I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, have considered it to be my duty to issue this my proclamation, declaring that an extraordinary occasion requires the Senate of the United States to convene for the transaction of…

The expediency of any legislation upon the subject is submitted for your consideration.

of your military necessities you must judge and execute, but please do so in the spirit and with the purpose above indicated.

while I can not order as within requested, allow me to say that it is my wish for you to relieve the people from all burdens, harassments and oppressions so far as is possible consistently with your military necessities;

the object of the war being to restore and maintain the blessings of peace and good government, I desire you to help, and not hinder, every advance in that direction.

The expediency of any legislation on the subject is submitted for your consideration.

Your having shown me Mr. Davis's letter to you of the 12th instant, you may say to him that I have constantly been, am now, and shall continue ready to receive any agent whom he or any other influential person now resisting the national…

Let nothing which is transpiring change, hinder, or delay your military movements or plans.

Induced by a dispatch from General Grant, I join you at Fort Monroe as soon as I come.

Allow the bearer, F. P. Blair, sr., to pass our lines, go South, and return.

In answer to the resolution of the Senate of the 8th instant, requesting information concerning recent conversations or communications with insurgents under Executive sanction, I transmit a report from the Secretary of State, to whom the…

Say to the gentlemen I will meet them personally at Fortress Monroe as soon as I can get there.

Be pleased to signify this to the respective Houses of Congress.

With deep gratitude to my countrymen for this mark of their confidence; with a distrust of my own ability to perform the duty required under the most favorable circumstances, and now rendered doubly difficult by existing national perils…

He disclaims all right of the Executive to interfere in any way in the matter of canvassing or counting electoral votes.

The pending call is not for three hundred thousand men subject to fair credits, but is for three hundred thousand remaining after all fair credits have been deducted.

The expediency of sanctioning the acceptance of the gift is submitted to your consideration.

By no other result can the six thousand men be obtained from the two States, and, at the same time deal justly and keep faith with both, and we do but confuse ourselves in questioning the process by which the right result is reached.