In sustaining the arrest of Vallandigham, President Lincoln had acted
not only within his constitutional, but also strictly within his legal,
authority. In the preceding March, Congress had passed an act
legalizing all orders of this character made by the President at any
time during the rebellion, and accorded him full indemnity for all
searches, seizures, and arrests or imprisonments made under his orders.
The act also provided:
"That, during the present rebellion, the President of the United States,
whenever in his judgment the public safety may require it, is authorized
to suspend the privilege of the writ of _habeas corpus_ in any case,
throughout the United States or any part thereof."
About the middle of September, Mr. Lincoln's proclamation formally put
the law in force, to obviate any hindering or delaying the prompt
execution of the draft law.
Though Vallandigham and the Democrats of his type were unable to prevent
or even delay the draft, they yet managed to enlist the sympathies and
secure the adhesion of many uneducated and unthinking men by means of
secret societies, known as "Knights of the Golden Circle," "The Order of
American Knights," "Order of the Star," "Sons of Liberty," and by other
equally high-sounding names, which they adopted and discarded in turn,
as one after the other was discovered and brought into undesired
prominence.
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