Proclamation of the Act to Suppress Insurrection

July 25, 1862

By the President of the United States of America,

A proclamation

In pursuance of the sixth section of the act of Congress entitled ``An act to suppress insurrection, and to punish treason and rebellion, to seize and confiscate property of rebels, and for other purposes,'' Approved July 17, 1862; and which act, and the Joint Resolution explanatory, thereof, are herewith published; I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, do hereby proclaim to, and warn all persons within the contemplation of said sixth section to cease participating in, aiding, countenancing, or abetting the existing rebellion, or any rebellion, against the government of the United States, and to return to their proper allegiance to the United States, on pain of the forfeitures and seizures, as within, and by said sixth section provided.

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

Done at the City of Washington, this twenty-fifth day of July, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-two, and of the Independence of the United States the eighty seventh.

By the President: ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

WILLIAM. H. SEWARD, Secretary of State.

SOURCE: Roy P. Basler, editor, Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, Vol. 5, p. 341