Order to Suspend Habeas Corpus, April 27, 1861

You are engaged in suppressing an insurrection against the laws of the United States. If at any point on or in the vicinity of any military line which is now or which shall be used between the city of Philadelphia and the city of Washington you find resistance which renders it necessary to suspend the writ of habeas corpus for the public safety, you personally, or through the officer in command at the point at which resistance occurs, are authorized to suspend that writ. This work is in the public domain in the United States because it is a work of the United States federal government ( see 17 U.S.C. 105 ).