And whereas the decree thus recited, by declaring a belligerent blockade unsupported by competent military or naval force, is in violation of the neutral rights of the United States as defined by the law of nations as well as of the treaties existing between the United States of America and the aforesaid United States of Mexico:
Now, therefore, I, Andrew Johnson, President of the United States, do hereby proclaim and declare that the aforesaid decree is held and will be held by the United States to be absolutely null and void as against the Government and citizens of the United States, and that any attempt which shall be made to enforce the same against the Government or the citizens of the United States will be disallowed.
In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.
[SEAL.]
Done at the city of Washington, the 17th day of August, A.D. 1866, and of the Independence of the United States of America the ninety-first.
ANDREW JOHNSON.
By the President:
WILLIAM H. SEWARD,
Secretary of State.
BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.
A PROCLAMATION.
Whereas by proclamations of the 15th and 19th of April, 1861, the President of the United States, in virtue of the power vested in him by the Constitution and the laws, declared that the laws of the United States were opposed and the execution thereof obstructed in the States of South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Florida, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas by combinations too powerful to be suppressed by the ordinary course of judicial proceedings, or by the powers vested in the marshals by law; and