existing, and not extend it to the whole military establishment, including the staff, or to confine the reduction to a proportional number of each corps and of each grade in each corps, the object in either instance might have been easily accomplished by a declaration to that effect.  No such declaration was made, nor can such intention be inferred.  We see, on the contrary, that every corps of the Army and staff was to be reorganized, and most of them reduced in officers and men, and that in arranging the officers from the old to the new corps full power was granted to the President to take them from any and every corps of the former establishment and place them in the latter.  In this latter grant of power it is proper to observe that the most comprehensive terms that could be adopted were used, the authority being to cause the arrangement to be made from the officers of the several corps then in the service of the United States, comprising, of course, every corps of the staff, as well as of artillery and infantry, and not from the corps of troops, as in the former act, and without any limitation as to grades.

It merits particular attention that although the object of this latter act was reduction and such its effect on an extensive scale, 5 new offices were created by it—­4 of the grade of colonel for the 4 regiments of artillery and that of Adjutant-General for the Army.  Three of the first mentioned were altogether new, the corps having been newly created, and although 1 officer of that grade as applicable to the corps of light artillery had existed, yet as that regiment was reduced and all its parts reorganized in another form and with other duties, being incorporated into the 4 new regiments, the commander was manifestly displaced and incapable of taking the command of either of the new regiments or any station in them until he should be authorized to do so by a new appointment.  The same remarks are applicable to the office of Adjutant-General to the Army.  It is an office of new creation, differing from that of Adjutant and Inspector General, and likewise from that of adjutant-general to a division, which were severally annulled.  It differs from the first in title, rank, and pay, and from the two latter because they had been created by law each for a division, whereas the new office, being instituted without such special designation, could have relation only to the whole Army.  It was manifest, therefore, that neither of those officers had any right to this new station nor to any other station unless he should be specially appointed to it, the principle of reduction being applicable to every officer in every corps.  It is proper also to observe that the duties of Adjutant-General under the existing arrangement correspond in almost every circumstance with those of the late Adjutant and Inspector General, and not with those of an adjutant-general of a division.

To give effect to this law the President was authorized by the twelfth section to cause the officers, noncommissioned officers, artificers, musicians, and privates of the several corps then in the service of the United States to be arranged in such manner as to form and complete out of the same the force thereby provided for, and to cause the supernumerary officers, noncommissioned officers, artificers, musicians, and privates to be discharged from the service.