Now there is hardly any rationale needed. Yet you claim that it’s just business as usual, done with a tin ear. That, to me, comes off as some nicely cooked establishmentarian propaganda.
I saw the executive order as two possibilities. One, it can be used to by Obama to follow the paths of war and desires of Wall Street. The second is my dream come true. If Obama is the socialist that the right claims he is and takes all the resources from people like the Koch brothers and turns America into a Marxist, workers, paradise.