WRITINGS OF SAM HOUSTON, 184-3
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defences. Generals placed in command independent of the gov- ernment, may be beneficial to Texas; but in no other country has it ever been deemed wise to render such officers irresponsible to the head of the government. The constitution declares expressly that the President shall be commander-in-chief of the Army. By this I presume it is meant that all officers shall receive their direction from him through the War Department and that they shall be responsible to him for their conduct- not that he is in person to command the army, but that by the constitutional and legally appointed officers his commands are to be executed. If the country is invaded, is it proper that expresses should resort to the seat of government with intelligence, or should they, passing by the seat of Government, have recourse to the Major General, who might reside upon the Sabine or Red River; or who might, perchance, be absent from the Republic, and all regular military operations be suspended until his action could be had? Or is it more proper that they should report to the Executive the condition of affairs and let him make a requisition through the Secretary of War upon the proper officers calling for the quota of troops proportionate to the emergency, or, if necessary order- ing out the militia en masse? Heretofore this has been the con- dition of the country. The suffering citizens have appealed to the Executive, when he could only reply that Congress by a constitu- tional majority had deprived him of the power of giving them the means of protection and defence and that they must go to the Major General to whom Congress had given the money and the men. Thus was the President deprived of his authority to be useful. But the people not comprehending fully the truth, nor apprised of the acts of their representatives, denounced the Executive, thus shorn of his rights and deprived of every means, as an enemy to the country. Many of them, even up to the present time, have remained ignorant of the circumstances in which he was placed by the action of Congress. This bill would place him in a similar situation, and make the officer who might be elected Major Gen- eral irresponsible to him; and not only that, but responsible to no power on earth. A provision of the bill requires that the Major General should make reports to the Secretary of War; but at the same time he is not held subject to the orders of the same authority. It is indeed creating a military government, unknown to the constitution and
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