MARCH 4, 1865.

SPECIAL MESSAGES.

WASHINGTON, D.C., March 8, 1865.

To the Senate of the United States: 

The fourth section of the law of 16th January, 1857, provides that reserved officers may be promoted on the reserved list, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, and under this authority various officers of the Navy have been promoted one grade from time to time.

I therefore nominate Commander John J. Young, now on the reserved list, to be a captain in the Navy on the reserved list from the 12th August, 1854, the date when he was entitled to his regular promotion had he not been overslaughed.  It is due to this officer to state that he was passed over in consequence of physical disability, this disability having occurred in the discharge of his duties; and prior to his misfortune he bore the reputation of an efficient and correct officer, and subsequently has evinced a willingness to perform whatever duties were assigned him.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

WASHINGTON, March 8, 1865.

To the Senate of the United States: 

In answer to the Senate’s resolution of the 6th instant, requesting the return of a certain joint resolution,[16] I transmit a report from the Secretary of State.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

[Footnote 16:  Entitled “Joint resolution in relation to certain railroads.”]

PROCLAMATIONS.

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

A PROCLAMATION.

Whereas the twenty-first section of the act of Congress approved on the 3d instant, entitled “An act to amend the several acts heretofore passed to provide for the enrolling and calling out the national forces and for other purposes,” requires “that, in addition to the other lawful penalties of the crime of desertion from the military or naval service, all persons who have deserted the military or naval service of the United States who shall not return to said service or report themselves to a provost-marshal within sixty days after the proclamation hereinafter mentioned shall be deemed and taken to have voluntarily relinquished and forfeited their rights of citizenship and their rights to become citizens, and such deserters shall be forever incapable of holding any office of trust or profit under the United States or of exercising any rights of citizens thereof; and all persons who shall hereafter desert the military or naval service, and all persons who, being duly enrolled, shall depart the jurisdiction of the district in which he is enrolled or go beyond the limits of the United States with intent to avoid any draft into the military or naval service duly ordered, shall be liable to the penalties of this section.  And the President is hereby authorized and required, forthwith on the passage of