Seventh. That the Secretary of the Interior put in force the laws relating to the Interior Department applicable to the geographical limits aforesaid.
In testimony whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.
Done at the city of Washington, this 21st day of June, A.D. 1865, and of the Independence of the United States the eighty-ninth.
By the President: WILLIAM H. SEWARD, _Secretary of State_.
BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.
Whereas by the proclamations of the President of the 19th and 27th of April, 1861, a blockade of certain ports of the United States was set on foot; but
Whereas the reasons for that measure have ceased to exist:
Now, therefore, be it known that I, Andrew Johnson, President of the United States, do hereby declare and proclaim the blockade aforesaid to be rescinded as to all the ports aforesaid, including that of Galveston and other ports west of the Mississippi River, which ports will be open to foreign commerce on the 1st of July next on the terms and conditions set forth in my proclamation of the 22d of May last.
It is to be understood, however, that the blockade thus rescinded was an international measure for the purpose of protecting the sovereign rights of the United States. The greater or less subversion of civil authority in the region to which it applied and the impracticability of at once restoring that in due efficiency may for a season make it advisable to employ the Army and Navy of the United States toward carrying the laws into effect wherever such employment may be necessary.
In testimony whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.
Done at the city of Washington, this 23d day of June, A.D. 1865, and of the Independence of the United States of America the eighty-ninth.
By the President: W. HUNTER, _Acting Secretary of State_.
Whereas it has been the desire of the General Government of the United States to restore unrestricted commercial intercourse between and in the several States as soon as the same could be safely done in view of resistance to the authority of the United States by combinations of armed insurgents; and
Whereas that desire has been shown in my proclamations of the 29th of April, 1865, the 13th of June, 1865, and the 23d of June, 1865; and