Show NATIONAL v HOW THE OLD SYSTEM GAVE WAY TO volunteers A Ill atory story of the early organization of be 11 the hunk UBI and ille of our 11 ne guard guards laws I awe that made training day days common in livery every part of tle the country A hundred years have passed since congress in the spring of passed lt its farst general maitin law this act remains today on the t lett statute at ule book with all its ancient phraseology and its mandates arc are impossible to execute still nominally in force Is its injunction upon any able bodied male citizen between eighteen and forty five y years ars of age enrolled by his captain to keep himself provided with a good musket or of a bore sufficient for balls of the eighteenth part of a pound two papare hints flints and twenty four cartridges or else with a good rifles rifle shot bot pouch powder horn twenty bulls balls and a quarter of a pound of powder the quaint instruction instructions for grenadiers grena diers and bombardiere bombardiers bombar diers are still to be perused and also the directions to officers to provide themselves with a sword or hanger banger and or if it mounted to have their hol bol baers covered with bearskin caps from time to time efforts havo have been made to remove this venerable chapter from the statute books or at least to modernize it until BOW at last it seems to derive a sort of protection from its age hut but the fact is that the law was never curried carried out no sooner was it enacted than efforts were made to repeal somo some provisions vi ions and amend others under the plan of general general knox which had been drawn up in 1700 young men between eighteen and twenty one years of age were to serve thirty days in ili a camp of instruction during each of the first two years and ten days of the third year citizens between t twenty wenty one and forty five yeara years were to drill tour four days lays annually those between forty five und and sixty were to be enrolled in tha the re erve which was to assemble semiannually for a simple inspection of arms this was it very striking and under the of the tile country at that time not a very onerous system while its serl ausness waa was shown by a provision that no irson per 0 n reaching the age of twenty one should exercise the rights of a citizen unless ho he could show a certificate of the required service in the militia but t the ile ac act t of may 8 1741 widely departed from knobs plan and the very next year after it was put in operation washington asked congress whether your own experience in the several veral states has not detected dome imperfections perfect perfections ious in the scheme the st story 0 ry of tho the way in to which numerous and fruitless attempts to amend thia this system resulted at length in its frank abandonment is instructive tive and interesting two years after its adoption a bill was reported for organizing a select corps of militia to bo be armed and equipped by the general government and to be paid while serving in annual camps of instruction this of course would havo have been a radical departure from the general law which required the citizens to arm and equip themselves and put them all on the samo same footing it is not unlikely that had bad this measure pre prevailed it would have been in force to the present day and might have buado ado a vast difference in the history of the country it would in fact have found ed 1 a national militia of an effective character however years passed without securing the modifications desired the chief step gained was tho the enactment of th the e law of april making an ap appropriation of V annually animally to provide provid e arms and equipments for the militia atlan it is noted us as a curious fact by the house committee on militia whose careful history of tha the subject is here briefly summarized that even when this new appropriation hz had been made the old requirement that each citizen should arm and equip himself was not repealed even then the reluctance to remove the old law was manifest jefferson and madison followed washington in urging year after year a modification of the militia system the latter iu in desired such a separation of the more active part from that which is less so that we may draw from it when necessary an all efficient corps corm fit for real and active bervice and to be called to it in regular rota lion tion he ile thought that it was quite enough to subject the population between eighteen and twenty six years of age to m military ili tary duty in time of peace matisons Madi sons most noticeable contribution to the subject was a proposal of annual camps of instruction t for the tile and non cominis hion ed 0 officers me I 1 iu 1 1816 mr secretary s detary graham by the direction tion 1 of congress prepared a new plan it divided ii the militia into three classes cla saes according to ages of which the two younger were to wem assemble ble in annual camps camps of I 1 instruction a iaru st action congressman of ohio afterward president proposed as a substitute military drill for all tho the schools and revived matisons Madi sons plan of annually instructing ting officers and noncommissioned of ficera in camp he ile estimated that tha cost to the government would bo be 15 WOW it year in 1823 1825 a board on which scott and arid zachary taylor were prominent reported tb that at the great detect in the law was the excess of numbers it held to service they suggested as a substitute a brigade of militia iu in each congress district to be instructed in camps for ten day year and paid for their time and expenses the drift toward a select body I 1 instead of A general organization hod bad thus been clearly manifest through all these yeara years yet two additional elements volunteering and state organizations were needed be foro the desired reforms could be becu secured rel jackson recommended the former while secretary poinsett in 1840 made an approach to the latter by a proposal of active militia apportioned among the states B each of which could keep its quota filled either by voluntary enlistment or draft one fourth would go out of service annually into the reserve while the lant could put them luto into camps under pay for a month annually iu in still another plan wa was reported that of maintaining in fach each state un an active militia between twenty one and thirty years of age whose officers should be lie instructed annually in lit camp by the tile general government hut but by that time the new ideas of v volunteers and state organizations had bad no not t only become rooted but had borne fruit such militia lit bodies were springing up all au over the union and in tact fact formed the basis of that body of volunteers who achieved distinction in the mexican war after that war greater interest than ever was taken in the state volunteer system ey steni and its growth put an end to tho tile long series of tib ortive abortive efforts to form ft a national m militia congress practically 1 accepting it as anub a aub t washington cor new york sun |