tain cases virtually
deprives the President of his constitutional functions as Commander in
Chief of the Army, and in the sixth section, which denies to ten States
of this Union their constitutional right to protect themselves in any
emergency by means of their own militia. Those provisions are out of
place in an appropriation act. I am compelled to defeat these necessary
appropriations if I withhold my signature to the act. Pressed by these
considerations, I feel constrained to return the bill with my signature,
but to accompany it with my protest against the sections which I have
indicated.

ANDREW JOHNSON.

VETO MESSAGES.

WASHINGTON, _January 5, 1867_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

I have received and considered a bill entitled "An act to regulate the
elective franchise in the District of Columbia," passed by the Senate
on the 13th of December and by the House of Representatives on the
succeeding day. It was presented for my approval on the 26th ultimo--six
days after the adjournment of Congress--and is now returned with my
objections to the Senate, in which House it originated.

Measures having been introduced at the commencement of the first session
of the present Congress for the extension of the elective franchise to
persons of color in the District of Columbia, steps were taken by the
corporate authorities of Washington and Georgetown to ascertain and make
known the opinion of the people of the two cities upon a subject so
immediately affecting their welfare as a community. The question was
submitted to the people at special elections held in the month of
December, 1865, when the qualified voters of Washington and Georgetown,
with great unanimity of sentiment, expressed themselves opposed to
the contemplated legislation. In Washington, in a vote of 6,556--the
largest, with but two exceptions, ever polled in that city--only
thirty-five ballots were cast for negro suffrage, while in Georgetown,
in an aggregate of 813 votes--a number considerably in excess of the
average vote at the four preceding annual elections--but one was given
in favor of the proposed extension of the elective franchise. As these
elections seem to have been conducted with entire fairness, the result
must be accepted as a truthful expression of the opinion of the people
of the District upon the question which evoked it. Possessing, as an
organized community, the same popular right as the inhabitants of a
State or Ter