WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, April 6, 1921. The following publication entitled "Military Laws of the United States" has been prepared in the office of the Judge Advocate General of the Army and is published for the information and guidance of all concerned. This compilation contains all statutes of the United States now in force directly affecting the War Department and the Military Establishment, including the legislation enacted by the Sixty-sixth Congress, which adjourned March 4, 1921. In addition, there are a few sections which contain provisions falling into one of two classes: (1) Statutes in force on June 4, 1920, impliedly repealed or rendered inoperative by the amendment to the national defense act of that date; (2) statutes, perhaps temporary or obsolete, inserted for the value of the precedent established or as indicative of the kind of treatment given the subject by Congress in the past. In the first class of cases an annotation is added, as a suggestion to the inquirer that the provision is perhaps no longer law, giving the reference to the section or sections which are assumed to have repealed it. In the second class of cases there is usually an annotation pointing out the supposed temporary or obsolete nature of the provision, but no attempt has been made to pass on doubtful implied repeals, this work being merely a compilation and not a codification. Therefore, the inclusion of an act, or part of an act, in this book is not necessarily to be considered as indicative of a conclusion that the same is in force at the present time. Very recent repeals of sections already given a place and number in this book have made it necessary to mark such sections "Vacant.” Each numbered section of this book is a faithful quotation from the statutes. Asterisks are used to show any omissions. The annotations have been taken chiefly from the United States Compiled Statutes, 1916" and "Federal Statutes Annotated," second edition, and opportunity is here taken to acknowledge the courtesy of the publishers of these excellent works in granting permission to make gratuitous use of, and reference to, their notes. These annotations have been brought down to April, 1921, in respect to Federal cases. Attention is invited to the frequent use of bracketed notes, e. g., "[C. S. p. --]," referring the reader for further notes to the specified page of the United States Compiled Statutes. A comprehensive table of statutes is included, so arranged, with reference to citations to sections in this work, that where particular excerpts have been taken from a statute and placed herein according to subject-matter the reader may gather the whole text of the statute used by assembling the numbered sections and placing them in the order given. |