martial law and to suspend the operation of the writ had expired
by limitation in February, 1863. The Alabama courts were
theoretically in full operation, but while the law was in force
the military authorities had acquired a habit of arbitrary
control. Though warned from Richmond in general orders that they
must not take unto themselves a power vested in the President
alone, they continued their previous course of action. It
thereupon became necessary to issue further general orders
annulling "all proclamations of martial law by general officers
and others" not invested by law with adequate authority.

Neither general orders nor the expiration of the statute,
however, seemed able to put an end to the interference with the
local courts on the part of local commanders. The evil apparently
grew during 1863. A picturesque instance is recorded with extreme
fullness by the Southern Advertiser in the autumn of the year. In
the minutely circumstantial account, we catch glimpses of one
Rhodes moving heaven and earth to prove himself exempt from
military service. After Rhodes is enrolled by the officers of the
local military rendezvous, the sheriff attempts to turn the
tables by arresting the Colonel in command. The soldiers rush to
defend their Colonel, who is ill in bed at a house some distance
away. The judge who had issued the writ is hot with anger at this
military interference in civil affairs. Thereupon the soldiers
seize him, but later, recognizing for some unexplained reason the
majesty of the civil law, they release him. And the hot-tempered
incident closes with the Colonel's determination to carry the
case to the Supreme Court of the State.

The much harassed people of Alabama had still other causes of