Peace Recognized at Last

General Grant has nullified his previous order requiring the army to arrest any citizens accused of a crime that the civil authorities refuse to arrest. The Dispatch is very happy with this decision.

Peace Recognized at Last.--Some time ago General Grant issued an order directing the army to arrest civilians charged with crime if the civil authorities refused to arrest them. He now decides that his order has been nullified. We quote: Headq'rs Armies of United States, Washington, October 17, 1866. Major General P. H. Sheridan, Commanding Department of the Gulf, New Orleans, La.: Sir--Referring to your endorsements upon communications of General J. G. Foster, commanding district of Florida, of date September 18 and 20, relative to the effect of the President's proclamations, &c., I am directed by the general-in-chief to enclose you a copy of the same, and to say that he construes these proclamations as nullifying General Orders No. 3, War Department, Adjutant - General's Office, January 12, and General Orders No. 44, Headquarters of the Army, July 6, 1866. I have the honor to be, very respectfully, your obedient servant, George K. Leet, Assistant Adjutant-General. Commenting upon this, a Radical writes from New Orleans to the Washington Chronicle that "half a dozen murders of late Union soldiers have recently been committed in the parish of Saint Landry. The facts were officially brought to the notice of General Sheridan by Governor Wells, but in consequence of the revoking of the orders above alluded to nothing can be done. There is no longer any protection for Union men in the South, and the sham of continuing martial law is now simply a farce." Good news, truly.

“Peace Recognized at Last,” Reconstructing Virginia, accessed May 28, 2023, https://reconstructingvirginia.richmond.edu/items/show/418.