fern) 
 
 
 Ouke University Libraries 
 
 Circular letter 
 
 Conf Pam q#17 
 
CONFEDERATE STATES OF AMERICA, 
 
 I Department of Justice, 
 
 Richmond, October 82, [862. 
 
 CIRCULAR LETTER TO DISTRICT ATTORNEYS, AND TO RECEIVERS UNDER THE 
 
 SEQUESTRATION ACT. 
 
 The Acl of the thirtieth of August, 1861, declares thai certain property "held, 
 owned, possessed, or enjoyed by, or tor any alien enemy, since the 2ls1 day of May one 
 thousand eight hundred and B'xty-onc," is thereby sequestrated, ami that it shall he held 
 lor the lull indemnity of a class of persons therein specified. The Ac vested the property 
 iu the Confederate States, and declared a trust, and you are instructed to proceed in all 
 cases, in which that trust seems to he impaired by subsequent legislation, as if m> such le- 
 gislation ha<l been made. The object is to settle judicially the constitutionality of such 
 subsequent legislat ion, 
 
 Instances wherein the trust seems to be impaired by the amendatory Acl of the loth 
 February, I 862, readily occur : as the seventh section thereof, which gives the property of 
 certain alien enemies to the next of kin. Independently of any trust, the section is a nul- 
 lity. It' the property bo not sequestrated, it remains in the alien enemy : if sequestrated, 
 the title is in the Confederate States, ami the Congress cannot make j;-if'ts nor grant boun- 
 ties. 
 
 The fourth section of the amendatory Act seems also to he violative of the trust, as in 
 contravention of the original Act. it exempts iron sequestration property transferred by an 
 alien enemy to a citizen of the Confederate States, prior to the .'Kith August, 1861 : ami so 
 of the sixth section of the amendatory Act, if it shall appear that it limits the class of 
 persons known as alien enemies, at the time the first Act was approved. Hut these are 
 
 uiven merely as instances, the better to call the whole subject to your careful consideration. 
 
 WADE KEYES, 
 
 Acting Attorney Hi mini. 
 

 
pe«nulife. 
 
 pHS.5