for clemency, like all other offenders, and their
application will receive due consideration.

I do further declare and proclaim that the oath presented in the aforesaid
proclamation of the 8th of December, 1863, may be taken and subscribed
before any commissioned officer, civil, military, or naval, in the service
of the United States, or any civil or military officer of a State or
Territory not in insurrection, who, by the laws thereof, may be qualified
for administering oaths.

All officers who receive such oaths are hereby authorized to give
certificates thereof to the persons respectively by whom they are made,
and such officers are hereby required to transmit the original records of
such oaths, at as early a day as may be convenient, to the Department of
State, where they will be deposited, and remain in the archives of the
Government.

The Secretary of State will keep a registry thereof, and will, on
application, in proper cases, issue certificates of such records in the
customary form of official certificates.

In testimony whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of
the United States to be affixed............

A. LINCOLN.

By the President: WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Secretary of State.

TO SECRETARY STANTON.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, March 28, 1864.

HON. SECRETARY OF WAR.

MY DEAR SIR:--The Governor of Kentucky is here, and desires to have the
following points definitely fixed:

First. That the quotas of troops furnished, and to be furnished, by
Kentucky may be adjusted upon the basis as actually reduced by able-bodied
men of hers having gone into the rebel service; and that she be required
to furnish no more than her just quotas upon fair adjustment upon such
basis.

Second. To whatever extent the enlistment and drafting, one or both,
of colored troops may be found necessary within the State, it may be
conducted within the law of Congress; and, so far as practicable, free
from collateral embarrassments, disorders, and provocations.

I think these requests of the Governor are reasonable; and I shall be
obliged if you will give him a full hearing, and do the best you can to
effect these objects.

Yours very truly,

A. LINCOLN.

TO GENERAL G. G. MEADE.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, March 29, 1864.

MAJOR-GENERAL MEADE.

MY DEAR SIR:--Your letter to Colonel Townsend, inclosing a slip from the
"Herald," and asking a court of inquiry, has been laid before me